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Video Game Appropriation
through Modifications
Attitudes Concerning Intellectual Property among Modders and Fans
Hector Postigo
University of Utah, USA
Abstract / This article investigates an instance in convergence culture: the conflicts and compro-
mises between modders (fans of a video game who actually make changes to the game) and their
supporters, and the owners of the copyrighted works they appropriate. I suggest that current copy-
right ownership in cultural products interferes with the way creative industries can benefit from
convergence; that modders (and fans generally) develop a specific rationale and set of norms rooted
in Jenkins’ concept of a ‘moral economy’ (Jenkins, Convergence Culture: Where Old and New
Media Collide, 2006) to justify their appropriations; and that mutually beneficial relationships can
be teased out of the apparently contradictory positions of modders and copyright owners. This
article focuses on two case studies that illustrate the ways modders reuse cultural products and
incorporate them into their video game modifications to achieve a sense of creative ownership and
meaning over their entertainment experience.
Key Words / intellectual property / modders / modding / moral economy / video game fans
Introduction
This article analyzes convergence in the video game industry with a focus on illustrating
how fan practices and copyright/licensing shape fan relations with video game companies
and copyright owners. The specific subset of video game fans being analyzed can be
divided into game fans who actively mod (modders)1and those fans who, while not
actively modding, are fans of the mods under development and/or the games being
modded. This classification is consistent with other game studies research, which has illus-
trated the complexity of video game fan identities and productive roles where (1) fans
generally have been categorized by their level of productive involvement (Abercrombie
and Longhurst, 1998), (2) game fans have been classified by their roles in fan production
teams (Postigo, 2003, forthcoming; Sotamaa, 2004) and (3) game fans have been shown
to be fans of both the games and mods (Sotamaa, 2004).
Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies
Copyright © 2008 Sage Publications
London, Los Angeles, New Delhi and Singapore Vol 14(1): 59–74
DOI: 10.1177/1354856507084419
http://cvg.sagepub.com
ARTICLE
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Convergence and Participatory Culture
The meaning of the term ‘convergence’ has had a dynamic history in the last 30 years.
It first was meant to describe the accumulation of control over mass media industries in
the hands of a few corporations. Later, it came to mean the merging of various media
formats such as text, audio, video, and graphics on digital networks such as the World
Wide Web. In this article, convergence is deployed using the meaning recently attributed
to it by Henry Jenkins and others where, due to the networked nature of new media,
content can be made both by professionals and by the scores of fans and consumers
inhabiting digital networks (Hartley, 2006; Jenkins, 2006b). Furthermore, convergence
encompasses a set of practices that are part of participatory culture, where consumers
actively engage in the production and recreation of content (Jenkins, 1992b).
Participatory culture has long been described as a characteristic of fandom but
recently the dynamics of convergence have brought it together with vast digital communi-
cation networks to produce a new paradigm for consumption and production. In this
new paradigm, consumers (not only fans), producers, media, and creative minds converge
to make production in the cultural industries a two-way street; where innovation can
come from consumers as easily as from traditional producers of content (Hartley, 2006;
Jenkins, 2006b).
To tap into the productive potential of convergence, cultural industries are increas-
ingly making content available through digital and interactive media that make creative
access a reality for consumers. Yet, as has often happened in fandom, consumers appro-
priate content in ways that industries do not condone. At these times conflicts with the
cultural industry break out, showing us the structures that typically hold the tenuous
relationship between media consumers and media producers together. Assumptions
about ownership, common consumer practices at odds with copyright law, and implicit
understandings between consumers and the cultural industries about the accepted limits
of appropriation are themes that quickly surface as these conflicts play themselves out.
Video games are an important site for the study of convergence because, at least in
the PC platform, the creative barrier between consumers and producers is historically
porous and fans have been making their own creative sorties into game code since the
days of Doom and Wolfenstein 3D (Au, 2002; Kushner, 2003). Video games are particu-
larly well suited for ‘transformative play’ where players ‘modify the game so that it is
different for others’. To this end, many games in a host of genres – such as real time
strategy (RTS), role playing games, or first person shooters (FPS) – are now designed to
incorporate the skilled user into a post-production process (Jones, 2006; Salen and
Zimmerman, 2003). FPS PC games were chosen for this study because they have a strong
history of fan involvement in modification. While other game genres, such as RTS games,
have mods, FPS mods and their production have been noted to be more ‘institutional-
ized’, implying that modding culture in this genre is more intertwined with the gaming
industry (Nieborg, 2005).
In PC games, convergence is exemplified by modders and the work they do on
their favorite games. Computer code that represents images and game play is de-
contextualized and reshaped, passed through a community of fan developers who will
create/appropriate and incorporate other bits of their cultural experience into the new
gaming world they create and eventually thrust it out into the internet where it may be
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downloaded by thousands who will then play the new code, layered onto the old. The
very text (both computer code and the codes of meaning) is ‘turned into an event’ for
the participation of the group (Fiske, 1992). This is convergence in its most salient
visage; a coming together of images, culture, media industries, and the roles of
consumers/creators (Jenkins, 2006b). Relationships exist between each of the entities
participating in the construction and reconstruction of the game, and these relationships
are bounded by the common interest in the meaning of cultural products and their value
as commodities.
The often-vested creative relationship modders and other fans have with their
favorite games emotionally charges the confrontations between copyright owners and
modders and their supporters. When they work together, fan/modder groups and the
game industry can be a powerful force for the production of novel material, incentiviz-
ing a strong participatory community whose products are likely to benefit both groups
(Postigo, forthcoming). But when they are in opposition, corporate interests, enforced by
click-through agreements and copyright law, can stand in the way of creativity and partici-
pation. At these times, modders find themselves frustrated because of their inability to
creatively work with the content they love. Furthermore their supporters and game fans
in general are angered because they cannot access innovative mods.
I and others have argued that the economic benefits of modding for game develop-
ers outweigh those that consumers and fans may garner (Kucklich, 2005; Postigo, 2003),
but also, research has shown that there are multiple types of ‘benefits’ that modders
derive from modding; they can be social as well as economic (Au, 2002; Kucklich, 2005;
Postigo, 2003, forthcoming). The point here is not to say that one benefit (economic
benefit, for example) outweighs another, but rather to suggest that given the freedom
to creatively explore modding, the pool of possibly interesting and novel derivative works
multiplies. The political economy of this type of work has been described as ‘free labor’
(Terranova, 2000, 2004), ‘invisible labor’ (Downey, 2001; Postigo, 2003) or ‘playbour’
(Kucklich, 2005) and is generalizable to new networked information communication tech-
nology industries (Kucklich, 2005). This article temporarily sets aside the important
question of political economy and instead highlights some of the tensions and norms that
govern modders and game fans so we can understand the cultural and normative influ-
ences that drive modders, volunteers, fans, and other value-producers in the networked
world.
The following two case studies describe the complex relationships between modders,
fans, and game companies or third party owners of cultural products. The cases are:
(1) the ‘Duke It Out in Quake’ mod, which imported characters from Apogee’s title Duke
Nukem 3D into id Software’s game, Quake 3, and (2) the ‘GI Joe’ mod for Battlefield
1942, where Hasbro stopped modders from developing a mod that would have imported
many of the GI Joe cartoon characters, weapons, and vehicles into Electronic Art’s (EA)
Battlefield 1942. Through research on fan forums, mod development forums, online news
media sources and interviews with modders, these cases illustrate the sometimes
confrontational relationship between game companies, third party copyright owners, and
modders and other game fans. The case studies are presented first, followed by analysis
of modders’ and fan comments, situating their viewpoints and attitudes within conver-
gence culture.
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When Mods Get ‘Foxed’:2‘Duke It Out in Quake’ and ‘GI Joe’
for Battlefield 1942
The ‘Duke It Out in Quake’ mod for Quake 3
In February 2001 a group of modders released a mod for id’s popular first person shooter
Quake 3: the mod was titled ‘Duke It Out in Quake’. Specifically, ‘Duke It Out in Quake’
imported characters, weapons, and maps from the popular Apogee title Duke Nukem 3D
into the Quake 3 game engine.
When Duke Nukem 3D was released in 1996 it acquired a rapid following for its
innovative game play. The game was open ended, had numerous references to pop
culture (which players discovered as they moved about the world) and the lead charac-
ter was able to humorously interact with in-world items. After the success of Duke Nukem
3D, fans eagerly awaited the next installment in the series: Duke Nukem Forever (a title
which is still in development). By 2001, due to production delays, many fans had become
frustrated and derisive comments about the slow development process became common
in fan forums. When ‘Duke It Out in Quake’ was released in 2001 fans were happy to
see their favorite game characters again, this time rendered with id’s powerful Quake 3
game engine. However, this posed serious copyright concerns for Apogee, because
players who did not own Duke Nukem 3D could now experience elements of the game
if they owned Quake 3 and installed the mod. Shortly after the release of ‘Duke It Out
in Quake’ George Broussard, co-owner of Apogee Software, posted the following
response to a fan site discussing the new mod:
I commend the guys on their being fans, but they really can’t do this. People really should know
better and it really pains me to have to write emails to hard working teams that picked the wrong
idea. But the level designs and the textures are all copyrighted works and you really can’t go around
re-creating them – even for fun or even for free. It’s the same reason you don’t see Doom 1 redone
in Quake 3. As much as we’d all like to see it – it’s just not allowed. (Broussard, 2001)
Apogee then contacted the ‘Duke It Out in Quake’ team and had them stop develop-
ment on the mod.
The fan community responded primarily with ire and disappointment to Apogee’s
decision. Many fans could not understand why Apogee would stop the mod’s develop-
ment, noting that since Apogee could not be counted on to release Duke Nukem Forever,
then modders were justified in releasing a version of Duke Nukem 3D on an updated
graphics engine. Some posters to a fan forum implied that because fans were likely to
have the game already, they should be allowed to play the mod. They implied that fans
somehow had a right to play ‘Duke It Out in Quake’ because of their devotion to Duke
Nukem and if Apogee really wanted to support the fan community, it would not have
asked the modders to stop their work. One fan wrote:
I can’t see what’s wrong with re-making the maps for Q3 [Quake 3]. People who download them
are either Duke3D fans that already got that game, or people that find out about the game (or the
sequel) because they like the maps.
And, for those who really don’t care if they could play the maps or not . . . this just hurts 3DRealms
reputation. You say you’re supporting the community when you’re doing the opposite. (Hustlah,
2001)
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Other fans sought to reconcile the perceived threat the mod posed for the company’s
intellectual property with the benefits to the fan community, noting that since the game
was old and generally outdated, modders ought to be able to infringe so that fans could
play the game on an updated platform. One fan wrote:
I fail to see, however, why you would stop a few guys from replicating some of the coolest DM
[Death Match, a type of multiplayer game] levels of all time for a modern platform. D3D [Duke
Nukem 3D] is 5 years old, and I have serious doubts as to the effect it will have on your companies
[sic] revenue. I understand intellectual property, but I also understand that going in the direction that
you are going with this will end up hurting you more that it would to simply let them do these levels.
(archvile, 2001)
Modders and other Duke Nukem fans also struggled to understand the limits of their
appropriations as delineated by copyright law, asking whether porting maps to any future
Apogee title would also be problematic (ease_one, 2001). Others struggled with issues
concerning copyright, asking at what point a modification of proprietary content is a
novel creation versus a derivative work that is still under the control of the original
designer (Vantage, 2001). Modders and their supporters showed an understanding of the
subtleties of being a consumer/creator under the control of copyright, asking, for
example, if the models and maps for Duke Nukem 3D had been recreated from scratch
rather than imported into Quake 3 would there still be a copyright violation? They
wondered at what level of representation an image, for example, would still be enough
like an original to constitute a reproduction – a key question in copyright law to be sure
(ease_one, 2001; Vantage, 2001).
Lastly, modders and their supporters sought to find a middle ground solution to the
conflict. They noted that the mod was good publicity for the sequel to Duke Nukem 3D,
a flattering statement about how much fans love the original title, and a good oppor-
tunity to acknowledge an important fan base. One fan wrote:
On the one hand, he [George Broussard] has a point about it being copyrighted material. On the
other hand, you’ve got stuff like Star Trek fan fiction on the web everywhere, and the lawyers don’t
do anything about it. The reason is that these fans are the core of the community. The fact that they
produce fan fiction (which is I think a pretty close analogy to this Duke→Q3 stuff) increases interest
in the commercial product. I’d say, let it slide unless someone tries to make money off of it. Consider
it flattery, and free advertising, and whetting of the appetite for Duke4 . . . (archvile, 2001)
The ‘GI Joe’ mod for Battlefield 1942
The ‘GI Joe’ mod for Battlefield 1942 was released in February 2003 and was a conver-
sion of the popular Electronic Arts title Battlefield 1942. Battlefield 1942 quickly became
popular among networked gamers because of its robust multiplayer design. The ability
to interact with a variety of vehicles and characters in the game environment set Battle-
field 1942 apart from other multiplayer games.
The ‘GI Joe’ mod imported newly designed game elements into the Battlefield 1942
environments that drew from the popular animated television series and Hasbro toy line,
GI Joe. Because the mod recreated GI Joe and COBRA (the arch-nemesis of the GI Joe
Organization) vehicles and operatives, gamers and fans of the old GI Joe series could not
only see their favorite childhood animated characters again but could actually play with
them during the game (see Figure 1).
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The mod tapped into fan nostalgia by referencing the popular series and toys of the
1980s and it was happily received. The release notes enthusiastically referenced the child-
hood experience of many who had grown up with the animated series, stating:
YO JOE! Ok, so you liked the 80’s GI: JOE cartoon also huh? Good! Now you can get a GI JOE Mod
for Battlefield 1942 and get to the frontlines. Because knowing is half the battle. (unknown, 2003)
This brief quotation reveals the extent to which this mod tapped into a collective nostal-
gia over the game with which those who were familiar with the television series could
quickly identify. The cartoon characters, for example, would shout ‘Yo Joe’ when they
went into combat and after each show the characters would provide a 30-second public
service announcement which would end with the character saying, ‘Now you know and
knowing is half the battle’. The mod was well received by fans and one reviewer noted
that the GI Joe ‘series stands in the same line of popularity and fame as Transformers,
Knight Rider, The A-Team etc,’ suggesting that the mod’s success had a lot to do with
its relation to the loved animation (Burdick, 2003). The ‘GI Joe’ mod team produced two
versions of the mod, one called the Alpha 1.1 version and a smaller ‘mini mod’. They
also produced a series of updates to the mod before Hasbro sent the team a ‘cease and
desist’ letter ending any further development on the mod less than a year after its release.
After the ‘GI Joe’ mod was shut down, the fan response was somewhat similar to
responses in the Duke Nukem case. Some fans saw Hasbro’s decision to kill the mod as
part of corporate greed. At the same time others argued that a mod like ‘GI Joe’ was
good for business and Hasbro had made a mistake by alienating fans and modders. They
argued that the mod could have stimulated interest in the old toy line and television series
and that Hasbro could have used it as a publicity tool (liQUiD8OR, 2004).
Fans and the ‘GI Joe’ modders were disappointed over losing the mod. Some made
heartfelt appeals to Hasbro to allow modders to continue working on the mod and they
suggested possible compromises that could benefit modders, fans, and Hasbro. One fan
wrote:
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FIGURE 1
The Hasbro GI Joe vehicle on the left was recreated in the ‘GI Joe’ mod as shown on the
right. Image on the left taken from www.rjsonline.net. Image on the right taken from
www.megagames.com
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I do understand your concerns from a business perspective, but again, the most important matter
in this is that your company was the only organization that stood to make ANY money from this
venture. I can see no reason that the final product could not have been inspected by Hasbro to insure
that the game was tailored to their liking. Furthermore, this would also have given you some very
good ideas as to what gamers are looking for (for any future software plans). And in the end you
and the talented designers of this mod could have helped all parties involved. (Shad_Blunt, 2004)
This quotation is telling of the possibilities perceived by fans and modders. For hacker
circles and modder groups working on video games, the possibility to engage in produc-
tive relationships with businesses had traditionally been part of their experience and had
Hasbro been a video game company, it might have been more open to this type of
development (as Valve Software was for the successful ‘Counter-Strike’ mod for Half-
life).3
In the case of the ‘GI Joe’ mod, fans and modders struggled with the boundaries set
by copyright. Some wondered whether, if the mod had been commercialized and proven
its monetary worth, Hasbro would have shut it down (Shad_Blunt, 2004). They were
generally confused about what the motives would be for Hasbro to have such a strong
grip on the GI Joe content if the mod team was not making any money from the develop-
ment. Fans showed a sense of community in this case as they tried to educate each other
as to why Hasbro might have stopped the mod. Some speculated that Hasbro did not
want its trademark diluted and others thought it was because Hasbro wanted to license
the likenesses of its toys to a software company that would pay high royalties
(Shad_Blunt, 2004).
As events unfolded, the ‘GI Joe’ mod team attempted to negotiate with Hasbro for
licensing terms. The modders offered to change the models so that they would not look
exactly like the GI Joe toys and they offered to remove the identifying marks found on
the vehicles (loony, 2004). Ultimately, Hasbro did not allow any compromises and the ‘GI
Joe’ mod team found itself in the awkward position of telling their supporters and other
fans that they would have to redesign most of the vehicles and player characters. Without
the recognizable GI Joe design, the mod could no longer rightly be called ‘GI Joe’.
In the end the ‘GI Joe’ mod team was forced to stop development because they
could not negotiate any use of the GI Joe content. One of the modders sent a sad good-
bye to his fan community as he announced they were no longer going to continue writing
updates or supporting the ‘GI Joe’ mod. He noted:
In many ways this is a tragedy, and in many others it’s just business. We live in a capitalist country.
Some times the little guy wins, but usually we get crushed for the good of corporate interest. I guess
just enjoy what we were able to bring you and that will have to do it. I can set up our old testing
server if any of you managed to get your hands on a leaked copy. Otherwise I’d be willing to set up
a Mini-Mod server if anyone is interested. (liQUiD8OR, 2004)
The cultural economy of the game, the content and its value to the fan/modder were
played out in the struggle over the ‘GI Joe’ mod. Modders worked hard to make the ‘GI
Joe’ mod. They purchased the
GI Joe movie, mini-series and Season 1 on DVD, along with some re-releases of the original toy line
and a whole slew of comics . . . not to mention countless hours of organizing facts about their toy
line and how [they] were going to portray them in the game’. (liQUiD8OR, 2004)
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Wanting to own (creatively) a moment of their childhood through the technological
possibilities of a digital present and being denied that almost natural desire because of
copyright, corporatism and capitalism, seemed to many fans absurd; all the more so
because they could see solutions to the problem that would benefit all involved. For many
fans and modders it was clear that copyright, the law that gave the cultural industries
near total control over content, became the biggest hurdle to participatory culture and
to convergence.
Modding in Context: Legal Structures and the Moral Economy
Modding and Resisting Copyright
Following the confrontations with third party copyright owners such as Hasbro and
Apogee, many fans and modders expressed frustration with the law and its disregard for
modders’ desires to engage creatively with content. While many recognized that the law
gave copyright owners control over creative works, given that the modders were not
trying to sell their wares and that a compromise would have allowed for the production
of quality content, fans and modders felt the law was not serving consumer interests.
One fan noted:
Actually, it’s [copyright] usually a good idea gone abused . . . or at least the laws governing it. And
it is only getting worse as media companies continue to try to eliminate all rights to fair, non-
commercial use. Like the book publishers trying to say that libraries are stealing from them. (crow,
2001)
Frustrated fans and modders demonstrated a different set of values than those espoused
by copyright. These values, if operationalized, would give them creative rights over copy-
right content so long as the new productions were not commercialized or when a
compromise could clearly be made as to how to exploit modder content to the benefit
of all. Given these attitudes, the important question to ask of these deliberations is not
whether modders and fans were legally correct, but rather how the law diverged from
what they believed ought to be the case; how modders and fans tried to reconcile this
divergence and how, when all else failed, they resisted copyright. Answers to these
questions increase the level of understanding between copyright owners and fans and
perhaps can lead to more productive relationships.
As noted earlier, fans implied a right to make and play the ‘Duke It Out in Quake’
mod because of their devotion to the game and because they felt let down by Apogee’s
delayed development of Duke Nukem Forever. This sense of having a ‘right’ over the
game content based on their relationship with the game led some to feel justified in
playing the mod, even against Apogee’s wishes. One fan told the fan community, ‘Thank
god I downloaded it before it could be yanked, and will now have it, even after it’s
pulled down from the information superhighway, to play illegally at my leisure’ (kbanas,
2001).
As fans and modders sought to develop an understanding of legal constraints, they
connected their struggle with the recent over-extension of copyright in the digital domain.
They referenced important cases in the copyright debate (such as the DeCSS case4) and
the restrictive consequences for fair use of digital rights management (DRM) systems,5
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and saw their own copyright troubles as part of a perceived shift away from user-friendly
practices concerning proprietary content. One Duke Nukem fan wrote:
Well, whether you like it or not, I’m downloading these right away! I made a vow to engrave the
DeCSS source code on a brass plaque, and I’m making a vow to download these maps and play
them until my fingers go numb! (archvile, 2001)
The reference to DeCSS is quite telling in this instance. DeCSS became a politicized tech-
nology at the time of its release because courts had enjoined some individuals from
posting it on the World Wide Web. In response, many activists in the Digital Rights
Movement and within the Free Software Movement (FSM) posted the DeCSS source as
a sign of solidarity with those censored by the court. To this day supporters of digital
rights and the FSM continue to post DeCSS on the web even though the software is
largely outdated; this is because they see DeCSS as emblematic of the fight against the
restriction of fair use and other traditional user privileges (Eschenfelder and Desai, 2004;
Eschenfelder et al., 2005; Postigo, forthcoming). While the case of ‘Duke It Out In
Quake’ is not necessarily about fair use, the willingness of fans to contest copyright (by
downloading and playing the maps in spite of copyright owners’ protests) and to see
parallels with the digital rights movement’s and the FSM’s values, illustrates the diver-
gence between copyright and modder/fan practices. It makes clear that when they feel
that game companies are not dealing fairly, some fans are willing to openly ignore
copyright.
In the case of the ‘GI Joe’ mod some Battlefield 1942 fans and modders became
equally frustrated with Hasbro’s decisions to shut down the mod and they suggested
boycotting Hasbro products or starting a signature drive among the Battlefield 1942
gaming community to petition Hasbro to change its practices (liQUiD8OR, 2004;
Roo_the_Almighty, 2004). In 2005, two years after development on the ‘GI Joe’ mod
stopped, another mod team attempted to design a ‘GI Joe’ mod for Battlefield 2, the
follow up to Battlefield 1942. In this case the fan and modding community attempted
to warn the new ‘GI Joe’ modders that Hasbro would probably stop them due to copy-
right concerns as had been done during the previous mod’s development. In this instance
the modders were much more vocal about their frustration with copyright and its effect
on modding. The lead developer for the second ‘GI Joe’ mod was adamant about
proceeding with development regardless of the copyright concerns. He told his
community:
I appreciate your concern, but a cease and desist will not stop this mod. I know that changing the
names (as well as the vehicles themselves as to what the BF1942 [Battlefield 1942] mod team was
required to do . . .) would allow us to do this with Hasbro’s permission. However that would not be
GI JOE. I think people would love a GI JOE mod, so that’s what I’m a gunna give ‘em! (sasori, 2005a)
The mod team developed a series of strategies to avoid being identified should
Hasbro attempt to sue them. They were, for example, looking into international copy-
right laws to see if the mod could be hosted somewhere where copyright law could be
interpreted in their favor, they had anonymized their postings in an attempt to make their
identities untraceable, and lastly, they had plans in place to distribute the mod among a
smaller circle of gamers and not to release it widely on the internet (sasori, 2005a, 2005b).
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Much like in the case of the ‘Duke It Out in Quake’ mod, the tone for much of the
discussion became one of frustrations and ultimately defiance. Modders and fans could
not understand why Hasbro would not want to benefit from the publicity that a mod
would garner; they felt justified in creating the mod based on their love of the content
and the possibility of re-creating a cherished childhood experience. Ultimately this second
mod was never released. It is unknown whether this was because Hasbro found out about
the mod and stopped it or whether the mod team lost its momentum and disbanded, as
many are apt to do.
The Moral Economy of Mods
As the case studies so far have shown, modders and fans vocalize a host of attitudes and
opinions concerning their relationship to and rights over proprietary content, especially
in times of conflict with content owners. What theoretical perspective might help us
understand how those attitudes arise? What gives fans the conceptual tools needed to
confront the powerful rhetoric of ownership legitimated by intellectual property law
generally and copyright law specifically? A useful concept to begin understanding the
nature of how fans and modders develop these viewpoints is Jenkins’ concept of the
‘moral economy’. Working with Star Trek fans, Jenkins used the concept of the ‘moral
economy’ to describe fan community norms and practices that explain how and why fans
justify appropriations of proprietary texts as well as set limits to those appropriations
(Jenkins, 2006c). Jenkins theorized that a set of characteristics came together to form
the particulars of the moral economy and that they collectively resulted in a consensus
among fans about what constituted legitimate appropriation. But what were these
characteristics exactly? Jenkins suggested that consensus was a result of material concerns
influencing the production of a wide range of possible appropriations and reconfigura-
tions of content. These limitations might include economic concerns over the cost of
producing fanzines or having a responsive audience (Jenkins, 2006c). Also, according to
Jenkins, fans experienced a fractured attitude towards the original creators of content,
showing a mix of respect and frustration when they felt that economic interests were
leading original creators along story lines that diverged from the ‘true’ nature of the
text.
The cases presented here exhibit the characteristics illustrated by Jenkins in his studies
and show us some new dynamics for a digital moral economy. Just as in the case of Star
Trek fans, a responsive audience matters. Modders typically seek community support and
encouragement to validate their hard work. Most mods have online fan forums, often
supported by the game companies that developed the game for which the mod is being
developed. On these forums, modders can keep fans informed on the progress of a given
mod, recruit potential team members, test beta versions of the mod, and elicit feedback.
Fans, for their part, post words of encouragement, critiques of concept artwork, ratings
of the mod, and other discussions that build support for the mod.
In his study, Jenkins pointed out that material constraints such as cost had an effect
on the breadth (topically) of content produced because the investment cost in publish-
ing a fanzine, for example, needed to be recouped through its adoption by a large fan
base. This interaction between costs and the popularity of a topic amounted to a barrier
to entry into mass producing fan-based content and influenced the consensus of what
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was an acceptable appropriation of original content. In these earlier instances the size of
the responsive audience mattered greatly, because it made the endeavor worthwhile.
In the case of mods the responsive audience need not be as large and therefore the
topical explorations of content are not necessarily constrained by a cost/mass appeal
barrier. This is a consequence of (1) online distribution, (2) the convergence culture of the
video game industry and its fans, and (3) the technologies that facilitate production.
Because the costs of producing a mod are not as high as publishing magazines,6there
exists a diverse topical ecology of mods for any particular game that is not limited by
audience size. The audience, for example, might simply be composed of the modder and
his or her three close friends. Surveys of mods produced for some of the most popular
PC games in 2004 show well over 1300 mods for EA’s Medal of Honor: Allied Assault
available in one distribution site, with some downloaded tens of thousands of times while
others only three or four times. When some of the modders making these less frequently
downloaded mods were asked about their audience, they noted they did the work mostly
for their small circle of friends. (Postigo, forthcoming). Thus a small audience was not a
significant disincentive to production. This suggests that production in a digital moral
economy is at least somewhat divorced from material limitations such as financial cost or
audience. The implication is that in the digital moral economy, the consensus about what
is a legitimate topical exploration may be more expansive as a result of both the decline
of material constraints and the availability of receptive audiences via the World Wide
Web. Modders were at liberty to explore topics that may have had a limited audience in
a different medium. One modder working on a mod about the Finnish Wars noted:
In our case, making the mod about Finnish Wars was an easy choice, since there is no commercial
game and almost every Finn is interested in our wars. (Valkonen, 2004 cited in Postigo, forthcoming)
Jenkins, when describing the characteristics of a moral economy, noted that consen-
sus was a result of a balance between respect for the original creators and a sense of
right to appropriate when the community felt that the content owners where not being
true to the content. Much like in Jenkins’ study of Star Trek fans, video game fans and
modders do show respect for the content and text of games but they also have layered
relationships with a game. Some will love the story in the game, others the themes in
game play and still others will love the game’s computer code. When the concept of a
moral economy was first deployed to describe fan appropriations it was meant to describe
instances where fans felt justified in claiming a moral ownership of a text because they
felt that they were being truer to the content than the legal owners (Jenkins, 2006c). In
a digital moral economy appropriations are not only about fans being keepers of original
intent but also about expansion and re-creation. In this new moral economy it is not only
the meaning of the texts that matters but also the meaning of code as a tool for cultural
expression. That is to say that the code (the source code of a game, the software develop-
ment kit or SDK, the textures and other design elements and tools) becomes an essen-
tial means of production, design, and play; maintaining the essence of the original text
is important but so is using the mechanisms that render the text as tools to expand and
re-create.
Modders in the digital moral economy of video games are not only fans of the text
but also fans of the code. The case studies bear this out. The ‘GI Joe’ mod team, for
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example, were avid fans of the GI Joe text; they collected old GI Joe series episodes, toys
and comic books but also they were fans of the Battlefield 1942 graphics engine, they
favored its technical differences compared to others. Similarly, the Duke Nukem 3D
modders were fans of the Quake 3 graphics engine and of the Duke Nukem content;
ultimately, their affinity for both brought them together in the ‘Duke It Out in Quake’
mod. Thus, research on modding and modders shows both kinds of fan producers, those
that expand on the text of the game and those that use the code of the game to expand
the text of some other cultural product, be that a movie, a board game, or a television
cartoon (Postigo, forthcoming).
Most importantly for third party intellectual property owners is how a digital moral
economy might legitimate unsanctioned appropriations and disdain for copyright
enforcement. It is clear that in a digital moral economy topical explorations have the
potential to be robust, that distribution and production costs are not significant barriers
to creativity and that perhaps these elements together give modders a greater sense of
freedom to appropriate. Fan forums and modder comments show that there is a level of
community legitimization for appropriation. In the cases presented, fan/modder
communities generated robust discussions about copyright, its limits, its perceived unfair-
ness, and as a result, a sense of loss over content never released or properly produced.
Instances of referencing the digital rights movement, the FSM, and their status as fans
to justify appropriation show that fan and modder communities became adherents to
internal legitimizing narratives that helped them ignore the legally authorized claims of
content owners.
The fan and modder communities were not monolithic in this regard, however, and
a significant number of fans in the cases presented also showed a willingness to accept
the ownership claims of content owners. To these fans, creative participatory culture
happened at the pleasure of the copyright owners. Yet the powerful technological reali-
ties of digital distribution networks and digital media made the material realization of
appropriation, in spite of content owner protest, a reality even as the community is
somewhat divided.
Conclusion: Situating Modders/Fans within Convergence and
Mass Culture
In a growing convergence culture, the moral economy once present only in fan communi-
ties will expand to consumers as a whole. It is not hyperbole to say that consumers in
the digital era have the potential to be called ‘fans’ in the fashion defined by Henry
Jenkins some 15 years ago. In today’s digital world of podcasts, YouTube, MySpace and
other networking and user-based content production initiatives, fans and fan practices
are no longer isolated in their communities, generating local value. Today, due to the rise
of digital technologies as important tools to mediate and produce content for the cultural
industries, the participatory culture once found exclusively in fandom may be in the midst
of a fundamental transition from being, as John Fiske noted, ‘associated with the cultural
tastes of the people, particularly with those disempowered by any combination of gender,
age, class and race’ (Jenkins, 1992b), to becoming mainstreamed and associated with
empowerment through creative participation and technological know-how; on the
cutting edge of meaning-making. In this sense the ‘cultural economy of fandom’ is born
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anew; no longer situated in small communities to create local cultural capital. A currently
up-to-date interpretation applied to the new technological realities of the cultural indus-
tries suggests that the digital age allows for meaning-making and ‘textual productivity’
from technologically empowered consumers transcending traditional distinctions associ-
ated with access to media power. The empowerment to the consumer is significant;
personal homegrown media are propelled into the mainstream by their ubiquity on the
World Wide Web and earning potential.7The lessons from fan studies (that fans are part
of a participatory culture and that the products of participatory culture have value) are
powerful insights into the workings of a new paradigm for consumption/production. Thus
in the closing days of 2006 Time Magazine named ‘You’ (you and me and everyone on
YouTube and MySpace) its ‘Person of the Year’, noting ‘you control the Information Age.
Welcome to your world’ (Grossman, 2006). Given new technologies, we are told, we are
all potential creators, appropriators, and important meaning-makers; we are all, at last,
true fans.
The literature tells us that fandom is more specific and situated and not only defined
by a set of productive practices but also composed of modes of reception, interpretation
and community (Jenkins, 1992a). Yet, the comparison between participatory culture in
fandom and participatory culture writ-large serves a purpose because it points to a fairly
important and recent phenomenon: that the practices of one community (fandom) are
bleeding into the other (mass culture); that changes in technologies that mediate cultural
products have made more porous the boundaries to practicing the mores of fan culture.
Looking at participatory culture and its practices among fans of video games we note
that they are part of a broader ‘knowledge culture’8that gains mastery over media
through knowledge of its content, be it textual or technological. Participatory culture in
video games and among fans in general, because it appropriates commercial content,
clashes against the ‘commodity culture’ of the cultural industries that seek to control the
form and flow of cultural goods.
Copyright law, and its rationale, formalizes assumptions about why cultural goods
should be exclusively owned and lends legitimacy to the various ways that rationale is
enforced. As interactive technologies and participatory culture serve to break down the
distinction between consumers and producers, copyright law serves as a structural
counterpoint. The passage of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), the Copy-
right Term Extension Act (Sony Bono Act), the NET Act (No Electronic Theft) and a host
of court cases strengthening digital copyright has shifted the interpretation and execu-
tion of copyright in favor of copyright owners. Therefore, as never before, copyright
serves as an effective boundary between fans (and other consumers) and the content
they may wish to access.
This tension has been an ongoing theme in studies of fans’ productive activities
and the creative industries (Jenkins, 2006c). In this article the point was exemplified
by the conflicts that surfaced between modders, game companies, and owners of third
party content where content owners effectively had to make a choice, ‘to mod or not
to mod’. That theme is now evident in mass culture as well, as businesses that depend
on user-created content (such as YouTube and MySpace) begin to confront the moral
economy gone mainstream. Cultural modders appropriate and perform altered versions
of copyrighted works producing not only mods, but machinima, animated videos,
music videos, skits and parodies. Copyright owners are not necessarily pleased by these
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appropriations and YouTube, for example, is left to police copyright or advocate for
licensing.
Henry Jenkins asked if knowledge culture would result in the loosening of the copy-
right laws and norms that limited its productive power (2006c). It may. But the cultural
industries could also help do this proactively and shape a workable hybrid position
between knowledge culture and commodity culture where norms and law work together
to achieve a beneficial relationship for both fans and the cultural industries. The idea of
convergence is particularly powerful because it explains how technology, participatory
culture, and people are coming together with the potential to surmount formerly rigid
boundaries that separated producers from consumers. Fan culture is converging with
mass culture and consumer roles are converging with creative roles. Convergence is
poised to profoundly impact upon the cultural industry in the next century, but to benefit
fully from convergence, copyright and/or contracts between consumers and the creative
industries must be made flexible enough to accommodate the practices of creative appro-
priation.
Notes
1 Modifications or ‘mods’ are defined as fan-made changes to a video game that can range in complex-
ity from simple tweaks in game play to ‘total conversions’ where the whole game is redesigned (Postigo,
2003; Sotamaa, 2004). Modders are those fans that make mods.
2 The term ‘foxed’ comes from fan writings regarding mods that are shut down due to intellectual
property concerns. It originates from when Twentieth Century Fox shut down the ‘Infestation’ mod for
Half-life because it used elements of the Fox films Predator and Alien.
3 Valve Software contracted the modders for ‘Counter-Strike’, commercialized the mod, and sold it at
major retailers even though it was still available for free online. The game continues to be wildly
popular: it has player leagues, modders (modding the mod) and is the most played first person shooter
on the web. While the ‘Counter-Strike’ team did not use third party IP and thus did not violate copy-
right, the comparison here serves to illustrate that openness to fan generated content has the possi-
bility to produce quality products.
4 DeCSS is an application developed by the Norwegian hacker Jon Johansen and others to crack the
encryption on DVDs.
5 DRM systems are applications that technologically enforce licensing agreements and copyright law by
limiting the number of copies a user can make of legally bought media and controlling access.
6 To produce a mod a modder would need the software development kit (SDK) produced by the game
development company available for free online, a copy of the game (typically $60 retail), and basic
knowledge of computer programming and or modeling. The knowledge cost is high but the economic
cost is very low.
7 In this sense the cultural capital of the fan, which Fiske saw primarily outside of ‘official’ cultural capital
that is responsible for economic gain, is now very valuable: even if it is not ‘official’, it can at least
begin to pay dividends of equal or greater worth.
8 Jenkins, drawing from Pierre Levy, notes that fans are part of a knowledge culture while cultural indus-
tries, with their primary goal of commodification, are part of commodity culture (Jenkins, 2006a; Levy,
1997).
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Hector Postigo is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication at
the University of Utah, USA. His research focuses on two areas in new media studies.
Firstly, on social movements and their use of information communication technolo-
gies, specifically analyzing the digital rights movement’s user-centered fair use
campaign and the movement’s deployment of hacking as a tactic in its extra-
institutional repertoire of action; secondly on value production on the internet
focusing on video game fans and their modifications to popular PC games and on
AOL’s volunteer communities.
Address Department of Communication, University of Utah, 255 South Central
Campus Dr., Rm 2400, Salt Lake City, Utah 84112, USA. [email: h.r.postigo@utah.edu]
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