FTB and Forge - Curse Partnership.

[Bluehorazon]

Slow has said that its part of the agreement for other launchers to be able to use the downloads that curse will provide for the modpacks and that there will not be any download throttling for non premium members, in other words it will have the same features as the current ftb launcher and possibly more. There will most likely be ads on the launcher, and im sure that slow and lex will have input on the type of ads that will be displayed. If you want more detail just read some of the previous posts on this thread.

Well my point is that Curse is company which is around monitizing third-party addition to several games like WoW-Addons and Minecraft Mods. The presented agreement here seems to have not a lot of benefits for curse. So the fear is that they mainly want the FTB-Users to kickstart there service. After they already have all the mods on curseforge there is no need for FTB anymore. Also allowing 3rd party-launcher actually means that they get to provide their bandwidth without any benefit for curse, that is something they always tried to shut down as soon as it happens, it is hard to believe that they will do this for free.

I actually still not concerned about FTBs future. If the agreement is as slow presented it, Curse takes the much higher risk, I'm not sure why, but they do. FTB will still be independent and could propably go back to the way things work now if curse somehow fucks it up. Although this would require FTB to reestablish all the infrastructere they now have, Curse would lose so much more. A lot of people would in that case actually blame Curse, which can have a large impact if some of the modders evt. step away from curse and even more so Forge.

I guess the reason for this whole agreement is that FTB wanted to grow, they propably wanted to be able to host mods and build modpacks here. But in that case growing to such a large degree actually is a high-risk move, because it would simply cost them money they somehow have to get in the first place. So if they wanted to grow and provide more and better services, partnering with Curse actually is the low-risk move.

This is why I have a problem with adfly/mediafire/any other pennies for clicks site. Some of those 'adverts' are really convincing.
It's also entirely why I downloaded the CurseClient in the first place (for WoW). I felt it was a far safer way than possibly clicking a malicious link manually downloading my addons every update.
I've also never had a problem with any Curse site (MCF, WoW stuff) giving me those shady adverts. It's usually pretty stinkin' obvious what's an advertisement.

I really don't understand why anyone has a problem with Curse, or that Slow is working toward trying to do what he thinks is best.

Isn't that a bit strange. So you are afraid of the adds on curse, but not on their client? As far as I noticed the adds a very similar and the ones on the site are far saver, because any protection layer you have is able to detect them way better than in the client. And actually there were even issues on the MCF with ads and they needed several hours to get rid of it.

Also the only reason people used the curse-launcher was that curse tried as hard as possible to monopolize WoW-addons. A lot of addons could only be downloaded from curse, and although there existed other clients (which actually were better than theres...) they used to bring them down with their lawyers.

Also it is always said that Curse promised that there will be no requirement to go premium and other parties can use the service too... is this in any way part of the contract or is it just "promised" by them?

 

[Ashzification]

Isn't that a bit strange. So you are afraid of the adds on curse, but not on their client? As far as I noticed the adds a very similar and the ones on the site are far saver, because any protection layer you have is able to detect them way better than in the client. And actually there were even issues on the MCF with ads and they needed several hours to get rid of it.

Also the only reason people used the curse-launcher was that curse tried as hard as possible to monopolize WoW-addons. A lot of addons could only be downloaded from curse, and although there existed other clients (which actually were better than theres...) they used to bring them down with their lawyers.

Also it is always said that Curse promised that there will be no requirement to go premium and other parties can use the service too... is this in any way part of the contract or is it just "promised" by them?

That isn't what I said at all, and I'm baffled by how you got that from what I said.
I said I don't like adfly, mediafire and any other pennies for clicks site. I like Curse because they make their ads recognizable. Granted this has just been my experience with Curse, and it's probably not the same for everyone. I don't like ads that can be easily confused for actual download links. I do like ads that I can tell are ads.

I don't click on the ads that are on launchers. I would prefer those ads didn't link to anything at all.

You don't have to buy Premium to use Curse. You just have to buy Premium to use the better stuff. Pretty standard business model if you ask me. I might buy Premium to get that better stuff. It's the same thing as Twitch Turbo.

 

[DZCreeper]

Fill me in on what Twitch Turbo is please. Sounds a lot like they throttle the connection to their servers and buying this "Turbo" unthrottles it. That would explain why TwitchTV streams have been annoying and laggy to the point were I no longer support anyone streaming on there because I simply can't watch.

 

[Bluehorazon]

It was related to this sentence:

It's also entirely why I downloaded the CurseClient in the first place (for WoW). I felt it was a far safer way than possibly clicking a malicious link manually downloading my addons every update.

I agree that Adfly sucks. But on the other hand a lot of people complained that Curse isn't worth it from the financial side for modders and addon-creators. So I'm not sure if curse is the right solution for that problem.

 

[Eyamaz]

Fill me in on what Twitch Turbo is please. Sounds a lot like they throttle the connection to their servers and buying this "Turbo" unthrottles it. That would explain why TwitchTV streams have been annoying and laggy to the point were I no longer support anyone streaming on there because I simply can't watch.

I'm Turbo. It just means I never have to watch ads, but a partner still gets paid as if I did.

 

[Ashzification]

It was related to this sentence:



I agree that Adfly sucks. But on the other hand a lot of people complained that Curse isn't worth it from the financial side for modders and addon-creators. So I'm not sure if curse is the right solution for that problem.

I'm not sure you understand how the wow client works. I downloaded the addons, once. After every patch, the client updated the addons for me. Seems better than hoping I click the right download link.

That's the main reason I support this whole idea. (At least the curse launcher part of it)

 

[Sakata]

Okay, I read about 10 pages and couldn't do any more because of the consistent repetition of the same things.

My only request of SlowPoke and LexManos is this: Please, CYA. Do not sign any agreements without reading through it several times, or better yet, getting a lawyer to read it -- if not two. Companies are in a business to make money. Profit these days is the sole purpose. Not loyalty, or any form of (whats the word I'm looking for... 'patriotism'? towards a community or product). Please, do not let them sneak in some way to take ownership of FtB or (not to insult) more importantly, Forge.

After years of in and out involvement with the community and seeing the end-actions of Slow and Lex, I make a fairly educated guess that SlowPoke actually does love the minecraft community and wouldn't consciously make a move that would destroy it. LexManos, while sometimes as abrasive as diamond flecked sandpaper (he reminds me of House), is extremely intelligent and also loves this community.

These guys have put in a LOT of effort to the community for no really measurable personal gain, and with the flak they get, I personally would not have been able to do as good a job of it as they have... I'd have probably left it all to burn after some of the crap they've dealt with.

While I'm leery of Curse myself, I say just wait and see how this pans out. So long as Slow and Lex leave themselves an out that doesn't mean check-out, the community will be fine.

 

[Bluehorazon]

I'm not sure you understand how the wow client works. I downloaded the addons, once. After every patch, the client updated the addons for me. Seems better than hoping I click the right download link.

That's the main reason I support this whole idea. (At least the curse launcher part of it)

Well... but that is what I meant. You don't trust the curse site, since there might be problematic adds, but you do trust their client. Also the kind of ads you seem to fear aren't on curse. The problem with curse is that they are too slow in removing adds that are infected with malfare and can be dangerous to less secure pcs just by viewing them (you don't have to even click them). Most security software is able to detect these ads in the browser, however the client would bypass a lot of security-messures. Up until now the curse-client was only affected once as far as I know of, but the site had the problem a bit more often (like I mentioned even the MCF was affected by it).

There are also complains that curse isn't really open towards their users when something happens. There was some accident in 2009 when the site went down for a few hours. After some time and funny enough with other parts of their service yet unavaible they said that they had technical issues which are fixed now (although obviously only partially, since some sites were still down). It was later suspected that curse was target of an attempt to steal user-information and they tried to hide it.

 

[Nerixel]

Well... but that is what I meant. You don't trust the curse site, since there might be problematic adds, but you do trust their client. Also the kind of ads you seem to fear aren't on curse. The problem with curse is that they are too slow in removing adds that are infected with malfare and can be dangerous to less secure pcs just by viewing them (you don't have to even click them). Most security software is able to detect these ads in the browser, however the client would bypass a lot of security-messures. Up until now the curse-client was only affected once as far as I know of, but the site had the problem a bit more often (like I mentioned even the MCF was affected by it).

There are also complains that curse isn't really open towards their users when something happens. There was some accident in 2009 when the site went down for a few hours. After some time and funny enough with other parts of their service yet unavaible they said that they had technical issues which are fixed now (although obviously only partially, since some sites were still down). It was later suspected that curse was target of an attempt to steal user-information and they tried to hide it.

... no, that's still not what she's saying. As I understand it, WoW addons are hosted on sites other than Curse. Doing it through the Curse client eliminates the possibility of you accidentally clicking an ad on that site.

I'm pretty sure the client wouldn't load a webpage then download the addon from there, it'd go straight to the file location, meaning no ads were ever actually loaded.

 

[xbony2]

Who told you that? Several ATLauncher packs have gregtech. There will never be any mods disallowed in ATLauncher packs, ever, never ever.

Mkay. Nevermind I guess (although the question now just points at curse)

 

[Greevir]

Mkay. Nevermind I guess (although the question now just points at curse)

It will bring them money, of course they won't have an issue with hosting it. The only real question is whether Greg wants it there. Cause that's the only thing that matters. It's his mod.

 

[Gaz_]

It will bring them money, of course they won't have an issue with hosting it. The only real question is whether Greg wants it there. Cause that's the only thing that matters. It's his mod.

Since you cant really read previous posts, It will be up to the mod author to upload their mod to the site.
Feed-the-trolls.com

 

[Bluehorazon]

... no, that's still not what she's saying. As I understand it, WoW addons are hosted on sites other than Curse. Doing it through the Curse client eliminates the possibility of you accidentally clicking an ad on that site.

I'm pretty sure the client wouldn't load a webpage then download the addon from there, it'd go straight to the file location, meaning no ads were ever actually loaded.

The curse client only uses mods from curse. That is true for minecraft and it was true for WoW.

 

[Nerixel]

The curse client only uses mods from curse. That is true for minecraft and it was true for WoW.

I dunno, was just kind of guessing. However, if it's like Minecraft, then there are mods available from sites other than Curse (which is what I was trying to say). Those other sites might have dodgy ads.

I'm sure Ash will come back and make sense of my stupidity anyway

 

[surferconor425]

Please don't do it. I love FTB and hate Curse. Curse has a lot of moderators that don't know how to moderate properly (I am not saying that is the case with all of them hense the a lot and not all) and how they run stuff is just generally annoying. I love the FTB mod pack platform as its free of mod packs that don't have permission to publish the mods inside of it and its got a good community full of good moderators and friendly people so please don't ruin it now after its come so far, please.

 

[Bluehorazon]

I dunno, was just kind of guessing. However, if it's like Minecraft, then there are mods available from sites other than Curse (which is what I was trying to say). Those other sites might have dodgy ads.

I'm sure Ash will come back and make sense of my stupidity anyway

I know what she means. However the client requires mods to be on curse. I understand that the current situation with mods all over the place and hidden behind adfly-links isn't really great. It is also pretty clear that partnering with curse to offer a central mod-location is far easier than establishing such a thing yourself.

The important thing about that deal is the ability to step back from it in case curse doesn't provide the expected service. Right now it is too early to judge the deal, but there are a lot of totally legit concerns considering curse past and the spirit of their business. Curse success is mainly created by monopolizing certain areas of gaming. And considering the offer to tekkit it is clear that they tried this with minecraft too, however obviously the tekkit-guys were aware how much value their business has and declined curse first offer. And I'm pretty sure that they would have loved to simply buy FTB too, however since the buyout already failed with tekkit they actually had to enter negotiations here. There advantage is that they propably have a large and professional legal department, so there is the danger that they will try to use some fishy tactics to get more control as they should. There large disadvantage however is that they lack a good network inside the community.

 

[Nerixel]

I know what she means. However the client requires mods to be on curse. I understand that the current situation with mods all over the place and hidden behind adfly-links isn't really great. It is also pretty clear that partnering with curse to offer a central mod-location is far easier than establishing such a thing yourself.

The important thing about that deal is the ability to step back from it in case curse doesn't provide the expected service. Right now it is too early to judge the deal, but there are a lot of totally legit concerns considering curse past and the spirit of their business. Curse success is mainly created by monopolizing certain areas of gaming. And considering the offer to tekkit it is clear that they tried this with minecraft too, however obviously the tekkit-guys were aware how much value their business has and declined curse first offer. And I'm pretty sure that they would have loved to simply buy FTB too, however since the buyout already failed with tekkit they actually had to enter negotiations here. There advantage is that they propably have a large and professional legal department, so there is the danger that they will try to use some fishy tactics to get more control as they should. There large disadvantage however is that they lack a good network inside the community.

That's something Slow and Lex have firmly maintained they'll hold onto, the ability to walk away if Curse goes bad. That's been mentioned, worried about and addressed earlier in this thread, so why are you even bringing it up again?

 

[surferconor425]

There is also no Curse Client for Mac, is this going to be changed or are Mac users going to be abandoned in the process, if thats so this is unbelievable that they would screw the whole community of Mac players over.

 

[xbony2]

There is also no Curse Client for Mac, is this going to be changed or are Mac users going to be abandoned in the process, if thats so this is unbelievable that they would screw the whole community of Mac players over.

I think they're going to make a version for mac/linux. And if not, then I'm screwed over.

 

[surferconor425]

I think they're going to make a version for mac/linux. And if not, then I'm screwed over.

It says this as they used to have a mac version and I quote

The Alpha version of the Mac client is no longer supported

After carefully exploring all possible options to provide our Mac users with a consistent experience that meets the high standards we have set for our products, we regret to inform you that we will no longer continue to develop our Mac client. Throughout it’s lifetime, the Alpha version of the Mac client has always been a bit behind our PC client, and we can no longer continue to support a product that does not provide the type of experience our users deserve and expect.

Users will be able to continue using the v4 version of the client, but currently, we are unable to guarantee any future updates or technical support.

I think Curse need to be stopped.