A discussion on authorship, copyright and approval for modifying WarCraft 3 resources

[WerBackIII]

Disclaimer! Read first!

I've been thinking on starting such a discussion some time ago, but my work on my campaign has actually forced be to raise the question.

First, let me mention several things before I start. I've never been a modeler, neither a texture artist, though I have some skins uploaded. Also, this thread does not reference WarCraft 3 maps and campaigns, as they can be referred as finished products rather than resources. Also, the discussion is not aimed at credits and who deserves them. Any 3d or 2d artists, and coders as well, are extremely welcomed to join the discussion.

When it comes to authorship of texture, model and spell resources here in the WarCraft Hive community, I feel that the rules are way too harsh. This is mostly due to the "do not modify without permission" rule (for models), and the fact that you need to ask an author of a texture for his permission to use his skin on your model.

I understand rules for protecting the authorship of a given resource. You spend time on it, you'd probably want to put it in your portfolio, it is made by you, you deserve the credits. Also, I do acknowledge that here, in THW, approved resources are mostly of extremely high quality and rarely need any fixes.

With that said, I do not understand why would we go further and ban users from modifying a resource so that it can fit their specific need, or even fixing issues with bugged resources, that otherwise would have been of very high quality.

I will give several examples.

Fixing a model with a flickering or buggy animation will usually be deemed OK by the community. This is also true for any kind of model bug - disappearing parts, animation name typos.

Adding death & decay animations (or birth animations) would usually not be deemed OK by the community. Still, it is doing nothing else than adding usability to the said resource.

Adding team color, additional animations (spells, sleep, stand work, etc.), weapons; editing particle count and color, editing the texture without permission are usually frowned upon by the community. Same goes for using a model within a model (an example would be a gold mine model that has "entangled" and "haunted" versions added by somebody else; a town hall with two additional tiers added by somebody else; an ancient that has a "rooted" version added by somebody else; models used to "construct" a menu screen for a campaign; etc.)

Yet, it is still the case of adding usability to the said resource. I am not arguing that whoever does this should take credit for modifying the author's resource, but why is this so frowned upon?

While browsing a number of WC3 sites, hunting for resources for my campaign, I've came across numbers and numbers of resources, that, as great as they might be, are either buggy or lacking. Examples would be those golden mines by Dimbasik, this uprooted ancient by Horn, or those awesome Draenei buildings that have no birth animation. Not to mention the countless of bugged resources or resources that lack a portrait camera, death, decay and dissipate animations.

My question is, are we going too far? WarCraft is a game that is 10 years old. Modding might still be easy, but there are fewer people playing it now than ever (don't take me as a doom prophet, just stating the obvious). With less and less people actively making resources for it, and russian modders relying mainly of ripping off WoW models, is this policy too much for the community? After all, WarCraft is just a game, and those resources were made so that somebody WILL use them. It's not like they'll be using it for commercial projects.

That is my opinion on the subject. I hope you guys join the discussion.

 

[Deleted member 219079]

I think modellers should add in description whether they want their models to be fixed.

 

[chobibo]

I guess it's not so bad if you let the mods put your update of the older buggy version and just credit you for fixing the said resource.

 

[Xonok]

I'd say that all fixing should be allowed even more if the original author is no longer here.
I've seen plenty of older models with huge faults, but noone bothers to fix them.
Some don't even seem to work at all(so far I've gone through about 300 and 2 of them don't load in editor)

 

[WerBackIII]

What about the further points? Adding birth, death, decay animations?

 

[chobibo]

I think mods should allow that, but the updated model should be posted on the original submission thread, and just credit the one who added those animations.

 

[Kino]

I mainly make models for personal use.
As a result I only do those animations that the original use required, which may be lacking to certain people.
Thus I always allow people to modify my models as per need.

I think your suggestion is pretty valid and should be allowed. Doubly so if the creator wishes it to be.

 

[Vladadamm]

Hmm, the do not modify without permission rule doesn't really concern spells imo. I don't see a lot of spells with that rule being stated in

Also, i think there's no problem in editing a model for your own map, aslong as you still give credits to the original author and do not distribute your edit on websites such as The Hive Workshop (or others).

Maybe having a tab for alternative versions in ressources (any kind of them, maps should also include previous versions), were the author can add alternative versions of the ressource (done by himself or someone) would be nice. It could be a nice feature of Hive 2.0.

 

[Apheraz Lucent]

Unless there is a statement somewhere that the modifications of certain resources are allowed (only can be given by the author of that resources), here on the Hive, it is automatically considered that you do not have the permission to edit the resource.

I, for instance, have stated that all of my resources can be redrawn, improved, or based upon. However, the icons or other resources still need to be at least 50+% freehanded. You can take my Alternate Jaina icon and improve it, but you need to state and show how you've done that 50+%.

When a user is inactive for a lenghty amount of time, and the resource is broken, just report it. Like the Jaina Druid model was (due to new update and an omnilight of old, it caused entire screen to go black when it was selected). The moderators will fix the broken resource if possible, and reupload it to the same resource page. Credits are not changed.

Now, about adding up 'usefulness'. Well, I have to say that I like the idea.
Over the years, the Hive team of mods have adapted the rules to the community, and overall usefulness, meaning that what would be rejected now, would be approved a year or two before. Because of rule shifting we needed, all models moderated recently actually do have to fit the requirements, to get approved. Which left older models not remoderated every time the rules were updated.

Hm. This is a problem in 90% with models - icons don't suffer from this, neither do skins (no ladder model updates).
This actually is a neat suggestion, but I'm not sure could this work.

Sorry for double post, for some reason, I can't edit :/ (Mods, please merge and remove this line, thanks)

What about specifying what is considered to be an acceptable and needed upgrade? Then, users who are willing to do this type of upgrade, can post fixed models in a new thread, from where the mods can update old models if it meets the criteria.

And to instantly remove any issues about credits, let's say that the volunteers will be awarded in some way (reputation, or award like Merit Badge is), and credits remain unchanged. So, basically, charity work.

 

[Xonok]

That would definitely be good. There needs to be a way to get larger amounts of models fixed.

Example of an otherwise good model that has issues:http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/models-530/forsakenripper-117691/"
and another:http://www.hiveworkshop.com/forums/models-530/chaos-warrior-48278/

Both of these are missing attachment points. For one of those I have a fixed model, but since the authors don't appear to be active or check their threads, then the uploaded versions are still broken.

 

[Ralle]

I don't know if I said this already, but if you find a bug in an old model, there is no problem with you uploading an edited version as an attachment to a reply on the resource. Perhaps if the author is completely gone, we will even replace his copy of it, but that depends very much on the case and the severity of the issue.

 

[WerBackIII]

Bugs are pretty straightforward indeed, I'm focusing more on the added usefulness part, like adding birth animations to buildings and doodads.

 

[Apheraz Lucent]

And less than 1% of people ever enters the model page, only scrolling through model list, which would make replying fixed models quite unnoticed and not that used.

 

[Ralle]

Well. You could post the fixed model and then report the model telling us that you fixed it. Then we can decide what should be done.