Donation Points system now live for mod authors on Nexus Mods

[Vanguardascendant]

Awesome. Worth the wait. Quick question that I couldn't find an answer for on the FAQ. Is it possible for mod users to donate $ directly to the pool? Or would we have to sign up for premium memberships, knowing that a portion of our membership dues will go to the pool?

 

Thanks.

[Xander9009]

In response to post #60307046.

Ashes2Asherz wrote: So every 10k of DP is worth 10 dollars through paypal.. Be honest what's the chance of a modder getting 10k of DP? 1% maybe.. less than 1%?

The idea was never to make it so modders can rely on this as a source of income. It's just a small way of saying thank you. Also, there's the option to donate the money to charities, who will happily accept and appreciate even relatively small amounts. Also, they'll be worth more if the community actively puts into the system, too. (Well, they'll be worth the same amount, but you'll get more of them...)

[Brandoman]

This is pretty cool and really nice of Nexusmods to do. Thanks guys!

[ousnius]

Thanks, this is gonna be interesting. :)

[Pickysaurus]

In response to post #60308196.

Vanguardascendant wrote: Awesome. Worth the wait. Quick question that I couldn't find an answer for on the FAQ. Is it possible for mod users to donate $ directly to the pool? Or would we have to sign up for premium memberships, knowing that a portion of our membership dues will go to the pool?

Thanks.

We'll be looking into this kind of thing as the system develops :)

[Ashes2Asherz]

In response to post #60307046. #60308276 is also a reply to the same post.

Ashes2Asherz wrote: So every 10k of DP is worth 10 dollars through paypal.. Be honest what's the chance of a modder getting 10k of DP? 1% maybe.. less than 1%?

Xander9009 wrote: The idea was never to make it so modders can rely on this as a source of income. It's just a small way of saying thank you. Also, there's the option to donate the money to charities, who will happily accept and appreciate even relatively small amounts. Also, they'll be worth more if the community actively puts into the system, too. (Well, they'll be worth the same amount, but you'll get more of them...)

that's not what I asked but thanks for your answer

[Egelord]

dowloads in this system are worthless? Only the new ones are this?

[Thaiauxn]

Not sure about this system.

 

According to this you're making a donation "pool" that you will then redistribute to the masses based on a unique download system. You're starting with a 3 month donation bin, then will award that "point system" to mod authors with the most unique downloads.

 

It sounds like something cool, but also kinda lame for us, because we still have lot of modders resources in FNC, each of which with unique permissions, but all of which gave us explicit non-commercial use.

 

Is this only for mods that are brand new, using all original assets, or old ones that are unaware of this set of terms?

 

We're looking to release FNC in this 3 month window, and we're gonna nuke the Nexus servers for weeks, so if it's a competition, we win.

 

But at the same time, do we need to go ping....

 

hagyjalbeken

Lord Inquisitor

Scott Mack

Macintroll

zzjay

drumber

El Pasco

Marcurios

kibblesticks

zilav

EdibleGrenade12

tapioks

pilamin

eomanv

Mesh Magnet

Johannes Scherer

SGHi.info

Sesom

Tyler "Speedy B" Bourne

Miles "TrickyVein" Wimbrow

Meo 3000

Cambragol

Andersh

Dragbody

Toadlet

Neverclock

Quetzlsacatanango

Chuck Steel

Rez

Harry Luck

bibbeh

Breeze

ElminsterAU

Sharlikran

zilav

hlp

ScripterRon

Purple Pigeon and hlp

Jon from Niftools

 

And tell them, yo, your assets you allowed us to use, for free, are going to be opted in for a monetary reward system. We're taking money for this now, or at least a large monetary reward, based on unique downloads, which your assets helped assure we would win.

 

Which to my communist mind says, "you guys did work on this mod, you hold stake in it, you own your elements of the mod you gave us for the enjoyment of the people. We must redistribute funds for the people's labour."

 

To my capitalist brain, "oh s***, that's a lot of license violations. That's a lot of potential litigation to defend."

 

Because we'd have to go to each one, one at a time, and ask them if that's cool, many of whom are inactive users who have been inactive for years. If we just go ahead and assume silence is yes, then, say, Harry Luck, who has been inactive for 6 years, but gave open permission to use his resources, comes back on, sees we won a cash reward, then gets irate that we didn't pay him for the privilege.... oh s#*!.

 

We're using Harry's trailers, an old tree tent, and a crashed Boeing. I could easily replace them. Years later I'm now a more then proficient 3D artist. It would take my 3-4 days and inarguably my own art would be superior (no offense Harry,) but it slows down release and inflates file size with higher poly assets that need the map/navmesh adjusted around the footprint of the new meshes.

 

The same is true of our active team members -- they can quickly be contacted and tell them how this goes down, "do you agree to these terms."

 

Because I can see some of our guys are totally fine with their work going into one brick of cash, which would go to Radian-Helix Media, LLC, and we'd use it to fund the next game. Not a mod, it'd help fun a commercial enterprise, because our team moving on to indie development after this full time. But I can also hear that they want what are effectively royalties on an unnegotiated contract -- we "licensed" their assets. Say, Mac's Wasteland Merc armour highres textures, or Vlad's Kira Vault Suit, each of those were donated or made for us by them on the premise they won't be distributed and will be non-commercial. Are they cool not getting a kickback from that? Because those assets are worth something in a dollar amount. They're great assets.

 

We also have 40+ Voice Actors (two of whom are union sag/aftra on the down low) and they agreed this was non-commercial and would receive no future royalties or payouts. It was done for experience, demo reel, education, and the love of the work (and in a lot of cases, favors to me.)

 

And we're not even gong to talk about RAD Tools Video format. I had a conversation with Mitch where I told him we were non-commercial, and he STILL came back saying, "I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but, you can't use Bink for a free mod project. It was never licensed for that application."

 

He said this after I asked him if I could buy an academic license for Bink 2's Premiere Pro plugin. And he quoted me a bare minimum of 10,000$ and sent us all into a panic for a week until he dropped it (probably because Mitch is really cool and decided if he just never saw it, he doesn't have to deal with it. Cool dude. Arguable license system, I was trying to give him my money, but cool dude.)

 

So unless we get a Nexus staff member to go through and comb New California's assets and find every fragment of a mod author's assets that could be a liability, contact them, and get permission how are we supposed to qualify for this safely?

 

It sounds like a nightmare.

Edited May 22, 2018 by Thaiauxn

[Dark0ne]

In response to post #60309136.

Thaiauxn wrote: Not sure about this system.

According to this you're making a donation "pool" that you will then redistribute to the masses based on a unique download system. You're starting with a 3 month donation bin, then will award that "point system" to mod authors with the most unique downloads.

It sounds like something cool, but also kinda lame for us, because we still have lot of modders resources in FNC, each of which with unique permissions, but all of which gave us explicit non-commercial use.

Is this only for mods that are brand new, using all original assets, or old ones that are unaware of this set of terms?

We're looking to release FNC in this 3 month window, and we're gonna nuke the Nexus servers for weeks, so if it's a competition, we win.

But at the same time, do we need to go ping....

hagyjalbeken
Lord Inquisitor
Scott Mack
Macintroll
zzjay
drumber
El Pasco
Marcurios
kibblesticks
zilav
EdibleGrenade12
tapioks
pilamin
eomanv
Mesh Magnet
Johannes Scherer
SGHi.info
Sesom
Tyler "Speedy B" Bourne
Miles "TrickyVein" Wimbrow
Meo 3000
Cambragol
Andersh
Dragbody
Toadlet
Neverclock
Quetzlsacatanango
Chuck Steel
Rez
Harry Luck
bibbeh
Breeze
ElminsterAU
Sharlikran
zilav
hlp
ScripterRon
Purple Pigeon and hlp
Jon from Niftools

And tell them, yo, your assets you allowed us to use, for free, are going to be opted in for a monetary reward system. We're taking money for this now, or at least a large monetary reward, based on unique downloads, which your assets helped assure we would win.

Which to my communist mind says, "you guys did work on this mod, you hold stake in it, you own your elements of the mod you gave us for the enjoyment of the people. We must redistribute funds for the people's labour."

To my capitalist brain, "oh s***, that's a lot of license violations. That's a lot of potential litigation to defend."

Because we'd have to go to each one, one at a time, and ask them if that's cool, many of whom are inactive users who have been inactive for years. If we just go ahead and assume silence is yes, then, say, Harry Luck, who has been inactive for 6 years, but gave open permission to use his resources, comes back on, sees we won a cash reward, then gets irate that we didn't pay him for the privilege.... oh s#*!.

We're using Harry's trailers, an old tree tent, and a crashed Boeing. I could easily replace them. Years later I'm now a more then proficient 3D artist. It would take my 3-4 days and inarguably my own art would be superior (no offense Harry,) but it slows down release and inflates file size with higher poly assets that need the map/navmesh adjusted around the footprint of the new meshes.

The same is true of our active team members -- they can quickly be contacted and tell them how this goes down, "do you agree to these terms."

Because I can see some of our guys are totally fine with their work going into one brick of cash, which would go to Radian-Helix Media, LLC, and we'd use it to fund the next game. Not a mod, it'd help fun a commercial enterprise, because our team moving on to indie development after this full time. But I can also hear that they want what are effectively royalties on an unnegotiated contract -- we "licensed" their assets. Say, Mac's Wasteland Merc armour highres textures, or Vlad's Kira Vault Suit, each of those were donated or made for us by them on the premise they won't be distributed and will be non-commercial. Are they cool not getting a kickback from that? Because those assets are worth something in a dollar amount. They're great assets.

We also have 40+ Voice Actors (two of whom are union sag/aftra on the down low) and they agreed this was non-commercial and would receive no future royalties or payouts. It was done for experience, demo reel, education, and the love of the work (and in a lot of cases, favors to me.)

And we're not even gong to talk about RAD Tools Video format. I had a conversation with Mitch where I told him we were non-commercial, and he STILL came back saying, "I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but, you can't use Bink for a free mod project. It was never licensed for that application."

He said this after I asked him if I could buy an academic license for Bink 2's Premiere Pro plugin. And he quoted me a bare minimum of 10,000$ and sent us all into a panic for a week until he dropped it (probably because Mitch is really cool and decided if he just never saw it, he doesn't have to deal with it. Cool dude. Arguable license system, I was trying to give him my money, but cool dude.)

So unless we get a Nexus staff member to go through and comb New California's assets and find every fragment of a mod author's assets that could be a liability, contact them, and get permission how are we supposed to qualify for this safely?

It sounds like a nightmare.

The onus really is on you to ensure that you have the requisite permissions to turn the Donation Point system on for your mods, and this is the downside to using other people's work extensively. It requires more "admin", for sure.

I'd argue that if mod authors specified when you got permission that you cannot financially gain from it, then your mod would fall foul and you would not be able to turn the DP system on without first sorting that issue out. However, if it was never mentioned either way, then your mod does not fall foul. In between Steam Workshop and Bethesda.net, paid modding has been a known about "thing" for many years now. If mod authors care about this issue, but aren't specifying whether assets can be used in mods that can potentially receive a financial kick back, then the onus is on them to ensure their permissions are correct, concise, up-to-date and cover this eventuality.

[wertfert]

In response to post #60309136. #60309441 is also a reply to the same post.

Thaiauxn wrote: Not sure about this system.

According to this you're making a donation "pool" that you will then redistribute to the masses based on a unique download system. You're starting with a 3 month donation bin, then will award that "point system" to mod authors with the most unique downloads.

It sounds like something cool, but also kinda lame for us, because we still have lot of modders resources in FNC, each of which with unique permissions, but all of which gave us explicit non-commercial use.

Is this only for mods that are brand new, using all original assets, or old ones that are unaware of this set of terms?

We're looking to release FNC in this 3 month window, and we're gonna nuke the Nexus servers for weeks, so if it's a competition, we win.

But at the same time, do we need to go ping....

hagyjalbeken
Lord Inquisitor
Scott Mack
Macintroll
zzjay
drumber
El Pasco
Marcurios
kibblesticks
zilav
EdibleGrenade12
tapioks
pilamin
eomanv
Mesh Magnet
Johannes Scherer
SGHi.info
Sesom
Tyler "Speedy B" Bourne
Miles "TrickyVein" Wimbrow
Meo 3000
Cambragol
Andersh
Dragbody
Toadlet
Neverclock
Quetzlsacatanango
Chuck Steel
Rez
Harry Luck
bibbeh
Breeze
ElminsterAU
Sharlikran
zilav
hlp
ScripterRon
Purple Pigeon and hlp
Jon from Niftools

And tell them, yo, your assets you allowed us to use, for free, are going to be opted in for a monetary reward system. We're taking money for this now, or at least a large monetary reward, based on unique downloads, which your assets helped assure we would win.

Which to my communist mind says, "you guys did work on this mod, you hold stake in it, you own your elements of the mod you gave us for the enjoyment of the people. We must redistribute funds for the people's labour."

To my capitalist brain, "oh s***, that's a lot of license violations. That's a lot of potential litigation to defend."

Because we'd have to go to each one, one at a time, and ask them if that's cool, many of whom are inactive users who have been inactive for years. If we just go ahead and assume silence is yes, then, say, Harry Luck, who has been inactive for 6 years, but gave open permission to use his resources, comes back on, sees we won a cash reward, then gets irate that we didn't pay him for the privilege.... oh s#*!.

We're using Harry's trailers, an old tree tent, and a crashed Boeing. I could easily replace them. Years later I'm now a more then proficient 3D artist. It would take my 3-4 days and inarguably my own art would be superior (no offense Harry,) but it slows down release and inflates file size with higher poly assets that need the map/navmesh adjusted around the footprint of the new meshes.

The same is true of our active team members -- they can quickly be contacted and tell them how this goes down, "do you agree to these terms."

Because I can see some of our guys are totally fine with their work going into one brick of cash, which would go to Radian-Helix Media, LLC, and we'd use it to fund the next game. Not a mod, it'd help fun a commercial enterprise, because our team moving on to indie development after this full time. But I can also hear that they want what are effectively royalties on an unnegotiated contract -- we "licensed" their assets. Say, Mac's Wasteland Merc armour highres textures, or Vlad's Kira Vault Suit, each of those were donated or made for us by them on the premise they won't be distributed and will be non-commercial. Are they cool not getting a kickback from that? Because those assets are worth something in a dollar amount. They're great assets.

We also have 40+ Voice Actors (two of whom are union sag/aftra on the down low) and they agreed this was non-commercial and would receive no future royalties or payouts. It was done for experience, demo reel, education, and the love of the work (and in a lot of cases, favors to me.)

And we're not even gong to talk about RAD Tools Video format. I had a conversation with Mitch where I told him we were non-commercial, and he STILL came back saying, "I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but, you can't use Bink for a free mod project. It was never licensed for that application."

He said this after I asked him if I could buy an academic license for Bink 2's Premiere Pro plugin. And he quoted me a bare minimum of 10,000$ and sent us all into a panic for a week until he dropped it (probably because Mitch is really cool and decided if he just never saw it, he doesn't have to deal with it. Cool dude. Arguable license system, I was trying to give him my money, but cool dude.)

So unless we get a Nexus staff member to go through and comb New California's assets and find every fragment of a mod author's assets that could be a liability, contact them, and get permission how are we supposed to qualify for this safely?

It sounds like a nightmare.

Dark0ne wrote: The onus really is on you to ensure that you have the requisite permissions to turn the Donation Point system on for your mods, and this is the downside to using other people's work extensively. It requires more "admin", for sure.

I'd argue that if mod authors specified when you got permission that you cannot financially gain from it, then your mod would fall foul and you would not be able to turn the DP system on without first sorting that issue out. However, if it was never mentioned either way, then your mod does not fall foul. In between Steam Workshop and Bethesda.net, paid modding has been a known about "thing" for many years now. If mod authors care about this issue, but aren't specifying whether assets can be used in mods that can potentially receive a financial kick back, then the onus is on them to ensure their permissions are correct, concise, up-to-date and cover this eventuality.

Wow, that is a comprehensive reply. Are you a lawyer? Everything you've stated is legally sound. This system could cause a lot of problems for you. Because even if you choose not to accept the money, there is the implication that you could. Maybe deciding to legally and publicly opting out of this so that you can remain entirely non-commercial? Just my thoughts.
(Edit: Dark0ne responded to you before me, while I was still reading and processing your post. He seems to have answered this. Good luck!) Edited May 22, 2018 by wertfert