Experiences using Marketplace Items - Policy update

Mogolovoniobrah · September 21, 2023, 4:36pm

This update is pretty bad. It will break so many games that it isn’t funny. Make sure to private your game in protest.

Mogolovoniobrah · September 21, 2023, 4:38pm

They moved the rest of the posts that were critical into a different thread. That’s why theres significantly less posts.

JustNylo · September 21, 2023, 4:39pm

This policy is stupid in every way. What is going on with companies recently? One word can sum it up: greed. First, Unity announced their bizzare fee policy and now this is being announced by Roblox? I’m sorry (or maybe not actually), but respect to users has vanished the recent years.

Do you think UGC creators will make more money this way? If you really want them to actually earn more money then reconcider your plans of making every UGC item limited and everything that contributes to UGC creators not making a fair amount of Robux.

I can suppose you were thinking about the experience owners through commissions. Right? Not that people will leave faster by being annoyed at the fact that a purchase prompt will be on their screen 24/7… This surely won’t affect the average playtime of the experience and the premium payouts…

Voidage · September 21, 2023, 4:40pm

Avarice runs rampant in this world and I guess companies such as Unity and Roblox have fallen victim to it as well. How pathetic this is.

Mogolovoniobrah · September 21, 2023, 4:41pm

As they say, the love of money is the root of all evil.
If only the people running the corporations understood this.

AlteFore · September 21, 2023, 4:49pm

Hi. I’ve been here before but I was so mad that I couldn’t make a well though-out post. I’m still really angry, but not so angry that I can’t even write. Time to really put ROBLOX on blast.

Roblox:

[Update] September 19, 2023

Roblox:

Hi everyone,

We value your feedback and concerns.

No the crap you don’t. Stop lying.

Roblox:

Our intent with this policy is to further ensure that UGC creations are respected and properly used across the platform.

No it isn’t, you liars. Your intent here is obviously to make money. STOP. LYING.

Roblox:

We realize that the requirements behind the policy are very nuanced and have a significant impact on experience creators. We sincerely apologize for causing these concerns.

I won’t accept this apology until you actually fix your [content deleted]. What’s going to happen is you’ll wait for this do blow over and then when there’s not as much heat on your backs, you drop this update and nuke your platform then act all surprised when everyone hates you, your stock bombs, and everything you worked for gets annihilated. Whoever wrote this policy did such a bad job that now there’s a civil war in your own company about it. Congratulations, policy team! You’re a failure.

Roblox:

In light of this, we have decided to pause the rollout of the policy. This means that on September 27, you will NOT be subject to moderation for this policy.

Cool, so what’s the date when you’ll drop this unchanged without warning? I need to know so I can be ready to watch everything I’ve built for a year get destroyed.

Roblox:

As a next step, we will thoroughly consider all your use cases and feedback, and refine the policy as appropriate while respecting creators’ rights.

So “thoroughly consider all your use cases and feedback, and refine the policy as appropriate while respecting creators’ rights” means thanos snapping over 1,500 replies to this post because you can’t handle the mean things people are (rightfully) saying? Ok, got it.

Roblox:

Once we finalize the policy, we will provide ample time to meet its requirements. We promise to keep you updated with any new information in the coming days.

Translation: “We hear your concerns and don’t care. We won’t tell you what changes we may or may not make, and any changes we make may or may not improve the situation. Expect your lives to barely change!”

Roblox:

Thank you for your patience. We are committed to learning from this and appreciate your feedback.

You were committed to learning from this during every terrible policy update you have ever made. When will you actually learn?

So now that that bullcrap is out of the way, let’s rip into ROBLOX’s other lies and mess-ups.

Clearly it isn’t, because otherwise:

Constant copyright infringement on the UGC catalog wouldn’t be a problem,
The audio update would have never happened (remember that?),
You’d pay people who do dev-ex fairly,
And this post wouldn’t exist.

Oh boy, more vague and useless bloat to the already vague community standards?!? WHOOPEE!!!

So now catalog games are effectively useless because the entire point of those games was to let players try things on, for free. “But Alte,” I hear you say, dear reader, “Doesn’t ROBLOX let you try on items on the catalog?” Yes they do, and in true ROBLOX fashion it’s a garbage implementation of a basic feature! Thank you ROBLOX!

…So now literally every game on ROBLOX that has:

NPCs
Character creator
Admin commands like :gear and :hat
Catalog try-on features (you know what I mean, right?)

or any other feature that may result in offsale items being used in-game, whether by direct result of the developer or not, is now not allowed? Boy, you guys sure are great (terrible) at writing policy! (Whoever wrote this update needs to be fired.)

Classic ROBLOX moment, using their terrible new UI and terrible rthro avatars to show off a terrible new update. Are you sure that you want to do this?

It wouldn’t be a ROBLOX policy change without an unreasonable deadline. Seven days?!?!?! You mean to tell me that every single roblox game, no matter how big or how small, how young or how old, how indie or how megacorporate, has to make updates ranging in size from near-nonexistent to COMPLETELY GAME-CHANGING in SEVEN DAYS?!?!?! WHY???

Everyone. This is everyone on ROBLOX. Idiots.

“Please change your game fundamentally in 7 days because we’re too stupid/lazy/cheap to actually solve whatever issues we have and therefore need to make users solve them for us, also give us money.” - ROBLOX

Roblox:

FAQ

Click here to view the FAQ!

So uh use of quoteblocks in these things are kinda finicky so I’m just gonna talk in italics ok?

Use of avatar Marketplace items in experiences has been a long-standing feature of Roblox. Why is this change happening now?

Because ROBLOX wasn’t run by greedy executives back in the day so this wasn’t a problem.

Historically, our Marketplace was primarily populated with Roblox-created items. As we are about to open up creation to a larger portion of the creator community, we have to better ensure fairness to those creators.

But this applies to ROBLOX-created items as well, surely if this was really the case then this policy would only apply to UGC.

Is Roblox planning to offer any additional tools or support to help developers navigate this requirement and/or provide more choice to UGC creators?

Of course they aren’t.

While this policy goes into effect on September 27, we are also working very hard to consider a more holistic approach to ensure a consistent experience for our players and to help our creators. We can’t commit to anything yet, but we are evaluating the possibility of providing additional tooling in the future.

“More holistic approach” = “A way for us to make more money” and “A consistent experience” = “The most intrusive and money-sucking approach to this we can possibly take without losing our entire playerbase”.

I found an experience that appears to be violating this policy (the Experience is using off-sale avatar items, Roblox’s items, someone else’s items, etc). How do I report this developer?

ROBLOX doesn’t usually read reports, so kinda just send in one and hope for the best.

To report an experience, enter the experience, and navigate to the Reporting tab of the menu. Follow the prompts for reporting the Experience and Reason for Abuse as “Inappropriate Content.” In order to help our moderation team more accurately identify and handle your report, be sure to include descriptors and keywords in your text input, such as “UGC,” “Marketplace,” “Roblox IP,” “off-sale,” or “avatar item.”

Remember what I said earlier about every game on ROBLOX being affected by this? This is precisely what I meant. Roblox IP, off-sale, and avatar item are all things that nearly every single actual game has in it and therefore, every single game that includes one of these things (spoiler alert: it’s almost all of them) is now going to be thanos-snapped. This is why catalog games are all doomed.

What happens to violating experiences and developers?

They get banned first and then are given the chance to comply later.

Developers who violate this policy are subject to moderation as they would be for any other violation of the Community Standards. This may include warnings, removal of your experience from the platform or suspension of your account.

Yup, I was right.

How do I inform Roblox of an agreement I have with a creator for using their creations in my experience without requiring it to be on-sale and purchasable?

Good question! We’re not going to tell you.

If Roblox receives a user report of a potential violation in your experience and you receive a moderation warning or action, you should appeal the action and provide evidence of your agreement with the avatar item’s creator to use their content.

Hey, I was right again! I’m battin’ a thousand with this one.

How can I protect my IP?

By doing the same thing you have been doing: issue a DMCA takedown request and only get action taken when a giant corporation with actual lawyers gets a chance to sue ROBLOX into the ground for the fourth time this week.

IP owners are the ones best positioned to tell Roblox what is infringing. And only the rights holder can report content that infringes on their intellectual property rights. If you find content on Roblox that you believe infringes your IP rights, please see our DMCA Guidelines for additional information on how to submit an IP takedown report to us.

No comment here, this is like the one good part of this post.

Roblox investigates each report and takes appropriate action, which may include removing or disabling the infringing content, and permanently terminating the accounts of users who have repeatedly infringed on the IP of others.

Jesus Christ, how quickly do you want your platform to die? Ludicrious speed or Unity speed?

Well that was a doozy…

They aren’t actually going to answer them though. Just offer a vague reply that inevitably gets you nowhere.

I hate you. Everyone hates you and everyone hates this. Please fix it.

Thank you for reading this, dear reader. I sincerely hope that whoever you are - a dev, a player, or a ROBLOX employee - doesn’t get screwed over by this. But, to be quite honest. we will all get screwed over. We always do.

Kind Regards,
Alte

UPDATE:

I have updated this post to include lists of games that might be deleted and games that will be deleted as a result of this update. games that might be deleted is a list of games that may or may not be deleted because of this update, likely put in that list because the policy is so vague that it’s hard to tell if it would be. games that will be deleted is a list of games that I am absolutely certain would be deleted.

GAMES THAT WILL BE DELETED

click to view

GAMES THAT MIGHT BE DELETED

click to view

Aeronautica by Hyperant - uses offsale ROBLOX-made item for NPC

These lists are absolutely nowhere close to exhaustive, so I encourage you to send me any games you know of that may or will be affected by this and I’ll add them to this list. Just send me the name, creator, and reasons for deletion of the game (preferably formatted like the entries in the lists are) and a link to the game so I can put it into a hyperlink.

This list will give just a tiny, tiny bit of perspective into just how wide-reaching this policy change will truely be.

You should be extremely angry at ROBLOX for this. Get angry and stay angry and voice your concerns as loud and respectfully as you can until they fix this. Do not back down and do not be complacent!

Mogolovoniobrah · September 21, 2023, 4:49pm

Another thing I’d like to ask is if any command that allows you to wear another person’s avatar would be allowed under this update? I think it’s not allowed based off of what I’m hearing. (EX: the ;char command for HD Admin)

Voidage · September 21, 2023, 4:51pm

It’s sad knowing all these pleas for reversal of this horrible update are simply going to be ignored. Roblox knew this would happen. They knew we would hate this. They really just don’t care, because in the end, it’s going to make them more money.

Cantii · September 21, 2023, 4:54pm

I’m sure plenty of people are just going to ignore the update if they ever bring it back.

Voidage · September 21, 2023, 4:54pm

Sure, I guess you could, but then you’re just waiting around for some troll or angry person to report your game and get it taken down.

Mogolovoniobrah · September 21, 2023, 4:54pm

They won’t. Believe me they won’t. The moment everyone finds out about this, everyones going to be so mad that the DevForums are going to turn into the Forums from 2017; full of trolls and angry people.

Voidage · September 21, 2023, 5:06pm

Salutations, Fellow Capitalist Pigs,

At Roblox, our insatiable greed and unquenchable avarice drive us to concoct schemes that make Ebenezer Scrooge look like a charitable saint. We proudly present to you “Experiences using Marketplace Items,” a testament to our relentless pursuit of the almighty dollar (to be enshrined in the Roblox Economy 666 section, where we worship profit above all else).

Prepare to witness the unbridled manifestation of our gluttonous intentions:

Greed-Inducing Purchase Prompts: We are ecstatic to announce the implementation of relentless purchase prompts that will hound you until you succumb to our monetary demands. Equipping an item you haven’t purchased yet will trigger a barrage of shameless pop-ups, designed solely to exploit your wallet. We’ll stop at nothing to milk you dry.
Profit Maximization: We are tightening the screws on your enjoyment. Items that can’t be purchased, such as the rarest and most exclusive, will remain tantalizingly out of reach. Our avaricious hearts swell with delight as we watch you yearn for the unattainable.

Just to make our greed crystal clear, an unaffiliated avatar Marketplace item is anything that the Experience creator didn’t craft or have the audacity to profit from. We revel in creating a legal minefield to maximize our riches.

This rapacious policy will infiltrate the Community Standards 666 on September 27, an ominous date for your wallets. Brace yourselves for a descent into financial servitude as you attempt to navigate this labyrinth of avarice.

If you have any pressing questions about how we’re gouging your pockets, please visit our FAQ section [link that leads to more ways for us to profit].

We thank you for being unwitting pawns in our relentless pursuit of wealth, and we eagerly anticipate counting our ill-gotten gains.

Yours voraciously,

The Roblox Greedmongers

may or may not have been made with ChatGPT

Mogolovoniobrah · September 21, 2023, 5:07pm

The person who made this update probably got a promotion, and declared a hero of capitalism most likely.

This is sarcastic, by the way.

AlteFore · September 21, 2023, 5:09pm

I could tell it was sarcasm, but thanks.

I might have to can the project I have been working on for 2 years because of this, if ROBLOX doesn’t fix this shit. If this is updated to ONLY apply to ugc items, and any and all ROBLOX items - offsale or not - were fair game, then this might not only be not terrible, but - dare I say it - a good update. But nah. Because this is ROBLOX.

Mogolovoniobrah · September 21, 2023, 5:10pm

I say private your game as a form of protest. We should get a hashtag trending so that way we can spread the word.

AlteFore · September 21, 2023, 5:11pm

I honestly might. ROBLOX needs to have it’s stock hit sub-dollar prices for them to learn. Let RBLX become the newest penny stock, please!

Mogolovoniobrah · September 21, 2023, 5:12pm

This situation kinda reminds me of some lyrics from “Stick Up” by Grandson.

Just take the bridge of the song, replace “America” with “Robloxia”, and you’ve got our situation there!

This is a joke. Please don’t take this seriously.

Windsonnes · September 21, 2023, 5:21pm

I wouldn’t be surprised if this wasn’t the worst that’s yet to come…

SwitchedDreams · September 21, 2023, 5:22pm

Yeah, but that’s the god damn issue.

I want my players to be able to wear UGC in game, not an NPC.

This policy needs to be shoved off the desk and cancelled.

checkersoda · September 21, 2023, 5:23pm

Employees are still censoring out comments on this post for bland and contrived reasons. Good job, guys, still gonna post my opinion though lmao

This update shows the absolute depravity of ROBLOX in the modern year, and this company will continue to show how they care little for their integrity and playerbase. In no way, shape, or form will having a mandatory purchase prompt/UI embedded in your game will benefit anyone, nor will flat-out removing the right to use any catalog items that people have created.