Proposed Policy Change - the Modiquette

[Ogedei_the_Mad]

How is a moderator expected to know who is using what mod?

Think it is an unreasonable expectation that staff is going to do pre-emptive checks every time someone wishes to use a mod?

Agreed. People pop in and out and sometimes they just disappear off the face of cyberspace. And CFC is a relatively huge online community.

I think - and I am also saying this as a modder - that if the modder doesn't want his work to be used any more, it is his or her own responsibility to make it clear. On the other side of this, a modder's intentions also ought to be respected - it should be very much a two-way street between content creators and content users.

 

[Kyriakos]

Not an accurate phrase, since it is not - as you know - a matter of wanting one's work to be used or not, but a matter of the work being modified. It is one thing to allow it to be used (generally if it is uploaded it can be used) and another thing to allow public modifications of it.

I still do not really see what the problem here is. If you make it, you own it, simple as that. If another person wants to use it, you offer it in the database. If another person wants to ruin modify it, then he must ask for permission first. In my perspective this is just logical.
And the idea that the default stance is to allow modifications is ok, just do note that if the creator specifies they are not allowed, this must be accepted.

 

[DaveShack]

If you don't want it modified, then you say that when you post it. But you're the one who will have to complain if it does get modified, there's no expectation that everything that gets posted is going to get inspected for compliance.

 

[Ogedei_the_Mad]

If you don't want it modified, then you say that when you post it. But you're the one who will have to complain if it does get modified, there's no expectation that everything that gets posted is going to get inspected for compliance.

Exactly. It's the modder's responsibility to be clear and it's the user's responsibility to be respectful. Simple as that.

 

[Padjur]

I don't really get the problem or what you are afraid of.

That the rule is not properly drafted and it ends up causing more problems than it is intended to fix.

 

[embryodead]

I don't think its right for someone to claim it is OK to break a modders terms and conditions, on the grounds that they contain standard file formats used in other software, file formats are not a viable argument or reason to ignore peoples terms and conditions. And nor are they a valid argument to ignore the game licence agreement.

Can we please leave the enforcement of license agreements to license owners, 2K? I'm sure they know better than modders what things are subject to their license and whether it is actually an issue for them.

 

[Kyriakos]

If you don't want it modified, then you say that when you post it. But you're the one who will have to complain if it does get modified, there's no expectation that everything that gets posted is going to get inspected for compliance.

I agree with you on that, obviously, but this was not my point. The question was a minor one, what happens when a modder has left the site, moreover one who in his pages states that no derivatives are allowed without permission, and someone claims that he has gotten permission.

But, like i said, this is a minor issue. I don't expect the rules to be so austere or overly shaped. It is far more important, at least for me, to agree that one can state- as is common practice now- that no derivatives are allowed without permission, and this will to stand practically in this site.

 

[Padjur]

I agree with you on that, obviously, but this was not my point. The question was a minor one, what happens when a modder has left the site, moreover one who in his pages states that no derivatives are allowed without permission, and someone claims that he has gotten permission.

If someone claims they have permission and there is no complaint against them, why would the site take action.
The responsibility to protect is the modder's, if it is so important to the modder that no one makes derivative of their mod they will have to police it.
And if they leave and no longer take a interest in what happens to it the mod, why should the site have to take responsibility for it?

 

[Monaldinio]

And if they leave and no longer take a interest in what happens to it the mod, why should the site have to take responsibility for it?

Cant imagent, only because a modder leave the Forum, that means Not automaticly he is no longer Interessted in Whats Happen with his work! Thats the biggest balderdash i have ever hear.
Do you think an Artist is no longer Interessted in his Artwork only because his work is completed?!?
More and more this discussion turs in the wrong direction!
And some of the contrarguments are realy wordly innocent...
As Long as a modder have Not give his work for Free use, you have to assume that he is interested in his work.

 

[Flying Pig]

I should agree with that - I was forced by circumstances very much beyond my control to take a hiatus from this forum not so long ago, and was very pleased to return.

 

[Padjur]

Cant imagent, only because a modder leave the Forum, that means Not automaticly he is no longer Interessted in Whats Happen with his work! Thats the biggest balderdash i have ever hear.
Do you think an Artist is no longer Interessted in his Artwork only because his work is completed?!?
More and more this discussion turs in the wrong direction!
And some of the contrarguments are realy wordly innocent...
As Long as a modder have Not give his work for Free use, you have to assume that he is interested in his work.

Don't miss quote me
I did not say that leaving the forum automatically means anything, I did not use the word automatically!
Try reading it again.

And there is no reason for you to be insulting to what is a perfectly reasoned argument.

the rule says that permission is required.
Derivative works are only allowed with permission, as long as no other rights are violated.

I accept the point that no one should be forced to share and that they should be asked but if you want people to ask for permission should they not be available to be asked?
If you require permission to use and make yourselves unavailable to be asked for permission, it effectively becomes a way of stopping people making a Derivative mod, regardless.
Is this rule meant to stop sharing then and prevent Derivative mods from being made?
I thought the rule change was about ensuring that members respect others hard work, not protectionism.
If you want to be asked fair enough, then the least you can do is leave a contact address and reply to any request to use the mod.

If you leave the site can you reasonably expect that the site to take responsibility for the terms and conditions of your Mod.
The enforcement of copyright has always been the responsibility of the copyright holder.
I know it has been challenged in various courts across the world as to whether or not intermediaries are liable for copyright infringement by their users, for example Megaupload (what a loss that was for the modding community!) but is this really the way we want to go here?

 

[raystuttgart]

the rule says that permission is required.
Derivative works are only allowed with permission, as long as no other rights are violated.

No, the rule does not say that.

The rule bacically says:
"If a modder explicitly states that permission is required ..."
(Unless stated otherwise ... free to use ...)

Most modders will not state that usage of their work requires permission.
They will either state nothing or state explicitly something like "You can use my work as long as you respect my terms of usage.".

I accept the point that no one should be forced to share and that they should be asked but if you want people to ask for permission should they not be available to be asked?

And again, even if modders become inactive, they will usually still be contactable by the eMail in their profile
or at least sometimes be around to read what has happened in their threads.

Or you can simply ask a moderator or one of the other "old" modders, if he knows how that modder can be contacted.

If you require permission to use and make yourselves unavailable to be asked for permission, it effectively becomes a way of stopping people making a Derivative mod, regardless.

No it does not, trust me.

Most of us have always been working like this.
It was a code of honor until now.
Now it simply becomes a rule.

If a modder really does not want to have derivates of his work, he can now state that.

Why is that good ?

1. Until now, such a modder usually simply did remove his downloads or did not publish at all.
No he might at least publish so that community can play his work.

2. Moderators and administrators will have less problems clarifying issues, because there is an explicit rule.

Is this rule meant to stop sharing then and prevent Derivative mods from being made?

Please stop to get into panic.
There really is no reason for that.

The only people that might get problems with that rule are respectless copycats.
Everybody else - community and modders - will profit from that.

If you leave the site can you reasonably expect that the site to take responsibility for the terms and conditions of your Mod.

Nobody does expect this site (meaning admins and moderators) to take responsibility for checking.

We - the modders - are also still around.

I am perfectly able to take responsibility for my own work.

On the other hand, if I believe, that somebody has violated the terms of usage or permissions of a modding friend or does not give credits to him,
I will simply inform my modding friend.

 

[Commander Bello]

I completely understand the staff's intention to develop clear guidelines. This will help staff and any member.

Nevertheless, people seem to neglect a lot of things. But let's do it step by step.

a) third party content (being under third party's copyright)
The new rule should clearly state that anybody making third party content available (by upload and/or link) has to have the right to do so and to state both: the fact that he has been authorized and that third party's copyright is still valid

b) free to use
i) The new rule should clearly state that content which has been linked to or has been uploaded shall be considered as "free to use" unless covered by (a).
ii) Furthermore, it should state that credit shall be given, if reasonably possible (in other words: as long as you can be expected to know the work's creator, you'll have to give credit).
iii) In case you have not given proper credit and someone else notifies you about this, you shall correct your fault within a reasonable amount of time. If you don't, a moderator can do that if requested by the work's creator.
iv) Furthermore, even if you seem to have left the forum, your work will stay as "free to use".
v) If you want to restrict others from using your work, please remove it from this forum's database within a reasonable timeframe (say: six months from publishing the new rule)

Rationale:
a)
I think (as far as I have got it from the current discussion) we all can agree about this.

b)
At least one person in this thread has expressed his willingness to exclude certain other members from the right to make use of his work.
This opens a can of worms.

If I create something and I refuse Mr. A to make use of it but allow it for Mr. B, what do I do if Mr. A picks that work from Mr. B's new work?
In general, allowing restrictions will ultimately lead to endless credit notes with addendums who is allowed to use or not to use, but only if criterion XYZ is met ... You get the picture.
This becomes even more important when talking about "big mods". When a mod becomes a "big mod"? As far as I know there isn't any definition of the term "big mod". Who would I have to ask? And how long would I have to wait for a response? How many "team members" have to be included in the decision process?

I strongly question any person's statement that he or she has created anything without the help of others. We all have read tutorials, have asked, have begged for assistance and finally are making use of programs which have generously provided to us.
And now, after having consumed all this support, "we" are to restrict others?

And if any "modder" here would say that he does not allow the re-use of his work (and here: once again if proper credit is given), I for my person would be willing to let him leave.

tldr:
Protection of third party content is necessary and essential.
Allowing restrictions (once again, if not third party's content is concerned) will only lead to a flood of complaints and sooner or later to denouncing others.
Furthermore, it will make the whole process of making use of other persons' work complicated and turn it into a bureaucratic process.

Edit: one more reason, why restrictions shall not be allowed:
Mr. A has restricted his mod. Mr. B doesn't care and makes use of it and doesn't give credit. Now I pick Mr. B's work and make a modmod, giving Mr. B credit.
Finally, Mr. A shows up and complains about violation of his rights.
What about my modmod? Do I have to drown it in the sewer?

 

[raystuttgart]

At least one person in this thread has expressed his willingness to exclude certain other members from the right to make use of his work.
This opens a can of worms.

And what can be done against that ?
Basically nothing.

As I said, there is no (good) way of forcing a modder to share his work if he does not want to ...

He can simply not publish (anymore).

In the end all have lost.

Players lost a mod to play.
Other modders can still not access his work.

--------

I still don't get what some are so afraid of.

Does anybody really believe, that suddenly all modders will not be sharing anymore ?
Does anybody really believe, that suddenly all modders will not listen to friendly and reasonable words anymore ?

Edit:
Basically the very same rule (considering content) is applied in several other forums I know.
They are all still existant and that rule works quite well for them ...

 

[Padjur]

No, the rule does not say that.

The rule bacically says:
"If a modder explicitly states that permission is required ..."
(Unless stated otherwise ... free to use ...)

Most modders will not state that usage of their work requires permission.
They will either state nothing or state explicitly something like "You can use my work as long as you respect my terms of usage.".
.

pure semantics I was quoting from here

Scenarios:
Modder says that permission is required. Derivative works are only allowed with permission, as long as no other rights are violated.

and point was that if the terms of usage was that permission was required, should he not then be available to be asked.

And again, even if modders become inactive, they will usually still be contactable by the eMail in their profile
or at least sometimes be around to read what has happened in their threads.

Or you can simply ask a moderator or one of the other "old" modders, if he knows how that modder can be contacted.

Do I not make this point,

If you want to be asked fair enough, then the least you can do is leave a contact address and reply to any request to use the mod.

That is the point I'm making, if you want people to ask make yourself available, otherwise how can people ask?

If a modder really does not want to have derivates of his work, he can now state that.

Scenarios:
Modder includes 3rd party (e.g. music) with permission and states this. The 3rd party works cannot be derived without obtaining rights.
Modder does not state any sharing rules. Derivative works are allowed as long as no other rights are violated.
Modder says that permission is required. Derivative works are only allowed with permission, as long as no other rights are violated.

So there is a hidden fourth Scenario
Modder says that No Derivative works are allowed. So No Derivative works are allowed.
But let me make this clear to you, I'm not in a panic.
I believe that the modding community thrives on sharing not protectionism.
I am am not driven by self interest as I have no desire to ever make a Derivative work from another's mod, mine is derived from BTS 3.19.

Nobody does expect this site (meaning admins and moderators) to take responsibility for checking.

If you had actually taken the time to read the posts you would have known that I was responding to people who do expect this site to take responsibility for checking. And my point was that it is unreasonable to expect that this site be responsible.
Please don't patronise me!
I might be West of the Shannon but I'm not a fool.

 

[Writing Bull]

Yesterday I have posted this at another thread:

---


I'm the coordinator of the TAC project-team. We have created and presented two large mods for Colonization named TAC and Werewolves.

1. When you upload content, you automatically grant permission for it to be used by all members of this community.
2. Therefore no permission is required to use content that is uploaded.

Sorry, but we cannot agree to these two declarations. I understand the intended purpose, and I like it. But we cannot give the people, who download our mods, the right to use the content completely free. Why not? Because we are not allowed to do that.

We have created a lot of artwork kindly supported by artists who are not members of the modding-community of Civilization or Colonization. Especially we have using graphic art from cgtextures.com and music from jamendo.com. These internet platforms have their own rules for using their content. Our ingame-credits advise our users and other modders of that. We are not allowed to change these rules. We cannot permit to use our stuff in a way which harms the copyright-rules of other creators.

---

The J has told me that this thread here is the right one for these remarks. Sorry, I don't know whether these remarks are necessary yet. The discussion extends over many threads and includes a great number of postings. There are modiquette-abstracts at different threads. And I don't know which discussant is an ordinary user advancing his individual opinion and which discussant has a leadership position advancing an official statement.

My request: Please assert at all modiquette-threads that the modiquette doesn't allow the users to harm the copyrights of Third-party-creators. And that declarations of modders restricting the usage of their mods by reference to the rights of Third-party-creators always take precedence over possibly lax declarations of the modiquette.

 

[raystuttgart]

Sorry, but we cannot agree to these two declarations.

We - Religion and Revolution team - fully agree with that.

Modders and mod-teams must have the right to state terms of usage / permissions.
These modders and mod-teams must then also be able to rely on this forum to help them,
if issues arise that are related to somebody breaking these terms of usage / permissions.

 

[kiwitt]

cgtextures.com

65.000+ high resolution textures, free for personal and commercial use!

jamendo.com

The content is under one of the Creative Commons licenses, ...

These sites seem free to me ... i.e. so long as it is "not for profit", which all created mods are essentially, we would have no problem using the content.

However, as has been discussed before the actual creative talent in a mod resides in the modder/team, to which credit should be given or permission obtained, if it is then used in a derivative work.

 

[Commander Bello]

Actually, I am a bit confused.

In this thread persons who gladly make use of other users' contents are requesting the right to restrict use of what they have created.

And I am not talking about that infamous piece of music or that one building, which is (should be) protected by the original creator's copyright anyway. I am pretty sure that none of the users here is intending to break the copyright of third parties.

But these people are founding their work on what others have created previously. They benefit from other people's work, but they advocate the right to restrict the same chance for others.

It seems to be quite obvious what will be the outcome of this: a general attitude of mistrust and complaints. "Who did dare to make use of my precious work? Who do I have to blame next?"

Make restrictions part of the new policy and the modding scene will die due to the bureaucratic hassle which inevitably will follow.

 

[raystuttgart]

Make restrictions part of the new policy and the modding scene will die due to the bureaucratic hassle which inevitably will follow.

Infracta, Total War Center, ... all have that policy we are talking about.
And none of these modding forums is dead.

This is all we are currently talking about:

Unless stated otherwise by its author(s), any work that is supplied through links in the forums or Downloads database is free to be re-used for non-commercial purposes within this community, without permission, as long as credit is given and no 3rd party rights are violated (not considering IP holders of the Civilization franchise and users from this forum)

And again, this is exactly what most of us have always been doing.
Nobody here is talking about suddenly abandoning all reason and normal relations between modders.