Morrowind 2011 Mod Collection Pulled After Complaints

[Bretty]

I think you need a reality check - the mod creators aren't in the wrong here, what the guy did was illegal, and what's more he clearly [well according to this news post anyway] didn't ask permission from the modders in the first place - and he's gaining positive publicity from their work...there's nothing wrong with them threatening action against him.

How is what he did illegal? The MOD creaters dont own any of the IP as it belongs to Bethesda. The only one who can sue anyone would be Bethesda.

But as the compiler is not making a profit, the Modders claims are baseless and jumped up.

This guy tried to do good for the community. Frankly speaking, as a member of that community, I am appaled that the modders were like this.

 

[grammarye]

Le sigh. The irony is that those modders, who spent a lot of their free time to work on great mods, are now less likely to see people using their work.

Should Mr Smith have requested permission? Yes. Should the modders have overreacted and made completely ridiculous legal threats? No. The burden on ownership of copyright is to prove that you made original works, first, without plagiarising others. I would genuinely struggle to see anyone other than individual model/sound artists etc. being able to make that claim. Software for example (scripts, source code) is notoriously hard to prove one way or the other. Ideas, note, cannot be subject to copyright - only patents.

Besides, what are they modding for if not for recognition? Smith needed to provide that by providing credits for certain, but that's the primary goal, no?

This 'you must give credit & you must contact the author' stance is getting ridiculous. For example, Fallout 3 had a great collection mod, the Unofficial Patch, containing loads of fixes. Today, Fallout New Vegas will never have such a collection, because the modders who might take on the task think it's far far too much work to catalogue, condense, and obtain permission for the literally thousands of little fix mods that they'd need to compile.

There is such a thing as too stringent. We're past that and into looney territory when modders, changing someone else's property in the first place, are claiming they can take legal action.

Reality checks required.

I don't know about your country, but in Australia anything you create gets an automatic copyright protection, theres no charge for it or anything like that, and you don't need to sell it to protect it you just need to prove its yours.

That misses an important legal distinction, setting aside that Bethesda only grant certain rights to modders anyway, which is that proving that something virtual like software is your creation is actually really hard. That it has your name on it is nothing like enough. It's a piece of electronic source code and could be altered by anyone at any time - you have to prove that you created (say) that script first and originally. That is extremely hard to do in a legal fashion, if someone contests that claim, at any point.

 

[Caiti Voltaire]

For once, I'm with the lawsuits here. He used the mods without the original owners permission. I can almost guarantee that if he contacted the creators first, this would never have happened.

I would rather have all the mods compiled into an easy package than find all of them myself. It doesnt generate any money for the modders, they're credited anyway. I think substantial work went into this finding mods that don't conflict, maybe not as much work as the sum of its parts, but enough to warrant it being a separate work in its own right.

If he contacted the creators first, they probably would've said no if the stance they're taking now is this extreme, also, people make mod-packs all the time, the only reason this one is being brought down is because its popular.

Pretty much. They feel threatened by someone actually gaining some sembalance of popularity. But they also feel that someone else is gaining popularity based on their work. But while the author of this compilation has bent over backwards and greased up his cornhole to deal with an acebric and egotistically petty community, the community in turn has just fucked him over all the harder.

I wish it was as black and white as to say that one party is clearly in the wrong here.

In some communities hard work and careful crediting would bring you praise and accolades. In the cesspool that is the TES modding community, it brings you legal threats and derision. In this light, I don't know why anyone bothers modding for these people. I have some Morrowind mods I am quite happy with, that I have made, and I share with friends, but Id never give them to the larger community. They frankly don't deserve it.

That said, however right or wrong the community or this compilation author may have been, the facts are this:

A: The TESCK EULA requires modders to surrender copyright to Bethesda.
B: This compilation was done without permission of the mod authors.
C: At least one of these mod authors complained to Bethesda.
D: Bethesda canned the mod compilation and banned the author.

Thats that. Bethesda's the copyright holder. They exerted their rights as the copyright holder.

Though I have to say, banning him from the forums as well cannot be anything other than trying to do damage control with the very histrionic mod authors. Personally, though, in the mod compilation authours place, I wouldn't want to participate there anymore either,

 

[Caiti Voltaire]

This 'you must give credit & you must contact the author' stance is getting ridiculous. For example, Fallout 3 had a great collection mod, the Unofficial Patch, containing loads of fixes. Today, Fallout New Vegas will never have such a collection, because the modders who might take on the task think it's far far too much work to catalogue, condense, and obtain permission for the literally thousands of little fix mods that they'd need to compile.

There is such a thing as too stringent. We're past that and into looney territory when modders, changing someone else's property in the first place, are claiming they can take legal action.

Reality checks required.

Due diligence is crediting people in a CREDITS file. This has been established convention with programming and patches, etc, since before the internet existed.

Asking everyone be contacted personally comes from the days of Shareware and has actually been struck down before in court as a legally-binding provision because email addresses were at the time considered not a reliable way to contact people online. Honestly? They still aren't. Email any 10 mod authors. You'll get maybe one response.

The author has to take due diligence to obtain permission, however, the permission holder must also exercise due diligence to inform the applicant that their request for permission is approved or denied.

Unfortunately the body that does hold the copyright - Bethesda - has made their stance clear. And it is indeed unfortunate, because its a knee-jerk reaction to histrionics in the community - histrionics the community should be deeply ashamed of - rather than an attempt to reconcile mod authors and the compilation author, which is what mature adults should do.

 

[Jamous]

GOD FUCKING DAMN IT.

 

[dfcrackhead]

Some asshole being an asshole deprived me of a Morrowind that doesn't look like ass. Yay.

So the Morrowind 2011 mod got taken down because all the modders whos mods were modded into the mod got mad?

That sucks, I don't even play Morrowind and that sucks

 

[D_987]

How is what he did illegal? The MOD creaters dont own any of the IP as it belongs to Bethesda. The only one who can sue anyone would be Bethesda.

You're wrong - see the massive debate about this earlier in the thread.

But as the compiler is not making a profit, the Modders claims are baseless and jumped up.

You're wrong - their claims aren't about money but not receiving sufficient credit for their work.

This guy tried to do good for the community. Frankly speaking, as a member of that community, I am appaled that the modders were like this.

You're wrong - the guy did exactly what a lot of people have done, the difference being he took their work without permission, contacted news-site to get his name [despite his lack of actually doing anything] on the front pages.

 

[Caiti Voltaire]

I would suspect that would depend on the work and what was used in creating it, regardless they would still own the rights to control who can reproduce their mods to some extent, if their work is their own and not a modified Bethesda job, however as stated above it depends on what the wording of the EULA is.

The EULA is very specific on this. You surrender all rights to the material to Bethesda, Personally, I would prefer something more like the first game you described, as that seems fairer to mod authors. However, that is not the reality of what Bethesda has chosen to do.

 

[grammarye]

Asking everyone be contacted personally comes from the days of Shareware and has actually been struck down before in court as a legally-binding provision because email addresses were at the time considered not a reliable way to contact people online. Honestly? They still aren't. Email any 10 mod authors. You'll get maybe one response.

Whilst I agree completely with what you said, that is unfortunately not true, at least in the way some modding communities are proceeding. Read the New Vegas Nexus terms of service:

# Absolutely no copyrighted work is to be used without permission of the original creator. This includes content from other games, from DLCs, music creators or from other file authors. This also includes members from countries that do not recognise copyright laws (such as Russia).
# All files uploaded must have been created by the uploader or used with permission from the original author of the content. If you cannot provide proof of consent when asked then your file will be removed and your account is likely to be banned.

We are right back in those days.

 

[RicoADF]

I would suspect that would depend on the work and what was used in creating it, regardless they would still own the rights to control who can reproduce their mods to some extent, if their work is their own and not a modified Bethesda job, however as stated above it depends on what the wording of the EULA is.

The EULA is very specific on this. You surrender all rights to the material to Bethesda, Personally, I would prefer something more like the first game you described, as that seems fairer to mod authors. However, that is not the reality of what Bethesda has chosen to do.

Well then I'll never be modding a Bethesda game, thankyou BIS I'm staying with ArmA

That's more or less true in the states as well. Improv is thinking of registering a copyright, which is necessary for mass publication. That said, the SDK does retain ownership of any modifications of the game for Bethesda.

What do you mean by registering a copyright? Do you mean trademark? In Australia there is nowhere to register as there is no need period for copyright (atleast afaik), weather its a photo you take of your family or a multimillion dollar game.

 

[Caiti Voltaire]

Asking everyone be contacted personally comes from the days of Shareware and has actually been struck down before in court as a legally-binding provision because email addresses were at the time considered not a reliable way to contact people online. Honestly? They still aren't. Email any 10 mod authors. You'll get maybe one response.

Whilst I agree completely with what you said, that is unfortunately not true, at least in the way some modding communities are proceeding. Read the New Vegas Nexus terms of service:

# Absolutely no copyrighted work is to be used without permission of the original creator. This includes content from other games, from DLCs, music creators or from other file authors. This also includes members from countries that do not recognise copyright laws (such as Russia).
# All files uploaded must have been created by the uploader or used with permission from the original author of the content. If you cannot provide proof of consent when asked then your file will be removed and your account is likely to be banned.

We are right back in those days.

The way mod communities govern their communities, is in this case, not supported by existing precedent. A certain ***** side to me almost wants to see this go to court, because I would be very interested in what the courts would have to say about this kind of instance.

Regardless, the TOS of a private community around a game does not change the EULA of a game, fortunately.

If, for instance, the Ultima Dragons (www.udic.org) decided it wasn't okay to distribute Ultima 4, it still wouldn't stop the fact that Electronic Arts made the game freeware, to be freely distributed within certain terms.

 

[RicoADF]

That misses an important legal distinction, setting aside that Bethesda only grant certain rights to modders anyway, which is that proving that something virtual like software is your creation is actually really hard. That it has your name on it is nothing like enough. It's a piece of electronic source code and could be altered by anyone at any time - you have to prove that you created (say) that script first and originally. That is extremely hard to do in a legal fashion, if someone contests that claim, at any point.

I'm refering to models/textures etc, things that can be claimed. Scripts and codes not so much.

 

[Delusibeta]

Incidentally, the project is not dead. [http://www.gog.com/en/forum/general/morrowind_2011_graphical_project/post106]

 

[grammarye]

The way mod communities govern their communities, is in this case, not supported by existing precedent. A certain ***** side to me almost wants to see this go to court, because I would be very interested in what the courts would have to say about this kind of instance.

Regardless, the TOS of a private community around a game does not change the EULA of a game, fortunately.

If, for instance, the Ultima Dragons (www.udic.org) decided it wasn't okay to distribute Ultima 4, it still wouldn't stop the fact that Electronic Arts made the game freeware, to be freely distributed within certain terms.

Quite correct, and I wasn't attempting to conflate the two. It is indeed unfortunate that Bethesda made the decision it did as the copyright holder, rather than a more even-handed one that let both parties salvage something from it.

Nevertheless, such modding communities are where all such mods typically began, and their own histrionics & rules are making life difficult for the very people they seek to empower.. *shrug*

 

[Mcface]

snip

I meant they have no legal right to sue someone for getting a bunch of mods on the internet.

 

[Tom Phoenix]

I have a question to those familiar with the Morrowind modding community. Do these modders release their mods exclusively on specific sites? It is possible that the issue isn't so much that the modders aren't getting credit, but that this takes away clicks from websites where the mods were originally uploaded. I ask beacuse this reminds me of the controversy in the World of WarCraft addon community regarding the program WoWMatrix, which simplified the updating of addons, but resulted in people not downloading these addons directly from websites on which they were originally hosted (although, in that case, it was made worse by the fact that WoWMatrix was using the bandwith of those websites to provide downloads instead of using its own).

I think issues like this point to a problem that has always existed regarding mods and that is the problem of modder recognition versus user convenience. It seems that every time someone attempts to streamline the process of applying mods in order to make it easier for less tech-savvy individuals, it always leads to a controversy regarding whether or not the modders themselves are getting enough recognition for their work.

Personally, I do agree that the creator of this mod compilation was wrong for including mods in it without the permission of their creators. Had he done so, I am sure many, if not most, would have happily agreed to contribute to the project, especially since it would make it easier for new blood to enter the community. That said, I cannot help but feel that some modders tend to be way overprotective of their work and that they would rather inconvenience the user than allow them to obtain the mod in any other way than the one they specifically specified. In the end, I think some sort of compromise is needed.

Overall, this just goes to show that projects like this should not be taken up single-handedly, but that the entire community should work together to make such project possible.

 

[GothmogII]

From the TES: Construction Kit EULA itself:

1. RESTRICTIONS ON USE
The Editor and any other software that is available for download from this Site is and shall remain the copyrighted property of Bethesda Softworks and/or its designee(s) and You shall take no action inconsistent with such title or ownership. You may not cause or permit the sale or other commercial distribution or commercial exploitation (e.g., by renting, licensing, sublicensing, leasing, disseminating, uploading, downloading, transmitting, whether on a pay-per-play basis or otherwise) of any New Materials without the express prior written consent of an authorized representative of Bethesda Softworks. This includes distributing New Materials as part of any compilation You and/or other Product users may create. You shall not create any New Materials that infringe upon the rights of others, or that are libelous, defamatory, harassing, or threatening, and You shall comply with all applicable laws in connection with the New Materials. You are only permitted to distribute the New Materials, without charge (i.e., on a strictly non-commercial basis), to other authorized users who have purchased the Product, solely for use with such users' own authorized copies of such Product and in accordance with and subject to the terms and conditions of this Agreement and all applicable laws. If You distribute or otherwise make available New Materials, You automatically grant to Bethesda Softworks the irrevocable, perpetual, royalty free, sublicensable right and license under all applicable copyrights and intellectual property rights laws to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, perform, display, distribute and otherwise exploit and/or dispose of the New Materials (or any part of the New Materials) in any way Bethesda Softworks, or its respective designee(s), sees fit. You also waive and agree never to assert against Bethesda Softworks or its affiliates, distributors or licensors any moral rights or similar rights, however designated, that You may have in or to any of the New Materials. If You commit any breach of this Agreement, Your right to use the Editor under this Agreement shall automatically terminate, without notice.

By accepting the EULA, you are essentially giving up your rights to the New Materials created with the Construction Set.

Seems pretty simple, I'm still going through the whole thing, but, it really doesn't look as if there's anything the Modders can do legally at this juncture. Of course, I've read somewhere that EULA's are quite iffy legal-wise, and may not in fact apply to all areas/countries, despite what the company in question may claim otherwise.

 

[Caiti Voltaire]

Quite correct, and I wasn't attempting to conflate the two. It is indeed unfortunate that Bethesda made the decision it did as the copyright holder, rather than a more even-handed one that let both parties salvage something from it.

Nevertheless, such modding communities are where all such mods typically began, and their own histrionics & rules are making life difficult for the very people they seek to empower.. *shrug*

If there is anything to take from this quite unfortunate turn, its that these communities only empower the people they choose to, and if you do not find their favour, it turns into schoolyard name-calling and histrionics very quickly.

Very unfortunate indeed. Especially since this is a community that Im part of by association, being someone who has authored Morrowind mods herself.

A part of me feels very deeply ashamed to be part of that community, despite the fact that I have tried to distance myself from it. Another part thinks that this is precisely why I had distanced myself from it.

 

[Caiti Voltaire]

I have a question to those familiar with the Morrowind modding community. Do these modders release their mods exclusively on specific sites? It is possible that the issue isn't so much that the modders aren't getting credit, but that this takes away clicks from websites where the mods were originally uploaded. I ask beacuse this reminds me of the controversy in the World of WarCraft addon community regarding the program WoWMatrix, which simplified the updating of addons, but resulted in people not downloading these addons directly from websites on which they were originally hosted (although, in that case, it was made worse by the fact that WoWMatrix was using the bandwith of those websites to provide downloads instead of using its own).

I think issues like this point to a problem that has always existed regarding mods and that is the problem of modder recognition versus user convenience. It seems that every time someone attempts to streamline the process of applying mods in order to make it easier for less tech-savvy individuals, it always leads to a controversy regarding whether or not the modders themselves are getting enough recognition for their work.

Personally, I do agree that the creator of this mod compilation was wrong for including mods in it without the permission of their creators. Had he done so, I am sure many, if not most, would have happily agreed to contribute to the project, especially since it would make it easier for new blood to enter the community. That said, I cannot help but feel that some modders tend to be way overprotective of their work and that they would rather inconvenience the user than allow them to obtain the mod in any other way than the one they specifically specified. In the end, I think some sort of compromise is needed.

Overall, this just goes to show that projects like this should not be taken up single-handedly, but that the entire community should work together to make such project possible.

Unfortunately, you speak out of naivete. I speak from personal experience when I say that most mod authors in the Morrowind community are almost religiously against the idea of mod compilations, and its why they're rarities.

As to why, well, you stated the reason yourself - its seems that every time that someone tries to steamline the process, drama ensues. Wyre (author of Wyre Mash/Wyre Bash) and the creators of OBMM and FOMM had the same drama they had to try to diffuse. It only becomes exacerbated in the case by actual mod content being involved.