[MUD-Dev] Community Relations

[J C Lawrence]

On Tue, 18 Jan 2000 00:10:11 -0500 
Jon A Lambert <jlsysinc at ix.netcom.com> wrote:

> I understand that these are very common policies throughout the
> "mudding" universe.

> "Thy shall not insult or offend any member of the administration"
> and "Thy shall not insult or offend any player"

I would add the modifier, "popular or significant" to both.

> Note that the former is usually enforced with great enthusiasm,
> while enforcement of the latter is haphazard and oftentimes
> explicitly non-existent.

Thus the modifier.

> Any thoughts as to why this is so?

A generic confusion between the operations of justice and morality?

> Don't such obtuse policies essentially boil down to "You can be
> banned at our whim"?

I'd view them more as a form of implicit sycophancy, whether
realised or not.  More amusingly with my moderation of this list,
the same can profitably be said about this list and me, or if you
wish:  

  I'd better like you, or you'd better suck up to me if you want to
  participate in MUD-Dev.

Even better, no matter how hard I may work to avoid that
characterisation, I implicitly can't avoid it.  Quite literally
nothing happens on MUD-Dev without my explicit consetn, therefore
MUD-Dev is highly filtered and tailored expression of me.

<yeah, right>

> What is it about administration personnel that makes them so much
> more delicate and important when it comes to being insulted or
> offended?

The fact that they require some sort of assumed authority and
altitude over those they "govern".

--
J C Lawrence                                 Home: claw at kanga.nu
----------(*)                              Other: coder at kanga.nu
--=| A man is as sane as he is dangerous to his environment |=--


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