[DGD] just out of curiosity

[Ragnar Lonn]

On 09/10/2012 05:51 PM, Schmidt, Stephen wrote:
> Dworkin wrote:
>> The second change is that muds are much further along the road to 
>> extinction.
> It strikes me that what's along the road to extinction is not MUDs, 
> but text-based
> connections. To whatever extent something like World of Warcraft 
> counts as a
> MUD (I think it meets at least some of the broader definitions of what 
> a MUD is)
> MUDs are doing fine. Or, perhaps, what is along the road to extinction 
> is free
> software run by hobbyists, displaced by commercial products like WoW, 
> though
> I think one can make a stronger case that freeware supported by 
> hobbyists has
> a future ahead of it.

WoW is to text-based MUDs what the world wide web was to Gopher. The 
same thing, but a richer experience (though in some aspects, a poorer one).

But WoW doesn't allow for community-based creation, like most MUDs. 
That's what's missing. Noone has created a good MMOG where users create 
the content. Second life is the closest example I can think of, and they 
screwed up by not looking at how text-based MUDs have evolved into 
places where content creation is strictly governed, rather than a 
free-for-all. Maybe it didn't fit their business model, so they 
sacrificed a huge opportunity for a smaller one, in my opinion (then 
again, their platform might not be ready for real success - when I 
looked at it, it didn't seem ideal for large-scale worlds).

No, there is still work left to do here. Too bad Felix has given up on 
games. I haven't though

   /Ragnar