Year

1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010

Month

Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec

Index

January 2000

JavaWorld: Build an object database J C Lawrence
Muq update Cynbe ru Taren
New link support J C Lawrence
OS Inspiration Phillip Lenhardt
- OS Inspiration Greg Miller
Chomsky's recursive theory of grammar J C Lawrence
concerning tokenization, compilation, performance, and other fun stuff. Nate Cain
- concerning tokenization, compilation, performance, and other fun stuff. cg@ami-cg.GraySage.Edmonton.AB.CA
- concerning tokenization, compilation, performance, and other fun stuff. Joel Dillon
- - concerning tokenization, compilation, performance, and other fun stuff. Greg Miller
- concerning tokenization, compilation, performance, and other fun stuff. Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- - concerning tokenization, compilation, performance, and other fun stuff. J C Lawrence
Library submission notification and updates J C Lawrence
EQ packet sniffer J C Lawrence
Catalog of Compiler Construction Tools J C Lawrence
Microthreads for Python J C Lawrence
For those interested in parsers and compilers J C Lawrence
EQ packet analyzer is gone? Sellers, Michael
- EQ packet analyzer is gone? J C Lawrence
- EQ packet analyzer is gone? J C Lawrence
RFC: Worldforge project Scott Clitheroe
ScryMUD 2.0.9 released (compiles on Windows (cygwin)) Ben Greear
Clay Shirky's "Playfulness in 3-D Spaces" J C Lawrence
- Clay Shirky's "Playfulness in 3-D Spaces" Raph & Kristen Koster
- - Clay Shirky's "Playfulness in 3-D Spaces" Sellers, Michael
  - Clay Shirky's "Playfulness in 3-D Spaces" Nick Shaffner
- Clay Shirky's "Playfulness in 3-D Spaces" Sellers, Michael
- Clay Shirky's "Playfulness in 3-D Spaces" Jeremy Music "Sterling"
- Clay Shirky's "Playfulness in 3-D Spaces" msew
ShowEQ Ashran
Hello! F. Randall Farmer
- Hello! Cynbe ru Taren
Y2K archives J C Lawrence
An introduction... Geoffrey A. MacDougall
- An introduction... Lovecraft
Laws website moves Raph & Kristen Koster
Ok, got some brand new core dumps. J C Lawrence
player politics (was An introduction...) Sellers, Michael
- player politics (was An introduction...) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- - player politics (was An introduction...) Sellers, Michael
  - - player politics (was An introduction...) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
    - player politics (was An introduction...) J C Lawrence
    - - player politics (was An introduction...) Sellers, Michael
A quick business question... Geoffrey A. MacDougall
- A quick business question... Matthew Mihaly
- - A quick business question... Darrin Hyrup
Question about multithreaded servers Fabian Lemke
- Question about multithreaded servers AR Schleicher
- Question about multithreaded servers Nick Shaffner
- - Question about multithreaded servers Ola Fosheim Grøstad
  - - Question about multithreaded servers Fabian
    - - Question about multithreaded servers Jon A. Lambert
      - Question about multithreaded servers Fabian
      - Question about multithreaded servers J C Lawrence
- Question about multithreaded servers Greg Underwood
- - Question about multithreaded servers cg@ami-cg.GraySage.Edmonton.AB.CA
  - - Question about multithreaded servers J C Lawrence
    - - Question about multithreaded servers Greg Underwood
- Question about multithreaded servers J C Lawrence
- - Question about multithreaded servers Emil Eifrém
  - - Question about multithreaded servers J C Lawrence
Community Relations Dundee
- Community Relations Christopher Allen
- - Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 - Community Relations Greg Miller
 - Community Relations Darrin Hyrup
 - Community Relations Dundee
 - - Community Relations Ola Fosheim Grøstad
 - - Community Relations Dundee
 - Community Relations Ola Fosheim Grøstad
 Community Relations Dundee
- Community Relations Marian Griffith
- Community Relations Koster, Raph
- Community Relations Jon A. Lambert
- - Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 - - Community Relations Ola Fosheim Grøstad
 - - Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 - Community Relations Ola Fosheim Grøstad
 Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 - Community Relations Marc Bowden
 - Community Relations Eli Stevens {Grey}
 - - Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 - - Community Relations Raph & Kristen Koster
 - Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 Community Relations Koster, Raph
 Community Relations Travis Casey
 Community Relations Ola Fosheim Grøstad
 Community Relations Travis Casey
 Community Relations Ola Fosheim Grøstad
 Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 Community Relations Rahul Sinha
 Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 Community Relations Ola Fosheim Grøstad
 Community Relations Koster, Raph
 Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 Community Relations Geoffrey A. MacDougall
 Community Relations Jon A. Lambert
 Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 Community Relations Ola Fosheim Grøstad
 - Community Relations Travis S. Casey
 - Community Relations Douglas Couch
 - Community Relations Dundee
 - Community Relations Marian Griffith
 - - Community Relations Jon A. Lambert
 - - Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 - Community Relations Jon A. Lambert
 Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 Community Relations Geoffrey A. MacDougall
 
 This message is in MIME format. Since your mail reader does not understand
 this format, some or all of this message may not be legible.
 
 ------_=_NextPart_001_01BF6615.4B8D52D0
 Content-Type: text/plain;
 charset="iso-8859-1"
 
 matt wrote:
 
 > I'm curious, how do you (or do you propose) choose the
 > players? It sounds
 > to me like you are talking about some sort of populist democratic
 > system? (correct me if I'm wrong please.) What happens when
 > they elect the
 > mud equivalent of hitler, and he decides that all Dwarves
 > should be kicked
 > off. Or, worse yet, what happens if the player who is at the
 > top of the
 > hierarchy decides hr is going to quit, and is going to go out
 > with a bang?
 
 Checks and balances. Limitations on power. Certain acts require the
 consent of multiple administrators...
 
 > I suppose though that it's not completely a matter of
 > gettting the best
 > administrators, but also of giving the playerbase a feeling of
 > empowerment.
 
 Interesting phrasing - because a _feeling_ of empowererment is, by
 definition, not necessarily the same thing as empowerment. Is it possible
 to grant a user base the feeling of empowerment without actually
 surrendering control?
 
 Has this strategy ever been successfully applied?
 
 > It's not
 > so easy as just letting them vote straight out though, and
 > then vesting
 > all legislative/executive/judiciary power in one hierarchy,
 > because you
 > will end up with tyranny of the majority.
 
 An effective charter of rights (as defined in my previous posting) goes a
 long way in avoiding these problems...
 
 > That method is also
 > poor (and I
 > think this is a major failing of American-style democracy)
 > because it does
 > not allow people to indicate HOW strongly they feel about
 > something. What
 > if 40% of your players are rabidly pro-player-killing, 15%
 > are rabidly
 > anti-player-killing, 5% who don't really care but if pressed will be
 > pro-player-killing because they are speciest and want to kill all
 > Dwarves, and 40% don't really care, but if pressed, will say
 > they are anti-player-killing, because their aunt got killed once (by a
 > Dwarf, no doubt) when she logged into a mud? (I'm not saying this is a
 > realistic breakdown of this particular issue)
 >
 > So, let's define people who are rabidly either way as being people who
 > care enough to quit your mud if things go against them, while the ones
 > more towards the middle might get a bit disgruntled, but
 > don't care enough
 > to stop playing.
 >
 > Then, in this case, even though, when it came to a straight vote, the
 > anti-player-killers would win (assuming everyone votes, which
 > may be close
 > or far from what actually happens, depending on how important the
 > electorate takes politics), the anti-player-killers would
 > win, with 55% of
 > the vote. However, this does not accurately represent the way this
 > community thinks about things. In this case, the majority
 > vote would cost
 > you 40% of your player-base, while had it swung the other
 > day, only 15%
 > would have quit. This is an extreme situation of course, but
 > the principle
 > is applicable. How to resolve this issue is not simple. Books
 > have been
 > written on how to avoid Madison's probolem of majority tyranny.
 
 Two points -
 
 1. The problem you've just outlined only arises if every member of the
 commmunity is forced to vote. Voting, for the most part, is optional IRL.
 The same must be even more true in MUDs, because forcing a vote will
 alienate the large majority of your players who are there to hack 'n slash
 or chat, and who don't really care about the way the MUD is governed. So,
 if, by your example, only 55% of your population holds a strong opinion on
 the matter, chances are that your voter turnout will not be much more than
 that. (Assuming mildly-opinionated voters will be balanced by
 strongly-opinionated non-voters.) So... To determined the interests of the
 population, hold a vote. To determine how strongly that opinion is held,
 make voting optional, or go one step further and make it a slight hassle to
 place your vote. Only dedicated lobbyists will go to out-of game web-pages,
 and jump though additional hoops to make their opinions known.
 
 The solution I've just proposed is not a particularly unique or original
 one, as the two variables I describe - the results of the vote, and the
 number of voters - are already used by pundits in this very manner. In
 Canada, at least, voter turnout is relatively high in federal elections,
 while very few people vote in municipal elections. This leads to the
 conclusion that international trade policy is generally held to be more
 important, and elicit stronger opinions then what day my garbage is
 collected. (No offense to any would-be municipal politicians in this group.
 :p )
 
 Holding separate ballots on different occassions for each issue is also a
 way to ensure that people don't voice an opinion about issues that they
 don't really care about.
 
 > As
 > politically correct as it is to hate special interest groups
 > in American
 > politics (sorry to be nation-specific, but it's what I'm most familiar
 > with), they do help to more accurately represent the true majority
 > _preference_ of the community. They essentially magnify the
 > influence of
 > their members by organizing and collection donations, which
 > are then used
 > to affect the electoral process. They effectively magnify the voice of
 > those who care enough to donate/participate in the special interest
 > groups, thus reflecting that those people care extra about
 > those issues.
 
 And 2. Is there a way to build this extra influence into the system?
 
 Ex - Some race car games artificially enhance the capabilities of vehicles
 being driven by players who are falling off the pace. The idea is to level
 the playing field, so that the players battle it out on the turns throughout
 the course of the entire race, instead of having the race won off the
 starting line - the assumption being that the former scenario is more fun.
 
 Is this kind of idea applicable in a MUD? Avoid the tyranny of the majority
 by playing with the odds to grant the minority an advantage? This tactic is
 already applied on a micro scale - ex. NPCs don't help Necromancers so make
 their spells more powerful - but can it be applied to the community at
 large?
 
 Cheers,
 
 Geoffrey
 
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 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
 
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 <META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1">
 <META NAME="Generator" CONTENT="MS Exchange Server version 5.5.2650.12">
 <TITLE>RE: [MUD-Dev] Community Relations</TITLE>
 </HEAD>
 <BODY>
 
 matt wrote:
 
 
 > I'm curious, how do you (or do you propose) choose the 
 > players? It sounds
 > to me like you are talking about some sort of populist democratic
 > system? (correct me if I'm wrong please.) What happens when 
 > they elect the
 > mud equivalent of hitler, and he decides that all Dwarves 
 > should be kicked
 > off. Or, worse yet, what happens if the player who is at the 
 > top of the
 > hierarchy decides hr is going to quit, and is going to go out 
 > with a bang? 
 
 
 Checks and balances.  Limitations on power.  Certain acts require the consent of multiple administrators...
 
 
 > I suppose though that it's not completely a matter of 
 > gettting the best
 > administrators, but also of giving the playerbase a feeling of
 > empowerment.
 
 
 Interesting phrasing - because a _feeling_ of empowererment is, by definition, not necessarily the same thing as empowerment.  Is it possible to grant a user base the feeling of empowerment without actually surrendering control?
 
 Has this strategy ever been successfully applied?
 
 
 > It's not
 > so easy as just letting them vote straight out though, and 
 > then vesting
 > all legislative/executive/judiciary power in one hierarchy, 
 > because you
 > will end up with tyranny of the majority.
 
 
 An effective charter of rights (as defined in my previous posting) goes a long way in avoiding these problems...
 
 
 > That method is also 
 > poor (and I
 > think this is a major failing of American-style democracy) 
 > because it does
 > not allow people to indicate HOW strongly they feel about 
 > something. What
 > if 40% of your players are rabidly pro-player-killing,  15% 
 > are rabidly
 > anti-player-killing, 5% who don't really care but if pressed will be
 > pro-player-killing because they are speciest and want to kill all
 > Dwarves, and 40% don't really care, but if pressed, will say
 > they are anti-player-killing, because their aunt got killed once (by a
 > Dwarf, no doubt) when she logged into a mud? (I'm not saying this is a
 > realistic breakdown of this particular issue)
 > 
 > So, let's define people who are rabidly either way as being people who
 > care enough to quit your mud if things go against them, while the ones
 > more towards the middle might get a bit disgruntled, but 
 > don't care enough
 > to stop playing.
 > 
 > Then, in this case, even though, when it came to a straight vote, the
 > anti-player-killers would win (assuming everyone votes, which 
 > may be close
 > or far from what actually happens, depending on how important the
 > electorate takes politics), the anti-player-killers would 
 > win, with 55% of
 > the vote. However, this does not accurately represent the way this
 > community thinks about things. In this case, the majority 
 > vote would cost
 > you 40% of your player-base, while had it swung the other 
 > day, only 15%
 > would have quit. This is an extreme situation of course, but 
 > the principle
 > is applicable. How to resolve this issue is not simple. Books 
 > have been
 > written on how to avoid Madison's probolem of majority tyranny.
 
 
 Two points - 
 
 
 1.  The problem you've just outlined only arises if every member of the commmunity is forced to vote.  Voting, for the most part, is optional IRL.  The same must be even more true in MUDs, because forcing a vote will alienate the large majority of your players who are there to hack 'n slash or chat, and who don't really care about the way the MUD is governed.  So, if, by your example, only 55% of your population holds a strong opinion on the matter, chances are that your voter turnout will not be much more than that.  (Assuming mildly-opinionated voters will be balanced by strongly-opinionated non-voters.)  So... To determined the interests of the population, hold a vote.  To determine how strongly that opinion is held, make voting optional, or go one step further and make it a slight hassle to place your vote.  Only dedicated lobbyists will go to out-of game web-pages, and jump though additional hoops to make their opinions known.
 
 The solution I've just proposed is not a particularly unique or original one, as the two variables I describe - the results of the vote, and the number of voters - are already used by pundits in this very manner.  In Canada, at least, voter turnout is relatively high in federal elections, while very few people vote in municipal elections.  This leads to the conclusion that international trade policy is generally held to be more important, and elicit stronger opinions then what day my garbage is collected.  (No offense to any would-be municipal politicians in this group. :p )
 
 Holding separate ballots on different occassions for each issue is also a way to ensure that people don't voice an opinion about issues that they don't really care about.
 
 > As
 > politically correct as it is to hate special interest groups 
 > in American
 > politics (sorry to be nation-specific, but it's what I'm most familiar
 > with), they do help to more accurately represent the true majority
 > _preference_ of the community. They essentially magnify the 
 > influence of
 > their members by organizing and collection donations, which 
 > are then used
 > to affect the electoral process. They effectively magnify the voice of
 > those who care enough to donate/participate in the special interest
 > groups, thus reflecting that those people care extra about 
 > those issues.
 
 
 And 2.  Is there a way to build this extra influence into the system?
 
 
 Ex - Some race car games artificially enhance the capabilities of vehicles being driven by players who are falling off the pace.  The idea is to level the playing field, so that the players battle it out on the turns throughout the course of the entire race, instead of having the race won off the starting line - the assumption being that the former scenario is more fun.
 
 Is this kind of idea applicable in a MUD?  Avoid the tyranny of the majority by playing with the odds to grant the minority an advantage?  This tactic is already applied on a micro scale - ex. NPCs don't help Necromancers so make their spells more powerful - but can it be applied to the community at large?
 
 Cheers,
 
 
 Geoffrey
 
 
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 </HTML>
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 Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 Community Relations Lovecraft
 Community Relations Geoffrey A. MacDougall
 Community Relations Lovecraft
 Community Relations Marian Griffith
 Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
 Community Relations Sellers, Michael
 Community Relations Lovecraft
 Community Relations J C Lawrence
 Community Relations Lovecraft
 Community Relations J C Lawrence
 Community Relations Koster, Raph
 Community Relations Jon A. Lambert
 Community Relations Ola Fosheim Grøstad
 Community Relations Lovecraft
 Community Relations Jon A. Lambert
 Community Relations Lovecraft
 Community Relations Jon A. Lambert
 Community Relations Jon A. Lambert
 - Community Relations J C Lawrence
- Community Relations Wes Connell
- - Community Relations Marc Bowden
 - Community Relations Dundee
- Community Relations J C Lawrence
- Community Relations J C Lawrence
- Community Relations F. Randall Farmer
- Community Relations Dr. Cat
- Community Relations J C Lawrence
- Community Relations Koster, Raph
- Community Relations Geoffrey A. MacDougall
- - Community Relations Matthew Mihaly
Commercial-use Restrictions on Code Bases (was: help me find 100% fre (fwd) J C Lawrence
Commercial-use Restrictions on Code Bases (was: help me find 100% fre (fwd) J C Lawrence
Databases (was Commercial-use Restrictions on Code Bases) Charles Hughes
- Databases (was Commercial-use Restrictions on Code Bases) cg@ami-cg.GraySage.Edmonton.AB.CA
- Databases (was Commercial-use Restrictions on Code Bases) Jon A. Lambert
- - Databases (was Commercial-use Restrictions on Code Bases) Jon A. Lambert
- Databases (was Commercial-use Restrictions on Code Bases) J C Lawrence
Mud-Dev FAQ part I Marian Griffith
Mud-Dev FAQ part II Marian Griffith
META: List goals (was OS Inspiration) J C Lawrence
Valhalla license? CFrancy@aol.com
- Valhalla license? Matthew Mihaly
- Valhalla license? Richard Woolcock
Planet/Solar System Generation Wes Connell
- Planet/Solar System Generation icecube@ihug.co.nz
- Planet/Solar System Generation Christopher Allen
- Planet/Solar System Generation J C Lawrence
Planet/Solar System Generation Nolan Darilek
- Planet/Solar System Generation Wes Connell
- - Planet/Solar System Generation Richard Woolcock
How to handle/display partial language skill Joe Kingry
- How to handle/display partial language skill Greg Underwood
- How to handle/display partial language skill Wes Connell
- How to handle/display partial language skill Matt Chatterley
Signing off... IronWolf
Simulated Populations phlUID
- Simulated Populations Charles Hughes
- Simulated Populations Vladimir Prelovac
- - Simulated Populations phlUID
  - - Simulated Populations Dundee
    - - Simulated Populations Wes Connell
  - Simulated Populations Nicolai Hansen
  - - Simulated Populations J C Lawrence
- Simulated Populations J C Lawrence
Business Licenses CFrancy@aol.com
- Business Licenses Bruce
- Business Licenses J C Lawrence
[adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? (fwd) J C Lawrence
- [adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? (fwd) Matthew Mihaly
- - [adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? (fwd) Wes Connell
  - - [adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? (fwd) Matthew Mihaly
- [adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? (fwd) Erik Jarvi
Multiply oriented interactive worlds... Justin Rogers
[adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? J C Lawrence
[adv-mud] Topic list repost (fwd) J C Lawrence
[adv-mud] Spellbound Hierarchy and Keys (fwd) J C Lawrence
- [adv-mud] Spellbound Hierarchy and Keys (fwd) J C Lawrence
[adv-mud] Better Grammer Detection J C Lawrence
[adv-mud] MUD-Dev vs. adv-mud J C Lawrence
MUD-Dev vs. adv-mud phlUID
[adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? phlUID
(fwd) Avatarism and Role-Playing Game Design claw@kanga.nu
Starlane test Joel Kelso
hoho Matthew Mihaly
Current Status of Middle Earth Online Geoffrey A. MacDougall
ScryMUD 2.0.10 released. Ben Greear
[adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? J C Lawrence
- [adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? Ben Greear
- [adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? J C Lawrence
- - [adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? Wes Connell
  - - [adv-mud] What good is a hero when nobody knows? J C Lawrence
Some new Library references J C Lawrence

MUD-Dev Archive

Year

Month

Index

January 2000