Paid Modding is gone... or is it?

[rylasasin]

 

And before you say, "but but but Aydoo-sempai that was a game!" Are you saying that Video Games are not Art?

 

 

No, I'd say it was a Non Sequitur because it has nothing to do with your argument let alone mine.

[cornbreadtm]

Regardless on your view of the subject. Paid modding is coming in the future.

 

One question I'd like to ask is, what do you guys think will happen to us?

 

You can't have an organized and funded operation with a guy in the corner pounding his meat.

 

Do you think they will implement non-pornography rules to modding?

 

It makes sense doesn't it? Everything has such rules but modding has been a community based no mans land. CBBE is the fifth highest mod on the Nexus with UNP at 22. It's not like that changes for any other moddable game.

 

They didn't stop you from doing it but it isn't advertized. It's not like Steam went "Skyrim modding! You can put HH tits on your character for 9.99!"

 

Will future Bethesda games have rules against such mods to legitimize the sale of mods as a non-pornographic business venture?

 

Sex sales but I doubt they want actual sex floating around especially since people will be buying mod for their adorable little children.

[guk]

Do you think they will implement non-pornography rules to modding?

http://forums.bethsoft.com/topic/1275960-adultmature-content/

 

 

edit: Somehow showing nipples/genitalia is equal to killing children in Bethesda's eyes. At least that's what i learned from reading that.

 

edit#2: That's maybe why the ongoing paranoia about Steam-DRM-Mods is so severe.

[quin666]

Fuck!!!! Sitting back waiting on some greedy Korean fool release Naver mods.

[Aydoo]

 

 

And before you say, "but but but Aydoo-sempai that was a game!" Are you saying that Video Games are not Art?

 

 

No, I'd say it was a Non Sequitur because it has nothing to do with your argument let alone mine.

 

 

[cornbreadtm]

 

Do you think they will implement non-pornography rules to modding?

http://forums.bethsoft.com/topic/1275960-adultmature-content/

 

 

I'm not talking about that I'm talking about cease and desists being thrown at people who produce them and pornographic mods being a complete no no in general. Pretty much Pornographic mods being treated as harshly as pirating.

[afa]

As for adult mods, personally that is the only horse I have in the race that I would be sad see going away.

In a sense adult mods are probably the "safest" since they aren't likely to feature them in an official channel, so probably won't see sex mods on workshop, I doubt nude character model will get on as well, but I could also see those going up, depends on social climate, but I digress.

The key is it is unlikely that adult mods will get the monetize treatment since for actual money to changes hand it will most likely need to be sanction by Bethesda, and these content can not go onto the workshop or other official means they cook up.

 

Now the question becomes will mods even be allow to exist in a non-sanction (and free) place in the future if it ever comes to that.

[guk]

I'm not talking about that I'm talking about cease and desists being thrown at people who produce them and pornographic mods being a complete no no in general. Pretty much Pornographic mods being treated as harshly as pirating.

AFAIK nobody who cooperates with PayPal can have anything to do with nudity/porn. Or am i confusing that with something else?

[jacques00]

 

 

 

 

And before you say, "but but but Aydoo-sempai that was a game!" Are you saying that Video Games are not Art?

 

 

No, I'd say it was a Non Sequitur because it has nothing to do with your argument let alone mine.

 

 

 

 

Those who are comfortable in their own echo chambers decorated in buzz words should just be ignored--they the bring nothing constructive to the conversation anyway.

 

[Aydoo]

 

 

 

 

 

And before you say, "but but but Aydoo-sempai that was a game!" Are you saying that Video Games are not Art?

 

 

No, I'd say it was a Non Sequitur because it has nothing to do with your argument let alone mine.

 

 

 

 

Those who are comfortable in their own echo chambers decorated in buzz words should just be ignored--they the bring nothing constructive to the conversation anyway.

 

 

Lol. BTW your avatar is a cutie :3 Did you do the art yourself?

[rylasasin]

Those who are comfortable in their own echo chambers decorated in buzz words should just be ignored--they the bring nothing constructive to the conversation anyway.

[Guerilla]

http://www.pcgamer.com/valve-has-removed-paid-mods-functionality-from-steam-workshop/

 

Looks like Valve has heard enough of complaints.

 

Though can anyone else confirm this?

 

 

EDIT: Yep it's moved off steam

 

 

AND kudos to Valve for keeping their word, although they brought this on them.

 

Victory for us all! Well majority of us that is. Somewhere, someplace SkyUI team are facepalming themselves...

 

Forces of mordor will try again, in another and darker place. Don't let your swords to rust.

[Kendo 2]

It seems like a lot of people are in this thread are actually asshurt this was taken down.........cry more

Two entities benefit from paid modding of a Bethesda game; that's Bethesda and whoever distributes it (in this case Valve).

 

I can't wrap my head around the stance that paid modding is good for modding.  Look at who we're dealing with; Gabby Gabe from Valve calling everyone in the modding community 'a bunch of cunts' because this scheme backfired and he didn't get his way.  Then we have Todd Howard whose opinion is 'game companies should ignore what the fans want'.  That's who we're dealing with.

 

And as I've already pointed out in this thread and the previous one, the payout plan is a joke.  Bethesda WILL control paid modding.  If it's going to happen payments for mods will go through them and the 'wages' will ultimately be doled out by them.  At every turn Bethesda will jockey itself into a position to get the lion's share.  Modders who chose to participate will NEVER get a fair shake of the dice.  That's just how it is, or will be.

 

That modders 'deserve' to be paid is a running joke at this point.  I deserve a big tiddied blonde and a candy-apple red 911 Targa but I'm not going to get that unless (1) I work for it and (2) there isn't someone there to cut me off at the knees to prevent me from getting it.  In the case of paid modding that 'someone' is Bethesda.  There is NO WAY they will allow a modder to make profit greater than theirs.

 

What I'm reading in this thread is a lot of utopian BS about how things with paid modding should be but NOT how they really will be.  There is no fucking way Bethesda is going to allow itself to be cut out of the process and they WILL control it, if it happens.

 

Just looking at the tinker toy EULA for the Skyrim CK as it is right now they already have the verbiage in place to designate who is an 'authorized user' of the software, thought it's ambiguous.  One of the key notes is 'authorized users' can only share player-made content with other 'authorized users'.  That is basically a warning against piracy BUT 'authorized users' is styled in lower case and it is not in the definitions of the EULA.  In other words it is an out for Bethesda because it's not defined or styled in legal manner.  They can make it mean whatever they want and it would take a court battle to get them to clarify what 'authorized users' really are.  THAT is how corporations work.

Using that, Bethesda can arbitrarily decide who is an authorized user and who isn't.  Sure, the person who bought the game software will be one, but who else?  Who can you share with?  Is Lover’s Lab an authorized user and can you share with it?  Is Dark0ne’s Nexus?  And what is sharing, since that isn’t defined either.  The most common means of sharing anything these days is uploading to a server.  Is that server an authorized user?

Maybe (just maybe) for the next Bethesda game Valve/Steam is the only authorized user other authorized users can share with?  Follow me?  Bethesda already controls mod distribution, they just haven’t mashed the gas pedal to make it happen.  They had the paid modding scheme worked out in 2012, the same time the Skyrim CK was released.  It was already planned, they just fucked it up by waiting too long and letting the community get established.  I doubt they’ll make that mistake again.

 

The reason I brought this up was to demonstrate who we’ll be dealing with when some people here get their bullshit wish and paid modding becomes a reality.  Bethesda will control it, the modders will be fucked and the downloaders will be fucked because we’re iddy-biddy fish in a great big corporate pond...and there are those here who want this to happen for the sake of the poor needy modders who should be paid for making content that should be free.  And that’s what happens when government/big business sticks it’s nose where it doesn’t belong.

 

@Yami

I wasn't directing this at YOU.  I agree with you.  I just quoted you first and then spun out.  

[Yami X]

Understandable lol.

[guk]

Well, my conclusion for the night is that for once we have something else to troll and flame about than the usual

 

CBBE -versus!-  UNP

 

and other meaningless questions of taste.

Seems like this time there were actual world views and ethics clashing, which is never good for a community that is usually held together by something abstract like virtual pussies and cocks.

[jacques00]

Lol. BTW your avatar is a cutie :3 Did you do the art yourself?

Thanks, and yes.

 

It seems like a lot of people are in this thread are actually asshurt this was taken down.........cry more

Two entities benefit from paid modding of a Bethesda game; that's Bethesda and whoever distributes it (in this case Valve).

 

I can't wrap my head around the stance that paid modding is good for modding.  Look at who we're dealing with; Gabby Gabe from Valve calling everyone in the modding community 'a bunch of cunts' because this scheme backfired and he didn't get his way.  Then we Have Todd Howard whose opinion is 'game companies should ignore what the fans want'.  That's who we're dealing with.

And as I've already pointed out in this thread and the previous one, the payout plan is a joke.  Bethesda WILL control paid modding.  If it's going to happen payments for mods will go through them and the 'wages' will ultimately be doled out by them.  At every turn Bethesda will jockey itself into a position to get the lion's share.  Modders who chose to participate will NEVER get a fair shake of the dice.  That's just how it is, or will be.

 

That modders 'deserve' to be paid is a running joke at this point.  I deserve a big tiddied blonde and a candy-apple red 911 Targa but I'm not going to get that unless (1) I work for it and (2) there isn't someone there to cut me off at the knees to prevent me from getting it.  In the case of paid modding that 'someone' is Bethesda.  There is NO WAY they will allow a modder to make profit greater than theirs.

 

What I'm reading in this thread is a lot of utopian BS about how things with paid modding should be but NOT how they really will be.  There is no fucking way Bethesda is going to allow itself to be cut out of the process and they WILL control it, if it happens.

 

Just looking at the tinker toy EULA for the Skyrim CK as it is right now they already have the verbiage in place to designate who is an 'author user' of the software, thought it's ambiguous.  One of the key notes is 'authorized users' can only share player-made content with other 'authorized users'.  That basically a warning against piracy BUT 'authorized users' is styled in lower case and it is not in the definitions of the EULA.  In other words it is an out for Bethesda because it's not defined or styled in legal manner.  They can make it mean whatever the want and it would take a court battle to get them to clarify what 'authorized users' really are.  THAT is how corporations work.

Using that, Bethesda can arbitrarily decide who is an authorized user and who isn't.  Sure, the person who bought the game software will be one, but who else?  Who can you share with?  Is Lover’s Lab an authorized user and can you share with it?  Is Dark0ne’s Nexus?  And what is sharing, since that isn’t defined either.  The most common means of sharing anything these days is uploading to a server.  Is that server an authorized user?

Maybe (just maybe) for the next Bethesda game Valve/Steam is the only authorized user other authorized users can share with?  Follow me?  Bethesda already controls mod distribution, they just haven’t mashed the gas pedal to make it happen.  They had the paid modding scheme worked out in 2012, the same time the Skyrim CK was released.  It was already planned, they just fucked it up by waiting too long and letting the community get established.  I doubt they’ll make that mistake again.

 

The reason I brought this up was to demonstrate who we’ll be dealing with when some people here get their bullshit wish and paid modding becomes a reality.  Bethesda will control it, the modders will be fucked and the downloaders will be fucked because we’re iddy-biddy fish in a great big corporate pond...and there are those here who want this to happen for the sake of the poor needy modders who should be paid for making content that should be free.  And that’s what happens when government/big business sticks it’s nose where it doesn’t belong.

 

@Yami

I wasn;t directing this at YOU.  I agree with you.  I just quoted you first and then spun out.  

I'm mostly neutral on this subject primarily because of how much of a clusterfuck it is. However, I don't necessarily see it as this being an inherently bad (or a "retarding" factor) in modding. Some people will paint a picture of this being the end-all of all modding in general. While I will agree that this was a horrid marketing debacle on both Bethesda and Valve's part (Todd Howard included), I still think it's something that can be ironed out over time (thanks for the iron, rylasasin!), if it were to follow through--if it fails, then it will collapse due to its own weight, not in a fiery heap under the boots of an angry mob. And for those who wanted to join the pay model, even just to test it out, can you say they all had evil intentions, even if it did not benefit them in the long run?

 

I mean, my stance is "pay mods, so what?" and "if you want to make it better, make it better." What I can't wrap my head around is why we can't have both as an option (once all the legal issue about shared ownership and property rights are sorted out of course). So I'm wondering if by this point that it's not just projected unanimous hate against Valve (that being the joke-of-choice for most gamers)? Like if it was any other company doing this and the modding community heavily disagreed, will it have the same vitriolic behavior or will it be handled in a more civil manner? Will the modding community be more accepting to the fact? How would it necessarily play out, or will it be the same?

 

Just curious if labeling enemies instead of actually attacking the practice was worth it.

 

Edit:

And to say that Valve's Steam Workshop Marketplace is representative of the whole Skyrim modding community, well, don't forget:

http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/

http://www.loverslab.com/topic/26107-sites-to-get-skyrim-mods-other-than-nexus-otnx/

[winny257]

Steam Workshop: Paid Skyrim mods stopped, buyers will receive money back                        

 

sorry in Germam

 

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/Steam-Software-69900/News/Skyrim-Bezahl-Mods-eingestellt-Kaeufer-Geld-zurueck-1157514/

[Aydoo]

Steam Workshop: Paid Skyrim mods stopped, buyers will receive money steam cash back                        

 

sorry in Germam

 

http://www.pcgameshardware.de/Steam-Software-69900/News/Skyrim-Bezahl-Mods-eingestellt-Kaeufer-Geld-zurueck-1157514/

 

Fixed.

[Darkwisdom]

Thank Mithras. I knew from the start that they'd see sense pretty quickly. It probably won't be the last we'll see of steam trying to economise modding though. 

[Kamen Rider Kuuga]

At this point, and it makes me sound like a shithead, I almost cannot blame Valve for taking a cut. After all, they're the one who are hosting the files and serving the downloads. They have server and bandwidth costs to cover, something Bethesda and the modders sure as fuck wouldn't want to cover. But at the standard 30%? That I don't know.

 

Bethesda, however, had no right to take as much as they did; they were not covering any costs at all. It was pure profit for doing nothing outside of making the CK free. If they wanted to make money off of this, then perhaps they should have just charged a fee for the CK... at least it would have been their work that they were being paid for, rather than just taking money off the top of another persons work.

 

As for the modder... there is no easy way to do this. People today think they simply have a right to be given money for something they make. This is a wholly opinion based thing, and for my part I do not agree. I do not think that mods have any inherent value to anybody other than the person who made it. It is up to them to make it have value to somebody else, be it to fill a niche or to simply be of a quality that surpasses others in a field. But at the end of the day, it is up to somebody else to decide if, and what, the mod is worth. Simply tossing a price tag on a mod does not work, because as I said, what you consider to be worth a dollar or ten to me is worth a quarter... or nothing at all.

 

More so, the whole thing on the modders who jumped at this is also up to opinion. Once again, for me it is rather clear; they threw the community under a bus for an attempt at free money, so whatever* they got, they deserved. Modders run out of the community? So be it. Mods dying because nobody wants to trust the people behind them? So be it. I have no sympathy at all for these people. They did it to themselves, and at the end of the day they should suffer the consequences of it all.

 

* With the usual caveats, of course. Nobody deserves death threats, etc.

 

At the end of the day, I don't think any course taken can ever be the best. There are too many opinions, too many directions to be taken. But I do think that locking things away behind a paywall is not the best, especially if they're at the core of modding like SkyUI. It is simply not right to have something so essential to the modding community as a whole to just be pushed behind a paywall. Even if they say that a free version will exist, which in all honesty is a lie. Once Bethesda obtained the rights to it, do you really think they would have let a free version exist? No, they would have the mod author remove the free version, and barring that, they would DMCA anybody who had the free version.

 

That, I think, is the concept nobody who kept talking about free modding wanted to consider. The fact that any free version of a paid mod would have been ultimately taken down to corner the market and force the consumer into paying, especially if it was something as vital as SkyUI.

[LidiaSun]

Update: After discussion with Valve, and listening to our community, paid mods are being removed from Steam Workshop. Even though we had the best intentions, the feedback has been clear – this is not a feature you want. Your support means everything to us, and we hear you.

 

http://www.bethblog.com/2015/04/27/why-were-trying-paid-skyrim-mods-on-steam/

 

 

It might have been more in this and the role which ever one has played. Although it looks like victory day in reality the casualties were big. The community has lost or get in quarrel and dispute with people who didn't deserve it, who have been unfortunately in the wrong timing of the events. A damage on the reliability about all has been altered. So anything that is dividing a community is the worst and the "innocent people" who have fallen in these grey days have suffered.

A testing condition planned long way back on 2012 has revealed that many want to earn in back of others. So the time for rebuilding has started and all of us must do the best to help.

In the name of Talos rebuild Skyrim.

p.s. Read about the origin of Talos http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talos

  :)

[Darkwisdom]

Update: After discussion with Valve, and listening to our community, paid mods are being removed from Steam Workshop. Even though we had the best intentions, the feedback has been clear – this is not a feature you want. Your support means everything to us, and we hear you.

 

http://www.bethblog.com/2015/04/27/why-were-trying-paid-skyrim-mods-on-steam/

 

 

It might have been more in this and the role which ever one has played. Although it looks like victory day in reality the casualties were big. The community has lost or get in quarrel and dispute with people who didn't deserve it, who have been unfortunately in the wrong timing of the events. A damage on the reliability about all has been altered. So anything that is dividing a community is the worst and the "innocent people" who have fallen in these grey days have suffered.

 

A testing condition planned long way back on 2012 has revealed that many want to earn in back of others. So the time for rebuilding has started and all of us must do the best to help.

 

In the name of Talos rebuild Skyrim.

 

p.s. Read about the origin of Talos http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talos

  :)

 

 

 

I thought this was appropriate.

 

 

[aqqh]

 

Steam Workshop: Paid Skyrim mods stopped, buyers will receive money steam cash back       

 

Fixed.

When you were buying those mods you were paying with steam cash.

Then what did you expect?

 

International money transfers are not free you know?

[Buddy Christ]

Sometimes people make bad decisions. Heck, I made so many bad decisions in my life, I should know

But people deserve a second chance if they realize their bad choice and regret it.

 

The Paid Mods are gone, but the community is still tearing itself apart over it. That makes me sad.

We need an "Unoffical Mod Community Patch". We have to pick up the pieces and glue them together again.

 

Many compared all of this to a "war" or "battle".

If anything at all, this was a proxy war. Valve/Beth pitted modder against modder.

We should not let talented modders become casualties of this proxy war.

 

Of course, like with every war, there are collaborators, they should be shunned. But we should make sure, we shun the right people.

And we should embrace those back into the community that got sucked into this by making one bad decision.

 

Let us set a sign that we are a community, not a corporation where someone gets fired for one bad decision.

Let us show that we are better than that.

 

Peace!

 

[Kendo 2]

@jacques

I'm worried about the ramifications of paid modding, how Bethesda will implement it and what they will do with the content uploaded.  They'll have to control everything and are they or Valve really trustworthy at this point?

 

The 25/75 split, Steam Dollars instead of real cash, banning people for multiple refunds even though that doesn't violate any Steam/Valve TOS, Gabby Gabe and his comments, Todd Howard and his well-established contempt for PC gamers, and so on.  That's just from the corporate side and doesn't even consider modders revamping dead mods just for paywall uploads or modders charging for content they didn't make.  None of these entities or individuals are showing any level of competency or morals.  No one should trust them, imo.

 

Something that people might be overlooking is how that Chesko dumb ass got rogered when he asked that the fishing mod be removed from Steam.  'Nope, not gonna.' was their response.  That tells me people who upload paid mods do not retain creative control and are being denied instance of creation rights.  THAT is illegal but the Steam response of 'unless legally compelled to do so' is corporate lingo for 'Fuck you sue me.'  And good luck with that.  That is a bad business model and if it was their response to the FIRST request to have a paid mod removed, what will the future hold?  Valve has already demonstrated they have no moral backbone and they are not going to do the right thing.  They don't work on the honor system like modders do and modders are NOT prepared to deal with that emotionally or financially.  If someone uploads a paid mod that has original meshes and textures that do not rely on a Bethesda platform to work Valve is going to take that and treat it like is an esp made with Bethesda software.  And they'll get away with it.

 

And Valve is using their MineCraft sales model and applying it for Skyrim and we all know by now that did not work.  Valve also has a shit reputation for refunds and we all know that too.  The way they are handling the store front for individual artists will turn the type of modders they're looking for away in droves.  At Renderosity the vendors have control over what they sell and what is or is not available.  Renderosity doesn't determine that.  Like when the Victoria Body was updated to v5 Renderosity did not tell the vendors they couldn't delete outdated v4 content.  Valve/Steam would do just that, like they did to Chesko.

 

I don't see any of this driving modders to be better at what they do.  All I see paid mods doing is driving a wedge and making two factions at odds with one another.  Free modders will not allow paid modders to benefit from their work and paid modders will be greedy (because they've already demonstrated they are) and not allow their content to be used in free mods.  That is what I see happening and the community as a whole will suffer for the sake of Valve and Bethesda's bank statements.  The free and open exchange that drives modding will cease.

 

Once a corporation gets control of something they start changing it and restricting it.  And for paid mods to work on a corpoarte model they'll have to control ALL modding, not just the paid-for content.  They won't know a happy medium because that is not how suits think.  I know because I used to be one.