Adventurer Groups [was Affecting the World]

[coder at ibm.net]

On 01/12/97 at 10:40 PM, s001gmu at nova.wright.edu said:

>First off, what's with all the repeats of the original of this message?
>List admin?

Writing as list owner:

  Yup, I'm still alive.  Barely.

  If you're looking for an official ruling, you're not going to get one. 
Sorry!

  Not to blow you off, some background:

    Generally the quoting level used on this list seems just about right
if not slightly on the too little side.  As such, there are always going
to be pertubations to the mean: one post quotes too much, the next too
little, and so on.  I'm not going to get involved or worried until it
becomes a pattern, or until it starts materially impacting the function or
purpose of the list.  One posting could very easily be a slip of the
fingers or an oversight.  I'm not going to get worried.  Please don't get
worried for me.  Its not worth it.

Not writing as list owner:

  Please note Greg, I'm not picking on you here, your post just sparked a
couple thoguhts, that especially in light of a few of the current threads,
might be profitably entertained.

  Greg's comment above, "First off, what's with all the repeats of the
original of this message?" is absolutely fasinating if looked at from a
viewpoint of being an example of a member of a micro-society attemping to
police its own micro-society.

  If you look at it, the membership of this list in many ways functions
similarly to the membership of a MUD, and as such, has similarly evolved
various social structures and forms in line with and supporting that. 
Some of them of course have been drummed in or imported from outside, such
as my requirement for attributions, or this example of quoting.  A few are
homegrown, such as the somewhat overly genteel civility used in debate on
the list (not that I'm knocking it, I think its quite wonderful and
something to be actively encouraged).  

  FWLIW Jon Lambert noticed this parallel in jest many months back (bet
he's forgotten).

  In this light, Greg's comment really becomes a piece of public rebuke,
of public censure, much are a pedestrian might rebuke another who justled
them while walking down the street: "Hey bozo!  Watch where ya goin, ya
dickhead!"  Tho done with better grammar.

  Where the true fascination of this enters in in how this society formed,
and what were the formative items were in that formation.  What function
did I play for instance as list owner, and how did my activities as a
member (given that you all knew I was also list owner) affect that?  What
were the real social repurcussions of the various events that have occured
on list (Jeff K's type rate, the rape thread, the commercial posturing
dictum, my heavy encouragement of scenario based discussion, Nathan's ever
subtle sotto voice comments, Jon's ever present satire, etc).  

  We have a micro-cosm, an artificial one admittedly, of a MUD society
here.  Worth study.

--
J C Lawrence                               Internet: claw at null.net
----------(*)                              Internet: coder at ibm.net
...Honourary Member of Clan McFud -- Teamer's Avenging Monolith...