Ngon's creations gone from workshop

[Tomas13TO 11]

Too bad. And very selfish. Due a few stupid comments? And what about all his fans? There are a lot of haters (trolls) in the world, unfortunately. Nobody can change it. It's a pity he decided like that. This is the worst solution for all his fans, including me.

[BugeyedDragon 412]

While I don't play much in C:S (don't wanna start over with a new ton of mods) I saw some of Ngon's assets and they look incredibly good! But, it's a shame that he deleted all of them (and from the game unintentionally or intentionally).

A similar thing happened with Gobias from the sc4 community but he didn't recieve hate comments that much (Never announced that hate hurt him after or beforehand) and they didn't disappear from the game, but it was a devastating blow and I'm sad I didn't grab them sooner, however, I'll get into another example.

I'm unsure what his hate comments were like, but if his comments were like:

"Hey, I liked this but one the building looks a little more of a house than a municipal soccer building. And the texture for the pavement could use a little work. It's still great though!"

Example no. 1 ^

now no. 2 v

"dude, your "creations" suck and you as a person are horrible, we have enough baseball fields, ugh just delete your account"

Now, example 2 is a stupid, non-constructive, terrible comment. You gain nothing from it other than he thinks there are too much baseball fields. Never say that to a creator who makes stuff, FOR FREE!. Sadly, many say the such to creators.

But example 1 is a legitimate constructive criticism, and he means no harm and says it's still good twice through the whole review. Multiple creators find certain advice such as "one building is a bit more of a house than so and so" as personal preference and an "insulting review". Reviews ARE personal preference, and if it's constructive, pull up your boots (either way really) and continue to improve. Some people over-privilege creators (Not to say they don't deserve their merit, they work hard, and I appreciate that) and after a hundred five gold stars one bit of criticism come along, constructive or stupid, and it's a great blow to some to the point they'll stop uploading, etc.

Ngon definitely was a great creator, but you need to realize in a big community, people have different opinions, and you need to trudge through the mud. There are no shortcuts, and I hope he changes his mind one day.

[Avanya 2,605]

Well said @BugeyedDragon! Comments like your 2nd example should just be deleted straight up and then forgotten. But comments like the 1st one are something we will have to deal with. When sharing something publicly there's bound to be ppl, who would have done it differently or find things that could be improved. Ngon is a pro artist, so I'm sure he's used to this (which might even be the issue here - he has it in RL and his hobby). Sometimes the changes are worth making, sometimes we should just stick to our design. But I don't think we can or should try and stop those comments from coming.

No doubt there's a lack of understanding how much effort is needed to create mods or models (at least from some people). And I don't think that's ever gonna change even if we explain the process. I think the only way to stay sane is to focus on the positive - those little loving comments that ppl drop - and encourage them. 2 critical comments mean alot more out of 10 comments than out of 50.  

[BLANKBLANK 4,414]

I wish creators would stop doing this. Ngon's assets were very popular and by removing them he has taken something away from the CS community. I can understand Ngon saying: "No more, I am not going to create any assets and feel free to use the files to ensure they stay updated." Fair enough. But to remove everything?

That's more selfish, narcissistic and nasty then all the Steam Workshop users who posted vindictive, hateful comments.

Gobias did something similar in SC4 and in doing so gutted most of the HD terrain mods that were available.

[Turjan 1,048]

It's not completely uncommon that items disappear from the Workshop. My first warning shot was this here:

Whatever you think of the asset itself, I liked it for what it was and was one day greeted by a big hole instead of the university (and the associated abandonment around it). It was uploaded later with a different lot size, and this needed some reworking of the city. Anyway, it was a reminder that not all workshop assets are forever.

I already mentioned Bad Peanut's "Old Brick" station (same city, as you can also see it on the first pic):

I think here the problem was some game update that broke the paths between modules. There was an endless string of complaints on the workshop, so this was pulled (later added back while hidden if I remember correctly, plus there was a new, different, replacement version). That was another one of those holes. However, I had a backup this time. I can understand the frustration when people don't read the description and endlessly complain, in particular if this is something beyond the modder's control.

The first case of someone removing pretty much all workshop content, if I remember correctly, was Sojiro. It took a while until I noticed that all my metros were broken because a lot of stations were just gone (you can now only get them back if you donate, or if you are a modder yourself). Well, you know the drift.

Anyway, I  can just recommend to back up your workshop content somewhere. It won't help when the assets need updates due to game changes, but at least you have some chance to fix your city if it's just gone, for whatever reason.

[Bad Peanut 826]

38 minutes ago, Turjan said:

I already mentioned Bad Peanut's "Old Brick" station

I think here the problem was some game update that broke the paths between modules. There was an endless string of complaints on the workshop, so this was pulled (later added back while hidden if I remember correctly, plus there was a new, different, replacement version). That was another one of those holes. However, I had a backup this time. I can understand the frustration when people don't read the description and endlessly complain, in particular if this is something beyond the modder's control.

 

I just want to say this is more in the line of an open letter/comment about the situation and is mainly in the hypothetical and not responding to a direct person (aside from using old brick as a prime example of a replaced asset)

in regards to Old brick station as an example...
It is my right as the creator to pull anything I deem broken from the website. I improved on and created a newer better version and on that version I got stupid bitching about how "i don't like how this one looks" or "why can't we have the old one". It's this sort of bull$%&^! that makes up 90% of all comments. If people would consider why it had changed they wouldn't post the same whining, nagging tripe - and yes I'm venting some frustration about this topic, I know - basically, it's my own prerogative to completely change a particular asset as many times as I like, without warning, without owing anything at all to anyone because at the end of the day, if you don't like how I manage my assets, you don't subscribe - it's just that simple. 
as "vindictive" as that all sounds I have very real reasons why I wouldn't hesitate to do any of that. again if we talk about the original old brick station as an example then I would say the first version's footprint was too big (we had not the tools to be able to edit things as we can now), the graphics weren't the greatest, and in general the way the modularity worked was seemingly too hard for most people who couldn't be bothered ready about 300 words to figure it out. 

You then have the endless bitching about "how long is this update taking" or " I'm unsubbing and only resubbing when it's updated" and other such passive aggressive demands as if I - a person who has a life etc - should just drop everything and push out an update on something I do for enjoyment, whenever I can find the time.

THEN when you have a fix even if you update the EXISTING workshop asset - if there is a change in footprint size/or some other significant change to the asset then the game removes the asset from it's plopped places in game and the player has to RE-PLOP them. Is this controllable? no. Do people still $%&^! about it because they can't be bothered rubbing a couple of brain cells together to wonder why it might happen and how it could just be a fact of the game? yes.

I don't mean to sound so exasperated but it's not just a matter of example 1 and 2 as mentioned above - it's all the other trollop as well.

Once more: the negative "oh Ngon is a douchebag he shouldn't have control over his own creations" blah blah blah is the exact attitude that caused him to withdraw in the first place. Check yourself every single time you think about commenting something, even if you think you're giving constructive criticism - think about how it might have already been addressed.
For god's sake, asset creators, modders alike and even the actual game devs are ALL JUST PEOPLE, how would you act if you were addressing them in person? or if you reversed roles and actually tried empathising the role of the content producer and not just a rabid consumer.

Disclaimer: I also know that this sort of person doesn't account for the entire community, but the bad side is leaving a bad stink of entitlement on both this forum and reddit. 
I'm sorry if anyone thinks I'm being over zealous and if you feel like unsubbing me on the workshop, please do me a favour and don't leave a passive aggressive comment about why -  just do it. The risk you take is you might actual miss the content no matter how much improvement you feel it could use - in your constructive opinions of course.

[Roadman20 601]

I rarely comment on any of the assets I have subbed to, I simply have too many to comment on each one.  I understand the time consuming process it takes to make them so I take them at the value they were created and say nothing more.  I usually make a quick look at the comments to see how people like it and then make a decision.  

If I don't like an asset, I just don't sub.  There's a lot of quality assets that I haven't subbed to.  For example since BadPeanut is in here... I just have his Industrial Elevated Station, but only that.  I do like his other content, and it's good to see it in a lot of other people's cities.

Since we're talking about the modding community, a lot of the general community gets overly whiny when CO has an update or DLC coming up and the weekend when it drops is a semi-mess.  Can't people take the hint that folks that modders need about 48 hours to fix kinks in the system.  The sense of entitlement is terrible all around I'm afraid.

[Turjan 1,048]

20 minutes ago, Bad Peanut said:

in regards to Old brick station as an example...
It is my right as the creator to pull anything I deem broken from the website. I improved on and created a newer better version and on that version I got stupid bitching about how "i don't like how this one looks" or "why can't we have the old one". It's this sort of bull$%&^! that makes up 90% of all comments. If people would consider why it had changed they wouldn't post the same whining, nagging tripe - and yes I'm venting some frustration about this topic, I know - basically, it's my own prerogative to completely change a particular asset as many times as I like, without warning, without owing anything at all to anyone because at the end of the day, if you don't like how I manage my assets, you don't subscribe - it's just that simple.

I understand all that. My post was more or less just a suggestion to everyone to make backups. Life happens.

17 minutes ago, Bad Peanut said:

For god's sake, asset creators, modders alike and even the actual game devs are ALL JUST PEOPLE, how would you act if you were addressing them in person? or if you reversed roles and actually tried empathising the role of the content producer and not just a rabid consumer.

That's the gist of it. As you may have noticed, I'm not mad at any of you. I guess I'm more of the practical kind. I'll just try and find a solution that works for everyone.

[Judazzz 1,936]

Many people simply don't read or research when things go south for whatever reason, I'm afraid. It pretty much copies real-life attitudes where people start throwing hissy fits, lash out, piss, moan and blame everything except themselves when things don't work out of the box or don't go their way. Just think of all those petty, self-righteous 'outrages' on social media, so I'm afraid that zero troubleshooting skills and vocal, entitled, spoiled behavior is just a sign of this time (and something I hate with every fiber of my being). And I'm also afraid there's not much that can be done about it, except ignoring those people and focus on the ones that are involved in a positive, constructive way (whether they have praise or criticism) - it's better for your sanity, for your enjoyment and for your motivation.

[Turjan 1,048]

8 minutes ago, Roadman20 said:

Since we're talking about the modding community, a lot of the general community gets overly whiny when CO has an update or DLC coming up and the weekend when it drops is a semi-mess.  Can't people take the hint that folks that modders need about 48 hours to fix kinks in the system.  The sense of entitlement is terrible all around I'm afraid.

Yup. I always avoid going to the Paradox forums after a game update. It's better if you don't want to lose your faith in humanity.

You can find traces of that even here, like people who cannot distinguish between mods that result in broken savegames due to game updates and mods that just break due to game updates. Different situations, with vastly different outcomes for the user.

[Roadman20 601]

2 minutes ago, Turjan said:

Yup. I always avoid going to the Paradox forums after a game update. It's better if you don't want to lose your faith in humanity.

You can find traces of that even here, like people who cannot distinguish between mods that result in broken savegames due to game updates and mods that just break due to game updates. Different situations, with vastly different outcomes for the user.

It's a bit a late in my faith in humanity overall, but yeah I totally want to say, "Chill folks, game will be back next weekend."

 

[Avanya 2,605]

@Bad Peanut I remember seeing some of those comments (and missing the brick station in my cities) - it seems (to me) that the more complex your stuff, the more of those negative comments. I gotta say though, that the "how long is this update taking" is fair enough (imo). For most it was prob just impatience to get their hands on your awesome work. But I 100% get how that gets annoying when it keeps coming and is bundled together with negative comments. And sadly the majority of all your subscribers don't comment as they're busy building cities with your awesome train stations.  

17 minutes ago, Judazzz said:

Many people simply don't read or research when going go south for them for whatever reason, I'm afraid. It pretty much copies real-life attitudes where people start throwing hissy fits, lash out, piss, moan and blame everything except themselves when things don't work out of the box or don't go their way. Just think of all those pretty 'outrages' on social media, so I'm afraid that zero troubleshooting skills and vocal, entitled, spoiled behavior is just a sign of this time (and something I hate with every fiber of my being). And I'm afraid there's not much that can be done about it, except ignoring those people and focus on the ones that are involved in a positive, constructive way (whether they have praise or criticism) - it's better for your sanity, for your enjoyment and for your motivation.

Couldn't agree more with that statement!

Now I'm thinking how we can deal with all this. No one wants our talented modders to burn out and stop making stuff because of negative comments. As I see it part of it is many people not understanding how much work creating things actually takes. We could try and enlighten them. Ofc most ppl won't see stuff even on reddit, as they just play the game. Perhaps it's something that could be done together with the developers to get it more visible. Another thing that popped into my head was to try and make the community aware of how important those positive comments are. Lots of positive comments appear when something is new, but then it moves more into the "this is broken" or requests for changes. Reminding people to drop a short positive comment might help, like "just built my transport hub and your asset/mod made it awesome!"

If you guys have some good ideas, throw them at me. I'm totally up for making some posts on the paradox forum and reddit. This game just wouldn't be the same without our modders and they deserve to be treated accordingly.

[Turjan 1,048]

Just as an aside: Some of the more critical voices regarding Ngon's move in this thread are also from content creators. I only mention this as it's probably wrong to assume a simple creators vs. users situation.

[Abrams 1,744]

In my brain,ngon maybe would bring back his stuff if thoose rude people would stop complaining,and say sorry to him.

This is sadly a problem in the current world,when somebody makes a good free thing,that's still not enough for some.

[Ocram's Razr 964]

I admit that I was rude and disrespectful towards a former modder who created quality assets.

 

Now for some clarification.

Fact: Content creators forfeit all rights to their creations upon uploading to the Steam Workshop.

In other words, anyone can do anything (besides charge money) to any asset on the Steam Workshop without any legal repercussions. However, it breaks contracts to reupload unaltered content. Changing geometry, adding an LOD, adding illumination and snow maps, and changing names makes it impossible for action to be taken against the "remixer" on Steam.

Fact: By bulk, a vast minority (or possibly a majority) of workshop content is slightly tweaked reuploads of previously made content.

Ethics: Crediting the original author is "the right thing to do" but is unneeded because nothing on the workshop can have any additional intellectual property license (such as CC attribution)

Fact: Sky Storme creates 'Let's Play' videos and maintains a website to host all the mods and assets he uses. He allows others to use them as well.

Opinion: I believe that Sky is doing a good public service by providing a copy of all the mods he uses. I think he even uploads his cities but I never used his site.

Fact: Mass deletion by former modders is an extremely rare occurrence. Asking permission to improve and continue support for their content has yet to be met with approval. However, as previously stated, approval is unneeded.

Opinion: I believe that content creators do a public service by improving assets of inactive (and I consider mass-deleters in the same category) modders and providing support for future users.

Fact: My Surface cannot run Cities: Skylines with high quality textures so I can only publish full quality mods from my desktop, which I don't often have access to. I'm also a perfectionist so I have only uploaded a map to the workshop.

[gfvsims 169]

20 hours ago, Avanya said:

This game just wouldn't be the same without our modders and they deserve to be treated accordingly.

Absolutely agree. My city would be an empty wasteland if it weren't for all you fabulous modders. I do comment on the Workshop fairly often, but I'll definitely try to do it more from now on. You are all very much appreciated by me!

[Mr_Maison 2,426]

There are 2 sides to this.

From a legal standpoint.....entitlement, rights, etc NGON did no wrong. Can I live without his assets, yes. There are too many other talented creators with awesomeness on the workshop to fold my cities because of one modder. But I would really miss his assets if not for the backup solution....let's be thankful for that.

Having said that, We as creators are contributing to a game that is built with open modding as part of the design.....a first for a city builder on this scale so many players will be depending on mods to enjoy the game. When I was updating the Shady Tree, I was nervous the whole time. Then what I feared happened....I misspelled the title in the new version somehow and I knew from the first report, over 30,000 players will have trees that disappeared in their cities. Thank goodness with the help of members here, I was able to fix it and someone reported they were back in his city.

We can all feel the way we do on this matter but for me personally, I think of the volume of players who voted with the subscribe button and ignore any unreasonable comments or down-rating. If I have 100-40,000 subscribers, even 20 trolls should not cause such a vast majority of players who are obviously enjoying the content to suffer. That's not an entitlement thing, it's the simple sensitivity to players who are taking time to find and use assets while planning their cities. We as creators take many hours and days to make stuff and on the player's side, it is also an activity of creation.....creation of a city which also takes many hours of work, unless you're just making random grids and flooding zones in an hour. I know because I actually play the game too and find myself taking just as long to make a neighborhood that it takes to make a tree. And shopping on Steam for what would fit perfectly in certain spots.

So while I agree we are not entitled to demand anything from content creators who provide for the game for free, I still think there should be a degree of respect and sensitivity for the players who make up the majority subscribing on the workshop. So as to what happened with NGON, I really hope this doesn't become a thing or it can hurt the game as a whole. We already have to deal with mods breaking at update seasons, we don't need massive loss of assets on top of it. Imagine if Fiendbild did this

 

EDIT, I think this is good reason for us to upload to STEX more. I admit I stopped uploading to STEX because I prefer Steam and also just being lazy, but in light of this situation, I can apreciate the value of our STEX more now. So in good faith to the community, I will begin uploading all my content on this site as well.

[Bad Peanut 826]

On 7/10/2016 at 5:25 AM, OcramsRzr said:

Fact: Content creators forfeit all rights to their creations upon uploading to the Steam Workshop.

In other words, anyone can do anything (besides charge money) to any asset on the Steam Workshop without any legal repercussions. However, it breaks contracts to reupload unaltered content. Changing geometry, adding an LOD, adding illumination and snow maps, and changing names makes it impossible for action to be taken against the "remixer" on Steam.

 

Just for some actual clarification:

This is incorrect, according to Valve Legal Information, Valve "respects the intellectual property rights of others, and we ask that everyone using our internet sites and services do the same."

In other words, Steam who is run by Valve is subject to a basic intellectual rights agreement as soon as you sign up and agree to the terms and conditions. Which means anyone cannot do anything to any asset on Steam Workshop unless "you own or control the rights thereto or have received all necessary consents to do the same." As listed on the Steam Online Conduct page which as a Steam Subscriber, you agree to abide by all the rules listed there.

On 7/10/2016 at 5:25 AM, OcramsRzr said:

Ethics: Crediting the original author is "the right thing to do" but is unneeded because nothing on the workshop can have any additional intellectual property license (such as CC attribution)

Again, this is incorrect. You must gain specific permission to "tweak" previously made content, not just mention the original author.

On 7/10/2016 at 5:25 AM, OcramsRzr said:

Fact: Mass deletion by former modders is an extremely rare occurrence. Asking permission to improve and continue support for their content has yet to be met with approval. However, as previously stated, approval is unneeded.

Just as a thought about mass deletion by former modders - If this happens to become a thing:

Under the Steam Subscriber Agreement - Section 6.B 

"You may, in your sole discretion, choose to remove a Workshop Contribution from the applicable Workshop pages. If you do so, Valve will no longer have the right to use, distribute, transmit, communicate, publicly display or publicly perform the Workshop Contribution, except that (a) Valve may continue to exercise these rights for any Workshop Contribution that is accepted for distribution in-game or distributed in a manner that allows it to be used in-game, and (b) your removal will not affect the rights of any Subscriber who has already obtained access to a copy of the Workshop Contribution."

Which means that if someone chooses to remove their own work, Valve still has their legal rights to use any material for their own particular use according to Section 6.A of the Subscriber Agreement (not a steam user) and a steam user can still use that material if it remains in their game after such a removal but the original author's intellectual rights are preserved - meaning such content cannot be re-uploaded or tweaked in any way without express permission from the original author (the intellectual owner)

 

Hopefully this helps to clarify some misguided ideas about intellectual property when it comes to free third part content. 

For those not sure whether all this U.S law applies to them - it does because in agreeing to the terms & conditions of Steam (Valve) you agree to be bound by such U.S law even if you do not reside there as many people who play the game do not.

 

And again, I believe that the community needs to stop its entitled attitude and appreciate quietly any free content they get. Thankfully the wider community doesn't reduce themselves to fabricated "facts" just to assert their "rights" to do whatever they please. Those people should do some fact checking before they make false claims about intellectual rights validity.

[Ocram's Razr 964]

@Bad Peanut I apologize. I apparently have not read the updated terms. At one point, the EULA seemed to say that original authors lost rights and remixing was unpreventable.