Identifying Major Issues

[Derp]

@faraday said in Identifying Major Issues:

Look at how freely people share things related to their real identity in the most silly and trivial of ways.

Click here to login with Facebook.

[ThatGuyThere]

@surreality said in Identifying Major Issues:

My judgement call on this is to work with @newpassword, rather than an IP ban. IP bans are not as reliable in the days of VPN,

How does requiring an e-mail do anything to help with ban reliability if anything it would make them less reliable. Hell I could sign up for a game requiring an e-mail as three different people right now. Four if I ever bothered to activate the e-mail account that my isp has for me.
Granted that would be more work than I would ever bother with but no less possible. If the idea of a ban is to deal with the player not the character an e-mail really is only as trustworthy as the person who provided it.

[ThatGuyThere]

@Derp said in Identifying Major Issues:

Click here to login with Facebook.

Or as I like to it, see which of my 'friends' are stupid button.

[Thenomain]

@faraday said in Identifying Major Issues:

@Thenomain said in Identifying Major Issues:

But how many know that they know, how many would know how to set up and manage multiple accounts with their email client, or know how to find a better client that would do this? How many would give up before getting that far?

But let's back up a step. How many Millennials would even care in the first place?

Find some and ask, and a very mild shame on you for thinking this is about Millennials. This is about barrier to entry and, apparently, being a single person to answer any other person's moving the goalpost. I'm being talked down by a lot of people, but so far nobody else has attempted even a tacit nod toward information gathering. How can we identify issues without escaping--to put it crudely for effect--this echo chamber?

I am clearly not going to be considered by the vocal, but I've done enough project work, enough information gathering, to know that what's going on here is closed-system thinking. My conclusions might be wrong, but I'd rather look further afield and be wrong than say "everyone else does it, therefore it must be right".

[Derp]

@ThatGuyThere said in Identifying Major Issues:

How does requiring an e-mail do anything to help with ban reliability if anything it would make them less reliable.

Neither is wholly reliable. But at the end of the day, banning someone based off of e-mail also guarantees that spouses/roommates don't get banned as well because of one person's bad behavior, as @surreality mentioned earlier. If someone is really determined, they'll find a way, but they are a significant minority.

Or as I like to it, see which of my 'friends' are stupid button.

I mean, that's one way to look at it. Another way to look at it is I don't have to remember fifty thousand logins and passwords and crap when I can use one app to log in to all of those things. Plus, it helps me connect to stuff. I have my Spotify, MyFitnessPal, and some other stuff all connected through my Facebook. You think that's stupid, I think people who think that's stupid are overly paranoid.

I mean, really, what is the worst that can happen if someone manages to get your e-mail, or even your facebook account? We have spam filters and block buttons for a reason. If you think someone can do some major damage with an e-mail address, I would say good luck on this whole 'internet' thing.

[ThatGuyThere]

It is less paranoia and more the pointlessness of it.
I don't give people on the internet info they don't need to fulfill their function in my life,. I have a Facebook but probably put up a status update less than 5 times a year. Mainly it is there as a vestigial organ from college.
I don't think anyone can do major damage with my e-mail addy but unless giving it to them serves a purpose that benefits me why would if give them one. Yes i do on games that i want to play but that will never stop me from calling it a stupid requirement.

Edit to add: And I think I cna handle the internet thing just fan I was here before it had pictures on webpages.

[surreality]

@ThatGuyThere It's more a case of avoiding the collateral damage, as @Derp mentions.

The real 'no immediate slinkback/return under a new name and keep ranting' is that it's closed create at the login screen.

That means there's an interval of time for the person to not be present in the environment, no matter how short, and even a few minutes to reflect on something can often make a rather enormous difference in someone's behavior.

You're still going to have your share of dedicated douchebags, but it's a pretty useful deterrent for the casual angrypants douchebag.

[Paris]

@Derp I'd rather not one of my stalkers show up with a shovel at my next professional gig. Since I've had to deal with some from RL, MMOs and MU* who were very determined to get my details, I actually do take my safety seriously.

Aside from that, staff have shared emails of players with other games to get those players blacklisted.

For most folks it's no biggie, but people do get burned.

[Meg]

let me back up to say that I don't think a MU* is a business; players aren't customers. But I disagree that it's like your house. Sure, you pay for it and provide it, but it's not like you get nothing back from the players that come there. They build into it, provide play and stories and put their own time and energy into it. I feel like staff that doesn't acknowledge that when they go about how much they are providing to their players is doing themselves a disservice.

It's more like a clubhouse. Yeah, you own it, but it's wasted money and a shitty, lonely building without the members that show up and contribute.

[SparklesTheClown]

Ughhh I hate having to sound like a responsible adult, but like, I think this email argument is getting a bit circular and you guys are never going to agree (I don't care enough to include myself in the "you guys").

Also, if MUDs are included in MUs, sometimes they're a business. But that's just nitpicky on my part.

While not a problem, more of a "this would be cool", I wonder what would change about the culture if more MUs embraced IC channels (IE: channels that represent internet, radio, phone, etc). Some private, some public, representing different areas of communication. I've always enjoyed games with them. Well, some of the games I play have moved beyond simply channels and already have their own uniquely coded systems for IC communication outside of a scene itself. I find them to be very convenient and fun, when properly moderated.

I say when properly moderated for reasons that anyone who played MCM 5 years ago or M3 2 years ago should know. Everyone else should just take it as an ominous warning that you don't want unregulated public IC channels. Private ones don't need to be regulated, really.

If I recall correctly, I think Reach had a channel for IC radio shows, that was fun. But that kind of concept can be taken much further (and has been many times).

When I make my game, I think I'm gonna give scouters access to a chat system that is limited to 140 characters, because fucking hilarious.

edit:

"Omg all these dickpics!"

[surreality]

@HelloProject I think there's a 'chat' thing you can set up on wiki. It's just a generic special page and is for anyone logged in to the wiki to use, not something with a chat per-page at all, but that's one thing people could potentially use as an OOC communication thing that's officialish and would be open to everyone participating in the game to use if they wished.

I looked at it, wondering if would be a useful 'per page' sort of thing that people could use for RP on wiki directly, but it wasn't, sadly, that.

[SparklesTheClown]

@surreality I in general don't like to separate RP from the actual MU itself, which comes from an experience I had pre-MUs. I played a Zoids RP called Metal Machine Music, it was a mixture of AIM chat and forum RP. It was fun, but the separation kind of created two distinct RP cultures and was kind of a disjointed and unfocused mess.

[surreality]

@HelloProject I'm looking at a setup for mediawiki that would let people do something on wiki directly, basically adding comments directly to a log as they go.

I get what you're saying, and realistically I'm fairly sure almost nobody would ever use it, but it might be something that could be potentially useful for odd corner cases, or for folks who can for whatever reason get to a web page from work but not telnet, etc. A lot of folks do RP in gdocs and such, and it would be similar -- just, it would all be public, which is a thing people would have to keep in mind, like... I don't care if they're TSing or anything, but they would have to be aware that, hey, anybody and everybody can read that as it happens, and you may have some popcorn-munching audience members, if you care about that.

[SparklesTheClown]

@surreality I can see the merit in this. While it's not necessarily the same ends as in-MU IC channels, I could see this potentially being useful for the people who use it.

For me, the appeal of IC channels is to enhance the flavor of the world, which is why I only have them exist in an IC context. IE: I avoid general "RP channels". If people are using some sort of IC channel, then I prefer it to be in the IC context of some sort of technology that they're not in the same room.

This is by no means necessary, it's just a strong personal preference on my part. Back in the day there were general "RP channels" on DBZ MUDs (oddly they didn't think that RPing in the same room was like, a thing), and people would just start writing their elaborate muscle descriptions and how awesome they are for the whole game to see.

It was cringe all around, so this is why I'm like, IC channels should always exist in an IC context, and never, ever in a highly descriptive manner. Well, there is one exception, which are live broadcast channels. Channels that represent a televised event and broadcasts what's happening in the room (people aren't actually RPing on the channel). We have one of those on M3, it's great.

But this Mediawiki thing doesn't really need to exist in an IC context, since it's mostly just a feature to RP off-MU, so I wouldn't worry too much about that. I say go for it.

[surreality]

@HelloProject The setting I'd be tinkering with, if I un-retire enough to do more than tinker in the most generalized sense, isn't modern day, so most of the mass communications mechanisms just aren't in place. There could arguably be something, like, 'the whale song channel' or something, or 'psychic network', but that's about it.

There is a text message and phone code out there for MUX; while it wouldn't be super helpful with Evennia, it's definitely something to consider.

[faraday]

@Thenomain said in Identifying Major Issues:

Find some and ask, and a very mild shame on you for thinking this is about Millennials. This is about barrier to entry and, apparently, being a single person to answer any other person's moving the goalpost. I'm being talked down by a lot of people, but so far nobody else has attempted even a tacit nod toward information gathering. How can we identify issues without escaping--to put it crudely for effect--this echo chamber?

Uh, I didn't bring up Millennials? I was replying to your poll. I did do a lot of info gathering when building Ares about player accounts, registration, etc, which is why I told @HelloProject that the number of MU*ers hyper-concerned about privacy is not a minority at all. (You can basically see the distribution in the thread here.) But as for the internet at large? I stand by my point. But hey, I only do this stuff for a living - what do I know about login best practices?

I'm out. Y'all have fun. Feel free to start a betting pool about how long I can stay away this time.

[SparklesTheClown]

@surreality I played a MUD (I forgot which one, I played a lot of them) that had a psychic network. It was kind of hilarious because it was basically a psychic chatroom. I highly recommend doing this.

I definitely don't think that weird magical variants of IC channels are a bad idea,

[surreality]

...back to the trust gap: it's obviously there.

Email is clearly one of the factors, and there's not much consensus on how to resolve it, apparently.

'Ability to alter the grid' is another, for which there are solutions, if people want to implement them. (I'm keen on allowing the desc adjustment thing as needed on a 'default to trust first, if it's horribly abused by someone, deal with that abuser specifically' basis; YMMV.)

Alts and alt transparency is another 'there is just not going to be a broad agreement on this one' subject, so maybe let's not poke that hornet's nest just yet.

Other than these things, what other issues -- from staff side or player side -- do you feel contribute to the trust gap? Any ideas of how you would try to handle them?

[SparklesTheClown]

I often find that I trust staff less when they entirely remove themselves from being on the same level as the playerbase. It just gives you this sense that they're aloof and unavailable, and I get the sense that I just don't know the people I'm working with even on a casual level.

Altering the grid is a bit of a weird thing. I oddly think Shangrila and Penultimate do it best, despite being TS MU*s. I just like the idea of being able to put in a request for expanding the theme in some way and contributing something. I never felt it needed to be more complicated than that.

I don't personally believe that every alt needs to be public, but I do believe that all staff need to know every alt. I also think that maybe alt privacy could be a privilege that's removed for reasons like someone being on harassment probation or something.

[surreality]

@HelloProject I am stupid keen on people being able to add 'I had a neat idea!' project areas to the grid. Doesn't have to be their business or something they maintain. Just 'I had a neat idea for a business I'd like to build where my character just hangs out sometimes' or 'it would be neat if there was a secret cave in <place>!' if they want to do it.

I think it would be very cool if people did build things like the business example to list on the wiki for people to 'claim' and so on; 'keep and run it', 'donate to game-owned grid', 'make claimable' as options, essentially. Would be neat. I know I've had, and known plenty of people who have had, highly cool ideas for businesses or areas of a grid that would be unique and interesting, but they don't feel like jumping through the hoops to make a character to run it (especially if they'd just want to be a customer there, or have a place they don't own but where they hang out, etc.) or meeting whatever the IC financial standards are for the build, etc.

Temp rooms get used for this kind of thing a lot, which is handy, sure, but sometimes the locations described would be quite useful or cool, and I'd love to see as permanent additions to the grid. Provided your core of grid rooms is sane, I really see very little harm in this. I 'grew up on' sprawling, immense grids, and always found them interesting. So long as sensible navigation is possible, people adding a park or a cave or a strange hidden garden or a secluded beach or whatever is something I think should be encouraged.