They didn't invest a single cent in them? Really? The entire workshop infrastructure, modding tools, fixing problems with approved mods, curation for the items. The game itself. I can see that it'd be better for modders and item makers to get more money, but it's just silly to say that they didn't invest a single cent on those.
All things that are done because
it benefits valve.
Again: The statement "valve paying modders" implies that valve takes a financial hit to benefit the modders, not gains money by having other people pay modders.
Your entire argument is built around this weird idea that valve is paying modders by building a storefront in which i can pay modders money and have valve profit off of it.
Valve enabling me to pay modders is not valve paying modders.
I've now accidentally repeated the same thing in three paragraphs because you don't seem to get it. But i'm gonna let it stand like this.
If 100% of the revenue stream towards the modder are coming from the community and valve takes a cut, valve does not pay modder, even if they built the enabling system. It is the community. They are the factor in the equation that ends up giving the modder money. Not valve.
What if they did provide modding tools?
Modding tools have been for ages part of the full priced package because these devs know that they move copies.
My point being is that they aren't proving anything of
further value that would justify them taking a cut from every mod created. They'd simply be taking that additional money because they could.
It's like saying "why do I have to pay for Netflix when I already pay for access to the Internet?", but for game content, if you think the developer should be excluded from a cut.
Just because you bought a Frozen blu-ray doesn't mean you have the right to make and sell Elsa dolls at Disney World without paying Disney.
What is it with videogames and awful examples.
I didn't the characters I'm making the items for. I didn't create the world the game is set in. I didn't create the art style of the game. I didn't model the characters. I didn't voice them. I didn't create the character lore.
These things are done to sell the game and would exist just as well if mods weren't a thing, they are covered by the game's sales and no justification to take an additional cut oter than that they simply can.
I didn't program the game to accept the items I'm making. I didn't create the mod tools. I didn't create the Workshop. I didn't pay the people curating my items. I'm not the one that in the end implemented the items in the game, nor I had to do anything for the items to get marketed in one way or the other.
These things are not provided by the developer and therefore completely irrelevant to my question.
re: developer of the game getting a cut. It's basically the modder paying a license for using the developer's existing world and tech to sell content within.
I have yet to see a reason as to why a modder should pay this license fee and why it isn't part of the package that comes with the game itself, just like how it's been with free mods in the past.
Your Harmonix example is cool and in that case it makes sense as the modding tools themselfs are free. But that usually is not the case and the only way to access most games mod tools is to buy the game, meaning the company already profits off of it at that point.
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Yes, i understand, the developer made the game. I'm not dumb. But it isn't at all a reason as to why they should by entitled to further profit off of other people's work on it long after the initial sales that netteted them an inital profit. You'rs are only reason as to why they can do this.