How To Continue Getting Free Content

Added: July 3rd 2006 / Updated: 07-03-2006

Earlier last month, Rome decided to remove her modules, Tales of Celts because she felt that the only people commenting were those who didn't appreciate the work she had put in. Thankfully Steve Savicki saved the day by bringing it to my attention and I was able to get her to change mind and the modules are back. However I need your help so it doesn't happen again. Here are some things you can do to make sure that you can always enjoy free content.

Obvious

1) Vote! : Voting is one of the most important things you can do. It's really simple and as easy as making a comment as the voting dropdown is just above the comment box.

2) Post Constructively : Please make your comments something the author can use to improve the content.

3) Alert Me to Problems : If someone is causing problems, please let me know.

Less Obvious

1) Don't Be Silent! : If someone makes a post that is negative, but you think otherwise, don't be silent! Feel free to let the author know that you don't agree with that person. That type of support can go a long way to help the author know how serious to take that negative post. For example if someone were to make a comment like:

I didn't enjoy this module and it was too (short, long, hard, easy, etc..)

and there were no other posts to counter that, the author might take that silence to mean that people agree with the poster or even worse, they don't care. However if someone were to instead make a positive post right afterwards, to support the author, it would remind the author that sometimes the most negative people are usually the small vocal minority.

2) Be lavish with your praise : Sadly people are more eager to give out critism than praise, when it should be the other way around. You can't overdo sincere praise if it's genuine. Look for opportunities to support your module authors. Even little things that they do are worthy of postive comments. Even something as simple as a Thank You for updates or help can mean a lot to someone who has worked hard, especially if it's free.

3) Higher Standards : When you pay $60 for a game done by 100 people, you expect it to be perfect, however it isn't fair to use those same standards for a free module done by a small team nor those standards for a module done by one person who also might be a teenager doing his best. I think the best way to vote is on whether you enjoyed it or not and not on how it compared to some other module you played.

To go with that, if you're a module author, it might help to put some of the challenges you faced when creating your work which the person voting might take into consideration.

If you enjoy free content to play, please help me, help you, and do your best to support the community content creators. The more you support them, the more they will create new and cool things for you to play with.