[MUD-Dev] Genuinely brief intro

[Jeff Kesselman]

At 06:50 PM 6/10/97 PST8PDT, you wrote:
>Just don't hang back too far! I would imagine most ongoing commercial
>projects have strong enough designs (in terms of how far along the design
>is, and how unlikely central things are to change at this point), that a
>bit of discussion won't change core issues. 
...
>There is also the other side of the coin to consider. If you learn
>something from this list (or from a newsgroup, for that matter), whether
>it is a technique or just the glimmer of an idea, it would be proper to
>not use it in your commercial products without the permission of the
>originator of the idea. 

Well... I'm not 100% sure of that.  Ideas aren't copyrightable, only
implementations., for good reason-- an amorphous idea generally only
becomes really tangible and useful when its actually implemented.

For the good Doctor and i however there are 2 issues here...

First, there is a long standing and strong rivalry between our two
employers for reasons I don't think it's a good idea to discuss publicly.
Suffice it to say there has been some genuine animosity BMW Path and TEN
since the inception of Mpath having to do with how both companies got started.

Given that, its not appropriate for he or I to be gaining insight into the
others' strategies in what at least e consider a major segment of our
markets through discussion here.

We can still talk about general principles, I'm just going to be a bit more
circumspect then i have been in discussing the specific weaknesses we have
found in some of our current products and what we plan to do about them.

I expect he will be similarly circumspect about his project.

This is just watching the fiduciary responsibilities we both have to our
employers, nothing more.

Oh., but BTW i AM happy to credit this list in general when i get to
credits as an excellent source for helping me refine my thoughts and coming
u up with new challenges to existing thought patterns.  If, when my next
project comes out, anyone sees anything in it that really reminds them of a
particular post, let me know and Ill be sure to give appropriate specific
credits in the docs.

JK