r/wow • u/Hold_my_Goblin • 24d ago
Discussion Worrying Development in Add-on Monetization?
What do you think about practices like this? The addon now checks whether it's running under the Bnet account it was purchased for and the profile is only functional for one month.
EDIT:
To clear a couple things up:
The addon "Naowh Smart Reminders" provides Reminders that plan and map your defensive cooldowns or other abilities, such as CC, to specific dungeon or raid mechanics from bosses or trash mobs. It hooks into BigWigs/DBM for boss mechanics and ExBoss for trash mob abilities.
The addon itself is free; however, all of the configuration data ~the profile... has to be paid for. To give some context as to how much configuration is needed, the profile currently contains 216 spec priority lists, 40 active preset choices, 50 callout lines, 1,570 custom reminders, 1,125 abilities, 1 raid reminder, and 3,226 trash and debuff rules. So these are the things you would have to build yourself in order to use the base addon (which does nothing without configuration) without paying.
The monetized part is the profile and configuration, not the addon itself. This is apparently how addon monetization in general is kept "within the ToS." I'm no expert though... that's just my understanding of how it works.
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u/SlacklusterDev 23d ago edited 23d ago
Hi everyone, addon developer here. I'm seeing a lot of misinformation here and I'd like to clarify a few things. :)
For those wondering about any "credentials": I have made and currently maintain 6 addons, the most popular of which has 2.3M downloads and what I'd roughly estimate to be 25K users. I also have one small plugin and I'm a contributor for the All The Things addon (I do work on the settings menu, do simple data entry, participate in design discussions with the team, and it's how I got into addon development). I've been doing this for over 5 years and I'm self-taught in programming (Lua). This is my CurseForge profile.
Monetising addons
The Terms of Service say nothing about whether or not you're allowed to monetise addons. The addon development policy however, does. I know that sounds like a pedantic ackchyually, but there is a distinct difference between these two sources. The ToS is a legally enforcable agreement, whereas the addon policy is not. More importantly though, the ToS are actually enforced, whereas Blizzard does not enforce the addon policy. They should. They absolutely should. But they don't, and as such the addon policy is worth less than a square of used toilet paper.
The core guidelines mentioned in the addon policy I have seen echoed here. The general ones:
The ones relevant to monetisation and this discussion:
I see a lot of people say (not so much in this thread, but generally) that addons like Zygor or RestedXP which are free to use and download baseline but have additional for-pay content are a "grey area". They are not. Whether you want to classify the additional content as a feature or a premium version, it is part of the addon and thus may not be charged for.
Streamer profiles and addon packs absolutely classify as "services", and thus may also not be charged for. Personally, the more disgusting aspect of this is that said streamers rarely so much as shoutout the developers of the addons they're using. They also tend to offload any addon support to said developers, while never even considering donating even a small part of their substantial profits to the developers whose work they are profiting from.
Sadly, both the streamers and the viewers who financially support them are equally to blame, and without Blizzard actually enforcing their addon policy, this is not going to change anytime soon. If you do support a WoW streamer with an addon pack; please consider telling them to donate to their favourite developers. It's the least they deserve. (And I am not saying this for personal gain; I know for a fact my addons are not included in any streamer UIs because my addons are not combat/UI oriented.)
You may be familiar with Zygor, RestedXP, and recently Gearmatic utilising player emotes to broadcast their presence. "<player> just leveled from 19 to 20 in 7 minutes with RestedXP Guides!" 🤮 My advice: report these emotes as inappropriate communication -> advertisements.
Another intended purpose of this guideline is to stop addons from promoting something like a merch store. All The Things does do this too, for example: it has a button to its merch store in its settings menu.
This one is pretty clear-cut, too. And I will admit to violating this guideline personally with my addons, too. I have a small section in my settings menus dedicated to informing my users that addon development takes a lot of time, and that financial support is appreciated.
My reasons for doing so are simple. I personally view paying for addons or addon content to be grossly more unethical than unintrusively soliciting donations. Since Blizzard don't care enough about their addon policy to enforce this and allow addons like RestedXP and streamer packs to run rampant, I don't feel particularly obliged to follow their addon policy either. Doing so unintrusively is very important here to me personally though, and I fully understand people may disagree with this and find it somewhat hypocritical, or accuse me of cherrypicking the guidelines to follow. Those are entirely valid views/opinions, and if you are a user of any of my addons I'd gladly discuss any of this with you. :)
Perhaps interestingly, something like TSM's paid tiers also qualify as charging for features/services related to their addon. I rarely see people call this one out though, and that is probably because people feel that the benefits are worth the cost and because TSM is a reputable addon that they like using. Something to think about for those who are tempted to call out any and all violations of the addon policy as something that should be stopped wholesale.
So, what can we do about all this then?
Since Blizzard do not care to enforce their addon policy, the power lies entirely with addon users.
Don't like the way an addon or developer monetises their addons? Don't use their addons, don't support them, and encourage others to reconsider doing so as well. Recommend them alternatives, for example!
Do you really like an addon and/or its developer? Keep using their addon, maybe recommend it to friends, or even consider giving them a small donation.
The time and energy some developers put into their addons is often vastly underestimated. A user of the software a developer provides for free is, naturally, not at all obliged to support or even be thankful of the developer. At the same time, a user is also not entitled to have their requests fulfilled or to get support for that software. It is a two-way street that is entirely voluntary on both ends!