[MUD-Dev] MMORPGs & MUDs

[J C Lawrence]

On Sun, 13 Jan 2002 10:34:11 -0500 
Michael Tresca <talien at toast.net> wrote:
> Dave Rickey posted on Saturday, January 12, 2002 1:30 PM

> So really, if it's all about credit cards, and that's the only
> physical filter that matters, then there you have it.

There's a basic dichotomy on this list there, between the hobbyist
and professional sides.  Its the same old argument that surrounded
the vaunted British Amateur.  Its also the same divide that splits
much of broadcast media (especially in regard to the BBC in the UK
and public television in the US).

  Does popularity make Right (with a capital 'R')?

Few of us, if offered a button which would, with a single push,
create a massive population affecting MUD, wouldn't push it.
Communicating effectively and crating emotional effects on large
numbers of people is seductive in its own right.  However, extremes
in either direction, rarely work.

Large scale explorative/original development has to be funded,
somehow.  New high ROI products and services require new and
original development for differentiation and in order to create and
establish/define new markets.  The funders are of course risk averse
and much prefer the safety of the "sure thing", even if they don't
like the mediocre returns of such also-rans.

So, we try and lunge out for the biggest most interesting unknown we
can find, but not too far that our funders/employers/etc balk and
pull back.  We need them, and they need us, and neither is entirely
happy with the arrangement.

Or at least that's the charitable view, and is of course just as
wrong as the other extreme(s).

> Here's the question: with a larger budget, would it still be
> valuable to devote staff to cultivating the community?

> After a certain point, I imagine it's too late.  The community you
> have is what you've got, unless you're willing to start canceling
> accounts and knocking players off, which is a bad business
> decision all around.

There's also the question of inherited community:

  Clan FOO from game BAR moves en masse onto your service with the
  prior social and cultural constructs, _AND_ reward mechanisms they
  built in BAR plastered onto your service whether or not they even
  remotely apply.

--
J C Lawrence                
---------(*)                Satan, oscillate my metallic sonatas. 
claw at kanga.nu               He lived as a devil, eh?		  
http://www.kanga.nu/~claw/  Evil is a name of a foeman, as I live.
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