this post was submitted on 21 Jan 2026
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no, this is super toxic to the entire modding ecosystem.
if even a single modder starts charging for access to mods, the entire system becomes utter shit over night.
this isn't theoretical: it has already happened multiple times.
the most famous example, i think, is skyrim.
bethesda tried to create a modding economy with paid mods, and immediately the entire store was filled with extremely low quality bullshit, with little information as to what the mod actually does, with the sole intention to rip users off for basically no effort. quality content got buried, bots were rampant and pushing slop to the top. a complete mess.
this is the guaranteed outcome of any such monetization scheme.
random people can be just as shitty as corporations, if they are financially incentivized to be.
that's why most modding communities are extremely opposed to paid mods, not because they like corporations.