Danger of popular mods dying off?

[GavinZac]

Ok, so maybe it's just me, but I'm starting to run into issues trying to continue using several of the mods I've been using for quite a while. Actually, I know it can't just be me as several of the mods are considered 'standards' that are frequently suggested. There have been some superb new mods in the last couple of months - procedural parts, kOS, etc. - but unfortunately the apparent loss of a few forum members seems to be killing off existing popular mods.

For example, here's a few of the more high profile addons I use, and their current state:

Mod			Current Status						Future?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ISAMapSat		Usage impractical; unmaintained				Possible replacement discussed, not started
RemoteTech2		Feature incomplete; 3 week silence			KSP 0.22 making basic use of antennas - obsolete?
MechJeb2		1 maintainer recently bugfixing;			maintainer has committed to stopping soon. Project is GPL though. 
KAS			Owner relinquishing project soon			Other modder has offered to bugfix and maintain
Deadly Reentry		Considered imbalanced; Owner silence for months		Stock implementation discussed; project is CC-A so available for fixing.
IonCross Crew Support	Completely broken during warp, impractical for use	Unclear license like CC-A but restricting hosting. Unmaintained.
MMM Base parts		Incomplete; owner silence 1 month			?

The plus side is that most of the projects have an open source license and can be carried on. And I know that nobody is obligated to continue to support any mod they make, but as a community, should we be concerned? Use them or not, KSP owes at least some of its popularity to its ease of modding.

[thescientist]

Sadly you're right. Another thing, you probably have forgotten Modular Fuel System (/tanks).

[GavinZac]

Sadly you're right. Another thing, you probably have forgotten Modular Fuel System (/tanks).

Yes, I've listed the ones I use, but there are more.

[Faark]

Its kind of sad that Squad does not enforce some kind of license for at least spaceport mods that allows other members to pick them up once they are unmaintained. Sure, lot of mods somehow allow it via their own license. But sill there is no customary procedure, e.g. to declare someone the new maintainer and give him the possibility to update the spaceport entry. Especially the last one will become even more important once squad offers some kind of auto update for addons.

[BubbaWilkins]

I'm optimistic that much of the functionality currently provided by the most popular mods will eventually be incorporated into the stock game. For those that aren't, there will likely always be someone who will either take up the mantle or otherwise produce a new one. Such is the nature of modding.

[regex]

Its kind of sad that Squad does not enforce some kind of license for at least spaceport mods that allows other members to pick them up once they are unmaintained. Sure, lot of mods somehow allow it via their own license. But sill there is no customary procedure, e.g. to declare someone the new maintainer and give him the possibility to update the spaceport entry. Especially the last one will become even more important once squad offers some kind of auto update for addons.

Write it yourself from scratch; KSP doesn't have any patent law protecting the "idea" behind a mod.

Look, if you really want a mod to be available to you for all time you should learn how to code, or at the very least compile for KSP. That way you can use the source code provided to continue using the mod when new versions come out.

[Captain Sierra]

KW ROcketry is another one that is unmaintained. It has a few bugs that need fixing and I don't think it has available source code.

[Talisar]

Your point is well taken, but there are a couple of examples of the opposite happening. In one instance, the Deadly Robotics mod fell into disuse and was forked by Sirkut (with what appears to be a lot of aid by Devo) and now Infernal Robotics is much better than the original. In another case, Sumghai got permission from Fusty to use his designs to expand the FusTek module, and now that pack is huge. All it really takes is for talented modders to step and and continue work on mods that fall to the wayside if the licensing allows, or just make their own version if the licensing doesn't. It would definitely help if the mod makers designate someone to take over when they move on (As it appears is happening with KAS), but I have faith that the community here won't let good ideas lie fallow for long.

[Greys]

Mods will always be a transitive thing. Stuff gets made, stuff gets used, stuff gets forgotten for one reason or another, new stuff gets made. Permissive licensing is not going to do any thing about that, and forcing a certain license is a really bad idea that will drive some modders away, and will cause some people in the future to not make mods because somebody decided that they don't get to have any authority over their works.

I know you want to dispute this saying nobody is that self involved or some bull**** like that but I assure you, people are that self involved or some bull****, and there are legitimate reasons for restrictive licenses.

Any system of having a "permissive after X months" license is going to be way too complicated and cause a decrease in quality because if the maker doesn't update they'll lose it so they gotta push something even if it's not up to their standard.

It's just a fact that mods come and go, they can linger for a long time but eventually the world moves on.

It's not something to worry about, new mods will be there.

[PDCWolf]

No modder is commited to continue their work. Yet letting their projects die without warning or without letting someone else continue it is as bad as it gets. It shows irresponsibility from their part. (Yes, I know I haven't continued my parts either, I'll do so when the game gets fun again. 3 updates without anything new certainly broke my will of playing KSP).

About the mods you list themselves, there's not much to say. Mechjeb dying off can't certainly be a bad thing. It was a monopoly. Its dead can only bring joy to players and modders alike, and maybe better made forks or entirely new projects.

Deadly reentry died because the maker let himself be carried away by casuals saying the mod was hard, and then it got turned into a useless heat module for parts without challenge at all.

IonCross got itself turned into "Add this module not to die", which is a ****ty mechanic.

RemoteTech 2 has a really ****ty development cycle, where devs would let their plugin be tested only by their "secret github club" instead of bringing it to light at the forums, which makes for a really slow development and pretty much dead testing. Another bad thing they did is just ripping off modules from mechjeb. I remember accidentally forking their project on github though.

The only mournable death you got on your list is KAS.

[satcharna]

It isn't really anything to worry about. If a mod dies off, and it filled a niche that had to be filled, another mod will take its place, regardless of whether the original mod was open source or not. Frankly, I'm happy that some of the mods on your list may die off, I didn't think of them as either needed or useful.

[regex]

Another bad thing they did is just ripping off modules from mechjeb.

MechJeb's source code is released under the GNU GPL which means the RemoteTech guy(s) did absolutely nothing wrong so long as they have their own code under the GPL.

As for the rest of your post, I don't see any real problem with abandoning a mod since there is nothing stopping a new coder from writing something to take its place or taking the code as their own given a permissive-enough license. However, I, too, lament the loss of "hard" mods.

[KasperVld]

Its kind of sad that Squad does not enforce some kind of license for at least spaceport mods that allows other members to pick them up once they are unmaintained.

While I understand your idea it is simply impossible for Squad to enforce a license for mods retroactively, things just don't work that way. It is up to the mod author to determine if he wants other people to continue / adapt his mods and not up to us to decide if he ever wanted it. If there is no license then intellectual copyright law dictates you cannot touch it, simple. As for forcing a certain license on mods I have to agree with some of the previous posters: it will scare mod makers off who don't agree with the terms of the license you apply. There are huge choices to be made: do I allow people to sell the code? Do people have to attribute me? Does any derived mod or program also have to be open source? etcetera.

What we do enforce on the forums (well, it is a rule anyway, enforcement takes a lot of time from the moderation team) is that every mod comes with a license of the authors choice. This mandatory inclusion of a license is also a feature on the new Spaceport website that is currently under development.

[Faark]

Write it yourself from scratch; KSP doesn't have any patent law protecting the "idea" behind a mod.

They do. If you are using KSP tech (and i'm pretty sure any mod does/has to), you need permission from squad. And i am pretty sure squad could combine a bunch of rules with this permission.

Look, if you really want a mod to be available to you for all time you should learn how to code, or at the very least compile for KSP. That way you can use the source code provided to continue using the mod when new versions come out.

Oh, i could maintain a mod. But without a license I'm not sure if i would be allowed to modify & compile it for personal use. And of that would not help the common forum folk at all, since i could not share the result.

[..]enforce a license for mods retroactively, things just don't work that way.[..]

I never meant a "retroactively". For new mods, but I'm pretty sure they could even enforce it for current ones with an KSP update (ala "if you want to mod for ksp 0.22, you have to ..."). Yes, rules could scare of mod makers. But nonetheless we have an "open source" rule here on the forum as well as spaceport and it definitively is good and beneficial for the modding community. Even if it scares of a few individuals. And I'm sure we could find other rules... ofc no one want to enforce an entire specific license!

Anyway, i really hope they do not force people to choose a license on the new space port. Offering a KSP-friendly default license and let people change it (while respecting those few limitations like "open source") if they don't like it would be the way to go. Otherwise you just make especially newer guys think about what rights they want to keep, instead of what they could offer. And yes, imo those default license should if somehow possible include a procedure for someone else to take over once the original developer is gone. Maybe sth like "we send you a mail and if you do not respond within 3 weeks...".

Same for the forum... is there really no way for Squad to specify a License as long as the mod developer did not? I also really hope i do not have to add a license for every code snipped i might post here on the forum^^

[regex]

They do. If you are using KSP tech (and i'm pretty sure any mod does/has to), you need permission from squad. And i am pretty sure squad could combine a bunch of rules with this permission.

Sorry, what? There are three maneuver node mods that I know of, including the one I wrote. They all do slightly different things and they all have unique codebases (insofar as code that does the same thing can be unique), and some of them have features that are similar and some have unique features.

Nothing prevents me from writing another MechJeb type mod; there is no patent law in KSP that protects the "idea" of a mod.

Oh, i could maintain a mod. But without a license I'm not sure if i would be allowed to modify & compile it for personal use.

Are you kidding me? Once you have the source code on your computer there is nothing preventing you from doing whatever the hell you want to do with it on your own computer. The only time you get into legal territory is when you share it.

And of that would not help the common forum folk at all, since i could not share the result.

Then write something of your own that does the same thing. The problem outlined by the OP simply doesn't exist. If you want something you either do it yourself, convince someone else to do it, or suffer. If the original author is not around, write something that does the same thing.

[Majiir]

The default license issue has been beaten to death in other threads. The current rule, if enforced, solves a lot of problems. It also creates a few. (e.g. KospY was given a scary notice that he had to pick a license, so he did so hastily without understanding the consequences and it seems the forum mod who gave him the notice didn't link him to any resources about choosing. Not a good practice.)

Mods that go unlicensed and abandoned are often considered a problem of the community or Squad. They're not. Blame rests with the mod developer. I'm strongly against any kind of default licensing scheme, and at the very least Kethane will disappear from the KSP network if Squad decides to go down that roadâ€â€but every indication from Squad has been exactly the opposite, so I think we're in good hands.

[HeadHunter67]

No modder is commited to continue their work. Yet letting their projects die without warning or without letting someone else continue it is as bad as it gets. It shows irresponsibility from their part.

Let me ask you (and those who share your sentiment) one simple question:

How many games did you used to play that you no longer play any more?

I'm sure there are many - some, I'm sure, you participated in to a considerable extent - but months or years later, you haven't played them in a long time.

Now, imagine for a moment that you had made mods for some of those games. Should you be required to stay active in a game just because others feel you owe it to them to continue those mods? Should you be forced to relinquish any control or authority over what you've created just because others have become so dependent upon your work that they cannot fathom doing it themselves?

Greys and Regex have very valid points. If there's a mod out there that is no longer being updated, create a new one that does the same thing. You'll be able to do it your own way - and you'll learn soon enough just how annoying it is when others tell you how it "should" be done or pester you for updates or demand that you hand over all your work to them because they've arbitrarily decided that it's been too long since your last update. Watch how fast this game starts to look like a job.

For those of you who feel things should be handled differently but can't write your own mods? Too bad - if you can't do it yourself, that doesn't entitle you to determine how others must hand over their work for your convenience.

This is a hobby - no one here owes anyone anything, least of which is rights to use or modify their work. Consider this: Even SQUAD is under no obligation to continue development of KSP, and not one of you would dare to claim that we'd have the right to modify and distribute it if they stopped doing so. Why should a mod shared freely have fewer intellectual property rights than something you had to pay to get?

[regex]

It also creates a few. (e.g. KospY was given a scary notice that he had to pick a license, so he did so hastily without understanding the consequences and it seems the forum mod who gave him the notice didn't link him to any resources about choosing. Not a good practice.)

I heartily agree with this. In fact, I would go so far as to say that posting a new mod thread in the "Add-on Releases and Projects Showcase" forum should result in the thread be queued for posting by mods, who would get a chance to look it over and reject threads if they don't meet the posting criteria.

[Faark]

The default license issue has been beaten to death in other threads. The current rule, if enforced, solves a lot of problems.

[..]

I'm strongly against any kind of default licensing scheme, and at the very least Kethane will disappear from the KSP network if Squad decides to go down that roadâ€â€but every indication from Squad has been exactly the opposite, so I think we're in good hands.

May i ask what the problem would be with Squad offering a specific license they like for mods/that is KSP-friendly in case the mod developer does not care? Like when you create your spaceport project, you have specific license preselected and can change it to whatever you want. I ofc do not want squad to enforce a specific license, but to kind of state what Squad would like and make it easy for modders to use that one, if they like it. Why should something like that make you remove Kethane from Spaceport? For me that does not appear to be in the interest of the KSP community but more some ideology stuff.

Could you please also link one/some of the mentioned threads? I haven't seen or found any, it was most likely before i got to this forum. You are not talking about your definitively helpful and interesting License Selection Guide, aren't you?

Sorry, what? There are three maneuver node mods that I know of, including the one I wrote. They all do slightly different things and they all have unique codebases (insofar as code that does the same thing can be unique), and some of them have features that are similar and some have unique features.

Nothing prevents me from writing another MechJeb type mod; there is no patent law in KSP that protects the "idea" of a mod.

I was not talking about your mod idea. That is yours, ofc. But your actual mod is based on Squads work / the game's DLLs. And for using those you have to follow Squads copyright. Thats what i meant.

Are you kidding me? Once you have the source code on your computer there is nothing preventing you from doing whatever the hell you want to do with it on your own computer. The only time you get into legal territory is when you share it.

What does "on your own computer" have to do with it? I also the game dll "on my computer" but that does not give me the right to decompile the sh** out of it, though .NET is an extremely reverse engineering friendly environment and I'm pretty sure there is nothing Squad could do to technically prevent me from doing so. But still we are not allowed to do so, even if no one would ever know it.

Or does "you have access to the source code" somehow automatically mean its free for your personal use? I'm not a legal expert, but isn't a license about what you are allowed to do with the product?

____

About those "write it from scratch" argument: Those argument is pretty much demanding a "free market" principal... but that doesn't really work here, since modders do not have a natural interest in ( => do not get payed for) keeping their mods alive and healthy, especially once they loose interested in KSP. So another modder should wast a lot of his time to rewrite sth from scratch while only a tiny update would have been sufficient, but it could not be done since the original author did not include a license? Thats time wasted a modder could spend on doing even more awesome stuff. So why not softly push mod developers towards making it easier to keep mods healthy and alive?

That does not intend to devaluate their initial work. Its kind of the opposite... their coding work is valuable to the community and should not have to be lost. Bringing fun into the game & the community should be the primary priority.

I know, its kind of an ideology discussion, so better stop here. Just want to mention that dying and especially unmaintained & broken mods can make the game look bad, so its should in Sqauds interest to have some control over mods, so "free market" principals dos not really apply anyway.

[Greys]

Quick notes:

Squad doesn't care what licenses mods use

Kethane isnt on spaceport

Endlessly necroing outdated mods is more harmful than mods dieing off, the work to make an old mod work in a new system is greater than the work to make the same thing in the new system to start with, and the native mod will perform better than the zombie mod.

-phoneGreys

[regex]

What does "on your own computer" have to do with it? I also the game dll "on my computer" but that does not give me the right to decompile the sh** out of it, though .NET is an extremely reverse engineering friendly environment and I'm pretty sure there is nothing Squad could do to technically prevent me from doing so.

That's the whole point. The only time you have to worry about legal repercussion is when you share your modifications.

Or does "you have access to the source code" somehow automatically mean its free for your personal use? I'm not a legal expert, but isn't a license about what you are allowed to do with the product?

Sure, but if you're only modifying it for your personal use, and no one outside of you has any access to those modifications, there's no violation of anyone's rights. Even if the mod author came after you what ground do they stand on? I'm fairly certain that would come under "fair use" since the only person benefiting from the modification is you.

About those "write it from scratch" argument: Those argument is pretty much demanding a "free market" principal... but that doesn't really work here, since modders do not have a natural interest in ( => do not get payed for) keeping their mods alive and healthy, especially once they loose interested in KSP.

Free market principals absolutely work in that case. If someone doesn't have the product you want, or you don't have the legal rights to modify the existing product, write it yourself! I definitely get "payed" for my work: I give people a tool that they and I enjoy using.

So another modder should wast a lot of his time to rewrite sth from scratch while only a tiny update would have been sufficient, but it could not be done since the original author did not include a license? Thats time wasted a modder could spend on doing even more awesome stuff.

Tough ****.

So why not softly push mod developers towards making it easier to keep mods healthy and alive?

Look, if SQUAD had dictated that I write under a certain license I would have given the community the finger and just programmed for myself. Maybe I'm a little different because I write under the BSD license, which is fairly unrestrictive compared to things like the GPL, and maybe it doesn't matter because I wrote a small mod of little consequence in the grand scheme of things (compared to, say, KAS or Kethane), but if I don't have control of my own work then there really isn't anything compelling me to write for the community in the first place.

The best thing you can do is try to compel mod authors to release their work under licenses that allow modification and redistribution, softly pushing them rather than demanding that SQUAD mandate a license.

[HeadHunter67]

-snip-

What "SQUAD wants" is to protect the rights of mod creators. You make the mistaken assumption that they want what you want, which sounds like the unfettered ability to use other people's work if they decide to stop developing it.

You talk about the "best interest of the community" without remembering that the community includes mod authors. Some of those authors would be disinclined to start a mod at all if it means that others could arbitrarily pick it up and change it. It's no different than writing a book and having someone else pick up your characters and your setting just because you haven't written a sequel in some given amount of time.

SQUAD has made their intent on mod authorship and rights very clear - your confusion comes from trying to impose your desires and values onto the situation. Contrary to your belief, it is not in SQUAD's interest to "have some control over mods", and they feel no need to control how modder's rights are managed because they are aware of something you overlook: In games such as this, the less control a publisher exerts over how the game may be modified, the healthier the modding community will be. You don't have to take my word for it, you need only look at The Sims, Minecraft, Battlefield 1942, and Half-Life as examples. And yes, each of them has had its share of mods that burned brightly and faded - yet it's clear that none of that "made the game look bad".

If I make something and decide to share it with others, that in no way determines or limits my rights to it. It doesn't obligate me to do anything - it doesn't mean I must continue to update, it doesn't mean I must let others modify or continue it. I'm perfectly within my rights to stop whenever I want, and to take my work with me if I so choose. Modders aren't "working for hire" here, moreso because you're not paying for the mods in the first place. What you get out of it is the ability to enjoy their work for as long as they choose to continue to develop and share it.

An expectation that this situation should be any different, that it should favor the desires of the user rather than the rights of the author, is historically proven to discourage creativity more than enhance it. You're right, this is not a "free market" - because you're not buying anything. You're not even paying for the "right" to use it, let alone modify it. You're being permitted to share something that another has created - and in my upbringing, it's been my understanding that if someone chooses to share something with you, that doesn't give you any say in how they do so.

[cantorobriar]

It is a developers choice whether they want to develop mods or not. I used to make mods for other games, but since I didn't want things to be complicated or receive hate mail or anything of the matter, I used them only for myself. There is a big difference between using things for your own purposes or distributing them. Many people don't realize it, but there are practically copies of Mechjeb and other mods that no one hears about, but when a big mod goes, people will use the lesser known ones and then that will become big, then that same process repeats for a while. If you delve into Spaceport, you will find out what I mean. You can't force someone to develop and maintain a mod, now can you?

[Tiron]

Mod			Current Status						Future?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
ISAMapSat		Usage impractical; unmaintained				Possible replacement discussed, not started

Not really quite accurate. Usage is only 'impractical' to people that insist on using a large number of memory hogging parts packs. The misconception that it 'causes problems' arises because it uses almost no memory at all when it's not being actively used(Which is actually good practice). People consequently fill up their memory with parts packs and don't leave it any room, and then grumble about it crashing the game when they try to use it. It's really their own fault for not leaving it enough space.

The high memory usage in general might actually be a bug, based on what I've seen. It kinda looks like the game's keeping stuff it only needs temporarily during scene transitions in Memory at all times. I'm really the wrong person to investigate though, as I'm a tech, not a developer, and consequently I'm not at all sure of this.

Second, he hasn't abandoned it, he's just been working on other, non-KSP projects. He hasn't updated it because people have told him it still works in the current version, which it does. If it breaks, I'm pretty sure he'll fix it.

[KasperVld]

Allow me to test the water a little here with a question for the mod makers: how do you feel about the current policy which states all mods must come with a license in some way, shape or form?