Why we can't use Patreon, and talking about donations and doing more to support mod authors

[gezegond]

In response to post #28556219. #28557049, #28557104, #28559119, #28559324, #28559434, #28559484, #28559684, #28559819, #28560459, #28560764, #28560979 are all replies on the same post.

gezegond wrote: Simple. Allow options. Patreon is subscription based and allow people to pay monthly. You can add that functionality with paypal. Same with Flattr. Actually Flattr is a better system. Have people just generally donate an amount "overall", like $10 a month or whatever, then at the end of the month spread that amount between all the mods that they have endorsed.

You could make it so people can go into a settings menu and customize the ratios for each mod. so if they think one mod they endorsed deserves more they could tweak it, but if not or can't be bothered just distribute it evenly between all endorsed mods.

That would probably make people more selective about using the endorsed button as well, making it more meaningful as a side effect.

Damn I'm a genius. :P

Elgar82 wrote: "Make people more selective about using the endorsed button" ?!?

Are you serious ? Endorsements are incredibly and shamefully low. Even very popular mods have endorsements ratios of 5 or 6%.

icecreamassassin wrote: yeah I suggested the paypal recurring donation option months ago but I don't think it got much play, but I suggested it again above with a link. It's really absurd that we aren't just doing this because literally the issue Bethesda seems to have is that they do not want modders paid for the mod itself. They are fine with money going to modders for their overall efforts, so just giving the option for small sustained donations makes total sense IMO.

gezegond wrote: low? compared to what? endorsements are just endorsements man they're not either high or low. By making them more selective I mean that, right now I just pretty much endorse every mod I download, and I think plenty of people are the same. And then there are people who don't endorse any mods that they play. It's either all or nothing, very few are actually selecting what to endorse and what not i think

SagittariusMoon wrote: I have to agree about low endorsements. Most people just download and run, never to be seen or heard from again.

pintocat wrote: How are endorsements low? The endorse / download ratio is pretty consistent across mods generally. If mods all get endorsed by about 5-10% of the people using it, how is it any different than if 100% of people do? The endorsement count's only relevence is relative to other mods, and it's already pretty consistent across mods... if this somehow changes and now all downloads auto-endorsed mod A, and the same happened to mod B, they'll still have the same relative endorsement rate to each other. The endorsement count is nothing really. It's not an indicator of quality, since it's just yes or no... which is why I am stingy about endorsing. There's no way to say "this mod works" vs "this mod is f*#@ing amazing".

shinji72 wrote: I think it ever Paid Mods are to become the norm, the montly fee, all-you-can-eat, Netflix style subscriptions would be the way to go.

When you mod as a user you wanna try them all. Test them. Try different combination. To have to pay for every single mod you download (even a very modest fee) would go against the way people use mods.

EnaiSiaion wrote:

I have to agree about low endorsements. Most people just download and run, never to be seen or heard from again.

It is actually really hard to not endorse a mod. Ever since the introduction of welfare endorsements a year or so ago, endorsements no longer mean "this mod is really cool, let's go back and endorse it". Now they mean "I was asked to endorse this mod when I downloaded the next mod".

I assume the intention was to cater to newbie mod creators and encourage them to keep going with the equivalent of a participation trophy, but it completely defeats the point of endorsements.

Get off my lawn. :(

Jokerine wrote: "Welfare endorsements"? Yeah, because people can't just, you know, skip the endorsement window? Boo.

gezegond wrote: pintocat : "There's no way to say "this mod works" vs "this mod is f***ing amazing"."

Exactly. That's why i suggested the tweaking option. You may feel like 1 mod deserves a larger portion of your money than another. On the other hand if it's tucked behind in some settings screen it won't confuse the newbies who just want to endorse a mod.

@ shinji72 : this is like what i suggested except on nexus the monthly fee is not mandatory. You can open up a friendly message and be like "would you like to support these modders\content creators? here's how you can support them all at the same time."

EnaiSiaion wrote:

"Welfare endorsements"? Yeah, because people can't just, you know, skip the endorsement window? Boo.

They can, but they could just not come back to endorse a mod either.

It used to require some actual effort to endorse, so only users who were blown away by your mod came back to endorse it. Today, as long as your mod doesn't completely suck, it gets a steady stream of endorsements from logged in users being shown a thumb button and asked to click it.

The information conveyed by endorsements ("how many people thought your mod was awesome") has been sacrificed in the name of generating more endorsements.

:(

Arthmoor wrote: @icecreamassassin:

I suspect the recurring part is mostly what Bethesda has issue with because that converts from a "donation" to a "subscription" which is substantially different in legal terms. Once you get into recurring payments, whether it be a "recurring donation" or something more concrete like Patreon or Flattr, they may view that as crossing into commercialization. Commercializing your mods is currently against their EULA for the various CKs.

@Arthmoor: Well Dark0ne can just contact them again and ask if they would have a problem with a recurring payment and\or the global donation distribution model.

If they have a problem with that they probably just don't want modders make money from mods. They're both donation, only one is likely to be more effective. ¯\_(-_-)_/¯

[Stewb]

Er.. Dark? You left the reply from GStaff in your second message quote from yourself, but you said you weren't showing Gstaff's replies?

[setiweb]

I wouldn't mind an option to the donate button where the author can check a tickbox to remove the author/subscriber options and enable all donations to go directly to the Nexus - as in thanks in general for the services the Nexus provides.

[Dark0ne]

In response to post #28561439.

Stewb wrote: Er.. Dark? You left the reply from GStaff in your second message quote from yourself, but you said you weren't showing Gstaff's replies?

I did!? Where?

[sevencardz]

In response to post #28561439. #28563124 is also a reply to the same post.

Stewb wrote: Er.. Dark? You left the reply from GStaff in your second message quote from yourself, but you said you weren't showing Gstaff's replies?

Dark0ne wrote: I did!? Where?

I checked twice and I don't see what Stewb sees. I think you're good, Dark0ne. Edited September 9, 2015 by sevencardz

[vram1974]

In response to post #28556219. #28557049, #28557104, #28559119, #28559324, #28559434, #28559484, #28559684, #28559819, #28560459, #28560764, #28560979, #28561394 are all replies on the same post.

gezegond wrote: Simple. Allow options. Patreon is subscription based and allow people to pay monthly. You can add that functionality with paypal. Same with Flattr. Actually Flattr is a better system. Have people just generally donate an amount "overall", like $10 a month or whatever, then at the end of the month spread that amount between all the mods that they have endorsed.

You could make it so people can go into a settings menu and customize the ratios for each mod. so if they think one mod they endorsed deserves more they could tweak it, but if not or can't be bothered just distribute it evenly between all endorsed mods.

That would probably make people more selective about using the endorsed button as well, making it more meaningful as a side effect.

Damn I'm a genius. :P

Elgar82 wrote: "Make people more selective about using the endorsed button" ?!?

Are you serious ? Endorsements are incredibly and shamefully low. Even very popular mods have endorsements ratios of 5 or 6%.

icecreamassassin wrote: yeah I suggested the paypal recurring donation option months ago but I don't think it got much play, but I suggested it again above with a link. It's really absurd that we aren't just doing this because literally the issue Bethesda seems to have is that they do not want modders paid for the mod itself. They are fine with money going to modders for their overall efforts, so just giving the option for small sustained donations makes total sense IMO.

gezegond wrote: low? compared to what? endorsements are just endorsements man they're not either high or low. By making them more selective I mean that, right now I just pretty much endorse every mod I download, and I think plenty of people are the same. And then there are people who don't endorse any mods that they play. It's either all or nothing, very few are actually selecting what to endorse and what not i think

SagittariusMoon wrote: I have to agree about low endorsements. Most people just download and run, never to be seen or heard from again.

pintocat wrote: How are endorsements low? The endorse / download ratio is pretty consistent across mods generally. If mods all get endorsed by about 5-10% of the people using it, how is it any different than if 100% of people do? The endorsement count's only relevence is relative to other mods, and it's already pretty consistent across mods... if this somehow changes and now all downloads auto-endorsed mod A, and the same happened to mod B, they'll still have the same relative endorsement rate to each other. The endorsement count is nothing really. It's not an indicator of quality, since it's just yes or no... which is why I am stingy about endorsing. There's no way to say "this mod works" vs "this mod is f*#@ing amazing".

shinji72 wrote: I think it ever Paid Mods are to become the norm, the montly fee, all-you-can-eat, Netflix style subscriptions would be the way to go.

When you mod as a user you wanna try them all. Test them. Try different combination. To have to pay for every single mod you download (even a very modest fee) would go against the way people use mods.

EnaiSiaion wrote:

I have to agree about low endorsements. Most people just download and run, never to be seen or heard from again.

It is actually really hard to not endorse a mod. Ever since the introduction of welfare endorsements a year or so ago, endorsements no longer mean "this mod is really cool, let's go back and endorse it". Now they mean "I was asked to endorse this mod when I downloaded the next mod".

I assume the intention was to cater to newbie mod creators and encourage them to keep going with the equivalent of a participation trophy, but it completely defeats the point of endorsements.

Get off my lawn. :(

Jokerine wrote: "Welfare endorsements"? Yeah, because people can't just, you know, skip the endorsement window? Boo.

gezegond wrote: pintocat : "There's no way to say "this mod works" vs "this mod is f***ing amazing"."

Exactly. That's why i suggested the tweaking option. You may feel like 1 mod deserves a larger portion of your money than another. On the other hand if it's tucked behind in some settings screen it won't confuse the newbies who just want to endorse a mod.

@ shinji72 : this is like what i suggested except on nexus the monthly fee is not mandatory. You can open up a friendly message and be like "would you like to support these modders\content creators? here's how you can support them all at the same time."

EnaiSiaion wrote:

"Welfare endorsements"? Yeah, because people can't just, you know, skip the endorsement window? Boo.

They can, but they could just not come back to endorse a mod either.

It used to require some actual effort to endorse, so only users who were blown away by your mod came back to endorse it. Today, as long as your mod doesn't completely suck, it gets a steady stream of endorsements from logged in users being shown a thumb button and asked to click it.

The information conveyed by endorsements ("how many people thought your mod was awesome") has been sacrificed in the name of generating more endorsements.

:(

Arthmoor wrote: @icecreamassassin:

I suspect the recurring part is mostly what Bethesda has issue with because that converts from a "donation" to a "subscription" which is substantially different in legal terms. Once you get into recurring payments, whether it be a "recurring donation" or something more concrete like Patreon or Flattr, they may view that as crossing into commercialization. Commercializing your mods is currently against their EULA for the various CKs.

gezegond wrote: @Arthmoor: Well Dark0ne can just contact them again and ask if they would have a problem with a recurring payment and\or the global donation distribution model.

If they have a problem with that they probably just don't want modders make money from mods. They're both donation, only one is likely to be more effective. ¯\_(-_-)_/¯

The fact less than 5 % of people return to endorse the product indicates to me a shameful sense of entitlement from gamers. At least paid mods would force users to acknowledge the hard work.

[vram1974]

In response to post #28557464. #28559179 is also a reply to the same post.

indycurt wrote: I find it hard to believe that people on the Nexus have no clue about donations. I've had the donation notice popups, and there are numerous mod pages with donate buttons, so for someone not to know it exists is clueless, and I would go further in saying that they would be people who wouldn't consider donating anyway.

That said, I always found it funny that the paid modding thing could have worked had it not been for greed (mostly on the part of the companies involved, NOT the modders). I've always thought that a "$1 store" approach would have been a great thing for everyone involved, modder, user, and company alike. If all mods were $1 think of the amazing results. Excellent mods would make a modder very rich. A mod say like Frostfall. . .That would have been a $1 Million mod based on "unique" downloads. For a mod of that quality, a user would have no problem with paying a buck for it. Even if Bethesda would take 50%, that is a half a million dollars for each involved. And that is just for ONE mod. Even the less popular, but good mods would make some really good money. For example a mod that only has 5 to 7 hundred downloads, even at a %50 cut, $250 to $350 for a mediocre mod is not bad money compared to zip for it now. The concept of a $1 a mod would make the user happy, the modder VERY happy, and the big greedy companies VERY happy.

AnyOldName3 wrote: But if you're the first downloader of a mod, how are you going to know that it's any good just from the screenshots and description? We already have cases of mod pages being pretty miss-representative, so either a lot of people will end up scammed, or it's going to be a huge amount of work if more than a small handful of mods ever make it there.

You're making the same assumptions of businesses like film companies and UFC and software developers. They believe that because a product, film or pay-per-view gets 1 million illegal downloads that it means they lost X amount of revenue from the user.

But if Frostfall cost $1 you wouldn't have 1 million downloads, you might have half that or less. Still significant, but cost is a disincentive to anything. The higher the cost the higher the disincentive to use it.

Paid mods will also inevitably lead to piracy. I support paid mods, I'm just saying.

[vram1974]

"The Nexus has a lot of users who "skirt the rules" already, sitting in a grey area where they know it's a bit naughty, but it's not going to get them into any trouble."

 

I'm curious for clarification about this bit.

 

I know quite a few Nexus modders who are using their Nexus mod as a "showcase" for their free mod and then hosting their paid mods elsewhere with additional content for a price. I know because I paid for a few (the mods are good).

 

I noticed Nexus has shut down one of these authors, but Nexus didn't state why.

 

So what's the policy if a modder has a Nexus mod for free and then a paywall mod elsewhere?

[Stewb]

In response to post #28561439. #28563124, #28563289 are all replies on the same post.

Stewb wrote: Er.. Dark? You left the reply from GStaff in your second message quote from yourself, but you said you weren't showing Gstaff's replies?

Dark0ne wrote: I did!? Where?

sevencardz wrote: I checked twice and I don't see what Stewb sees. I think you're good, Dark0ne.

The part

Unfortunately this is something the mod authors are pushing me heavily for so I kind of need a little better wording on this one (sorry!). When you say "it's not something we can support"

Where you say "When you say" it does sounds like you're quoting them. Sorry for the delay I was in-game :S

[SKYZOO]

In response to post #28560734.

psychoslaphead wrote: I'm a dedicated game modder, and I just wish this whole paid/donation/I need a handout modding thing would go away. Permanently.

It just leads down a very dark path, as was seen in the past experience with Bethesda jumping in. So why do people want a repeat of that? Masochism?

I completely agree with what you've said. +Kudos to you.

Edit: I've never made a mod with the intention of making a single penny. I did it simply because I enjoyed it, and I shared it because I thought maybe a few others might too. Isn't that why we all started modding in the first place? Edited September 9, 2015 by SKYZOO