How did this come to be?

[VampLena]

Sorry if this is a stupid question, im new to the sims mod scene, but this is the most ridiculous thing I've ever seen.  How do these people get away with selling mods? I've never seen in any other game people getting away with blatant violations of the user agreement.

More over i find it laughable they take the "morally" outraged person attitude. and have the audacity to call people thieves. EA Games should be dismatling their whole pathetic union, not allowing it to grow.  How did it get to be this way? Again I say, this is the only game I've ever seen where the company allows people to ignore their EULA. These idiots deserve every download people make from the booty.

[Plum]

It started with The Sims 1 with a site saying they needed to take donations to pay for bandwidth, and if you donated you'd get such-and-such for free.  Then... probably either 8DS or SimFreaks started this whole subscription thing.  And, since it was under the guise of needing the monies to pay for bandwidth, it grew.

I think it's because The Sims 2 attracts a lot of non-gamers, who don't realize that gaming communities charging for mods is not at all the norm, so they blindly accept it.

[VampLena]

I see, non gamers are getting duped. If this crap ever happened in the mainstream gaming community there'd be rioting, Bethesda started charging for "Official" mods and that nearly produced a riot.  

I really hope sims fans start smartening up and rise up against this, I guess im a 100% Pirate because I wholly support this site and all efforts to bring down paysites. Its just a shame EA is too lazy to act like a real game company and shut these fools down for the good of their customers.

[Quinctia]

You'd get blacklisted in the fanfic community for charging money for it; I've seen it.  Also, it'd be like someone charging for ROM hacks or translations, just completely ludicrous.

I'm a big proponent of filesharing anyway (I wouldn't have gotten into my favorite band without it, and now I own seven albums, a greatest hits compilation, a guitar book), so this is definitely something I support.

[lookatmytreasurechest]

In Sims 1, 7DS opened up 8DS to keep 7DS "alive". So they could pay for "bandwidth". Then SimFreaks and WDS followed suit and a whole bunch others. That's the beginning of this and where the "bandwidth" excuse originated from. It seems to have worked quite well due to the # of paysites out there.... Dontcha think?

[LesserOr]

Only the sims community could cry about the "rights" of the artist while photoskinning name brands and stealing meshes.
And claim donation with a straight face.

[toomanyguppys]

That's the thing.  The recent discussion at the sims 2 community proved that many people still believe that the "donations" go to help sites pay for "bandwidth."  And most paysite owners are keeping damn quiet about how much money really is or is not involved.  I see this as deliberately misleading people.

If all the paysite owners would be completely honest about the financial end of their websites, I wonder how many people would still fork over the cash.

[Jysudo]

Nyah, sims is not the only game doing this.
People are selling things for Wow, Oblivion blah blah...you just have to look around.

I am really sure WDS is making loads of $$$. Just look at the number of artists that they are hiring. And let not even mention Sim Chic...

[LesserOr]

Nyah, sims is not the only game doing this.
People are selling things for Wow, Oblivion blah blah...you just have to look around.

Such things aren't freely, wildly accepted and defended by their communities.
The majority is against those practices.

[VampLena]

The only difference is people selling stuff for those games get shut down hard by the gaming companies when they are discovered. Hell, on a monthly basis WoW bans hundreds of users and removes millions of gold from the game when anyone gets in the mind to pull crap like this.  As with Oblivion, the community doesnt tolorate the selling of mods outside of official channels, which is why with all that stuff one has to look for it, with the sims it seems these criminals operate openly.

I just cant stop laughing at how straight faced they are, calling us Resistance people criminals, meanwhile they use pathetic excuses to cover their violations of the EA End User Agreement. It says pretty plainly EA owns their mods, not them.

[idtaminger]

I really hope sims fans start smartening up and rise up against this.

Well, when you consider that probably 80% of the sims community online are tweens asking for daddy's credit cards and wanting desperately to be "cool", it doesn't seem very likely.

[jesserocket]

In Sims 1, 7DS opened up 8DS to keep 7DS "alive". So they could pay for "bandwidth". Then SimFreaks and WDS followed suit and a whole bunch others. That's the beginning of this and where the "bandwidth" excuse originated from. It seems to have worked quite well due to the # of paysites out there.... Dontcha think?

Actually, the first site to go pay was Mall of the Sims, ironically, as far as I remember, although it's still actually there, it became very frowned-upon as not really worth it, after it went pay, and faded into obscurity. It was also the very first custom content sims site I ever ever found. When it was free.

And back in those days, bandwidth genuinely was an issue...it just SO isn't any more... :?

[calalily]

The issue about Sims 1 sites is also being discussed here:

http://community.livejournal.com/thesims2/3286144.html

Provides a few nice screenshots of Rose sharing paypal info too - under proof of info sharing.

This entry also shows what happens if you ask outright to sell screenshots, altered from the game.

Maybe someone should email Maxis and ask if they are welcome to sell cc?

[VampLena]

I think people should email Gamespot, IGN, Gamespy and other gaming websites, if this got brought into the limeline (especially since these gaming websites do have lines into companies like EA) It would get the exposure it should have.

Being that my girlfriend works for a law firm i can tell you all of this is illegal, everytime anyone uses Sims software they agree all CC becomes the intellectual property of EA Games and cannot be sold in anyway. This also makes it horribly funny they call us "thieves" and "pirates" when they are the ones violating copyright laws.

[lookatmytreasurechest]

Actually, the first site to go pay was Mall of the Sims, ironically, as far as I remember, although it's still actually there, it became very frowned-upon as not really worth it, after it went pay, and faded into obscurity. It was also the very first custom content sims site I ever ever found. When it was free.

And back in those days, bandwidth genuinely was an issue...it just SO isn't any more... :?

Oh. I remember Mall of Sims!! I had forgotten bout it! They USED to be pretty damn cool..... The first Sims site I ever found was Evil Sims or something along that nature. They had been banned by maxis or something..... Anyone remember that site??