I was on the nexus this evening, planning for a new play through of FNV and came across some very old mods. Looking through the descriptions I got very curious to try them out, on my current character. Unfortunately, the mod hadn't been updated is quite some time and currently wasn't compatible with some of the newer, popular mods.

Reading through the forum posts, a lot of people wanted an update to this mod, or permissions to make an update themselves. Which got me thinking about archived mods, and their "statue of limitation" for lack of a better phrase.

In a hypothetical situation, you are the author of a mod but have not updated, looked at or even thought about it in quite some time (say 2+ years). Many people have reached out requesting your permission to update, add-on or use the basis of this mod; however, you've not responded to these messages. Is there ever a "tipping point" in your mind, when responsibility/ownership should transfer from you to another individual? Or does ownership solely remain with you as its original author, even if left to stagnate in the nexus/vgu/etc.?

I wanted to pose this hypothetical situation to the many mod contributors/authors here, as I'm curious if there are any differences in opinions. Speak soon

well since its a copyright situation the original author still retains all rights since copyright on an item lasts until 75 years after the authors death but if you cant contact him click on his nexus page it may say "banned" under his username in red letters other than that you can try re upload it but at your own risk ( i wouldn't recommend it )

it also depends on the mod really sorry i cant be of much help

It may be worthwhile to check if the mod is hosted on any other sites. It might just be that the mod author is no longer active on nexus but may be active on another site. I've seen some of the same mods hosted on other sites and while i'm not certain if they obtained the author's permission to host the mod on the site, they may have in fact gotten permission to host the mod in which case they may still have the author's contact information.

Other than that I would try and make sure i've made all reasonable attempts to contact the mod author and wait an appropriate amount of time before taking any action, however, you still run the risk of copyright violation. Some mod author's also give permission's to use their assets so long as they are credited but they'll usually specify this at the bottom of their page.

Ultimately I think it comes down to what you intend to do with mod and whether the changes you want to make are derivative or transformative, you'd have to look more into copyright laws to make sure your not infringing on any copyrighted material.

Still kinda sucks though, there are a lot of cool mods out there that could use a nice update.

No, there wouldn't be a point where I'd feel like 'okay, x amount of time has passed, do whatever you want with my mods'.  I'm sure some people don't care, more power to them, but I do.

As I've said before... one of my biggest pet peeves are people who take someone else's mod, add some paltry 'update' to it... only to re-upload it with their name on it.  I don't care if its been 1 week or 38 months - if I spend hundreds of hours (or thousands, in the case of some of my projects) working on something... the idea of someone changing a couple of things and releasing <Name of Mod> Enhanced Edition or whatever is absolutely blood-boiling.

And the lack of a response from a mod author doesn't mean 'go ahead, do it anyway'.  Maybe there's a reason they don't reply.  Could be busy (real life does that) or maybe they just don't want to sound like a jerk by saying NO LEAVE MY MOD ALONE.  

In my case, I'd outright tell someone no.  There would be no doubts where I stood on it, and I've done it here several times in regards to my Metroid mod.  A couple of pushy people practically insisted on 'porting' it to NV, only with their own tweaks and crap... so I did it myself.

Apologies if I sound hostile, but its something I have a very strong stance on.  Too many people stand on the shoulders of modders in a way that lets them slap their name on someone else's work.  The Nexus is drowning in such mods, for a multitude of games.

@falloutveteran20 just a hypothetical situation, but I thank you for your response none the less.

@Weasel21 perhaps someone would have to ascertain the author's enthusiasm for tending his/her mods, but ultimately without permissions a person would be better off from scratch. Therefore, it becomes imperative for all authors to include some disclaimer in their descriptions which expresses their attitudes to this situation. Though I was just curious for people's responses.

@Tesvixen No apologies needed. and you don't sound hostile. You come across as proud of the work and effort you've made when producing your mods, in my opinion. Thank you for your passionate response.