Will KSP mods ever turn Paid?

[Dragonchampion]

SO with Skyrim mods turning pay-based, I am worried that other modding communities might get pulled into things. Is there any assurance we have that this will never happen to KSP?

[ImJake]

There's not any assurance that I'm aware of, but this is such an awesome community that I doubt it will ever happen.

[Ippo]

If it happened, it would be absolutely legal and understandable (although a real PITA). Software development is a lot of work: if one wishes to get paid for it, he/she has a point.

Not saying that it would be a good business model, I'm just saying that it's understandable.

Now, what skyrim mods are gonna be paid? As a skyrim player, I'm worried.

[Starwhip]

If it happened, it would be absolutely legal and understandable (although a real PITA). Software development is a lot of work: if one wishes to get paid for it, he/she has a point.

Not saying that it would be a good business model, I'm just saying that it's understandable.

Now, what skyrim mods are gonna be paid? As a skyrim player, I'm worried.

Quick, download everything!

I doubt that any of the really big mods will ever become paid. If that happens, I for one will simply stop updating the mod. Or stop using it entirely.

[NathanKell]

While it's legal to profit commercially from KSP addons, it's against the forum rules to post any such addons. It is, however, entirely within the rules to ask for, and receive, donations.

[Fel]

SO with Skyrim mods turning pay-based, I am worried that other modding communities might get pulled into things. Is there any assurance we have that this will never happen to KSP?

Well, donation-ware has happened in the past. That is, putting extremely large "give me your money" buttons all over your screen while playing.

There's also "Donation-Nagging" where developers release for free, but only patch things if they get paid.

The forum rules forbid people from trying to get money out of other players, though the spirit of the rule concerns adfly.

It really depends, ultimately the developer will want to use SQUAD's network to advertise, but if the official services don't like the deal; getting people to know about it may be difficult.

- - - Updated - - -

While it's legal to profit commercially from KSP addons, it's against the forum rules to post any such addons. It is, however, entirely within the rules to ask for, and receive, donations.

The zeitgeist of the rule is that the poster personally benefits from the posting. Its a strong loophole because it means people can talk about the mod, possibly even link to it, but the developer of the mod cannot "advertise" it.

I know that talk of games pops up in the space lounge, which sets precedent here. The only question is if a rule should be amended to specifically deal with KSP or not.

[m4v]

While it's legal to profit commercially from KSP addons, it's against the forum rules to post any such addons. It is, however, entirely within the rules to ask for, and receive, donations.

This is a technicality, but imo the rules say that you can't post closed source mods, not that you can't profit from them (so long it isn't done within KSP). Of course selling an open source addon wouldn't be practical.

[SorensonPA]

There's not any assurance that I'm aware of, but this is such an awesome community that I doubt it will ever happen.

And such was said of the Skyrim modding community, I'm sure, and yet here we are bearing witness to people charging $5 for incomplete fishing mods less than a day out of the gate.

[Eric S]

Since the devs have stated that they want to stay away from Steam Workshop, I don't see this being an issue in the near future. Farther out, possibly.

[Norpo]

Heh, I doubt it. If someone charged for their mod, unless it was a really good one, then I doubt it'd get a single purchase.

[Fel]

Heh, I doubt it. If someone charged for their mod, unless it was a really good one, then I doubt it'd get a single purchase.

Step 1) Make a Good Mod

Step 2) Make the source really hard to understand

Step 3) Remove all sources for your mod, make CERTAIN your license says "You cannot redistribute this without my permission"

Step 4) "Update" the mod with DRM and put up a paypal site to buy the updated mod

Step 5) Profit from the popularity gained as an open source mod

It isn't like this hasn't happened with several open source projects.

[Blaster]

If I am going to pay for a mod, it better be as good as DLC. If it can't be at least as good quality as the game itself, it no gets purchase.

[DuoDex]

I sure hope so!

Oh wait, we're talking about game mods, not forum moderators.

Never mind.

[sidfu]

I have no problem donating to good modders but forceing people to pay for mods will just make another greenlight debaticale in my opinion

[sarbian]

This is a technicality, but imo the rules say that you can't post closed source mods, not that you can't profit from them (so long it isn't done within KSP). Of course selling an open source addon wouldn't be practical.

No, there is a rule about that but you have to follow the "2. Forbidden content" rules of addon posting to find it.

Community-Rules

"Links that promote projects and/or products that are meant for the personal profit of either party, this specifically includes linking through ad.fly"

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Modding is a lot of work. I perfectly understand that someone may want to earn some money when they work for hours every evening (if not all day as some modders do here). Some recent example in City:Skylines have shown that someone may even earn a living from modding. Free is good but it does not pay for the bills.

Donation is a nice way to thanks someone but nearly no one gives. I had 4 donation for 2 years of work and I am really thankful for those but this is nothing compared to the hours I put in my mods (note that this is not a call for donation; just plain fact).

Personally I don't want to turn my modding into a job but I am sure there are other who may want it and would create awesome mods. In a community that revere streamers (that do earn money from their work) I find it strange that talking about money for mod is shunned

And before some fantasize about the money MechJeb generate from Curse here is the awesome revenue stream of the most downloaded KSP mod from Curse : $0.6 / day

[Xannari Ferrows]

I believe modders wouldn't allow themselves to stoop that low. They're very nice people, who devote their work to everyone, and ask for nothing in return. I really want to give all of them a hug.

[Fel]

Modding is a lot of work. I perfectly understand that someone may want to earn some money when they work for hours every evening (if not all day as some modders do here).

I find it strange that talking about money for mod is shunned

This is a bit blunt but... you, as a modder, may work on something on and off for a total of... 500 man-hours of labor/year

HarvesteR and Friends may work on KSP, continuously, for a total of 36000 man-hours of labor/year.

HarvesteR and Friends charge $30 for KSP at a cost of 833 u$ per man hour

You may charge, $2 for a mod at a cost of 4 m$ per man hour, or 4.8x more than what the game devs charge.

Economies of scale affects how much you make, but it also affects how much the dollar is worth in our eyes.

[KillAshley]

I am on the fence, really...I can see how it would benefit the community in such a way to provide modders with an income to continue to do great work, and put more passion into their mods...BUT the whole thing is a minefield waiting to happen. I for one have never charged for work I've done for other games in the past, nor will i for work i do in the future. My additions are made for me primarily, to breath new life into the game in a way I want to (as is probably the same sentiment with a lot of people out there) and releasing them to the community is a way to share that experience.

The main problem I see is how would the paid scheme actually work? For example, KSRPC relies on other mods (texture replacer/kittopiatech/EVE/DOE/PlanetShine/RSS) would the authors of those dependency mods get paid when KSPRC get downloaded? My New Horizons planet pack relies on Kopernicus & KittopiaTech, would the authors of those mods get paid if my pack was downloaded? Things like that would drive prices a lot higher than a normal person would be willing to pay for, resulting in the whole scheme collapsing on itself.

[sarbian]

This is a bit blunt but... you, as a modder, may work on something on and off for a total of... 500 man-hours of labor/year

HarvesteR and Friends may work on KSP, continuously, for a total of 36000 man-hours of labor/year.

HarvesteR and Friends charge $30 for KSP at a cost of 833 u$ per man hour

You may charge, $2 for a mod at a cost of 4 m$ per man hour, or 4.8x more than what the game devs charge.

Economies of scale affects how much you make, but it also affects how much the dollar is worth in our eyes.

First your comparison is wrong since the devs don't work 365 days per year and not 10 hours a day. And not all Squad dev are full time on KSP. And I sure spend way more than 500 hour a year on KSP modding.

Second economics is a matter of demand and cost. If someone feel that 2$ for a mod is worth it then they pay for it. If it was a pure matter of time then you wouldn't see any $5 game and AAA title would sold for hundreds of dollars.

[hab136]

I believe modders wouldn't allow themselves to stoop that low. They're very nice people, who devote their work to everyone, and ask for nothing in return. I really want to give all of them a hug.

I can't speak for other modders, but I'm not that nice, and I both write mods and contribute to other mods for entirely selfish reasons - either because something is annoying me, or I want some feature to exist.

• AutoAsparagus - asparagus staging annoyed me, so I wrote a mod to do it for me. If SmartStage had existed at the time, I might not have bothered.
  
• SafeChute continued - I didn't even write this, just spruced it up, because it wasn't working and I wanted it to.
  
• Icons for MechJeb - I made some crappy placeholder icons for the toolbar, mostly just to figure out the icon names needed. Somehow they turned into the default set.
  
• EPL: it annoyed me that EPL didn't have background building or Kerbal Alarm Clock integration, so I fixed those. Also pad renaming and drawing up the X/Y/Z axis for stakes.
  
• Davon Supply Mod: this is a time-based mod, yet didn't have Kerbal Alarm Clock integration?? I'll just fix that myself.
  
• 
  

I did these things for me, not anyone else. But, it costs me nothing to share, and I do receive benefit for sharing, just not cash.

By sharing, I got:

• AutoAsparagus: Graphics, code fixes, and ideas
  
• SafeChute continued: Easy install via CKAN
  
• Mechjeb icons: Easy install (don't have to manually change icons every time I upgrade)
  
• EPL: code fixes, and I don't have to maintain my own fork
  
• Davon Supply Mod: code fixes, and I don't have to maintain my own fork
  
• 
  

I'd rather have all that than the $3.50 I'd get from selling the work I've done.

On the flip side.. if I thought I could make mods for a living, I'd probably do that. I've got a folder full of mod ideas that I don't have time to work on, let alone time to work on my existing mod. I just don't see a way to clear a livable wage off it, even in a low-cost country.

[sarbian]

I did these things for me, not anyone else.

This. So much this

[sp1989]

If I may comment from a consumer perspective. I am not a modder, texturer, or configurer. With KSP being in its current form I don't think paying modders would work mainly because of abandoned mods and IRL events that cause modders to drop projects and in some cases beloved and very useful projects get completely lost. So paying for a mod only to have it lose support doesn't work. There needs to a guarantee that work is continued through iterations and support is given if something goes wrong. I know this is 1.0 and supposedly a stable game but come on this is Squad I can't imagine them stopping here. There will be updates just less often. So my point is, that to pay for a mod and then have it die, that would be unacceptable. Even if the cost incentive is there, things happen and interest gets lost.

That being said when 1.0 comes out it might be a good idea for squad to take a look at some of the best mods out there, Sarbian Mechjeb is certainly one that should get a look, and buy the rights from each perspective modder. Then release them as DLCs and not only pay the modder for the rights to the mod but also give them money for each download. It also could be better for this community because people would release better mods hoping that squad will buy and maintain it so squad will buy it. I don't have alot of money but I have also had countless hours of fun and enjoyment because of many modders out there. If one day they were to become paid mods I feel that even if its just to support the people who have made this game amazing for me I would buy the DLC. Because the modders have been basically beta testing their mods just like squad has for the last 4 years. So it seems only fair. Would I like having to pay? definitely not. Would I? Hell yes because having been a part of this community for almost two years now, I know the hard work that goes into everything and you guys deserve it. I also think that there are alot of awesome modders out there who have been hiding a lot of their best stuff or have left the community due to loss of interest. So they mod for themselves. If there was a cost incentive we might truly see some amazing mods come out or get revived.

[michaelhester07]

I wouldn't mind being paid for my mods. If I could devote 8 hours a day on just that and work it for a living I'd be able to make much higher quality mods and still have time to play. Not only that I'd have time to support my mods too. I'd love to work from home selling mods. I've always had a knack for finding the things people like to see. One of my first mods was long ago for Dungeon Siege (if you recall that... good for you) where I made weapon packs including some Lord of the Rings weapons. Sadly im not the owner of the Skyrim version of that pack. Hearing that skyrim mods can be sold I may go back to work on my wheel weapon mod. Here in Kerbal Space Program I have Stanford Torus and Civilian Management, both are fairly popular mods. Civilian Management could have been worth $12000 last I checked on its download count assuming it went for $0.99 like most iphone apps. Even if squad takes 60/40 for that I could have had $5000 for it. If I made money like that from a mod I'd have much more incentive to work on it.

I feel like I have a lack of support for my Civilian Population mod because I don't get much free time for that. Truth be told on that one I've been waiting for 1.0 to do another update. If I can make steady income off mods then I can have time to support them properly. I'll definitely be updating my mods for 1.0 (I finally made the kraken killer for Stanford Torus) but that will take my free time next week.

I doubt I would have had the popularity in my mods if they were pay to play that I do now. I notice this with most gamers is they're rather... frugal when it comes to paying for in-game things. I'd agree with that sentiment. I was actually disgusted yesterday while waiting in line at a restaurant. These kids were playing a frogger clone on their iphone. Every time their frog died there was an Ad for $4.99 in-game purchase. If I saw that I'd take the game away. I'd hate to feel that game mods are going the same way but it makes sense from a business standpoint. Make a Madoka Magicka mod for Skyrim... get 100,000 downloads. Bethesda goes "hey.. that could have been $100,000 profit that we didn't get!" Modder goes "hey i made the mod I want a cut of that". Bethesda then goes "sure... we get 50%, steam gets 30% for hosting it, and you get 20%". All invested parties win, players have no trouble dropping 99c on a mod.

At that point it becomes this question: should someone be allowed to live off modding games?

For me if a mod is good enough I'd pay for it.

As far as KSP goes though... a lot of mods for it wouldn't exist without certain framework mods. These mods are only useful so long as the remain free and easy to license (Creative Commons makes that easy). My CivPop mod wouldn't work as well as it does if I had to use my own code for it.. at least not quickly. I'd eventually get there.

[Gordon861]

I worried when I saw Steam was starting with the paid for mods yesterday, I think it is a slippery slope that may lead to all sorts of problems in the future.

As far as I'm concerned a paid for Mod should be proper DLC and supported for all future versions of the product it Mods. It should also mean that the DEVs of the main product should provide a proper system of integrating MODs so that they don't conflict and proper registry of which are supported officially in game, including changelogs etc. The current Steam Workshop XXX Mod has updated with no idea what has actually happened is not a good system.

I hope that the KSP DEVs do not decide to follow the Steam route.

[michaelhester07]

Paid mod wouldn't become proper DLC for at least two reason I can think of:

- No dev in their right mind wants to fully support a third party developed project. It's already a PITA to support their own material.

- No mod player will pay $29.95 for player made DLC (what proper DLC will end up costing if what I paid for the Skyrim DLC is any indicator).

I wouldn't want to price my mods at the same cost as full games. I'd want to charge 99 cents (if that) so that you don't get sticker shocked away from my material.

That said I'd probably never charge for KSP mods as I'd have to provide my own backend rather than use public frameworks to avoid licensing issues.