I'd expect Firaxis to have some responsibilities in regards to preventing some mods from being distributed. This is much more relevant to them than it was before if it is true they will allow the distribution of mods using their own servers (or Steam's). Previously they had no responsibility over what was distributed on fansites like cfc, IIUC.
A theory that Firaxis will ban mods they don't like (most probably before they get far into development I'm sure) is not crackpot, but maybe alarmist.
As for opposing the idea of adopting a "sky is falling attitude", we've already seen that it's hard to argue with a game feature if it's announced well after the actual decision was made to go ahead with it. Unlike the requirement of Steam, complaining about how mods get handled or DLC will be handled could actually have an effect on future decisions by Firaxis or 2K. People have every right, and almost a responsibility IMO, to voice their concerns about which direction the game is going in.
The only reason we didn't have people complaining about Steam around here before it was announced was obviously because it was not expected. I bet you would have happily called someone's suggestion that civ5 will be a Steamworks game a crackpot theory, because it had no evidence to support it. If everyone always waited until final decisions were made before complaining they would have effectively zero influence on the decisions made about the game's development. For many people, experience tells them that once a publisher or developer starts to employ DLC, they rarely back down on it later - it only can get worse. So while it's definitely pessimistic, it is from their point of view expected.
And none of this is helped by the fact that Firaxis are known to have a very silent strategy in regards to community consultation and involvement. People have to speculate about possible future scenarios because they have little real info to go on and know they need to get in with complaints early.
A theory that Firaxis will ban mods they don't like (most probably before they get far into development I'm sure) is not crackpot, but maybe alarmist.
As for opposing the idea of adopting a "sky is falling attitude", we've already seen that it's hard to argue with a game feature if it's announced well after the actual decision was made to go ahead with it. Unlike the requirement of Steam, complaining about how mods get handled or DLC will be handled could actually have an effect on future decisions by Firaxis or 2K. People have every right, and almost a responsibility IMO, to voice their concerns about which direction the game is going in.
The only reason we didn't have people complaining about Steam around here before it was announced was obviously because it was not expected. I bet you would have happily called someone's suggestion that civ5 will be a Steamworks game a crackpot theory, because it had no evidence to support it. If everyone always waited until final decisions were made before complaining they would have effectively zero influence on the decisions made about the game's development. For many people, experience tells them that once a publisher or developer starts to employ DLC, they rarely back down on it later - it only can get worse. So while it's definitely pessimistic, it is from their point of view expected.
And none of this is helped by the fact that Firaxis are known to have a very silent strategy in regards to community consultation and involvement. People have to speculate about possible future scenarios because they have little real info to go on and know they need to get in with complaints early.