November 2004
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really! (By R. Bartle) William Leader
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Richard A. Bartle
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Matt Mihaly
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Per Magne Bjørnerud
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Koster, Raph
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Richard A. Bartle
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Koster, Raph
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Matt Mihaly
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Wayne Witzke
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Wayne Witzke
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Koster, Raph
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Richard A. Bartle
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Matt Mihaly
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Koster, Raph
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) ceo
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Matt Mihaly
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Wayne Witzke
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Eric Random
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ted L. Chen
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Eric Random
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) J C Lawrence
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Richard A. Bartle
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Lee Sheldon
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) ceo
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Dana V. Baldwin
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) J C Lawrence
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Matt Mihaly
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle) Martin Keegan
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle) Mike Rozak
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle) Martin Keegan
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle) Mike Rozak
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle) Richard A. Bartle
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By R. Bartle) Koster, Raph
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Ken Snider
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Davion Kalhen
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Wayne Witzke
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Richard A. Bartle
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Dana V. Baldwin
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Johan
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Miroslav Silovic
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Otis Viles
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Miroslav Silovic
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Otis Viles
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Damion Schubert
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Douglas Goodall
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Miroslav Silovic
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design GZ
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Ted L. Chen
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Douglas Goodall
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Ted L. Chen
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Ken Snider
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Kirinyaga
- Richard A. Bartle talks MUD Design Davion Kalhen
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really! (By R. Bartle) William Leader
- ADMIN: The definitions of "What is role-playing?" J C Lawrence
- Semireliable UDP-based protocol development Scott Hilbert
- Semireliable UDP-based protocol development Mark Terrano (XBOX)
- Semireliable UDP-based protocol development Jeremy Gaffney
- The Lag monster... Harlan Beverly
- The Lag monster... Ben Carter
- The Lag monster... J C Lawrence
- The Lag monster... Amanda Walker
- The Lag monster... Miroslav Silovic
- The Lag monster... Morris Cox
- The Lag monster... Miroslav Silovic
- How many UDP sockets to use? PizaZ
- How many UDP sockets to use? Jon Mayo
- How many UDP sockets to use? Michael Montague
- JOB/RESUME: Cryptic Studios Needs Heroes! Serdar Copur
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By Chris Duesing
- NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies -No, Really! (By Chris Duesing
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) David Kennerly
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) neild-mud@misago.org
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) David Kennerly
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) neild-mud@misago.org
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) David Kennerly
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) David Kennerly
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) ceo
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) olag@ifi.uio.no
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) David Kennerly
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) Koster, Raph
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) David Kennerly
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) Koster, Raph
David Kennerly [mailto:kennerly@finegamedesign.com] wrote:
> Raph Koster wrote:
>> To me, the term "computer mediated community" has a very literal
>> meaning and requires only "communication." Everything else you
>> describe is emergent given the communications medium--we've seen
>> most all of that list show up in IRC, for example.
> I think that community includes trade, whereas communication (by
> itself) does not. But perhaps I'm injecting too much of my own
> opinions into the common meaning of "community."
Based on the dictionary definitions, I suspect most would agree with
me that you are bringing more to it than the bare necessities,
certainly. I think #1 (as regards locality) and #2 (as regards
shared interests) are the most likely touchstone for us as regards
muds.
com*mu*ni*ty ( P )
n. pl. com*mu*ni*ties
1.
a. A group of people living in the same locality and under
the same government.
b. The district or locality in which such a group lives.
2.
a. A group of people having common interests: the scientific
community; the international business community.
b. A group viewed as forming a distinct segment of society: the
gay community; the community of color.
3.
a. Similarity or identity: a community of interests.
b. Sharing, participation, and fellowship.
4. Society as a whole; the public.
5. Ecology.
a. A group of plants and animals living and interacting with one
another in a specific region under relatively similar
environmental conditions.
b. The region occupied by a group of interacting organisms.
[Middle English communite, citizenry, from Old French, from Latin
communitas, fellowship, from communis, common. See common.]
Source: The American Heritage(r) Dictionary of the English
Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright (c) 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
>> - a representation of space (the key factor that distinguishes
>> text muds from other hypertextual systems)
> One could order the systems along an axis: a text MUD has more
> representation of space than hypertext does, but a graphical MUD
> (usually) has a more consistent representation of space than a
> text MUD does. I'm not sure that a text MUD sufficiently
> represents physical space, unless you mean that any undirected
> graph suffices.
No, muds have the peculiarity of being an undirected graph wherein a
spatial metaphor is employed. I grant you that there is no technical
reason why the spatial metaphor is present, in the more robust
systems, but nonetheless, it is present and common to virtually all
mud systems.
Even in more flexible codebases than the Diku family, when exits are
given arbitrary labels, they are almost always coded for users in
terms of spatiality. "Inside the TV" to use a famous LambdaMOO
example, is still recognizably a location.
[snip many good comments on the differences between spaces in text
muds and graphical environments]
> I agree that there should be an organized and navigable place, and
> that space suffices. But I'm not certain that space is necessary
> for a text MUD.
It is not technically necessary, and yet I would argue that were you
to connect to a text mud that did not employ a spatial metaphor (eg,
the "rooms" were not "places"), you would most likely mistake it for
a gopher server or perhaps browsing under lynx. In other words, the
spatial metaphor is intrinsic to our understanding of what a mud IS
even if the technical capabilities of the code do not enforce the
restriction.
> At least for text, the space is not necessarily analogous to
> physical space. The text MUD is isomorphic to an undirected graph
> whose vertices may possess varying degrees of connectivity. These
> edges may result in an inconsistent spatial arrangement. A
> discrete representation of space, as a graph, would likely have a
> consistent arrangement of edges between its vertices, such as in a
> system of coordinates.
I don't make any claims about this space being in any way
Euclidean. The edges between vertices are by convention
bidirectional, but many muds have been made with directed
graphs. Many muds do not fit nicely onto graph paper because there
are no assumptions made about scale. Nonetheless, the spatial
metaphor is employed.
It is worth pointing out that the most popular family of codebases,
the Diku tree, does in fact enforce the spatial metaphor in its exit
conventions.
It is also worth pointing out that spatiality is an assumed
convention in most of our core terminology:
- area
- zone
- room
- exit
- drop
- get
-Raph - The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) David Kennerly
- The Root of the Tree (was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds ...) Koster, Raph
- The Root of the Tree Eric Random
- The Root of the Tree David Kennerly
- Early Attempts at Slaying the Lag Monster Greg Boyd
- Early Attempts at Slaying the Lag Monster Amanda Walker
- Early Attempts at Slaying the Lag Monster Morris Cox
- Slaying the Lag Monster Kirinyaga
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking (fwd) J C Lawrence
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking (fwd) Ken Snider
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking (fwd) Vincent Archer
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking (fwd) Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking (fwd) Michael Hartman
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking (fwd) Chek Yang FOO
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking (fwd) Tom "cro" Gordon
- NEWS: Security officials to spy on chat rooms Mike Rozak
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 (fwd) J C Lawrence
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 (fwd) Michael Oxford
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking Dread Quixadhal
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking Morris Cox
- [ssows] thinking about EQ2 - kill locking Jason Downs
- Time Limited MUDs and Dead Horses Revived (was: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed by Newbies) Peter Keeler
- Time Limited MUDs and Dead Horses Revived (was: WhyVirtual Worlds are Designed by Newbies) John Buehler
- In Game Family Trees (Was: Time Limited MUDs) William Leader
- In Game Family Trees (Was: Time Limited MUDs) Johan A
- In Game Family Trees (Was: Time Limited MUDs) Amanda Walker
- In Game Family Trees (Was: Time Limited MUDs) Matt Mihaly
- Challenging the grind - take 2 Vincent Archer
- Time limited worlds (Was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle)) Mike Rozak
- Time limited worlds (was: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed by Newbies) Mike Rozak
- Distributed virtual worlds (Was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle)) Mike Rozak
- Distributed virtual worlds (Was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle)) Wayne Witzke
- Distributed virtual worlds (Was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle)) Yannick Jean
- Distributed virtual worlds (Was NEWS: Why VirtualWorlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle)) Mike Rozak
- Distributed virtual worlds (Was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle)) Sean Kelly
- Distributed virtual worlds Ola Fosheim Grøstad
- UI Design in MMOs Derek Licciardi
- UI Design in MMOs Mike Rozak
- UI Design in MMOs Mike Rozak
- UI Design in MMOs Sean Howard
- UI Design in MMOs Tom "cro" Gordon
- UI Design in MMOs David Kennerly
- UI Design in MMOs Nathan Rogers
- UI Design in MMOs Jason Murdick
- UI Design in MMOs Amanda Walker
- UI Design in MMOs rjw
- UI Design in MMOs Johan A
- UI Design in MMOs Derek Licciardi
- UI Design in MMOs rjw
- UI Design in MMOs Damion Schubert
- UI Design in MMOs Mike Rozak
- UI Design in MMOs Paolo Piselli
- UI Design in MMOs Mike Rozak
- UI Design in MMOs Ghilardi Filippo
- UI Design in MMOs Derek Licciardi
- UI Design in MMOs Mike Rozak
- UI Design in MMOs Corey Cauble
- Making the Customer Pay for Patch Bandwidth Michael Hartman
- Making the Customer Pay for Patch Bandwidth Robert "kebernet" Cooper
- Making the Customer Pay for Patch Bandwidth Michael Hartman
- Making the Customer Pay for Patch Bandwidth Byron Ellacott
- Making the Customer Pay for Patch Bandwidth Balthazaar
- Distributed virtual worlds (Was NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle)) Mike Rozak
- Time limited worlds (was: Why Virtual Worlds areDesigned by Newbies) Mike Rozak