Mods must have a banner-picture

[ssilk]

It is the mod owner's who suffer by not having a thumbnail because they miss out on a recognisable symbol for their mod and catching people's eyes as they scroll past.

Ya! I thought similar till some weeks ago. But that’s exactly the point, where it becomes the mod-users/players “problem”: it’s less recognizable. But he/she needs to pay attention for that.

It’s like in the woods, when you collect berries. Some are red, some are violet. Nice, easy to see. But some are green: you need too pay extra attention to find them within all the leaves.

[Deadlock989]

Deadlock, I didn’t insult anybody. Who insults is just you.

You said it is a bad UI. That's insulting. You should apologise.

t is - according to the newest ui-research - a (small) problem.

Oh, this should be good. Please provide a source for this "newest ui-research". Because if you don't, we might be tempted to think you're making up bullshit.

[jodokus31]

Because if you don't, we might be tempted to think you're making up bullshit.

Let me guess, that's not insulting?

[Deadlock989]

Let me guess, that's not insulting?

We'll find out when this "newest ui-research" is given a source, won't we. I mean, I fully expect it to either not exist or turn out to be some completely subjective in-house style guide from years ago, but maybe I'm wrong and it turns out that there was a ton of peer-reviewed research on the many serious problems created by not having a thumbnail published in 2020.

[jodokus31]

Let me guess, that's not insulting?

We'll find out when this "newest ui-research" is given a source, won't we. I mean, I fully expect it to either not exist or turn out to be some completely subjective in-house style guide from years ago, but maybe I'm wrong and it turns out that there was a ton of peer-reviewed research on the many serious problems created by not having a thumbnail published in 2020.

In my perception/opinion, if you say "we might be tempted to think you're making up bullshit.", it doesn't matter if you're right in the end, it just sounds slightly insulting. On the other side, i don't perceive ssilk's comment "it is a bad UI" as insulting.
But that's just my view

[Deadlock989]

But that's just my view

Yes, obviously these things are always going to be subjective.

[eradicator]

It is the mod owner's who suffer by not having a thumbnail because they miss out on a recognisable symbol for their mod and catching people's eyes as they scroll past.

Ya! I thought similar till some weeks ago. But that’s exactly the point, where it becomes the mod-users/players “problem”: it’s less recognizable. But he/she needs to pay attention for that.

I think you're both too focused on your own desire to make your own life easier and forget about the needs / wants of mod authors. Is "download count" the only metric you measure by? It certainly feels a bit patronising to be told that I'm "suffering" (from what?) or "missing out" (on what?) when I decide to not have a thumbnail. You're free to make your own mod-with-a-picture.

Imagine what would happen if posting on the forum / mod-portal was only allowed for people with avatar pictures.

In my perception/opinion, if you say "we might be tempted to think you're making up bullshit.",

I'm afraid I have to concur that "bullshit" isn't an insult. It's a very common way to say that something portraied as "fact" is not factual at all (or at least seems very likely not to be). There's even a game named after it "Bullshit bingo".

But apart from the politics.... I too would be very interested in a link to that latest UI-Research.

Happy New Year!

[Koub]

Imagine what would happen if posting on the forum / mod-portal was only allowed for people with avatar pictures.

Please no, I'd have to ban myself

[Deadlock989]

I think you're both too focused on your own desire to make your own life easier and forget about the needs / wants of mod authors. Is "download count" the only metric you measure by? It certainly feels a bit patronising to be told that I'm "suffering" (from what?) or "missing out" (on what?) when I decide to not have a thumbnail. You're free to make your own mod-with-a-picture.

The portal itself is partly responsible for this kind of misperception. Probably the "most downloaded" button is intended to be some kind of proxy for popularity and quality, but let's face it, it's mostly likely going to be the same RSO/Bob medley for the rest of Factorio's finite shelf life like it has for the last, what, three years. As for the "trending" button, who knows what that means, or why it's different depending on whether it's before or after 12:00 GMT. Whatever those rankings are supposed to be, they just reinforce the terribly sad "beauty pageant for toddlers" perception. Anyone who genuinely gave a shit about good mods being obscured should take a long hard look at those.

Mostly though it's all these gamer kiddies desperate for clicks and views and likes, assuming the folks that make game mods all think on those same lines as well. Genuinely: I couldn't give a fuck whether my mods are visible or not. I'd prefer a single digit number of monthly downloads if it represented any kind of normal social interaction with genuinely interesting people. This time last year I was going batshit crazy trying to deal with a minimum hour a day, every day, of answering stupid questions on three different platforms from a horde of foaming man-Karens that had crawled off of Reddit or Discord or whatever internet sewer was trending that year, all demanding that I be their personal tech support hotline or change the way I play this game to suit their whims. Fuck that for a game of tennis. I even had this YouTuber e-mailing me: they started off with "Hi, it's me, <name>" like I was supposed to have a clue who they were. I'd throw every thumbnail I've ever made into a nuclear furnace if I thought it would guarantee avoidance of that kind of terminal embarrassment ever again.

All of this is true objective fact, you can find it in "the newest research".

[jodokus31]

In my perception/opinion, if you say "we might be tempted to think you're making up bullshit.",

I'm afraid I have to concur that "bullshit" isn't an insult. It's a very common way to say that something portraied as "fact" is not factual at all (or at least seems very likely not to be). There's even a game named after it "Bullshit bingo".

You are probably right. I was just triggered, that one requests somebody else to apologize, because something is perceived insulting, but IMO strikes back it the same post. Didn't make sense to me.

Mostly though it's all these gamer kiddies desperate for clicks and views and likes, assuming the folks that make game mods all think on those same lines as well. Genuinely: I couldn't give a fuck whether my mods are visible or not. I'd prefer a single digit number of monthly downloads if it represented any kind of normal social interaction with genuinely interesting people. This time last year I was going batshit crazy trying to deal with a minimum hour a day, every day, of answering stupid questions on three different platforms from a horde of foaming man-Karens that had crawled off of Reddit or Discord or whatever internet sewer was trending that year, all demanding that I be their personal tech support hotline or change the way I play this game to suit their whims. Fuck that for a game of tennis. I even had this YouTuber e-mailing me: they started off with "Hi, it's me, <name>" like I was supposed to have a clue who they were. I'd throw every thumbnail I've ever made into a nuclear furnace if I thought it would guarantee avoidance of that kind of terminal embarrassment ever again.

I don't know, what you expect. You release some of the greatest mod and want that nobody cares? People are like that

[ssilk]

Imagine what would happen if posting on the forum / mod-portal was only allowed for people with avatar pictures.

Please no, I'd have to ban myself

Very good point.

The forum doesn’t indicate that there is a picture if there is no avatar. There is just ... nothing. I think that’s what I find so irritating with the mod-portal.

[Deadlock989]

Very good point.

The forum doesn’t indicate that there is a picture if there is no avatar. There is just ... nothing. I think that’s what I find so irritating with the mod-portal.

So there was no "newest ui-research" and it was just bullshit after all.

[eradicator]

I don't know, what you expect. You release some of the greatest mod and want that nobody cares? :) People are like that

Can't speak for other people. Personally I make most mods for myself because modding is fun to me. Then if someone likes them and "cares" that's ok. Most users don't say a single word so i have no clue if they're long time users or deleted the thing after a minute. Also i don't even know how many users i have because "download count" counts every download of ever minor update - which is completely unrelated to all-time user count (let alone current user count). For all i know i could have 5 or 500 users.

The problems start when people start "demanding" new features that go against the core idea of the mod. Even with low-4-digit downloads, I've already had people threaten me for not "supporting" some other mod that I've never heared about (which ultimately led me to abandon my SFR mod). And really when someone asks for a new feature there's no "good" way out once the question is posted. There's only bad options left: ignore them, decline shortly, or decline with an explanation and deal with people trying to refute the explanation - not realizing/caring that the explanation is not negotiable.

[jodokus31]

The problems start when people start "demanding" new features that go against the core idea of the mod. Even with low-4-digit downloads, I've already had people threaten me for not "supporting" some other mod that I've never heared about (which ultimately led me to abandon my SFR mod). And really when someone asks for a new feature there's no "good" way out once the question is posted. There's only bad options left: ignore them, decline shortly, or decline with an explanation and deal with people trying to refute the explanation - not realizing/caring that the explanation is not negotiable.

That sucks Is it really that bad, that you have to abandon mods? Is there no reasonable way to keep distance?

[Deadlock989]

That sucks Is it really that bad, that you have to abandon mods? Is there no reasonable way to keep distance?

Depends what you mean by "reasonable". You can shut the discussion board down completely: that's really your only option as far as that part of the mod portal goes, since they don't have any decent moderation tools beyond deleting posts and threads, you don't have any of the basic mechanisms that phpBB had 15-20 years ago like banning individual abusers (and unlike phpBB that would actually work since a portal account is linked to a Factorio purchase). Beyond that, you can remove any links in the mod portal entry to external sites such as the source repository in case people start stalking and pestering you there (I even had someone trawling transaction logs to get my personal e-mail address and real name, so check your Github account privacy), and you can decline to have a forum thread here on these forums. You can't even delete your own mods if you want to.

But yeah, let's dick around policing people's thumbnails, clearly that's the most pressing issue.

[eradicator]

Is there no reasonable way to keep distance?

Like @Deadlock said. You either deal with everyone or with noone.

That sucks :( Is it really that bad, that you have to abandon mods?

Think about it from a motivational standpoint: I don't get money for this. I didn't personally need the mod anymore. And i got no positive feedback for it either (download count is not feedback). So there was really nothing to offset the "having to deal with trolls" factor.

[Deadlock989]

Is there no reasonable way to keep distance?

Like @Deadlock said. You either deal with everyone or with noone.

A third option is to transfer the mod to someone else to look after. I've done that a few times. Mostly that has worked out very well for me and for air-quote-waggly-fingers "the community" air-quote-waggly-fingers, perhaps not so well for the folks who got saddled with them, I don't know.

That sucks Is it really that bad, that you have to abandon mods?

Think about it from a motivational standpoint: I don't get money for this. I didn't personally need the mod anymore. And i got no positive feedback for it either (download count is not feedback). So there was really nothing to offset the "having to deal with trolls" factor.

I did get positivity and support and also occasionally people actually took it on themselves to help. But it only takes a couple of really determined trolls to poison the motivation spring. I have regrettably broken contact with some good people because with the best will in the world, it was never going to offset the misery of dealing with entitled gamers. I've read here that I don't know how to take feedback. Maybe, but here's a fact: giving feedback is also a skill and most anonymous randos off the internet don't have it.

I enjoy modding a lot more now that I read almost none of what "the community" has to say about them. This is just one of many ways in which I more closely resemble Judi Dench with every passing day. But if everyone I know hadn't been double-fucked by Covid and Brexit and I hadn't been locked indoors for a year while my real work ground to a halt and the planet burns to the ground, I probably wouldn't have started modding Factorio again. So yay for silver linings.

[Bilka]

Think about it from a motivational standpoint: I don't get money for this. I didn't personally need the mod anymore. And i got no positive feedback for it either (download count is not feedback). So there was really nothing to offset the "having to deal with trolls" factor.

I did get positivity and support and also occasionally people actually took it on themselves to help. But it only takes a couple of really determined trolls to poison the motivation spring. I have regrettably broken contact with some good people because with the best will in the world, it was never going to offset the misery of dealing with entitled gamers.

It'll probably look bad to have someone with my color name chime in here, but I want to support the issues brought up by eradicator and Deadlock.

1.1 has been the first major release where I didn't immediately update my mods, which now has left me with people asking for updates over and over, despite me already giving an answer ("When I have the time"). The straw that broke the camels back was when a self-proclaimed patient person managed to post 3 separate messages (2x forums, 1x mod portal) at once to ask for an update. It certainly does not help with motivation to pursue a hobby when a small break is met with more posts asking for updates than the lifetime amount of positive comments.

It seems that mods and their maintenance are expected, instead of happily appreciated as the free hobby contributions or even "presents" to communities that they are. This forms unreasonable expectations for players, mods and authors, these clash and you get frustrated authors and frustrated players - shown rather well by this thread.

[eradicator]

1.1 has been the first major release where I didn't immediately update my mods, which now has left me with people asking for updates over and over, despite me already giving an answer ("When I have the time").

Heh yea. Even on my 3-digit-download-count mods where I get almost no feedback it often doesn't take long for someone to ask for an update. (And currently i've got three mods stuck on old versions because certain processes are taking their time *cough*.)

If you think about it, asking for updates isn't really ever useful. There's two main possible situations:

1. The author is still actively playing/modding. In this case they are already aware that an update is needed because it broke on their own system. Which means the update will be released "when it's done" and answering questions will only delay it further.
2. The author isn't active anymore. So no update will ever happen even in the off-chance that the author even sees the question.

In both of these asking for updates is pointless. I guess trying to reduce this nagging is one of the reasons why commercial developers (Wube etc) go into "forward defense" and post regular status updates. But that's just not something i can or want to do for mods.

[Edit] Addendum: Also this is about updates of mods to the latest *experimental* version. Stable-only modding doesn't even exist as far as I am aware. For comparison: In Minecraft it sometimes takes weeks after a *stable* release before even the modding *framework* is updated. And only then can modders even start to update their mods. But here it is expected that mods are updated mere days after an experimental release that nobody but the dev team knows anything about before its release.

[jodokus31]

Sad to hear, that modders and their great mods get so little positive feedback and so much trolling and demanding. I can say, that I appreciate a lot, what was achieved in the modding scene. Seems also, that's a bit the spirit of the current time to complain selfishly and drag something in the mud. Probably, there a many who don't know, that mods are made by volunteers from the community.

I wonder, how that could be changed:
Better moderation tools seem obvious.
More reliable download count calculations (f.e. per username)
Maybe some well seen hint, that the work of mods is done by volunteers
What about a mod rating? With or without comments?
Something (I dont know exactly what) to easily let a regular mod user show appreciation.