Report stolen mods

[Optera]

Currently the mod portal offers no way to directly report mods as stolen.

Today RobocafterLP uploaded identical copies of Loader Redux without asking me first:
https://mods.factorio.com/mod/Loader_Redux
https://mods.factorio.com/mod/MoreLoaderRedux

Before anyone starts arguing MIT would allow that. No, MIT does neither allow removal of the included license nor removing the copyright holder in said license, which these reuploads do.

[Arch666Angel]

Funny enough that he left the gfx credits in

[Optera]

Funny enough that he left the gfx credits in

Because he copied info.json
I'm not as conceited yet as to write credits to myself in my mod descriptions. Given this blatant rip though maybe I should to get credit for my work.

[Pi-C]

Today RobocafterLP uploaded identical copies of Loader Redux without asking me first:

Look here: Six mods published by that person, all of them "created" at most a day ago. Four of these mods have changelogs that go back several months or even years. Stupid.

[steinio]

Do we use this as a collector thread?

This mod https://mods.factorio.com/mod/WaterWellRev is altered and republished under new license against the original license.

Original mod (I'm a collaborator): https://mods.factorio.com/mod/WaterWell

[eradicator]

Given certain not-so-recent-anymore discussions about mod licenses and the reaction of certain wube developers to it i'm very interested in how this turns out. Have there been blatant license violations reported before?

Threads from the last big license discussion:
viewtopic.php?p=455541#p455541
viewtopic.php?p=455423#p455423

[Optera]

To my knowledge there is no moderation on the mod portal nor a way to report blatant copies. Hence my request to add a way to report mods.
Uploading such blatant rips on sites like nexus gets you banned almost instantly.

I would like for fair moderation with common sense rather than having to add 100 page legal documents to each of my mods and threaten lawsuits.

[Deadlock989]

+1, even if it is just a more obvious link which pops open a policy/procedure and an e-mail address at Wube.

[dockmeister]

Uploading such blatant rips on sites like nexus gets you banned almost instantly.

I would like for fair moderation with common sense rather than having to add 100 page legal documents to each of my mods and threaten lawsuits.

I said it in discord yesterday:
In regards to the re-upload of Loaders Redux, i don't see any infringement, rip, stolen content or violation of the MIT license. His mod does contain your MIT license and you're still named as an author in the info.json.
It is certainly not very transparent what changes were made and it will lead to confusion for players searching for this mod (especially ingame).
But there might be perfectly valid reasons for his upload, covered by the MIT license.

I cannot say anything about More Loaders Redux.

It would be nice, however, to have a more sought out mechanism to deal with issues like that.

[kirazy]

Uploading such blatant rips on sites like nexus gets you banned almost instantly.

I would like for fair moderation with common sense rather than having to add 100 page legal documents to each of my mods and threaten lawsuits.

I said it in discord yesterday:
In regards to the re-upload of Loaders Redux, i don't see any infringement, rip, stolen content or violation of the MIT license. His mod does contain your MIT license and you're still named as an author in the info.json.
It is certainly not very transparent what changes were made and it will lead to confusion for players searching for this mod (especially ingame).
But there might be perfectly valid reasons for his upload, covered by the MIT license.

I cannot say anything about More Loaders Redux.

It would be nice, however, to have a more sought out mechanism to deal with issues like that.

More Loaders Redux has dropped License.md and is still identical to Loaders Redux except for like 8 additional lines of code adding some customized loaders, and some additional graphics files. There's far better ways to do what he was trying to do than to clone the base mod, and then clone it again to add additional loaders with the first clone as a dependency.

[Optera]

A better way would be to just read the FAQ of LR.
You can create custom loaders and register them through the API and LR will take care of them as if they where part of it.

I don't see how someone not even capable of doing that hopes to even support LR.

[darkfrei]

I am happy that some of my mods are copied and supported without my attention. The mod support was pretty good automatized!

The mod Delete Empty Chunks was based on my work, but it's now much better than my mod was before.

Another good mod is Load-Furn Advanced Furnaces, what was based on this mod. The mod got own graphics, it was reworked and it's a good example why you must give another authors the permission to make their forks.

Better more better mods than less poor mods. Yes, here always can be someone, that is more talented as you.

[Optera]

You have to differentiate between someone capable picking up a mod you no longer want, improving and supporting it, and someone doing a carbon copy of one of the most downloaded mods on the portal just to slap his name on it to grab some attention.

[Optera]

Again could we please have some moderation on the portal.

I just had the displeasure of interacting with another black sheep constantly ripping mods with no regards of the authors license.
https://mods.factorio.com/user/ptx0

[ptx0]

you would have to point out the text in the license that disallows the modification I made for compatibility reasons - oops, no, that exception is granted in the license.

[ptx0]

also, "constantly" ripping mods with disregard for license? please - only one is in dispute, and it wasn't even authored by you - and the rest are all GNU GPLv3 or AGPLv3.

[Optera]

you would have to point out the text in the license that disallows the modification I made for compatibility reasons - oops, no, that exception is granted in the license.

Presumably you are talking about my License.
Again here's the exception granted to specifically two files:

Exceptions to the no modification rule include:

- Minor bug fixes/tweak for compatibility reasons, such as altering the dependencies line in info.json to force a load order in a modpack.
- Config - Any config.lua file may be edited and freely redistributed by itself.

Odd you don't instantly start arguing Github would overrule my license like you did on the deleted post on your ripped mod.
That debate came up before and let me tell you, Github does not overwrite project licenses.

Licensing aside, what do you hope to gain from picking a mod with thousands of downloads and slapping your name on it? 5 minutes of fame!?
I highly doubt you'd be capable of maintaining Edurans work.

[ptx0]

Licensing aside, what do you hope to gain from picking a mod with thousands of downloads and slapping your name on it? 5 minutes of fame!?
I highly doubt you'd be capable of maintaining Edurans work.

oh, this is what it comes down to really, you think I care at all about recognition. i think your ego is speaking for you here. I just wanted to allow users to join my server automatically without receiving a message that mods mismatch or are unavailable. the reason I slapped my name on it is so the users recognise it's not the original mod.

and what do YOU hope to gain by removing a mod with thousands of downloads? 5 minutes of fame?!

i don't intend on UPDATING THE WORK, all I need to do is apply pull requests from others who want it to do X or Y.

also, eduran could always just come back and update his mod and then I remove mine from the portal! It's not like I didn't give him credit, I linked to the original forum thread.

[ptx0]

I highly doubt you'd be capable of maintaining Edurans work.

maybe I will do this, because you seem to think you are the only one who is capable of anything around here? I'm a Linux developer with tons of background on this kind of stuff, maybe take yourself down a peg or two.

[Deadlock989]

Can we have a response from Wube on this? There are thieves operating with impunity on the portal.

In the cases where mods have been ripped due to ignorance or incompetence rather than pre-meditated theft, or if a modder simply wants to discontinue a mod, they can't even delete their own entries on the mod portal. At the moment, the only recourse is to upload an empty zip and then delete all the older versions, which has the side effect of wiping the mod from the hard disks of everyone that clicks on "update".

I don't know why the portal forces us to go through all these legalese shenanigans if there's absolutely no recourse or any way at all to protect your work.