Modding
4 days ago, Valve and Bethesda announced a paid mods feature on the Steam Workshop. Not 3 hours ago, they reversed their decision and announced that, with immediate effect, the feature will be removed. More details about the announcement can be seen on the Steam workshop announcement as well as on Bethesda’s blog.
For those who have not been in the loop, the idea of paid mods caused the Internet to explode. Just a comment from Valve’s CEO Gabe Newell referring to the number of emails/messages Valve has received,
“yes, I mean pissing off the Internet costs you a million bucks in just a couple of days”
- Gabe Newell, Valve CEO on Reddit
So beware, all you Internet pisser-offers.
Let me start by explaining the situation these past few days with an analogy.
Imagine $restaurant is offering $dish.
$dish is really popular with everyone, so popular that people form communities to share their enjoyment of $dish and recipes for how they can better enjoy it, eg. by bringing and adding their own special ingredients, by using a special spoon, by pairing a certain wine etc.
These recipes have always been shared freely, born out of people’s love for $dish and cooking.
$restaurant knows how popular $dish is and doesn’t mind that people come in bringing their own additions to $dish. In fact, $restaurant purposely took time to present $dish such that people could bring a large variety of additions.
$restaurant also set up $corner in their place for people to showcase these recipes, just like those other communities that have already been set up.
One day, $restaurant decides that it would be a good idea to add a cashier in front of $corner so people who decide to showcase their recipes there can decide to charge for it.
Valve’s rationale for implementing such a feature is more money that this will lead to higher, better quality mods and improve the community as a whole.
“Think of money as information. The community directing money flows works for the same reason that prediction markets crush pundits.”
- Gabe Newell, Valve CEO on Reddit
This is flawed. Ever since Skyrim launched on 11 November 2011, the modding community has operated fine without paid mods. And mods are what kept Skyrim alive for longer than most other games. This might work in a free market situation where money talks. But the modding community is not even a market. It is a bunch of people who are passionate about the same thing, who gather regularly to share that passion, who help those who are new, who create mods because they want to. That’s why it’s called a community.
Of course, I can’t speak for every modder apparently.
“I improved your Skyrim UI for free when I still could, purely because it was something that had do be done. I didn’t even enjoy doing it.”
- schlangster, author of SkyUI on Bethesda forums
But he did start out wanting to make the mod, no one forced him to mod at all.
Let me just make it clear that I do not find having paid mods a bad idea in and of itself. It is up to the author whether or not they want to charge others for their work.
The main problem about bringing money into the equation in such a way as paid mods is copyright issues. Mods depend a lot on other mods and this creates an intricate web of interdependencies. Most modders just require a notice or some form of credits if you want to use their mod as a resource. With money in the way, all sorts of legal issues can arise from using someone else’s resources; think lawsuits.
Another issue is expectations. When the mod is free, users expect nothing. If there is a bug, the most they can do is point it out to the modders and hope that they fix it. With paid mods, there is an expectation for mods to be of a certain quality, and for the modders to support the mod just as professional software developers support their software. It is all well and good if the modder actually intends to do this but what of those who don’t? Will there be some kind of refund policy for that?
With Valve’s timing of this launch though, trying to launch a paid mod feature in a mature, 3 and a half year old modding community, it was honestly not a very smart thing to do. The community has operated on a system of free mods with optional donations for such a long time. The Internet is full of free Skyrim mods, both of crappy quality and of worthy of being a rewrite of the entire game. Once Valve launched the paid mods feature, some dishonest people began uploading free mods which are not theirs and charged money for them. And Valve’s stance was that mod authors have to police their own content. Talk about responsibility.
“Between ours and the community’s policing, I’m confident that the authors will have control over their creations, not someone trying to rip them off.”
- Gabe Newell, Valve CEO on Reddit
Another sticking point of Valve’s implementation of paid mods is that mod authors will only get 25% of sales, and only after the mod has made $100 will the author receive anything. Sure, Bethesda made the game and Valve distributed it, but isn’t 25% too little for what is essentially someone else’s work?
Personally, I have yet to create mods for Skyrim but have, as I mentioned in a previous post, created mods for another game. From the viewpoint of a modder, if my mods could earn me money, all the better, if not, I don’t mind; I’m not going to force anyone to pay for my hobby. No one forced me to spend time picking up 3D modeling, animations, textures and whatnot. I created mods out of my own free will, to enhance mine and others’ enjoyment of the game. My only reward was Internet points. No seriously, my reward was the satisfaction of creating something useful, something that others enjoyed and appreciated. (Also, I did get a few Internet points.)
Just going to end this with a quote I found floating around.
“Don’t ruin your hobby by turning it into your job.”
- The Internet