[HN Gopher] Roblox faces criticism for 'exploiting' young game d...
___________________________________________________________________
Roblox faces criticism for 'exploiting' young game developers
Author : turbohz
Score : 263 points
Date : 2021-08-20 15:19 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.gamasutra.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.gamasutra.com)
| dang wrote:
| The video this article is reporting on is
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_gXlauRB1EQ.
|
| Normally we'd change the URL to the original source but I think
| most HN readers probably prefer to read a summary even if the
| article is cribbed.
| djrogers wrote:
| Upon further reflection, I think I've figured out why my kids and
| I don't see this as exploitative - they're not trying to get rich
| or famous.
|
| I'm not trying to be mean to anyone, but if you look at all of
| the complaints through the filter of someone who wants to a)
| learn to make a video game, b) learn some programming, and c)
| make a cool game to share with his friends, then Roblox is a
| really fun, free, and easy way to do all of the above.
|
| If your filter is a kid who a) wants to make a game that goes
| viral and earn a bunch of money off of it, then yeah - some of
| these are legit complaints.
| rdtwo wrote:
| Can't you fix most of this problem by just buying the blox off
| market. Though discord and other backdoor channels?
| MrStonedOne wrote:
| i mean, roblox still makes money off of the kid's effort and
| labor and work, and engineered the system such that they take
| large amount of cuts for that work.
|
| I highly doubt the amount they take as a cut is necessary.
| eezing wrote:
| An 11 year old is having trouble earning a living as an
| independent game developer?
| csours wrote:
| A lot of people seem to be missing the point - Roblox is
| motivated to make money from kids. In pursuit of making money
| they are likely to ignore harms associated to their business
| model.
|
| Yes, this is how business works, but this is also why child labor
| laws exist. Roblox is treading a fine line between game
| development for fun and game development for work.
| 123pie123 wrote:
| my son (not yet 14yo) has learnt to write a few games in Roblox
|
| he's learnt Lua, object orientated programing client side/ server
| side distributed programing (and how to optimse the speed)
|
| he's also learnt that the people who run the platform will screw
| you over in many different ways (he's learnt a few tricks to semi
| counter this)
|
| he's learnt that advertising can be useless and costly,
|
| learnt people are extremely fickle, there's a far amount of
| people who have money to throw around
|
| learnt that doing good graphics is harder than it seems. (also
| learnt how to use blender)
|
| also that game dynamics and subtile changes can have big real
| world changes to peoples experiances
|
| also that UI and UX are important
|
| also to train other (kids) how to program - for money
|
| I'd say as a learning platform it has been fantastic, he's not
| made much real money, but has earned a far amount of robuks
| (platforms currency) that's he's spent in game
| wonderwonder wrote:
| Its not really surprising, this is a platform designed solely for
| the purpose of keeping kids glued to their screens and spending
| money. And they are excellent at it. My kids are obsessed with it
| to the point where I have been planning a complete ban on gaming
| for a couple weeks to try and break the addiction. I know several
| (4) other families who's kids are going through the same thing.
| My kids are constantly asking for money as well to buy things in
| game, constantly to the point that it really reminds me of a drug
| addiction.
| phone8675309 wrote:
| These allegations, if true, are terrible, and Roblox should
| address them.
|
| That said, maybe if these young developers learn first hand why
| digital sharecropping is bad at an early age they can avoid being
| chewed up and spit out by the "AAA" game development machine and
| instead focus on creating and promoting games on a platform they
| have control over.
| kevingadd wrote:
| I think it is a terrible waste if even one kid with a bright
| future developing (for example) indie games is traumatized by
| this stuff and ends up pushing spreadsheets or designing
| webpages at an ad firm instead.
| jandrese wrote:
| On the other hand it may turn a child onto development when
| they would have normally defaulted into some kind of boring
| pencil pushing position. Or it may encourage the kids to go
| into open source if they're not getting paid anyway.
| andrewstuart wrote:
| It's the epitome of what people have come to expect from Silicon
| Valley bro culture to exploit child programmers instead of paying
| them cash.
|
| Roblox developer business model should be renamed Dickensian
| Development.
| MaxfordAndSons wrote:
| Sort of orthogonal, but a perhaps culturally telling anecdote: a
| few months ago I was actively looking for a new job, and got a
| cold email from a technical recruiter from Roblox (via linkedin).
| I was curious, so set up a time to call, he asked for me to
| submit my cv (which is 90% things you could see on my linkedin,
| but sure, whatever) through a upload page on some recruiting site
| of their. Within minutes of submitting the cv, I got a rejection
| email from them, even though I had already scheduled the call. I
| figured it was an error, but nope, crickets when the time for the
| call came around.
| MrStonedOne wrote:
| articles like this would do better to actually spell things out.
|
| What _is_ the cut. They say it 's worse than other platforms, but
| nothing stops them from actually saying what it is.
|
| edit: the cut roblox takes for themselves is 30% at transaction
| time, _and 65% at withdrawal time_.
| Shadonototro wrote:
| some people are jealous they didn't buy the IPO when it was
| cheap, some FOMO in hopes they can buy some now lol
|
| i am omniscient
| Mountain_Skies wrote:
| Wonder what the IRS would think of these earnings. If someone
| earns $5,000 worth of Robux but spends it all in Roblox rather
| than ever converting it to currency, is that taxable income? Or
| would it be like S&H Green Stamps? While there likely aren't many
| who make games that earn that much or whatever the IRS's
| threshold is, this is the kind of edge case that ends up making
| headlines when (if) the IRS comes sniffing around.
| kenjackson wrote:
| This probably is exploitative at some level. Although for my son,
| he has made a handful of very low budget games. And he's gotten
| paid in Robux for them. He was actually pleasantly surprised when
| he got his first payout. Probably the equivalent of a few
| dollars.
|
| While he can't cash out his Robux, it turns out not to be so bad
| for him since he likes Robux. On his last birthday his biggest as
| was for Robux.
|
| As far as gaming development platforms, it is probably the best
| I've used. I'm not a pro game developer, so I've used simple
| stuff like Unity. But I have found Roblox to be a really easy
| platform to get started with.
| caiomassan wrote:
| they should all go to sandbox. https://www.sandbox.game/en/ Play,
| Create, Own, and Govern a virtual world made by players
| [deleted]
| flerchin wrote:
| Cut is high, something like 91.25%. That should probably change.
| All the rest is whinging.
| sierpinsky wrote:
| What I find most disturbing about this is the possibility to use
| real money to promote the games. Due to the misrepresentation of
| the chances of success this turns the platform into a gambling
| den for ten year olds.
| rdtwo wrote:
| I mean is a shit model but as long as you do all your
| transactions off marketplace it reduces fees significantly
| forgotpwd16 wrote:
| Not sure what Roblox is in first place. An integrated game engine
| and hosting site?
| MichaelGroves wrote:
| _Second Life_ for kids.
| freemint wrote:
| With a really good physics engine that can simulate
| complicated mechanical contraptions
| https://youtu.be/P-WP1yMOkc4
| sumtechguy wrote:
| It is basically that. With freemium style monetization,
| cooldown periods, timed pop ups, consumable items (purchase
| in the store) and all,
|
| My niece was about 300 dollars into this game before my
| sister got involved. She was using 'oh get me itunes gift
| cards' from relatives so mom would not notice. She was using
| all of the tools of an addicted person to use that game. Her
| sister on the other hand got bored with it and gave up on it.
| cwkoss wrote:
| It is a metaverse filled with games for kids. Kind of
| minecraft-like in quality, but more like an arcade than a lego
| set.
| TinkersW wrote:
| A really messy and ugly game that lets people make & distribute
| mods for it, somehow popular with children, despite being a
| complete mess.
| AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote:
| I haven't played roblox and know relatively little about it,
| but my guess would be that it is popular with children
| because it has a low barrier to entry. Sort of like what
| Flash did for young animators.
| tenaciousDaniel wrote:
| I played Dreams on the PS4 before I had heard of Roblox, and
| when I first heard about it I thought "oh wow it's probably
| like Dreams but for PC!"
|
| I was sorely disappointed - I'm as perplexed as you are how
| they became so successful. It is indeed a total mess.
| wvenable wrote:
| Kids love the total mess! As an adult I don't see the
| appeal but I can understand why kids like it. Most of the
| complaints here about Roblox and revenue sharing, etc,
| completely miss the point: Roblox is not Steam; it's a
| playground.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| in my experience kids tend to gravitate towards chaos, and
| roblox has a LOT of it
| jamesgeck0 wrote:
| Yep. It's surprisingly unknown outside the target demographic,
| despite being one of the most highly valued gaming properties
| around.
| djrogers wrote:
| That's precisely what it is. The game animations are fairly
| simple, but you can build a world and write fairly
| sophisticated game elements/rules/etc with Lua, and the kids
| actually seem to like the cartoonish models.
|
| Once you write a game or create a world, you can click and
| publish it for anyone to join.
| duxup wrote:
| Think Steam.
|
| But you can jump from game to game quickly.
|
| Many of the games are similar-ish to popular games but the
| barrier to entry is low, share assets, games are easy to jump
| in and out of together with your friends.
| fridif wrote:
| It's all fun and games till people start talking about money and
| exploitation.
|
| Back in my day, we made mods for fun, and then we used the skills
| we learned to get jobs doing something corporate.
| duxup wrote:
| My son makes some games on Roblox and plays a lot.
|
| He has a great time, he's not chasing $, he just wants to have
| fun. It works great for that.
|
| As soon as you try to stand out and chase money, yeah it gets
| HARD. Just like streaming on YouTube... or just getting noticed
| online for your blog.
|
| But what's the alternative here? That's a question of scale. Just
| not let kids even have a chance to make money?
| [deleted]
| dtagames wrote:
| I think what the video presenter is suggesting is that:
|
| 1. Revenue could be shared more fairly. The money that Roblox
| is keeping _from kids_ is going into corporate pockets. There
| 's no way around that.
|
| 2. The advertising could be more honest. If it's only for devs
| to make money, then mention that part only under the dev pages
| where 1% of the people will find them. For everyone else,
| advertise playing and creating for fun.
| jnwatson wrote:
| The main complaint is they encourage kids to create games by
| emphasizing the revenue sharing aspect, without making clear
| how hard it is to derive any revenue at all from it.
| djrogers wrote:
| > they encourage kids to create games by emphasizing the
| revenue sharing aspect
|
| I disagree completely here - they encourage kids to create
| games by giving them an easy platform to create games and
| letting them play games other kids have created.
|
| A kid who sees that other kids their age are able to actually
| _make a video game_ is far more likely to want to learn to do
| that themselves.
| DixieDev wrote:
| While I am sure many kids would be swayed without it, the
| potential to make "serious cash" is one of just three
| things they highlight about their platform on their creator
| page: https://www.roblox.com/create
| vmception wrote:
| A common practice used to encourage adults too
|
| Whether I dis/agree with the practice or not, I find a
| separate standard for children to be disingenuous if we are
| talking about a common practice
| duxup wrote:
| Honestly I think it is a good learning experience.
|
| I talked about it with my son.
|
| "Yup there's lots of people making games, it's hard to make
| games as elaborate as everyone else."
|
| And then you just make them for fun ...
|
| The fact that kids try and fail at this is not a bad thing
| IMO.
|
| If kids out there can't control themselves (they're kids...)
| I gotta wonder what if any parental involvement there is.
| Let's say they ban kids from creating content ... kid who
| can't control him/herself will just go make an 'adult'
| account too and do the same thing. Roblox can only do so
| much.
| only_as_i_fall wrote:
| >Second, there's the matter of how extensively Robux (Roblox's
| in-app currency) are used to navigate the creator economy. Roblox
| creators are paid first by receiving a cut of Robux that comes
| from the sale, which they can use to purchase other Roblox
| experiences, in-game assets, cosmetics, etc. That means once a
| developer enters the Robux economy, their money is all spent
| inside the Roblox system until they're able to withdraw it. ...
| But to withdraw it, they need to have raked in roughly $1,000
| worth of Robux.
|
| This part seems pretty indefensible. Like yeah to a certain
| extent all online content platforms have a gate like this, but
| I've never heard of one that high. YouTube e will pay you as soon
| as you make something like $20 iirc. And the fact that they pay
| you in their gated currency which they then allow you to spend
| but only within their system seems like am obvious self-serving
| money grab.
| tomnipotent wrote:
| > But to withdraw it, they need to have raked in roughly $1,000
| worth of Robux
|
| You can thank modern accrual accounting for this.
|
| Roblox will be allowed to move money from liability to revenue
| based on a schedule using some sort of historical trends
| supporting the method. The higher the threshold, the higher
| their liability but also the more money that goes back to them
| long-term.
| spir wrote:
| These kinds of non-level playing fields are what the ethereum
| community hopes to replace with open protocols and non-
| custodial property rights.
| peoplefromibiza wrote:
| I don't honestly know about Roblox, but I've read that YouTube
| (to name one of the most popular UGC platforms) keeps 45% of
| the advertising revenues.
|
| Looking at the numbers they made around $46 billion in the past
| three years.
|
| Do we know how much of those 46 billions went to creators?
|
| YouTube videos are also very different from video games, one
| can easily make 30 YouTube videos in 30 days, video games
| require weeks (if not more), it's easier to give up.
|
| The incentive is very different.
|
| Paying for low effort content posted frequently rewards
| consistency, YouTube needs their creators to keep making fresh
| content, not their best content, new is enough.
|
| Video games not so much, they have to be at least appealing and
| a higher threshold could be better to keep creators focused on
| finishing their work and/or maintain an higher quality of the
| product, instead of cashing out quickly by making very cheap
| games just for the 50 dollars of payout.
| nipponese wrote:
| It's obvious that the company is trying to create clear
| distinctions between hobbyists and professional devs. A low
| cash-out threshold seems like bait, where as a higher threshold
| discourages would-bes from thinking it will be easy money and
| filling the catalog with garbage.
|
| Though I do concede... the catalog is filled with a lot of
| garbage.
| code_duck wrote:
| I had a blog or two that used Google AdWords circa 2008. I got
| very close to the $100 limit but never reached it - so Google
| just kept my $90. I wonder how many people and how much revenue
| that applies to.
| interwho wrote:
| I had the same issue, Google escheated the money to the state
| of Delaware (where they're incorporated) after a few years
| though. Consider checking Delaware's unclaimed property site,
| you may find your money there.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| I wonder if the old regulations around company scrip and stores
| might be used to legally undermine such tactics.
|
| It doesn't matter if you're creating digital experiences, you
| must pay people with money, not company tokens.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| You would first have to establish these kids were employed by
| Roblox, and I would predict that to be a very uphill battle.
|
| It would be hard to argue Roblox is paying anyone in exchange
| for work.
| donmcronald wrote:
| There's probably a long tail where a tiny fraction of devs make
| more than that. Free labor!
| alex_munroe wrote:
| By the same logic, YCombinator is "exploiting our free labor"
| through Hacker News. People write thoughtful comments, get
| nothing in return, and YC benefits from free publicity. Same
| for facebook posts, instagram, reddit, and every business
| that benefits from community and network effects.
|
| Same for every video game that allows mods, custom levels,
| and so on. The only difference is that Minecraft users make
| no money at all for their efforts. How terrible! Poor
| children!
|
| Either that, or people just enjoy being creative, making
| things is fun, and it's okay for kids to just enjoy making
| things and sharing them with each other, even if (oh, gasp!)
| the business that built the engine benefits from it. And
| being able to make any money from this at all is just a nice
| bonus.
| darknavi wrote:
| > The only difference is that Minecraft users make no money
| at all for their efforts.
|
| Minecraft dev. here, not strictly true. We have a pretty
| bustling marketplace full of paid and free content (maps,
| skins, etc.) but the process to release such content right
| now is pretty hands-on and not suitable for non-adults.
| dtagames wrote:
| I beg to differ. HN is free because the contributors and
| audience provide a significant input funnel for founders,
| employees, and investors who directly participate in the YC
| economy. It's a recruitment and promotional tool for all
| three groups.
|
| However, YC does not charge people to play HN in the way
| that Roblox charges for that game. No one is counting my
| minutes on HN and sending someone a payment, or a bill.
| There is no direct monetization of my UGC.
|
| Mod.io is a gaming add-on (for mods) that also has no in-
| platform direct monetization of UGC assets. Of course, the
| games that use mod.io do it because having UGC at all
| brings the right kind of players and those players do pay.
|
| So it is possible to make money, have UGC, and not be
| exploitative. I don't think Roblox can say that's where
| they are right now.
| duxup wrote:
| Most of these kids are just sharing games with their
| friends... like posting a video to youtube.
|
| Free content maybe, but not free labor exactly IMO.
| kevingadd wrote:
| It's labor regardless of how much money you make off of it,
| though I think maybe you mean that they're little games
| that aren't the result of much effort?
| duxup wrote:
| Is YouTube getting free labor when I upload a video?
|
| I feel like the exchange there is not about labor...
| ATsch wrote:
| Yes it is. That is what they make their money off of, the
| difference between what they earn off of the labor of the
| video creators and the money they pay out. If nobody
| uploaded videos, youtube could not sell attention just
| like if no steelworkers arrived, the steel mill can not
| sell steel. That applies to all social media/user
| generated content platforms.
|
| Now, you might argue that this does not feel like labor
| because it's more voluntary than labor usually is. Which
| is totally correct and exactly why this industry is so
| lucrative.
| dtagames wrote:
| Not sure why you were downvoted but you're right.
| YouTube, in a total inversion of the TV business model,
| doesn't pay creators for anything until after it's been
| monetized -- and then they take a cut first. The cut is
| so early in the process that millions of videos are
| monetized and the creators are not even aware, much less
| paid.
|
| This is the reverse of the Hollywood TV model where you
| paid creators first and then tried to monetize the
| content you owned. It's certainly still labor to create
| it. The only things that have changed are the ownership,
| licensing, and payment stream.
| duxup wrote:
| I feel like that really distorts my relationship /
| expectations with YouTube and just turns just about
| anything into 'labor'.
| kortilla wrote:
| Yes, anything that takes the work of a person (making a
| video, writing a game, writing a blog) is labor.
| ATsch wrote:
| I don't think recognizing it as labor needs to change how
| you feel about doing it at all. I'm doing labor that
| makes HN more monetarily valuable right now by writing
| replies and I'm obviously fine with that. And as to
| almost everything being labor in some way... well, that's
| the world we live in for better or worse.
| majormajor wrote:
| The threshold to cash out seems high, but the percentage cut is
| curious, and I'm not convinced "exploitative" is the right
| word. It's a high cut, but is there anything else that makes it
| anywhere as close to make a game and share it with your
| friends? It seems to be in an entirely different league as any
| of the app stores or PC game development, so a higher cut there
| would make sense.
|
| The "it's just for fun!" argument does cut both ways - then why
| introduce real money into the ecosystem at all? - but has an
| obvious "because real money is needed to make the product and
| ecosystem exist" answer. Is taking _this much_ real money
| necessary? That seems like a much harder question. You could
| say it 's a bit like college sports - playing a game with your
| friends and there's some institution that's taking all the
| money, and then, yes, if Roblox is rolling in huge profits and
| distributing a penance, they deserve some pressure on that.
| MrStonedOne wrote:
| from what i can tell, its 30% at transaction time, then 65%
| at withdrawal time.
|
| That is not necessary.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| midwestemo wrote:
| > YouTube will pay you as soon as you make something like $20
| iirc.
|
| Isn't it $100?
|
| https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/1709871?hl=en
| kibwen wrote:
| On Twitch it's also $100.
| the_jeremy wrote:
| Used to be lower.
| tapland wrote:
| Not for youtube. I made a video and got stuck at $85 or so
| which has been sitting there. And the gate to get any ad
| revenue at all has been raised so I'd have to get pretty
| serious to get the hours watched to earn the remaining $15
| code_duck wrote:
| When? This was the level I failed to meet for AdWords when
| I had a blog around 2007. What Google or other companies
| were doing in 2005 is so long ago that it's hardly
| relevant.
| Stevvo wrote:
| Roblox is not comparable to YouTube.
|
| When you make a video and upload it to YouTube, that creation
| is entirely the result of your own hard work and ingenuity.
| YouTube doesn't need to exist for your video to exist.
|
| When you make a game in Roblox, you are combining some amount
| of hard work and ingenuity of your own with a larger amount of
| hard work and ingenuity by Roblox Creation.
|
| If you want to keep all the money, then you need to do all of
| the work.
| fshbbdssbbgdd wrote:
| I'd guess that more engineer-hours have gone into making
| YouTube what is than Roblox. At least, if someone's going to
| express a strong claim about that, they ought to supply some
| numbers and not just an assertion.
| [deleted]
| endisneigh wrote:
| By your logic unless Roblox corporation created computers
| they shouldn't keep all the money, either.
|
| I'm not sure why anyone would defend a dollar amount above
| $1. If you have money in you should be able to get it out
| immediately IMO.
| jerf wrote:
| I expect it'll need to be higher than $1 because there's
| going to be some legal matters to deal with around paying
| the legally-minor creators any amount of money.
|
| To be honest, when I think about it that way, you're not
| going to get _that_ far under $1000 no matter what you do.
| There 's tax forms at the very least, and probably extra
| stuff to do with dealing with minors, plus generalized
| legal risk of being sued or investigated anyhow... we need
| to be dealing with more than a few bucks here before it's
| worth Roblox's time & risk. Some of this is the cost of
| protecting minors, too.
| endisneigh wrote:
| I don't see why the amount matters. It's a solved
| problem. All of it can be aggregated and forms can be
| sent once at the end of the year. It's not like this
| stuff has to be manually dealt with. Computers deal with
| virtually everything.
| FemmeAndroid wrote:
| > If you want to keep all the money, then you need to do all
| of the work.
|
| The person you're responding to isn't even talking about the
| cut. It's the threshold at which you may take money out of
| the ecosystem. Both YouTube and Roblox take a cut, but with
| Roblox, even after the cut, you need to have made a
| substantial amount of money before you can see a penny of it.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| I mean, it's not like YouTube content creators made YouTube,
| by your logic YT shouldn't be paying its content creators
| either.
|
| In reality the relationship between these platforms and the
| creators is a necessary and mutually beneficial relationship.
| The exchange in value between these parties should be in a
| format useful to both sides: cash.
| jacobr1 wrote:
| > When you make a video and upload it to YouTube, that
| creation is entirely the result of your own hard work and
| ingenuity. YouTube doesn't need to exist for your video to
| exist.
|
| YT probably does need to exist for many creators to get the
| kind of distribution that enables them to monetize their
| content including the operationally managing the scale of the
| site, the brand they've built and the ad network. A highly
| viewed piece of content is generally much more valuable than
| unseen content. Which isn't to say you can't monetize video
| outside of YT, just the YT is providing a very valuable
| service and it isn't clear to me that is qualitatively of
| less value than what Roblox provides its content creators.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| Also, YT content creators and the YT algorithm are clearly
| affecting each other in complex ways. The content created
| for YT is tailored to succeed on YT, and would obviously
| fail on any other platform with a different recommendation
| engine and community.
| jameshart wrote:
| You're definitely undervaluing the raw video encoding,
| transmission and delivery framework YouTube brings to bear
| there. Sure, you made a video. But that's not the same as
| having a player that works in multiple browsers, support for
| multiple streaming bitrates and codecs, optimized global
| distribution and caching.. and that's all before we get to
| the discoverability, hosting and channel management features.
| Talanes wrote:
| But with a video you have the portability to take your
| content somewhere other than Youtube for the supporting
| infrastructure. Your Roblox game is much less portable.
| rtkwe wrote:
| > But to withdraw it, they need to have raked in roughly $1,000
| worth of Robux.
|
| It's even worse than that. They sell robux at one rate and cash
| them out for developers at a very different rate. That $1,000
| worth of Robux becomes $350 when you go to extract it. So
| they're taking cuts twice, once on the actual sale and again
| whenever you try to turn it into real money instead of their
| scrip.
| all2 wrote:
| They need a stable-coin.
| pjc50 wrote:
| Sounds like they already have one.
| all2 wrote:
| I was thinking something more stable than "buy for X and
| sell for X/10". Probably something not controlled by
| Roblox at all (USDC or DAI?). That would be giving up a
| lot of control, but it would solve the problems they're
| giving the kiddos.
| rtkwe wrote:
| Yeah Roblox doesn't want that. They want to be able to
| take a cut every chance they get and also to encourage
| people to just keep their money in Roblox to keep it
| moving through purchases so they can keep taking 75% cuts
| instead of the /only/ 65% they taken when someone cashes
| out.
| kortilla wrote:
| They can already solve that problem, it's literally a
| rate they program. They don't need a shitcoin to do that.
| humanlion87 wrote:
| That is insane. How are they even getting away with such a
| scheme? Did they start out at a 1:1 ratio and change it once
| network effects and lock-in happened.
| Kiro wrote:
| In literally all other games I know of the ratio is 1:0
| since you can't cash out their in-game currency at all. Do
| you have any of example of a game or a platform where you
| can sell the in-game currency for the purchase price?
| rnotaro wrote:
| Secondlife have a fair spread and is player to player.
|
| They take 3.5% of fee when you are transfering it to USD.
| (Sellers)
|
| Buyers are charged charged a 7.50% transaction fee with a
| minimum of US$ 1.49 and a maximum of US$ 9.99 per
| transaction
|
| ------ The current spread on Lindex (SL Forex) is :
|
| BUY: L$242 / US$1.00 (L$14,816 Remaining) SELL: L$249 /
| US$1.00 (L$29,411 remaining)
| Talanes wrote:
| The closest I can think of are systems like Eve, where
| players can trade in-game currency for game time tokens
| purchased by other players. 1:1 ratio, but the real money
| is proxied by game time so that no one can actually
| remove cash.
| Moru wrote:
| They get away with it because it's all kids that doesn't
| know any better.
| stickfigure wrote:
| Can you transfer it? If so, seems like it would be hard to
| prevent secondary markets from forming.
| kenjackson wrote:
| You can sort of transfer it via trading. There is a black
| market that exists, but it is FULL of scammers.
| [deleted]
| rtkwe wrote:
| No, they don't have a way to move anything other than
| games. Probably specifically to avoid the chance of a
| secondary market forming. Trying to police real world
| trading is hard so they just cut off the chance for it
| entirely.
|
| https://en.help.roblox.com/hc/en-
| us/articles/203313090-Can-I...
| rtkwe wrote:
| I was wrong there is a trading system this is just about
| moving items between accounts. Some places implement
| balanced trade requirements to get around RWT.
| robocat wrote:
| Section 3.F of Terms of Abuse:
|
| "the following will make you ineligible for a Cash Out:"
| "attempting to exchange Robux for real currency other than
| through DevEx"
|
| https://en.help.roblox.com/hc/en-us/articles/115005718246
| [deleted]
| elliekelly wrote:
| > That $1,000 worth of Robux becomes $350 when you go to
| extract it.
|
| Knowing nothing at all about Robux I'm not sure I follow.
| When you say "$1,000 worth of Robux" here you mean $1,000
| USD, right? And not 1,000 units of Robux?
|
| So if I'm a developer on the platform and I've earned however
| many Robux equal $1,000 USD and I initiate a transfer then my
| actual cash receipts will be ~$350 USD? Am I understanding
| that correctly? Because that seems nuts. Especially when
| they're targeting kids as their primary "developers".
| Fargren wrote:
| Yes, you understand correctly. The minimum amount to
| withdraw is an amount that would cost 1000 USD to buy. When
| withdrawing that amount, you would get 350 USD
| Arrath wrote:
| Wow, that is pretty awful.
| elliekelly wrote:
| Ah, thank you. One follow-up question: if I _don't_ cash
| out my $1,000 USD worth of Robux can I spend them in game
| at their full $1,000 USD value?
| Raymonf wrote:
| Yes, you can spend it in-game at the full value.
|
| I'm not sure if this has been mentioned yet, but it's
| also important to note that not all Robux is equal.
| There's more information at
| https://en.help.roblox.com/hc/en-us/articles/115005718246
| under section 3.B.
| robocat wrote:
| 3.B "Minimum of 100,000 earned Robux in your account. In
| order to protect against money laundering and comply with
| applicable law, we limit all Cash Outs to "earned" Robux.
| Robux are considered "earned" if you receive them by
| receiving payments from a bona fide third party
| transaction through the Services for (a) virtual items
| (such as clothing for an avatar) that you created or (b)
| virtual things in your game or for your game or
| experience. This means that Robux acquired in other ways
| (e.g., receiving Robux as part of a membership plan or
| referral bonus, a purchase of Robux or gift card, or
| trading/selling virtual goods that you did not create)
| are not considered "earned". We will determine how much
| you are eligible to Cash Out by totaling the amount of
| Robux earned (over the lifetime of the account) and
| subtracting the amounts previously paid out to you
| through DevEx;"
|
| Also note that there is a comment in the video that you
| need to be careful how you spend your Robux for buying
| development, because if you are not then a cut gets
| taken, which maybe relates to 3B for the person you are
| paying?
| dtagames wrote:
| Ugh. It feels like Roblox is the MLM of gaming.
| jedberg wrote:
| I believe it is like Forex but with a really bad spread.
| You can buy Robux for $X USD, but when you sell robux you
| only get $.35X USD.
| rtkwe wrote:
| > my actual cash receipts will be ~$350 USD?
|
| Yes, ignoring any tax requirements because I'm not a tax
| attorney. You have to have 100k Robux (Rb) to initiate a
| withdrawl, that 100k Rb costs 1000 USD (ignoring any bulk
| deals they may run) to buy if you just purchased it from
| Roblox, but when you sell it to Roblox for USD you get 350
| USD. So depending on how you look at it it is worth either
| 1k or 350 USD. The article was using 1k as the frame and
| it's what it would cost you to get that much buying
| directly so to me that's the most accurate.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| Anaminus wrote:
| Worth noting that, since the currency can also come from a
| handful of other sources (e.g. trading cosmetics), each cash-
| out is manually reviewed to ensure that the currency only comes
| from approved sources (sale of assets, games, products).
| Because of this, reducing the minimum payout does not scale,
| and at some point becomes infeasible. The article and video, of
| course, both fail to mention this.
|
| Maybe throwing more manpower at the problem will let them
| reduce the minimum rate. Or they could work on altering their
| infrastructure to support a more automated system, possibly
| eliminating the minimum rate entirely.
| tyleo wrote:
| I read the article but have not watched the video so I may be
| missing some context.
|
| It really depends on how you define "exploiting". It doesn't seem
| like you _need_ to buy the ads. A kid could make a game on any
| platform and would encounter similar barriers.
|
| Would it be better if the kid played Call of Duty rather than
| creating something? Even if the chance to profit is low does the
| kid get something else out of Roblox?
|
| To my knowledge kids aren't dropping out of high school with
| hopes of being a Roblox millionaire. They may dream about it but
| I don't think they act on it. I dreamed about being a pro eSports
| gamer in high school and I'd argue my time was much worse spent
| doing that.
| rtkwe wrote:
| Roblox takes their 75% cut out of each sale then if you ever
| manage to accumulate the 100,000 Robux needed to cash out
| ($1000 worth for what Roblox sells it for) you only get $350.
| They're double dipping their cut. You should really watch the
| video it lays out the case very well.
|
| If it's meant to be educational it shouldn't be marketing
| itself as a way to make money or charging kids to promote their
| app. It would have better ways to surface new applications
| instead of only showing the top N that already have to have
| over a thousand users.
| [deleted]
| stuaxo wrote:
| The comparison to being paid in scrip you could only use in
| the company store is spot on.
| dtagames wrote:
| Microsoft MakeCode (here's MakeCode Arcade[0], just one
| aspect) is a terrific gaming platform which teaches standard
| Typescript (using a Scratch-type interface). It doesn't offer
| monetization of any kind so they can honestly advertise for
| the pure creative, maker, and educational markets. And they
| do!
|
| [0] https://arcade.makecode.com/
| rtkwe wrote:
| Yeah there's definitely a cool niche there for an easy to
| use tool to build games in a way that deals with the mess
| of networking and servers that isn't just siphoning all the
| money away from the users at every turn.
| testudovictoria wrote:
| To combine the numbers:
|
| Roblox takes 75% of each sale. This means the developer needs
| to make 400,000 in Robux sales before the developer
| accumulates 100,000 Robux for cash withdrawal.
|
| If 100,000 Robux is sold for $1,000, and 100,000 Robux only
| nets the developer $350, then the double dip gives Roblox a
| net 91.25% of developer sales. This excludes any applicable
| taxes or app store fees.
| robocat wrote:
| The video mentioned you must also have a premium account at
| $5/month, so conservatively 7 months is another $35 down.
|
| And presumably you have to pay for the premium account
| before you withdraw, so you are investing real cash for a
| chance of a payout?
| [deleted]
| tyleo wrote:
| I'll have to watch the video. It looks like there is some
| missing context in the article alone.
|
| Still not sure how I feel. On the fence but leaning more good
| than bad. The thing I cant get past is "what else would a kid
| do with their time?" Even if its not a great way to make
| money, it seems like a better use of time than what I did. It
| just seems like it still provides a strong learning
| opportunity.
|
| I think there may be a different argument about whether it
| exploits developers generally and not just kids.
| PoignardAzur wrote:
| Play Minecraft?
|
| Learn a programming language and write small games in
| Unity/Godot/whatever? Make levels in
| LittleBigPlanet/Dreams?
|
| To be fair, those options can get exploitative too, but
| Roblox feels on another level. The only time I played
| Roblox, I distinctly remember thinking "the only people who
| would put money into this are kids who don't know any
| better".
| kortilla wrote:
| The argument you're making could just as easily be applied
| to having kids "compete cleaning tables at a restaurant"
| where the winner for the day gets $10.
|
| Once money is in the equation, all of the incentives change
| and it's not about "learning opportunities" or fun.
| Tostino wrote:
| It can be a "good" for the child, while still being
| exploitative. Take care of the exploitation, and don't
| destroy the "good" parts. I don't think it's an entirely
| binary situation.
| [deleted]
| Ashanmaril wrote:
| It sounds like Roblox does want there to be dedicated Roblox
| developers. I saw a clip from one of their conventions with
| someone, possibly the CEO, saying they envision companies of
| 100 people doing Roblox development
| dexwiz wrote:
| There are already studios like this, such as Uplift
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uplift_Games
| anonymousab wrote:
| If they were forced to change, I feel like the most likely
| outcome would be to remove the chance of renumeration for young
| developers, to sidestep any possible legal implications
| altogether. To turn experience-making, for kids at least, into a
| purely hobby effort. Maybe that's not bad, but I figure the same
| negative pressures would still exist, for the most part.
|
| It would be interesting to see the company's reaction to a
| completely free, hobby Experience becoming the most played (and
| unpaid) game on the platform. It's unlikely, but fun to imagine.
| jamesgeck0 wrote:
| If you're interested in more info about the platform dynamics of
| Roblox, I found _So You Want to Compete with Roblox_[1] to be
| informative.
|
| 1. https://www.fortressofdoors.com/so-you-want-to-compete-
| with-...
| alexgmcm wrote:
| I have no experience of Roblox development, but if it teaches
| transferable skills to 'real' programming then it's still
| probably a net good.
| bink wrote:
| It does. The development environment is pretty bloated, but
| it's relatively easy to use and does require actual Lua code to
| do anything complicated.
| duxup wrote:
| The scripting under the hood teaches some real skills. They use
| Lua. Very handy.
| djrogers wrote:
| My kids (and I) certainly don't see it as exploitation - they
| _love_ learning to create games, and would be happy to do it even
| without any chance of payout.
|
| I don't think the $1k minimum payout is crazy either, as the
| overhead of paying 10s of thousands of kids $11.32 would kill
| margins (leading to Robux having to take a higher %age). I'd have
| to think most kids are in the same boat as mine - if their games
| ever earn them any Robux, they'll turn around and spend those
| Robux in another game, because that's what they want to do with
| it anyway.
| rtkwe wrote:
| It looks worse when that $1k becomes $350 because Roblox cashes
| out Robux at a 65% discount for itself after taking nearly 75%
| of every transaction.
| BigJono wrote:
| So, to make $350 you need to sell $4000 worth of mtx? That's
| ludicrous.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| bink wrote:
| Same with me. My kid makes Roblox games for her and her
| friends. It didn't take her long to realize that the odds of
| her making any money at all were very slim. In the meantime she
| gets to learn programming skills in a way that she finds fun.
|
| I do feel a bit bad for the older kids that put real effort
| into it, but I don't see how it's much worse than trying to
| start a youtube or twitch channel and failing. At least with
| coding they're getting some valuable experience.
|
| All that said, the way they sell "Robux" is absolutely
| predatory. We've had to have several talks about what is
| reasonable to spend money on. They even let you pay with
| Amazon. Payments via Amazon are on by default for Amazon
| accounts and don't require re-authentication, so a kid who
| clicks on a link in Roblox on a computer that has already
| authenticated with Amazon can drain their parent's account.
| thenayr wrote:
| The $1k minimum is kind of the entire argument here though,
| they are exploiting free labor and making massive profits off
| of it.
|
| So you're basically saying "It's totally fine if Roblox keeps
| up to $999 in profits from millions of developers (potentially
| children) because they haven't hit the $1k min."
|
| I'm almost certain ANY of these kids would be happier with $100
| in cold hard cash in their pockets than they would be with $100
| of robox currency. Right now they just have no option.
| [deleted]
| jonny_eh wrote:
| Do you not see that there's a huge difference between $11.32
| and $1000?
| 41209 wrote:
| Hard disagree.
|
| The absurd vast majority of people will never make any money via
| Roblox, or any of the major app stores for that matter. I have a
| few apps on both Google Play and the App Store.
|
| I'm never going to see a dime. If anything I like that Roblox is
| encouraging kids to learn game development, later on they can
| always move on to Unity or Godot( I'm not really an Unreal fan
| since the editor doesn't run well on my computer). Then they can
| also enjoy making no money on Steam ! It's very very rare for
| indie game devs to make money !!
| dreyfan wrote:
| This is no more exploitative than someone trying to make it big
| on Youtube, Twitch, or Spotify and gaining zero traction. If the
| content someone creates on these platforms doesn't capture an
| audience, the hosting platform doesn't generate any revenue and
| neither does the creator. It's completely free to produce the
| content (minus your time) and the platform hosts it for free,
| even though 99% of it never receives any views/plays/listens.
|
| At the end of the day I think the only worthy argument is whether
| or not the revenue sharing arrangement is fair.
| nyghtly wrote:
| > the hosting platform doesn't generate any revenue
|
| That's false.
|
| "YouTube will run ads on smaller creators' videos without
| paying them"
|
| https://www.engadget.com/youtube-ads-on-small-creator-videos...
|
| Requirement for YouTube partner is 1000 subscriptions.
|
| In the case of Robox, they are still getting paid for all those
| small games that make less than $1000, and meanwhile the
| creators get scrip.
| ARandumGuy wrote:
| Well yeah, streaming services also suck for creators. That
| doesn't excuse the practices of Roblox.
|
| However, the comparison isn't entirely fair for several
| reasons. First off, those platforms don't restrict releasing
| the content on other platforms. If I'm unhappy with Spotify, I
| can move my music to Soundcloud, Bandcamp, or even my own
| website. This isn't ideal, and doesn't excuse bad practices,
| but it is possible. Roblox games only work in Roblox, and if I
| want to move my games elsewhere, I have to rebuild it entirely
| from scratch.
|
| Secondly, all of these services have various tools that enable
| discoverability, without requiring any payment. These tools are
| obviously not ideal, but I can become successful on Youtube
| without giving Google a single cent, and without advertising
| outside of the site. It's unlikely, but it's possible. Roblox
| requires you to spend money for any chance at discoverability,
| and even then there are no guarantees. Roblox doesn't even let
| you cash out unless you have an active subscription.
|
| Finally, all of these other services pay me in actual money,
| not their own fun bucks. The conversion rate is also
| ridiculously bad for creators. According to the video linked in
| the article, you can only cash out when you have $1000 worth of
| Robux, which then only returns $350 back to you. Combine this
| terrible conversion rate with the fact that Roblox takes an
| additional cut of basically every transaction, and the actual
| percentage of money going to creators is potentially as low as
| 17%, which is way worse then any other service I know of.
|
| So yeah, I would say this is more exploitative then someone
| trying to make it big on other platforms. And we should call
| out these bad practices specifically when we see them, instead
| of brushing it off under "all platforms are bad too."
| [deleted]
| wccrawford wrote:
| For adults, I agree. But this is squarely aimed at kids and
| they haven't got the life experience to see these problems
| coming or deal with them appropriately.
|
| If it were aimed at adults, but kids wanted to try, too, like
| Youtube... I don't have as much problem with that. But the
| target audience of Roblox ads is kids and always has been.
|
| It doesn't seem at all fair to trap kids into this ecosystem,
| sell them the things they need to get rich and famous, and then
| also give them a worse cut on their games than Steam, Apple,
| Google, etc.
| inetknght wrote:
| > _For adults, I agree. But this is squarely aimed at kids_
|
| If it's manipulative of kids then it's manipulative of adults
| too.
| only_as_i_fall wrote:
| Eh, I think it's reasonable to have different expectations
| of children vs adults. After all, isn't there a reason why
| children can't sign legally binding contracts?
| inetknght wrote:
| > _I think it 's reasonable to have different
| expectations of children vs adults._
|
| Given the current state of _stupidity_ in the US, I think
| there are a lot of children in adult bodies. No, I don 't
| think it's reasonable to have different expectations for
| users.
| alex_munroe wrote:
| > For adults, I agree. But this is squarely aimed at kids and
| they haven't got the life experience to see these problems
| coming or deal with them appropriately.
|
| That's what parents are for.
| duxup wrote:
| What then? Just don't let them make money on the platform?
| mike_d wrote:
| Sure. I also don't think 11 year olds should be working in
| coal mines or farm fields either.
| kook_throwaway wrote:
| Although I can't prove it, I suspect there wouldn't be a
| lot of kids that would stop making games on roblox for an
| enjoyable day in the coal mine with their friends.
| MichaelGroves wrote:
| That's how it works in minecraft right? Kids can design and
| build a minigame within the context of minecraft, but
| minecraft doesn't provide provide some _minecraft diamonds
| to USD_ conversion service that allows players to bring
| real money into the game, or to cash out game money for
| real money. (Some third party servers might provide this,
| in violation of the Terms of Use.)
|
| This seems like a fine state of affairs to me.
| trs8080 wrote:
| uh, yes? if your business model relies on exploiting
| children, you shouldn't be allowed to operate as a
| business.
|
| or maybe don't pay kids whose work attracts people to your
| platform in your in-game digital currency. pay them, like,
| actual money that they've earned.
| duxup wrote:
| I feel like we'd then have the same article:
|
| "Adults can make money but they don't let kids who create
| content make any money!"
| trs8080 wrote:
| kids can still make money from their creations. just pay
| them with real money instead of roblox digital currency
| (and remove the ridiculous minimum of $1k).
| gbl08ma wrote:
| One could argue that this would fall into child labor
| laws, which exist for a reason.
| wccrawford wrote:
| If you make money from the work of kids, you _must_ be 100%
| fair with them. Giving them a worse cut than the parts of
| the game industry that are already under fire for not
| giving a big enough cut is _not_ fair. Setting false
| expectations for them is not fair. And forcing them to earn
| $1000 before they can pull money out is not fair. Someone
| else mentioned that Second Life only requires $10 as their
| minimum.
|
| But even if you're sure you're being 100% fair, you have to
| be incredibly clear with those kids about what's going on
| and how it works, and you should probably also make their
| parents very clear on it, too.
|
| If you can't commit to that kind of fairness towards
| someone who can't legally sign contracts because the law
| recognizes that they don't have the life experience to do
| it fairly on their own, you shouldn't do it, and you
| definitely shouldn't base your business on it.
| duxup wrote:
| >Giving them a worse cut than the parts of the game
| industry
|
| What does the industry give indie devs whose games aren't
| popular?
|
| Most of these kids are just sharing games with fiends on
| a platform.
|
| If they want to go pro... welcome to the world / every
| platform where scale / getting attention is hard?
|
| Better they have a learning experience now because they
| made a roblox game.
| AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote:
| Honestly the only thing I find really disingenuous about this
| is the implication that it's realistic to get rich and famous
| on it, which is a quality shared by a lot of "creator"
| platforms. Also college.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| 8 year olds, dude
| AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote:
| Yeah, I'm reading this and thinking it is pretty similar to the
| situation on twitch. I'm the world's lamest twitch streamer in
| a category with paltry viewership, so it took me over 600 hours
| of streaming to get a payout[0] and I had to hit arbitrary
| milestones for affiliate in the first place. I have no idea how
| discovery even works on twitch, but I have to imagine it's the
| same as everywhere else: popular stuff gets more popular and
| everyone else languishes in obscurity. How else could it work,
| really?
|
| [0] Twitch pays out at $100, if anyone didn't know.
| meheleventyone wrote:
| Twitch isn't amazing at it in total but it does recommend
| smaller streamers to people.
| xmprt wrote:
| I think discoverability on YouTube is 100x easier than
| Twitch. I've been recommended videos with a few hundred or
| thousand views before. The equivalent on Twitch is a 0-10
| viewer stream which I've literally never come across
| without it being through me actively looking for a niche
| game, through a raid, or through (ironically) finding their
| channel on YouTube which linked to their Twitch.
| meheleventyone wrote:
| Twitch has a "Recommended Smaller Communities" section on
| their user frontpage now.
| RistrettoMike wrote:
| I'm with others here in that this - while an extreme example - is
| just another version of common revenue-sharing that happens on
| pretty much _all_ online creation platforms where the user isn 't
| responsible for hosting the content themselves.
|
| I think it's a bit ludicrous that the company is pushing that as
| a marketing point towards children, that the payout-threshold is
| so high, and that they take multiple cuts of that payout, but at
| the end of the day; _aren 't all monetized products aimed at
| children kind of a scam built on exploiting people who can't
| recognize they're being exploited?_
|
| Kind of egregious, but also just the same principle as _many_
| other platforms like Twitch, YouTube, Spotify, Medium, Google,
| etc.
| [deleted]
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| See Carmack's rebuttal:
| https://twitter.com/ID_AA_Carmack/status/1428483898896535562
|
| > I have been impressed by the number of real world economic and
| business issues that Roblox is exposing my younger son to, both
| in the experiences and the larger ecosystem. There is a lot of
| thinking in terms of effort, reward, and risk.
|
| "You seem to be ignoring the thesis of the video. For the vast
| majority of their creators, their is very little reward, and
| mostly a lot of exploitative business preying on children."
|
| > I am disagreeing with the thesis of the video. Roblox provides
| opportunities previously unavailable; it is up to the individuals
| to decide if they are worthwhile to invest time in.
|
| If the most legendary game developer of all time thinks Roblox is
| fine, are you sure he's mistaken?
| TeMPOraL wrote:
| > _Roblox provides opportunities previously unavailable; it is
| up to the individuals to decide if they are worthwhile to
| invest time in._
|
| Oh boy. I think we've all heard that many times before. Every
| exploitative business will use this line as its defense (see
| e.g. every controversy about employee/contractor status in the
| gig economy), so taken alone it isn't much of an argument.
|
| For example, individuals can be mislead as to whether the
| opportunity is worthwhile to invest - with enough trickery and
| unsophisticated target group (e.g. Joe Random Uberdriver who
| never before calculated depreciation of their car), the
| business can exploit people for many years before they wisen up
| as a group.
| thethirdone wrote:
| I think it is important to note that its not the payment
| model itself that's the issue in those cases. It is instead
| the marketing that convinces people to engage with it in a
| way that is harmful / allows them to be exploited.
|
| I would think contractor status can make sense for a small
| portion of people in the gig economy, but for a lot of people
| it would not.
| jwmhjwmh wrote:
| > If the most legendary game developer of all time thinks
| Roblox is fine, are you sure he's mistaken?
|
| Isn't this an argument from authority?
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argument_from_authority
|
| Furthermore, the video made the argument that Roblox tries to
| mislead kids into thinking they can make money. In other words,
| an individual might be wrong in thinking the opportunities are
| worth investing time in due to the manipulative practices of
| Roblox.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| It is. And you're right to be skeptical of such arguments.
|
| But such arguments also happen all the time. For example, if
| you join a company as a junior developer, most people would
| trust an existing senior developer.
|
| I was about to write "I think it's fine to mislead kids into
| thinking they can make money." Then I reconsidered.
|
| After reconsidering, I think it's fine to mislead kids into
| thinking they can make money. Lemonade stands and lawnmowing
| for neighbors are examples of this. They may make a little
| bit, but unless they're exceptionally lucky, no one would be
| under any illusions that it would become their full time
| profession.
| cma wrote:
| But he is CTO of a company trying to become Roblox which
| takes half the money from kids the article/video talks
| about, and he's CTO of a 30% app store which takes the
| other half of the money from kids the article/video talks
| about.
|
| Why does his C-programming ability have more weight than
| his obvious conflict of interest weighing in here? He may
| be being geniune, but since he works in this exact area, it
| is too tainted by that to take at face value or especially
| to take on authority.
| CobrastanJorji wrote:
| Lawnmowing for a neighbor takes about an hour and earns
| maybe $10. Making a Roblox game takes perhaps 100 hours and
| is almost certainly going to result in earning $0 for
| everyone except the Roblox Corporation.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Ditto for learning the violin. (In this case, you learn
| Lua.)
| vmception wrote:
| An argument from authority isn't inherently a fallacy, as
| your own wikipedia article mentions.
|
| But, like you, I do think it is inherently a flag that
| suggests other inputs are necessary. And that all opinions
| that solely reference the authority are equally lower
| weighted until additional inputs are found to match, or
| further negate.
| cma wrote:
| > If the most legendary game developer of all time thinks
| Roblox is fine, are you sure he's mistaken?
|
| FWIW, he's the CTO of a 30% app store trying to also break into
| the Roblox business (their Metaverse talk/Facebook Horizon).
|
| So rather than Roblox only taking 40% and giving 30% to Apple,
| Facebook will potentially be in position to take the full 70%
| (or more due to getting children to pay for ad spend) of the
| child labor.
| elefanten wrote:
| I don't think Oculus is courting amateur kiddie devs.
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| Carmack is a full time AI developer. He's working on AI in
| the most hardcore sense: aiming at full AGI. I've DM'ed with
| him for months about it. I was skeptical, and then his ideas
| turned out to be some of the most innovative I've seen.
|
| When Carmack tweets something, it's because he believes what
| he's saying is true.
|
| Searching for the most charitable interpretation of your
| argument, the only thing I can think of is "Maybe Carmack's
| view was contaminated by his time spent as CTO of Oculus."
| But he joined Oculus long before Facebook acquired it, and
| before the policies you mention. Carmack may be legendary,
| but he likely had no say in those policies.
| cma wrote:
| > Carmack is a full time AI developer.
|
| He's still simultaneously the CTO of Facebook's Oculus
| division, which runs their 30% app store and is building
| the Roblox-aesthetic Facebook Horizon "metaverse":
|
| https://techcrunch.com/wp-
| content/uploads/2019/09/Facebook-W...
|
| https://roadtovrlive-5ea0.kxcdn.com/wp-
| content/uploads/2020/...
|
| https://roadtovrlive-5ea0.kxcdn.com/wp-
| content/uploads/2020/...
|
| He's separated out his AI work as his own thing.
| w-j-w wrote:
| I'm not really convinced by "John Carmack doesn't think it's a
| bad deal, so it's probably ok". He might very well be an
| incredibly talented game developer, but he also hasn't been in
| the position of being unknown in the space since the 90s. He
| also isn't an economist. However, I do think he makes a good
| point about accessibility. I also think that similar arguments
| are commonly used to defend MLM companies, which many
| rightfully still dislike.
| andyfleming wrote:
| > thinks Roblox is fine
|
| I don't think he's claiming it's not exploitative behavior, but
| rather values the experience for the real world lessons.
| PoignardAzur wrote:
| Yeah, the only way I think Roblox could useful for kids is as
| a case study for how predatory game companies try to take
| your money.
|
| For the creative side, there are other options. Play
| Minecraft, Trackmania and Super Mario Maker.
| tpush wrote:
| Carmack being a prolific game developer doesn't mean that he
| has special insight into any other issue, like corporations
| economically exploiting children.
|
| He may have a point, but him being 'legendary' doesn't make his
| arguments any better (or worse).
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| I think him being a father gives him special insight into
| that issue. Most fathers are keenly aware when their children
| are being taken advantage of.
|
| Most parents on this HN thread seem to agree.
| sombremesa wrote:
| Quote from my friend, who is a mom:
|
| > I'm honestly not a fan as a mom but it's a very fluid
| marketplace for games and gives people an opportunity to
| make their own video games and make money.
|
| Given that this opportunity to make money scarcely exists
| in reality (it's equivalent to my opportunity to make money
| by starring in a Hollywood film as a random Seattle
| engineer), seems like parents don't really have a clue
| what's going on.
|
| From my own experience from when I was a kid, it would seem
| to be true that parents don't have a clue what their
| children are actually exposed to on the internet, unless
| they take extreme and draconian measures.
|
| Unfortunately, parents have a strong interest in protecting
| their image as that of a good parent, so it's rare for them
| to admit to not knowing such things.
| johnny53169 wrote:
| > If the most legendary game developer of all time thinks
| Roblox is fine, are you sure he's mistaken?
|
| If he was the most legendary game _designer_ sure, but in that
| area he hasn't been very relevant in a while, as a programmer I
| don't see what special insight he has.
|
| He seems like a nice guy and he is obviously one of the best
| developer ever, but I don't get the near cult he has
| sillysaurusx wrote:
| I was surprised how grounded he was. It's pretty much the
| opposite of a cult.
|
| When you talk with him about a technical idea, you come away
| feeling that whatever Carmack said, it was plausible. So you
| start questioning your own assumptions.
|
| I've learned to trust his thinking. It doesn't mean that I
| don't think for myself. Quite the opposite; I don't think
| anyone else in the AI scene insisted to him that it was
| crucial to have a loss function.
|
| But in matters like this, where he's clearly given it more
| thought than I have (see tweet) and has more experience than
| I have (see son), I am perfectly content to outsource my
| thinking to him.
|
| I'll wager you $500 he's right. (The problem with such wagers
| is that it's hard to define the terms precisely. But, if it
| were possible to make it precise the way a mathematics
| formula is precise, I would happily bet you the $500.)
| elliekelly wrote:
| Aren't most modern game developers notoriously exploitative of
| their adult workers? And, increasingly, their users of all
| ages? Perhaps a "legendary" game developer isn't the best
| person to weigh in on whether Roblox is "fine" or exploitative.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-08-20 23:01 UTC)