The game's publisher determines how much it wants to skim off the top. But Valve's cut, just like on iOS, was indeed only 30 percent. Some contrasted this unfavorably to Apple's App Store, in which content creators receive a 70 percent share. In the case of Skyrim, 75 percent of the profit from a mod's sale was split between Valve and Bethesda, with only 25 percent making its way to the mod creator's pocket. Many think that the profit-sharing model is unfair to modders.
Valve boss Gabe Newell even took to Reddit to address the controversy directly and "to make sure that if people are pissed off, they are at least pissed off for the right reasons." A petition calling for Valve to remove the pay-for-mods system quickly garnered more than 130,000 signatures.