Thanks to everyone for all of the kind words, endorsements, and logos. I put the fast edit of the "Forever Free" logo up, and it was cool to see people take the idea to use it as an avatar. Hopefully the info. and links helps someone make Skyrim a more enjoyable place. I'll try to update it with any good stuff I find, if you know of anything you think I should add, let me know! Keep on supporting those mod authors, tutorial and review videos, and the Nexus wherever you can! Wow!!! Hotfiles 5/4/2015!!! Thanks everyone!
This whole debacle has really shown how undeserving a lot of people in this community is. There was much talk of greedy mod authors who had the audacity to put a price tag on their work, but not much talk of how utterly disgusting it was to see ungrateful, entitled children fight with teeth and claws to take away paid mods from the very people who had given them so much over the years, all so they wouldn't have to give a penny for someone else's work.
The majority of this community has never made a mod in their entire life, they've only prospered off of the free labor of actual modders, and yet these clueless people think they can speak for the "modding community". If you've never made a mod then I don't consider you a "modder" I don't see you as part of the mod community, and you should not get a say in what modders should and shouldn't do with their work. We might give you our work for free, but don't think for a second that you deserve it.
Mods that carry a lot of weight in the community should really be made unavailable in response to the "free mods" attitude and a message should be sent to Valve and Bethesda that the outcry that got paid mods removed are for the most part not the voice of actual modders.
Except a lot of mod authors were against paid mods as well, including the Creation Kids, Trainwiz, the devs of Skywind, and numerous other big modders. Those who haven't made any mods can still be a part of the community by giving suggestions for modders, beta testing mods, finding bugs and incompatibilities. All of these are essential parts of the community, and can be done without making any mods directly.
I understand how you feel, but even after all that has happened I think we can get something positive. I don't think this is going to be the end of paid mods, but I do hope that whenever the time comes for the second round, Valve and Bethesda will aproach it in a better way, without all that ominous secrecy and that unfair 75-25 cut. I hope this won't start another argument, but I think a lot of us weren't against paid mods in general, but against how the project was implemented. I've never made a mod myself but I've always felt a huge admiration to modders, that's why I think they deserve some compensation, so I like the donate, endorse, and vote options here in the nexus. However, from the very first moment I thought the paid mods project was unfair to the authors that participated in it, and though I do respect them, I do not share Beth and Valve's views of it.
@leirynot Except they weren't, I didn't see any mod author that was actually against paid mods, what they were against was how it was implemented. The revenue split wasn't very fair in most peoples eyes (yet it was a whole lot more than what you'd get from donations), people were against the lack of community involvement and the secrecy leading up to the sudden implementation of paid mods. Most mod authors didn't agree with paid mods in it's current state, but they usually mentioned that they had nothing against mod authors getting paid for their work.
Paid mods could have brought the modding scene to the next level, attracted a lot of new and old talent and lead to some amazing mods, but the majority of loud mouths would rather have modding stay in the comfortable sate of "free stuff" than to see it evolve. Paid mods weren't allowed to stay long enough to prove to be a positive or a negative thing so now we'll never really know.
People contributing to your mod is all well and good, but doesn't happen very often, testing the mod is something most modder have to do themselves so saying community contribution is essential is a bit of a stretch.
@rubenpaca I don't think there is much positive to get out of this, we've seen a lot of ugly faces from people on both sides of the argument and it will definitely turn some people off modding for good.
Except they weren't, I didn't see any mod author that was actually against paid mods, what they were against was how it was implemented.
Just look at the 'mod' "Forever Free", it's a banner mod that this banner mod inspired, for modders who were against paid mods Go see how many modders on the nexus are using it as an avatar or on their mod pages. I see plenty.
Read that quote again, you can be against paid mods on Steam in it's current state and still think that mod authors should be able to monetize their mods. Here is another quote taken from the "Forever Free" page:
There is nothing wrong with an artist choosing to sell their work – only failing to communicate that fact, when the work of other artists relies upon them. This is not about drawing lines in the sand or putting up walls: only leveling the playing field, and keeping things transparent.
What Forever Free is NOT: - A call-to-arms. - A display of protest. - An us-versus-them statement that seeks to demonize those who wish to sell their work.
As for people using it as an avatar, I can barely see any and even fewer mod authors. You're seeing what you want to see. In the future, actually read peoples opinions before you use them to support your own.
Jokerine, the guy who made the "Forever Free" logo for New Vegas? He is a modder, and there are many modders using that logo. How do I know? I click their profile and see if they have any mods. Dead simple.
You can nitpick mod authors all you want, as I've already stated above; the "Forever Free" label doesn't prove a mod author is against the concept of paid mods, all it shows is that they vow to not move their existing mod behind a pay wall and that's it. I refuse to believe that any mod author with respect for their own work and time would be against monetizing it, I refuse to think a mod users with respect for other peoples hard work and effort would be opposed to them receiving compensation for it. All I see are hysterically misguided, self righteous mod users who under the guise of justice used bully tactics to terrorize Valve and Bethesda in order to destroyed a golden opportunity for content creators because they didn't respect them enough to make their own decisions. Now that the "monster" has been torn to pieces by the mob you all conveniently revert back to your humble selves, waving around "Forever Thankful" and singing kumbaya as if to wash your hands clean. You're not thankful, you're greedy and entitled, you've made it crystal clear by crippling content creators because you were afraid they'll take their mods some place better. You think Valve and Bethesda are bad for leaving only 25% of the cut, try looking at your own 0% figure that you fought so hard to maintain, what a considerate and grateful community.
I find it completely wrong to be labeling the community as either a "modder", or "user" as both sect's of this community need to be able to know the basic working's of "mod's" in order to even use them, thus the entire community are "modder's".
While some have a higher skill set to be able to create the new content, "all" other's need to learn something's just to use the content the more skilled create.
Nobody here in this community is "entitled" to anything, and saying people are acting "entitled" only makes one look blind to the entire situation.
We are all modder's in our own right (the better skilled, and everyone else misguidedly labeled as "user's) we should all start working together once again, and move on from this petty squabble.
when debating paid mods separating the mod users from the mod authors is necessary because placing your own mod behind a pay wall is a choice only a mod authors has the right to make. Knowing the very basics of modding shouldn't give your opinion on paid mods much weight and it certainly doesn't give you the right to take the choice away by boycotting the system, and that is exactly what happened and that is why the community are entitled. In the context of paid mods, mod users are not modders because they're not invested and therefore it doesn't concern them, their turn comes when the mod is available for purchase and they can either agree that the mod is worth paying for or they disagree and move on.
If it turned out that no one was buying mods and it wasn't worth it for mod authors then and only then would paid mods really have failed, the system being torched and burned to the ground is not a failure by paid mods it's a failure by the community. An entitled community that think they have a claim on everyone's work for free, regardless of what the creator might think.
I know I'm being very cynical, but someone has to point out the hypocrisy in all this.
Hmm looking at your profile show's that you yourself are what you call a "user"... now, I personally shared none of my view's on this subject until just today when I posted just above here. I have always supported mod creator's, and have helped test, and evaluate several mod's for their creator's. Also I have torn apart many mod's and added to them what I wanted for my personal use. No I have not uploaded any that I have had a hand in changing, nor will I.
The point is almost all of us do this, that make's all of us just as creative as any of the mod creator's.
The "debate" as you call it is over, there (for the moment) are no Beth/Valve paid mod's... it's done, over.
Now this is a file for use by "everyone" to help show more support for the mod creator's, not a debate forum to keep slandering part of the community. Beyond this post I will not reply to your (what you call) "debate".
Yes, a mod author on Nexus is also a mod user, what a keen observation, this totally invalidates what I've said, you really got me. Oh wait it doesn't, I guess you're just not paying attention. If you can't be bothered to read what has already been said and you don't want to start a discussion, then don't comment, pretty easy. Only downside is that you don't get to act like a patronizing idiot and have the last word by declaring the "discussion" as over.
Sorry bud, but paid mods wouldn't work anything like the system now. There's all the copyright issues to begin with, forget collaborations between modders being a common sight. Then there's the fact that a mod is going to have to be updated to work with each new patch of a game (not an issue with skyrim, but it'd be a major issue with new games to come, like an upcoming Fallout maybe hmm? Not to mention, what's a "reasonable" amount of time a mod is to be supported after being put up for sale?) or other mods (would people even be able to get a refund if mod A counteracted with mod B?). If a mod does become abandoned, can people pick up where it left off or cannibalize it into their own mod? What happens to a mod if there IS an unintended/stolen texture from somewhere else, do people get a refund?
I'm sure there's a number of other issues that'd spring up under this system, outside of the crap percentages modders got from their work. If you can't see how this was a major pain in the ass that was averted, I have some timeshares I want to discuss with you.
You're talking about all these issues as if they are insurmountable, most of them would be easily avoided by policing the system and offering a return policy that properly protects the consumer. I want to make it clear that I'm not putting the blame entirely on the community, Valve and Bethesda are mostly to blame. A lot of the issues with paid mods was the result of a very poorly implemented system, the whole PR nightmare might have been avoided if Valve only allowed users to set the minimum price to $0.00 from the start and maybe just maybe they should have given a little heads up before turning the whole modding scene upside down over night. Valve should have introduced the concept of paid mods and collaborated with the community so they would know about these issues beforehand, then paid mods might have had the proper infrastructure or Valve might have even concluded that paid mods wasn't feasible.
Valve's eagerness to always revolutionize and surprise their fans combined with Bethesda's philosophy to not get involved with mods was the perfect recipe for a disaster. This whole affair has made both companies look completely incompetent, they were told by Chesko and other modders involved that it would cause a backlash and that the 25% cut only promoted quantity over quality, they knew and they ignored it. And in the end what did they learn? That paid mods is not something modders want, which I strongly believe is wrong. We want a system that promotes great mods that wouldn't have existed without it, we want a paid mods system that works and actually benefits the community and it's content creators. They made a broken system that crashed and burned before it even left the ground, and they think it's because we don't want it. This all because Valve and Bethesda are completely out of touch and because they're listening to people who are as clueless as they are.
Ashameduser, thank you so much for this effort to bring a positive, community-building spirit out of such a negative, divisive event. I love Forever Free for that reason, but I agree, we need a different "rallying cry" in our capacity as mod users. I really appreciate how you're working to spread a good attitude and educate fellow users. Thanks also to papp263 for the flames version of the logo. I'm proud to use it and try to do my part to spread the gratitude.
It's wonderful to see people mobilizing to show appreciation and respect for the incredible folks who devote their time, talent and energy to making mods. We have them to thank for so many invaluable moments, hours and even years in which we have taken joy in their creations.
People like me who use Mod Organizer can do mod testing for people because we can just make a test profile with only the selected mods installed. And it wont mess with our own saves.
One of the best part about Mod Organizer my test profile. I try to test any mod I like and report stuff but some mods would just take real play through to find the conflicts.
You downloaded a virus that will turn skyrim into hello kitty island adventure!!!!!! Ha ha ha!!!! Thanks for all of your mods Edhildil, great contributions to the community!!
AlexanderJVelicky made a LOD tutorial that really helped me a lot. Kind of advanced but still really useful. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kB2rqH7Ytko
Nice video from the Falskaar guy! So far, all the information on my page is for mod users. I didn't have anything for creation kit or mod creating.Great info. nonetheless, thanks for adding it here and thanks for your mod contributions to the community!!
Thanks, and thank you for your awesome mods, I use many of them on my builds. Great textures, been using the enchanter and alchemy tables forever now! Keep up the great work! Nice link too, TED talks are great!
199 comments
The majority of this community has never made a mod in their entire life, they've only prospered off of the free labor of actual modders, and yet these clueless people think they can speak for the "modding community". If you've never made a mod then I don't consider you a "modder" I don't see you as part of the mod community, and you should not get a say in what modders should and shouldn't do with their work. We might give you our work for free, but don't think for a second that you deserve it.
Mods that carry a lot of weight in the community should really be made unavailable in response to the "free mods" attitude and a message should be sent to Valve and Bethesda that the outcry that got paid mods removed are for the most part not the voice of actual modders.
I hope this won't start another argument, but I think a lot of us weren't against paid mods in general, but against how the project was implemented.
I've never made a mod myself but I've always felt a huge admiration to modders, that's why I think they deserve some compensation, so I like the donate, endorse, and vote options here in the nexus. However, from the very first moment I thought the paid mods project was unfair to the authors that participated in it, and though I do respect them, I do not share Beth and Valve's views of it.
Except they weren't, I didn't see any mod author that was actually against paid mods, what they were against was how it was implemented. The revenue split wasn't very fair in most peoples eyes (yet it was a whole lot more than what you'd get from donations), people were against the lack of community involvement and the secrecy leading up to the sudden implementation of paid mods. Most mod authors didn't agree with paid mods in it's current state, but they usually mentioned that they had nothing against mod authors getting paid for their work.
Paid mods could have brought the modding scene to the next level, attracted a lot of new and old talent and lead to some amazing mods, but the majority of loud mouths would rather have modding stay in the comfortable sate of "free stuff" than to see it evolve. Paid mods weren't allowed to stay long enough to prove to be a positive or a negative thing so now we'll never really know.
People contributing to your mod is all well and good, but doesn't happen very often, testing the mod is something most modder have to do themselves so saying community contribution is essential is a bit of a stretch.
@rubenpaca
I don't think there is much positive to get out of this, we've seen a lot of ugly faces from people on both sides of the argument and it will definitely turn some people off modding for good.
Just look at the 'mod' "Forever Free", it's a banner mod that this banner mod inspired, for modders who were against paid mods
Go see how many modders on the nexus are using it as an avatar or on their mod pages.
I see plenty.
As for people using it as an avatar, I can barely see any and even fewer mod authors. You're seeing what you want to see. In the future, actually read peoples opinions before you use them to support your own.
While some have a higher skill set to be able to create the new content, "all" other's need to learn something's just to use the content the more skilled create.
Nobody here in this community is "entitled" to anything, and saying people are acting "entitled" only makes one look blind to the entire situation.
We are all modder's in our own right (the better skilled, and everyone else misguidedly labeled as "user's) we should all start working together once again, and move on from this petty squabble.
Cheers!
If it turned out that no one was buying mods and it wasn't worth it for mod authors then and only then would paid mods really have failed, the system being torched and burned to the ground is not a failure by paid mods it's a failure by the community. An entitled community that think they have a claim on everyone's work for free, regardless of what the creator might think.
I know I'm being very cynical, but someone has to point out the hypocrisy in all this.
The point is almost all of us do this, that make's all of us just as creative as any of the mod creator's.
The "debate" as you call it is over, there (for the moment) are no Beth/Valve paid mod's... it's done, over.
Now this is a file for use by "everyone" to help show more support for the mod creator's, not a debate forum to keep slandering part of the community. Beyond this post I will not reply to your (what you call) "debate".
Cheers!
A+ for effort though.
Cheers!
I'm sure there's a number of other issues that'd spring up under this system, outside of the crap percentages modders got from their work. If you can't see how this was a major pain in the ass that was averted, I have some timeshares I want to discuss with you.
Valve's eagerness to always revolutionize and surprise their fans combined with Bethesda's philosophy to not get involved with mods was the perfect recipe for a disaster. This whole affair has made both companies look completely incompetent, they were told by Chesko and other modders involved that it would cause a backlash and that the 25% cut only promoted quantity over quality, they knew and they ignored it. And in the end what did they learn? That paid mods is not something modders want, which I strongly believe is wrong. We want a system that promotes great mods that wouldn't have existed without it, we want a paid mods system that works and actually benefits the community and it's content creators. They made a broken system that crashed and burned before it even left the ground, and they think it's because we don't want it. This all because Valve and Bethesda are completely out of touch and because they're listening to people who are as clueless as they are.
It's wonderful to see people mobilizing to show appreciation and respect for the incredible folks who devote their time, talent and energy to making mods. We have them to thank for so many invaluable moments, hours and even years in which we have taken joy in their creations.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kB2rqH7Ytko
thank you
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMj_P_6H69g