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New Team Fortress 2 Marketplace Pays Out Crazy Money To Content Creators
Five lucky and creative people just made $39,000 to $47,000 each in royalties from creating custom in-game items for Valve's new peer-to-peer Mann-Conomy marketplace in Team Fortress 2.
Valve announced that Rob Laro, Shawn Spetch, Steven Skidmore, Spencer Kern, and Shaylyn Hamm, made this sweet, sweet cash in just two weeks of sales.
"It's astounding that so many people want to purchase the items that came out of the community," said content creator Spencer Kern in a statement. "The response exceeded my wildest expectations. There really is no doubt at this point that there's a huge demand for community-created content in TF2 and, hopefully, more games will start to tap into this demand."
Apparently, the royalties were to be deposited directly into the creators' Paypal accounts, but within just a few days, the money flew past Paypal's maximum allowed deposit size. Valve had to make other arrangements and two users even flew to the company's office to pick up the money in person.
"At a time when content creators are struggling with changing markets and evolving technologies, the Steam community is sending a clear message with these checks," said Valve president Gabe Newell in a statement. "Platforms that enable this kind of peer-to-peer exchange of virtual goods and services are going to be enthusiastically received. They create an inherently greater efficiency in connecting creators and consumers."
Seriously, if you know how to make in-game assets, go to Valve's submission site right now and get creating.
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