[MUD-Dev] Re: Affordances and social method

[J C Lawrence]

On Wed, 29 Jul 1998 09:16:07 +1000 
Leach, Brad BA<Leach.Brad.BA at bhp.com.au> wrote:

> On Tuesday, July 14, 1998 12:21 PM J C Lawrence
> <claw at under.engr.sgi.com> wrote:

>> On Mon, 13 Jul 1998 11:50:39 -0700 (PDT) Adam
>> Wiggins<adam at angel.com> wrote:
>> 
>> > The answer is that it is invitation-only, and at its core a >
>> dictatorship.  This keeps quality up, but number of players low >
>> (have we ever had more than about 20 active posters at any given >
>> time?).  I think most here would agree with me that this is a >
>> desirable effect; you could do a mud the very same way as long as >
>> you didn't mind spending a lot of energy on it and after four years
>> > only having 20 active players. :)
>> 

> Has anyone actually tried running a mud as an invitation-only
> service?  

I've heard of a few, all heavy RP games.

> How successful has this been? 

Armageddon (?) I think was the last I heard of.  Per Usenet report
(that Oracle of absolute truth), it was doing fairly well at
maintaining its RP goals but had great trouble accumulating its player
base (suspect data as none of it was from Armageddon principles).

>> The period when the list /was/ invitation only (remember, that
>> hasn't been true for several months now) was significant however.
>> It allowed the list culture to evolve, consolidate, and to become
>> deeply accepted by the membership.  This is important to the extent
>> that it provides a commonly agreed upon and accepted premise for
>> new members conform to and join.
>> 
> Imagine the fun you would have with such a player base for a
> mud. :-) From a personal point of view, the culture of a mud is one
> of the key factors for me. I have played an old EoD based Diku mud
> for years. The code is, well, primitive (Sorry Greg :-), but it has
> such a distinguished culture (to me). I continue to go back and play
> there over and over.

The fact that MUD-Dev, due to its email nature, exists outside of
realtime has been a major factor in its success and creation.  Heck,
the message I'm replying to here is over two months old.  This sort of 
communicative persistence as well as extended context on the list has
had a very fundamental effect.  Consider what a MUD would be like if
you were able to re-visit a PK that happened two months ago join
in on the posse for the PK'er, also two months ago, etc...

Time assumes a very transparent nature on mailling lists that isn't
really possible in physically rooted media.

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