When Valve introduced the ability for developers to offer paid mods through Steam last week (with Skyrim as the guinea pig), the fan reaction was swift and overwhelmingly negative. After receiving 3,500 messages about the change over the course of a flight up the coast, Valve CEO and cofounder Gabe Newell had one thought: "Looks like we did something to piss off the Internet." This weekend, Newell addressed the community concerns in a Reddit Ask Me Anything thread, "to make sure that if people are pissed off, they are at least pissed off for the right reasons," as he put it.

Many in the modding community seem philosophically opposed to the idea of charging for mods, but Newell sees the ability to sell mods through Steam as a way to encourage higher-quality content. "The option for paid MODs is supposed to increase the investment in quality modding, not hurt it," he said, citing a number of modders who were only free to focus on their craft full-time once they were hired by Valve. "All of them were liberated to just do game development once they started getting paid. Working at Waffle House does not help you make a better game."

"Our view of Steam is that it's a collection of useful tools for customers and content developers," he continued. "With the Steam workshop, we've already reached the point where the community is paying their favorite contributors more than they would make if they worked at a traditional game developer. We see this as a really good step. The option of MOD developers getting paid seemed like a good extension of that."

In any case, Newell seemed adamant that the option to charge for mods wouldn't destroy the need for freely distributed mods that have been so important to Valve and the PC gaming community. Mods can still be offered for free through Steam, or for a pay-what you want "donation" model, and Newell committed to adding a hybrid pay-what-you-want option with a minimum set price as well.

Newell also expressed a "reluctance" to force mod makers into a DRM-style system that would mean their mods would only work through Steam, and he pledged to work with outside sources like Nexus Mods to ensure compatibility across platforms. "Exclusivity is a bad idea for everyone," he said. "It's basically a financial leveraging strategy that creates short term market distortion and long term crying."

Regarding the 25 percent cut paid to mod makers for Skyrim, Newell passed the buck, saying merely that "the pay-outs are set by the owner of the game that is being modded." Newell and Valve have not publicly confirmed how the 75 percent share of the mod's selling price is split between Valve and Bethesda. Paid mods haven't been a huge windfall for Valve thus far, though, generating only "$10K total," according to Newell. That number has been far outweighed by the time and effort involved in responding to community concerns, he added.

Newell also expressed a lack of concern over the possibly illicit reuse of content from other sources in mods sold for money, as has already happened with a Skyrim fishing mod that has been pulled from Steam. "Between ours and the community's policing, I'm confident that the authors will have control over their creations, not someone trying to rip them off," Newell said.

Many community members have been angry over what they see as overzealous moderation of modding discussions in recent days, a situation Newell vowed to fix. "Well, if we are censoring people, that's stupid. I'll get that to stop. On top of it being stupid, it doesn't work (see Top Gear forums on Jeremy Clarkson)."