Making money with SFM

[Empty]

I read FAQ on SFM website and I saw the question asking whether or not I can make money with SFM.

Valve says yes ONLY if I do NOT use Valve's assets (props, maps, etc). In this case, Valve's assets may include all of models TF2, DOD, L4D, etc. I do understand commericializing their assets and making money by myself are totally different, but...

I want to clarify by myself with their answers.

1. So, if I am using maps, props and models from workshop or other outer websites, is it possible to make money with it?
2. What do they mean by "making money" essentially? What is allowed and what is not allowed? Of course, we should not use Scout model as advertisement for promoting my products..
3. (Important) I see many tutorial videos online on YouTube and basically they are all free. Then, what if I make my own tutorial videos with using workshop maps and models and get paid from people on the online website?

This might be both questions and discussion. Any thoughts?

[Zappy]

Originally posted by Empty:

- 1. So, if I am using maps, props and models from workshop or other outer websites, is it possible to make money with it? -

"Yes". It is, however, only allowed if you can get permission from the uploads' authors, as well as the copyright holders if the franchise it's from/based on is owned by someone. (For example, if someone uploads a model of Mario from the Super Mario series, you should get permission from both the model's uploader and from Nintendo.)

Originally posted by Empty:

- 2. What do they mean by "making money" essentially? What is allowed and what is not allowed? Of course, we should not use Scout model as advertisement for promoting my products.. -

If you refer to VALVe's video policy, they say that you are free to for example have advertisements on the video on YouTube, but that the video itself must be possible to view without paying money.

From what I can tell, you're free to make money with Source Filmmaker stuff while using VALVe's characters, as long as the end product is not locked behind an actual "pay-wall".

Originally posted by Empty:

- 3. (Important) I see many tutorial videos online on YouTube and basically they are all free. Then, what if I make my own tutorial videos with using workshop maps and models and get paid from people on the online website? -

Again, you should get permission from all relevant people/companies first, at the very least. Beyond that, I don't even know exactly what you're asking about here...

[marty]

id say dont bother and get a real job

[Capt Fuzzy]

Originally posted by cryin may:

id say dont bother and get a real job

That's probably the safest bet...

[Empty]

Originally posted by cryin may:

id say dont bother and get a real job

Of course I will never, and I am not willing to get this as my main job. However, I do not also want to ignore opportunities that Valve allowed to me. But before I move forward, I would like to make everything for sure.

[Empty]

Originally posted by Capt Fuzzy:

Originally posted by cryin may:

id say dont bother and get a real job

That's probably the safest bet...

I agree with it. But as you know, the more you become aware of things more, the more brave you can behave.

[Empty]

Originally posted by Empty:

Originally posted by Zappy:

"Yes". It is, however, only allowed if you can get permission from the uploads' authors, as well as the copyright holders if the franchise it's from/based on is owned by someone. (For example, if someone uploads a model of Mario from the Super Mario series, you should get permission from both the model's uploader and from Nintendo.)

If you refer to VALVe's video policy, they say that you are free to for example have advertisements on the video on YouTube, but that the video itself must be possible to view without paying money.

From what I can tell, you're free to make money with Source Filmmaker stuff while using VALVe's characters, as long as the end product is not locked behind an actual "pay-wall".

Again, you should get permission from all relevant people/companies first, at the very least. Beyond that, I don't even know exactly what you're asking about here...

Slightly confused with your answer #2. So, are you saying that I am allowed to get paid from Youtube by uploading advertisements with using SFM models while I let public to view as free? If you said yes, then it means I cannot upload tutorial videos and get paid on online tutorial websites with using Valve's assets. Am I correct?

[Capt Fuzzy]

If a person wishes to view your tutorial video, and the only way to do that is for them to pay you to see the video, then no, you cannot use any of Valve's assets, or ANY other copyrighted assets without the owner's permission.
If you simply monetize them by adding advertisements, but do not require a person to pay to view them, then yes, you CAN use Valve's assets. Any other copyrighted assets would require permission from their individual owners.

[Empty]

Originally posted by Capt Fuzzy:

If a person wishes to view your tutorial video, and the only way to do that is for them to pay you to see the video, then no, you cannot use any of Valve's assets, or ANY other copyrighted assets without the owner's permission.
If you simply monetize them by adding advertisements, but do not require a person to pay to view them, then yes, you CAN use Valve's assets. Any other copyrighted assets would require permission from their individual owners.

The more clearer answer that I got from you. Thank you :)

[Marco Skoll]

Aside from Youtube monetisation (or whatever another video site calls the equivalent), there also seems to be a certain amount of leeway around things like Twitch and Patreon (given the large streaming community using both), as long as the final videos are free for anyone to view.

I assume Patreon rewards would have to be limited to things like suggesting videos rather than watching them - or other things entirely - but as long as the final videos are on Youtube with no paywall, that does seem to be within the policy.

[Empty]

Originally posted by Marco Skoll:

Aside from Youtube monetisation (or whatever another video site calls the equivalent), there also seems to be a certain amount of leeway around things like Twitch and Patreon (given the large streaming community using both), as long as the final videos are free for anyone to view.

I assume Patreon rewards would have to be limited to things like suggesting videos rather than watching them - or other things entirely - but as long as the final videos are on Youtube with no paywall, that does seem to be within the policy.

So then, no matter which site I upload my tutorial videos created with SFM, I should open it for free to the public.

This was my first plan. As I already mentioned above, I was thinking of uploading SFM tutorial videos on one of tutorial websites, and make some of chapters are free for view so that people can decide whether or not to continue taking my course after paying small amount of money (I was trying to make another chapters which have advanced contents not mentioned in Valve's basic tutorials as non-free contents). However, I never thought of getting huge amount of money from this because only few people in the world are aware of this program as long as they are not filmmaker "mania"s.

You know there are always bright and dark side when it comes to "legal" thing. For some users who regularly post their videos for the purpose of monetization by Youtube get small amount of bucks in their pocket with complying all legal things, while other users in other websites (even for those who made porn with it) just upload it without even getting legal permission (and for porn, they cannot be accepted even tho they uploaded for free and I know it).

The reason why those people are not yet caught might be beause they are not hugely popular to be spotted, and if my assumption is correct, then any of those who are NOT that popular can make money with SFM as long as they won't get caught. This is really totally up to one's moral thing. As long as they can afford legal punishment that can happen in the future, then they will do whatever they want to do.

I might be stupid for casting this question which seems to already have obvious answer which is "NO". I just wanted to raise alert for ambiguity of their FAQ answers and for those who has at least conscience in their mind can make their conscience more firmly.

[Capt Fuzzy]

Originally posted by Empty:

Originally posted by Capt Fuzzy:

If a person wishes to view your tutorial video, and the only way to do that is for them to pay you to see the video, then no, you cannot use any of Valve's assets, or ANY other copyrighted assets without the owner's permission.
If you simply monetize them by adding advertisements, but do not require a person to pay to view them, then yes, you CAN use Valve's assets. Any other copyrighted assets would require permission from their individual owners.

The more clearer answer that I got from you. Thank you :)

You're welcome, glad I could be of help.

If you happen to visit my youtube channel (link is on my profile), I have videos there with copyrighted material.
I do not charge anyone to view any of them, but some of the copyright holders (owners) have added advertisements to them and allowed me to leave them up in return.
Legally, they have every right to make me take them down, but because I didn't fight them monetizing the videos, they let me keep them up, otherwise I'd have to edit their content out or take the videos down.

[Empty]

Originally posted by Capt Fuzzy:

Originally posted by Empty:

The more clearer answer that I got from you. Thank you :)

You're welcome, glad I could be of help.

If you happen to visit my youtube channel (link is on my profile), I have videos there with copyrighted material.
I do not charge anyone to view any of them, but some of the copyright holders (owners) have added advertisements to them and allowed me to leave them up in return.
Legally, they have every right to make me take them down, but because I didn't fight them monetizing the videos, they let me keep them up, otherwise I'd have to edit their content out or take the videos down.

Sure. I will definitely visit your Youtube channel for getting more thoughts of this. Thank you again.

[Chapéu Poligonal]

Originally posted by Empty:

Originally posted by Empty:

Slightly confused with your answer #2. So, are you saying that I am allowed to get paid from Youtube by uploading advertisements with using SFM models while I let public to view as free? If you said yes, then it means I cannot upload tutorial videos and get paid on online tutorial websites with using Valve's assets. Am I correct?

thank you for this, and the 2 question bassically said if you can earn money if you dont ask to pay directly, valve let you get paid by google, not from user only watching by paying