Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

Ah yeah I should perhaps mention that I meant "you" as a general term for anyone considering it.... Just realized how harsh my rhetoric sounded... no offence meant to you personally far327! I do take my proverbial hat of for you starting this discussion and gathering feedback! :)

Anyways I do not really see a problem in you more actively asking for donations.. as long as people can opt out if that is the case I do not see a problem in it. And in that case any legal technicalities would be null n void since the product is for all intents and purposes free.

I guess overall that this is a fairly unique problem of sorts... in the creative industry you can most often sell the creative product you make... but you can not sell what you used to create it. (Not going to take experience in using the tools into account which might eventually make you a job one day! It might happen for some in this case, but... you know what I mean I hope!)
There is a reason why photoshop cost half an arm... if you know how to use the tool you can earn a lot of money and not have to pay any royalties to adobe for doing it.

In the case of ENB and other post processing injectors, you will also be selling what you use to create your creative product... and that is a no go, since that part of the whole deal is covered by licences that prohibit it in most cases.

Also I have accepted a few donations in my time... although only in the form of games on my steam account. And then only after saying "no need" for about two times.. but there are just some people who are really nice out there! Also I do not want to deal with money issues... it is just to bothersome.. with tax and everything!

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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

Aiyen wrote:Ah yeah I should perhaps mention that I meant "you" as a general term for anyone considering it.... Just realized how harsh my rhetoric sounded... no offence meant to you personally far327! I do take my proverbial hat of for you starting this discussion and gathering feedback! :)

Anyways I do not really see a problem in you more actively asking for donations.. as long as people can opt out if that is the case I do not see a problem in it. And in that case any legal technicalities would be null n void since the product is for all intents and purposes free.

I guess overall that this is a fairly unique problem of sorts... in the creative industry you can most often sell the creative product you make... but you can not sell what you used to create it. (Not going to take experience in using the tools into account which might eventually make you a job one day! It might happen for some in this case, but... you know what I mean I hope!)
There is a reason why photoshop cost half an arm... if you know how to use the tool you can earn a lot of money and not have to pay any royalties to adobe for doing it.

In the case of ENB and other post processing injectors, you will also be selling what you use to create your creative product... and that is a no go, since that part of the whole deal is covered by licences that prohibit it in most cases.

Also I have accepted a few donations in my time... although only in the form of games on my steam account. And then only after saying "no need" for about two times.. but there are just some people who are really nice out there! Also I do not want to deal with money issues... it is just to bothersome.. with tax and everything!

No no, you have been extremely polite and knowledgeable in articulating your points of concern. I knew bringing up a topic like this here would be a good experience. A healthy debate :)

I can't say such nice things for the overall Skyrim community however. If anyone cares to see the extreme comments I had to put up with and defend myself against, check out this long Reddit thread all based on my decision to go donate only with my preset. Maybe then some may understand better, how vicious and disrespectful the downloading community can really be.

Remember guys, when they talk about modders, enb preset creators etc... They aren't just talking about me, they are talking about all of us. Bear in mind that most of my comments were down voted to dirt, so you will have to do a find for "far327" on the page to see my voice on the matter and how I stuck up for the ENB community and modding community as a whole. I suggest sorting the discussion by controversial. Else most of the actual debate gets lost in biased opinion.

EDIT: Additionally, if you read the reddit thread, for the record the .dll files were removed from my upload. I simply forgot to remove them before the initial upload. Also, my mod on Nexus was re-instated 24 hours later. (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/57189/?) I even have an administrators attention to possibly allow me to link to my blog from my nexus page as long as I don't solicit donations on my nexus mods page.

http://www.reddit.com/r/skyrimmods/comm ... nate_only/

and again here...

http://www.reddit.com/r/modpiracy/comme ... b_presets/
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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

Yeah well considering you forgot to remove .dll´s etc and then make it sound like you charge money for your work.... donatation to get password = selling.. at least if the user does not have the option to say "I donate 0.00 bucks".
I can understand why someone would get their panties in a twist over that sort of thing.

But yeah there are just too many people who really do not think before they type.... I have done it at one (+/- more) time(s), heck I am sure we all have... if we are passionate about something and/or have a bad day, we tend to forget ourselves. Granted some people really should have their anonymity privilege removed when moving about the internet.

That said I do not condone what most users out there do... but I can understand the reaction, especially since most people hear it from 3rd party sources, where the context of something has long since vanished... and now they just hear "Pay for ENB preset".

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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

Aiyen wrote:donatation to get password = selling.. at least if the user does not have the option to say "I donate 0.00 bucks".
Sorry Aiyen, I couldn't tell if you are just stating how the Reddit community interrupted this, or if that is your opinion i.e. "donation for a password = selling"

But yes, I'm happy someone recognizes the rabid types that exist against the whole pay for mods thing. I think they would nail me to a cross if given the opportunity.

Actually they do have the option to donate 0.00. Well at least 0.01 if they want. Although I would consider this trolling and almost all cases, but who am I to judge what someone can afford?
Last edited by far327 on 09 May 2015, 00:30, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

Far, if you think you should be paid for your work, then ask for it, and if someone think it's worth, he will pay, like everything else.
Just keep in mind that there are countries (like mine :) ) where only small % of software (games, movies, music, etc..) are actually paid, and paying for some tiny mod sounds ridiculous. Dont get me wrong I totally respect yours and all other guys/girls work here. Just want to give you another perspective.

As for the shader, if you look on the WEB there are tons of examples for every kind of image processing and who is original author is very questionable.

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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

saltr wrote:Far, if you think you should be paid for your work, then ask for it, and if someone think it's worth, he will pay, like everything else.
Just keep in mind that there are countries (like mine :) ) where only small % of software (games, movies, music, etc..) are actually paid, and paying for some tiny mod sounds ridiculous. Dont get me wrong I totally respect yours and all other guys/girls work here. Just want to give you another perspective.

As for the shader, if you look on the WEB there are tons of examples for every kind of image processing and who is original author is very questionable.
Thanks saltr

I mean, what you said is pretty much what I'm doing. I guess I didn't consider other countries software buying habits. I visit my family in the Philippines each year and I know exactly what you are saying. But I'm not looking to get rich or even really make a side income (although a side income would be nice.) And I'm not worried about online community reputation. This is about a couple things. I want to see a shift in donations for modders work, because the download to donation ratio is heavily out of balance and I believe we mostly are taken advantage of. I also want to remind downloaders that what we create is not something that they can dictate on how we decide to share it. I'm trying to prove a point, that downloaders do not represent all modders voices when it came to the failed Skyrim Workshop "pay for mods" program.

If I didn't donate frequently to others, I don't think I would have such an extreme view on this, but it's very frustrating to me when I donate to someone else and they usually tell me that no one has ever offered a donation, or that my donation was the first they'd received.

A basic principle is lost in this debate. When a good or service is provided, something should be given in return. Something tangible.
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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

I thought that since the license about ENB was brought up, I'd copy and paste it as reference for all joining the conversation:
LICENSE AGREEMENT AND DISTRIBUTION RULES:
1 Copyrights of the ENBSeries (the SOFTWARE) exclusively belongs to AUTHOR - Vorontsov Boris (ENB developer).
2 ENBSeries is DonateWare application (freeware), which means you may or may not pay for this software to the author as donation.
3 Software provided "AS IS", without warranty of any kind, use it on your own risk.
4 You agree not to change or remove any parts of software (files in archive or installer) without author permission. Decompilation, reverse enginering, disassembling, debugging or changing resources of software is prohibited.
5 You may use and distribute software in commercial or non-commercial purposes. For commercial use it is required to warn about using this software (in credits, on the box or other places). Commercial distribution of software as part of the games without author permission prohibited.
6 Author reserve the right to change these license agreement.
7 All the rights, not described in this license agreement belongs to author.
8 You allowed to add new files to ENBSeries archive or installer.
9 You may sell presets, shaders, bitmaps, documentation and any other components for ENBSeries, except binary files (dll, exe) created by author of ENBSeries.
10 Custom presets, shaders, bitmaps, documentation and any other components for ENBSeries belongs to their authors and may have copyrights and license.

By executing the ENBSeries you accepting terms of use and this license agreement.
So, legally, it specifically says you CAN SELL PRESETS including DEFAULT SHADERS except for binary files. Custom presets and other components belong to their respective authors. Now, this is where it gets a little murky... someone like Aiyen, for example, or prod80 or others like them have created most or all of their shaders from scratch. They may use ideas and work that's been developed elsewhere (all work is building on the shoulders of others) but ultimately those shaders are theirs. They made them. It's their work. Others, like myself, who can read about 1/4th of the HLSL code in shader files at most and can't write a shader to save their lives (usually because of laziness, certainly in my case :P ), may own the preset they created as a whole, but the components within belong to the original authors. Therefore, if selling that preset, those original authors could request a share of proceeds or removal of those files because those files are theirs, not yours.

I'd like to comment for a moment on the most common objection I hear about the whole idea of paid mods, one which I believe Kontrapunkt brought up (sorry if you didn't, but I think you did). This is the idea of "you started modding because you love it" or some variation thereof. Initially, yeah, we do it because we want to. We release it for a variety of reasons. For some it's because they share screenshots and people want to make their game look like that. Some because they put in a ton of work and want to share what they've made. Some do it for the community, to give something of worth. Some don't really know why, they just release it. Whatever the reason in the beginning, the mod users can change that idea and fast. For a mod user to get some perspective, imagine what it's like to take the time to write out detailed instructions on how to install the mod, triple-checking it to make sure all the info is correct. Then users start commenting and complaining (not asking for help, but actually complaining) that the mod doesn't work. You know the answer to their problem from the brief description they said, they listen to what you said and go "oh... yeah, I didn't do that" WHICH IS CLEARLY WRITTEN in the description... Imagine this happening 20 times in a row... answering the same question... people requesting or even demanding some change or this or that. Managing a mod released for free on the Nexus, especially a popular one, can become as time-consuming as a part-time job (heck even full-time). After a little while of this you might go "I'm putting 20 (or 30 or 40 or 10 or whatever) hours a week into this... I really should get paid for this." And this is after the 10's or 100's or 1000's of hours we put into making the mod. We make the mod because we want to make the mod. We release the mod to share. We DON'T release the mod to be the idiot checker or become a tech support service. But that's what mod authors become... either that or the comment page starts getting filled with "This mod's abandoned... it's gonna be broken forever" and the like.

At this point, it's up to each author to make the choice to ask for donations, or sell, or not. And I don't begrudge them that choice. If you want to request donations or put it up for sale or whatever, feel free. You DO avoid a lot of the legal pitfalls if you make it a gift in exchange for donations. I can think of a number of organizations that I get solicited by for donations and, in return for my donation, are willing to give me something whether a book or dvd or subscription to something. Just be ready for community backlash... oh, and if it were me, I'd never go to reddit again if you do involve money... that place is... *shudders* Ravenous wolves...
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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

far327 wrote:
saltr wrote:Far, if you think you should be paid for your work, then ask for it, and if someone think it's worth, he will pay, like everything else.
Just keep in mind that there are countries (like mine :) ) where only small % of software (games, movies, music, etc..) are actually paid, and paying for some tiny mod sounds ridiculous. Dont get me wrong I totally respect yours and all other guys/girls work here. Just want to give you another perspective.

As for the shader, if you look on the WEB there are tons of examples for every kind of image processing and who is original author is very questionable.
Thanks saltr

I mean, what you said is pretty much what I'm doing. I guess I didn't consider other countries software buying habits. I visit my family in the Philippines each year and I know exactly what you are saying. But I'm not looking to get rich or even really make a side income (although a side income would be nice.) And I'm not worried about online community reputation. This is about a couple things. I want to see a shift in donations for modders work, because the download to donation ratio is heavily out of balance and I believe we mostly are taken advantage of. I also want to remind downloaders that what we create is not something that they can dictate on how we decide to share it. I'm trying to prove a point, that downloaders do not represent all modders voices when it came to the failed Skyrim Workshop "pay for mods" program.

If I didn't donate frequently to others, I don't think I would have such an extreme view on this, but it's very frustrating to me when I donate to someone else and they usually tell me that no one has ever offered a donation, or that my donation was the first they'd received.

A basic principle is lost in this debate. When a good or service is provided, something should be given in return. Something tangible.
Just want to add that I agree with you completely and I want to say thank you for stepping up to represent mod authors. Some of the things with the Steam Workshop thing were ridiculous, the pay model and all that... there were a lot of things to be upset about, some of which I was upset about, but the idea as a whole there's nothing wrong with. I'm stunned when I hear how few donations (or no donations) some of these authors have gotten. I admit I often forget to donate, but when I find out someone has never been offered a donation, particularly a prominent author, it stuns me.
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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

@Jafin16

Wow man! You really nailed it when describing how much time is put into support, let alone the creation process. These were the reasons I finally decided to turn off comments permanently.

Thanks for your comradery on the issue. I was hoping this would be the one place I could find some support and agreement on this subject. So far, I feel this is a great discussion!

Thanks for posting the license agreement. To add to that, I have direct permission from Boris via email as well. I posted it on the reddit thread to shut-up the lot of them. And, yeah I don't see myself going back there. I only created the account to defend myself when I saw all them talking shit! LoL!!
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Re: Your opinion about soliciting ENB presets for donations

Guys, you are out of reality. First of all, i granted selling possibility for presets from very beginning, because ENBSeries is standalone software which not fall under any game licenses and do not utilize any third party code required licensing (AntTweakBar license is loyal, same as the fastest compression algorithm and xml parser). I was mad when heard several years ago about some korean user who sell my mod, because they sell it as own creation with binaries. Same about those "hexers" who modified mod startup text and about data to their own, which is illegal almost for any software.
Second, you know what i call "crapware"? These are very popular nowadays, while wasn't the problem when i just started the project. Basically, that crap is everything which hook in to game process (and not just games frequently) to provide questionably features, dublicating them from other more pro tools. Why? Because they sell such soft, display advertisement or use malicious code (or all together). Are they made by great guys who i can trust or respect? Definetly not. But why the heck they have the profit for doing nothing and breaking proper work of games and my mod, but true job can't be paid? It's me who was burn and raised in communistic country, but i still feel this situation is not right. Release high quality product and be proud of it, others will always take money for any single shit they made, while you whine how wrong to sell the presets. Yes, it's wrong, but for selling mods, not presets (though FSX mods available for sale and very popular, i think it's only because non-pop community where you have no chance to release tons of trash).
Third, shaders made by others are not perfect at least by optimization and i don't see any issue to get idea behind them and write own same algorithm heavily optimized, it's the job actually (when i worked on optimizing, asked twice higher salary than regular 3d coding). You can't just use same file of slightly modify it, but algorithms behind them are not covered by any patents (yet), so rewriting entirely will work fine. I suggest to write somewhere which work is based to make author happy, in some way.

Summary, there is always someone who will buy your product and someone who will hate you, so make a profit from it as you live once.
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