Video Game News: Steam Sells Skyrim Mods.

And it's a pretty awful thing.

http://steamcommunity.com/games/SteamWorkshop/announcements/detail/208632365237576574

Why?
Mods are traditionally free from Skyrim Nexus or hundred of modding sites where they are made and downloaded without cost.
But now they're being monetised, it is widely assumed that many of the most popular game models will abandon the free sites in order to make a profit on Steam Workshop.

That isn't a problem.
What is the problem is that the person who made the content doesn't necessarily have to do that.

There is absolutely nothing to stop me from downloading a bunch of game mods and reselling them on Steam Workshop. I could easily make quite a fair amount of money from literally stealing content from hobbyists and enthusiasts.

There is no site moderations, no support, absolutely nothing to stop me from downloading a bunch of content, not even repurposing it, and then resell it to lots of less-than-intelligent consumers who don't quite understand that mods are free and always have been (Essentially, children with their parents wallets.)

I could get banned from Steam, but the content creator has no proof I stole their content they spent weekends of downtime from work painstakingly building. And anyone can snatch it up and make a quick buck.
And Steam are not going to check the Nexus to see if the mod is officially yours. The site contains great mods made by veteran developers, weird/cheap/broken mods made by teenagers and people who just enjoy Skyrim and... adult ones made by people with too much time on their hands.

The author makes a 25% cut from the mod, 75% goes to Bethesda who then take a 5% morsel and throw it at Valve. 5% may not seem like much, but if you don't think they'll make money, you're underestimating just how many people are still playing Skyrim.

Which is sort of weird. It's a game from 2011, four years ago, that people are still making lots of money off today despite the fact they were just enjoying the game and creating new parts of it yesterday without making a red cent.

It is, as PCGamer summed up thusly:  Bethesda and Valve are inviting the rebels into the boardroom—come in here, dear boy, have a cigar—and a lot of PC gamers are looking on in disgust.


I'm just a bit blown away by the oversight here. No curation? Half the mods barely work with each other and what if it crashes your game or corrupts it? You'll have to pay for the game and mods all over again!

Jeez.