[MUD-Dev] Administrative Responsibilities

[Mike Sellers]

Catching up...

At 02:54 PM 1/31/98 PST8PDT, Greg Munt wrote:
> [...all-too common tale of harassment woe snipped...]
>
>I was told that my attitudes were not shared. That users must deal with 
>things, or leave. I was also told that there was something wrong with me, 
>if the activities of certain other players caused me distress/trauma in 
>real life. So, I left.
>
>My question: should mud administrators neccessarily feel any 
>responsibilities, in the manner of which I have described above? Are they 
>simply maintainers of the server and its database, or does their position 
>*demand* that they take an interest in social issues too? 

Admins will do, of course, what they want to do.  You can't force them to
do anything.  In the past, MUDs have primarily been the province of, well,
geeks.  The "like it or lump it -- I'm busy with the code" attitude tends
to work only with technologically and net-savvy people who are often longer
on technical skills than social skills anyway (a sweeping generalization? I
guess... but I think it fits).  

However: as more MUDs of higher, even commercial quality emerge, I suspect
that admins with such attitudes will find themselves weeded out of a hobby,
or at least relegated to a small corner of the hobby/industry.  If there
are ten high quality, friendly, responsive muds you can go to rather than
stay and be abused in mine, why would you stay?  In other words, you can
and should vote with your feet, and not worry about those you've left
behind.  

>Should players 
>expect protection from social problems - such as harassment and 
>victimisation - from administrators? If protection is not offered, are 
>players reasonably entitled to deem the administrators unworthy? 

Unworthy?  Who owns the hardware and the software?  Is the admin your
employee?  While I think admins *do* have a responsibility to discourage
harassment and other social ills both in their designs and their actions, I
don't think we need to get into the worth of various muds or admins.  Like
I said above, if you don't like it, go find another mud you *do* like, and
leave these guys to whatever game it is that they're playing.  


--

Mike Sellers   Chief Alchemist -- Online Alchemy   mike at online-alchemy.com

"One of the most difficult tasks men can perform, however much others 
may despise it, is the invention of good games.  And it cannot be done 
by men out of touch with their instinctive values."  - Carl Jung