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PSA: Don't poke the bears.. (Translation: Don't pester the modmakers (for updates))


Stone Blue

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On 4/15/2016 at 8:24 PM, Divstator said:

This, I think is the best approach to fix that. But maybe a little better fleshed out? A little less "commanding"? Because to me y'all are sounding exclusionary, which seems out of character.

I'd be happy to explain more, but not sure what you mean by "fleshed out"-- I gave quite a bit of explanation in the post you partially quoted here, and also quite a bit more explanation earlier in the thread.  And if you'll read everything I've written there, I think you'll find that it's fairly friendly and not particularly "commanding" at all-- at least, I hope not.  It's not my style.

The particular bullet points you quote above may come across as "commanding" when taken completely out of context, I suppose... but they're deliberately boiled-down.  As anyone who spends much time reading my forum posts can tell you, I tend to be very long-winded :wink: ...and as much as I enjoy hearing myself talk, I appreciate that not everyone wants to wade through walls of text.  So where possible, I like to provide a handy TL;DR summary somewhere that boils it all down to the essentials, which is what those bullet points are about.

I'm having trouble understanding what you mean by "y'all are sounding exclusionary".

  • First, by "y'all", which I interpret as a plural pronoun, i.e. you're referring to "me and some group of people" rather than just me, so clarifying that would be helpful.  I can speak for myself, but I can't speak for a group, at least not unless I know what group you're referring to.  Do you mean "moderators"?  Or "mod authors"?  Or some other category?  (It's helpful to know, since I happen to belong to both groups, and those are completely unrelated to each other.)
  • Second, by "exclusionary"-- not sure what is meant, here.  Excluding whom, from what?

I'm not trying to be pedantic, here-- it's clear that you have a significant concern, I'm just trying to identify exactly what it is so I can address it.

On 4/15/2016 at 8:24 PM, Divstator said:

New players and new modders are going to be ignorant, everyone starts out that way. Best way to fix that is with guidance.

Well, sure!  That's why this thread is here.  :) Also,  the following prominently-displayed sticky thread that was posted specifically to address this issue and give people a place to discuss it:

[EDIT, March 2017] The above link was discussing a forum rule that was current at the time this message was first posted.  The forum rules have since been updated, and the old 2.3.f is now removed.  However, please note the new 2.2.p, which refers to demanding or pressuring for release dates or updates from content creators.  Therefore, this discussion remains relevant.

Also the forum guidelines themselves.

Sure, there will always be new folks who don't notice the rules before they bump into them (believe me, moderators run into this every day!)  But other than having publicly posted rules and some prominently posted forum threads, what else can we do?

On 4/15/2016 at 8:24 PM, Divstator said:

Perhaps if you have to school someone, maybe do it through PM first? Giving someone a public thrashing is not really... inspiring?

Not sure what you mean; moderators don't publicly thrash people.  Moderation actions are deliberately kept quite private. If somebody breaks a rule, there are various things that can happen-- the post can be removed, they can receive infraction points, they might get a PM-- but that's all between the forum user and the moderator staff, and none of that is in the public eye.

If it's someone else (i.e. not a moderator) who notices a problem... that also is supposed to be non-public.  The encouraged mechanism there is for the person who sees a problem not to call the alleged offender out publicly, but rather to just report the post, which privately alerts the moderators so we can look at it and decide what (private) action to take.

Do you have an example of somebody being given a public "thrashing" that would / could / should have been kept private?

On 4/15/2016 at 8:24 PM, Divstator said:

Also if you had a community guide on how to communicate with modders then when someone went astray they could just be directed to the guide without the modder coming off as the heavy, because that's not really fair to somebody who gives so much for very little return.

That's not a bad idea, but really, it pretty much just boils down to "don't pester modders for updates."  That's the only systemic problem that we've come across that needs to be publicly communicated.  And that's why it's right there in black and white, in the forum guidelines.

And modders don't have to come across as the heavy.  If anybody (the modders themselves, or other forum users) happens to notice a modder-pestering post in a mod thread, all they have to do is report the post.  It's private, and the only people who can see who did the reporting are the moderators.  And then the moderators can take whatever action is needed, so that any heat will get directed at the moderators themselves, not the modder or anyone else.  And that's as it should be.  It's what we moderators are for.  We have highly flame-resistant skin.  :)

Edited by Snark
Add a note for obsolete 2.3.f reference -> 2.2.p
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I'll try to clarify. y'all =  modders = mod developers. Wasn't referring to moderators at all. I just meant it as "in general" and not at any specific developer at all.

by "exclusionary" I meant veteran mod developers vs newcomers whether they be new players or veteran players and new developers. I don't believe it's intentional. It is sometimes necessary for me to take a step back occasionally as a developer and remember to look through the eyes of someone who is seeing things for the first time. I figure if it's necessary for me to do it, that it might be helpful to remind others to do it? I know that I am guilty of getting caught  up in coding and not seeing things clearly sometimes, especially when I have been involved in something for a long time, it's easy to overlook what I take for granted. Plus I don't have the skill set that others do when it comes to dealing with the public (a.k.a. KasperVld).

 

Also I am in no way trying to call anyone out or anything like that. I am very grateful for what all the developers do, which is why I want to see more developers. And yes, pestering developers for updates is the current problem. I was thinking more of "general rules of conduct" kinda thing so that people that are new to not only KSP but gaming in general would understand some of the world that developers have to live in. To understand that developers have to respond publicly to some requests that are frustrating, because the person making those requests either doesn't understand the difficulty, amount of effort involved or the fact that their request is the millionth time it's been answered either in the current thread or hundreds of threads over years worth of development. Also I imagine that KSP is attractive to younger players that don't have the life experience to know that they are expected to read 2 posts above and actually be considerate(which is what I meant by "growing pains").

Perhaps "thrashing" was a poor choice. Yeah, it was a poor choice. Like I said, not the best at dealing with the public. I think I used that word to kind of demonstrate about the added weight of the words that the gifted developers are burdened with, if that makes any sense? Disapproval by someone you respect always carries greater significance than coming from someone you don't.

Also, by "fleshed out", I meant something a little less formal than forum rules.

by the way @Snark, I hope you didn't take what I said as disapproval, I meant just the opposite.

Sorry for the late response, had family things I had to take care and wanted to answer to the best of my ability.

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  • 3 months later...

Well as a new mod developer a update request can be humbleing and make you feel grate. But as the demand stacks up a dream of making art in digital form of mods to a nightmare so I honestly can't say what should be done about this.

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On 5/20/2017 at 11:22 AM, XLjedi said:

...and if you didn't grant such authority?

Then you wouldnt have had a reason to up your post count by asking this snarky question... :P

Edited by Stone Blue
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Just a passing thought I had.

A lot of modders have Patreon or other ways for players to support them. 

Since, in essence, the players have "paid" the modders as a thank you, I wonder how the modding community would react to a Patreon asking about or encouraging a mod update? 

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31 minutes ago, Gargamel said:

Just a passing thought I had.

A lot of modders have Patreon or other ways for players to support them. 

Since, in essence, the players have "paid" the modders as a thank you, I wonder how the modding community would react to a Patreon asking about or encouraging a mod update? 

I make it very clear that donations do not mean a donator will receive special treatment or a faster update. A donation should be for what a modder has done, not for what a modder should do. Some people tend to think it entitles them to something.

Regardless of how much or how often a modder gets donations, obviously it’s not enough to live off of, so real life takes precedence. Maybe if modding was a full time job with benefits, but it isn’t, and so modders don’t have to do anything they don’t want or have time for.

Edited by Galileo
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On 5/13/2018 at 9:28 AM, Gargamel said:

Just a passing thought I had.

A lot of modders have Patreon or other ways for players to support them. 

Since, in essence, the players have "paid" the modders as a thank you, I wonder how the modding community would react to a Patreon asking about or encouraging a mod update? 

While I don't get that much from Patreon, if a long-term donator made a request, I would consider it.  No promises, and it may never happen.

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On 7/18/2018 at 6:47 AM, darthcloakedguy said:

Maybe it's time for the first post in this threat to be edited? Seems... a little out of date.

No, it's just fine.  the version numbers don't matter, the length of time that has passed doesn't matter, in fact, even the game itself doesn't matter.  

Just don't poke the bears. 

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On 8/7/2018 at 7:00 AM, Gargamel said:

No, it's just fine.  the version numbers don't matter, the length of time that has passed doesn't matter, in fact, even the game itself doesn't matter.  

Just don't poke the bears. 

Personally I would like to exclude myself from this 'rule' . This bear likes the be poked as it shows people care about my work ;)

 

Edited by FreeThinker
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  • 1 year later...
On 5/28/2019 at 4:06 PM, FreeThinker said:

Personally I would like to exclude myself from this 'rule' . This bear likes the be poked as it shows people care about my work ;)

 

The games are usually created to be played, not to be "does-not-mattered", the game and mod developers are supposed to be praised and cheered, not to be "poked", so users and players always will be crying like pup-bears for new versions of addons to PLAY-DA-GAMEEE, instead of saying "nah, KSP doesn't matter'...

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