From my hands

[Whilyam]

Given that Cyan started, created and built an amazing legacy with all the Myst games and MOUL, I am going to have to side with them and I will tell you why. If I and my brother created what they did, I wouldn't be in such a hurry to give it away. And if I was going to give it into open source, I would take all the time it takes to make sure it didn't get carried off by others. Carried off by others my best guess would be those hacking, setting up their own servers and wanting to take it unto themselves as they see fit. It is clear enough that there is much more to MOUL, again open sourcing at some point than most of us can really know. I only know that most things in my life that I take on to set my mind to doing never go as planned. I always have to be ready to compromise and rethink matters many times over to get it done. Sometimes the adversities make it better than I had planned and hoped for. Other times I am disappointed in how it comes out. My dad always told me “soon enough, if right”. The only thing hurrying ever did for me on a project was put it further behind and cost more, than if I had just taken the time. I learned over the years that those who want you to hurry up, are the ones who usually have the least to lose if it goes wrong. CYAN may never get circumstances to line up well enough to get open source MOUL going. I only know that if it were me, I wouldn't give out anything until I knew I could keep it from being . . .

I'm reminded of two quotes from The Heavy
"Waaa.. waaa... Cry some more!"
"You are so small! Ees funny to me!"

Seriously, though: You have no business telling the guilds (this or others) how they should run themselves. Especially considering you were the one who made the fake Guild hoods without the permission of those Guilds.

You criticize others when they get frustrated in the bureaucracy of Uru, when they have spent years and years donating time and money hoping for progress, when now progress is within sight but Cyan yet again wastes time and caters towards the pant-wetters. You use their frustration to try and convince others to celebrate delays. You criticize others who have years of knowledge (and as near to expertise as you can get) with Uru's inner workings, the very people we need, and drive them from Uru. All the while you seem to be a complete idiot on the subject yourself. You don't even know the common courtesy of asking for permission before setting up fake neighborhoods!

Now you come here spewing garbage and goading others. I think your a worthless troll who has no interest in growing Uru.

[N. Sigismund]

Pot, kettle...

Eh, whatever. There's a lot of resentment in this entire community, it's not especially helpful and Cyan's silence on the OS front (they're happier to talk about the iPhone than MOULa, which makes sense as it's a main project of theirs) allows this resentment to sit in a stagnating pool. Of course, I'm as guilty as anyone of pointless internet arguing recently...

I think the URU moddding community as a whole needs to be more open. Less of this DRC-like slowness and more production threads. There's no point at the moment hiding what you're doing for maximum impact when you release - so little is released that anything to look at and talk about would be refreshing... :\

[ddb174]

Let's talk about Huinexus :D

But to be fair, Jahmen creating the hoods in Moulagain isn't a big deal. Besides, in some sense, guildofmessengers.com, guildofwriters.com, guildofmaintainers.org, etc are the ones pretending/faking to be the real guilds. (This isn't a flame against these organizations, I'm just pointing out that they don't really have a greater claim to anything.)

[Chacal]

Whilyam, I read Jahmen's post a few times and I don't see anything in it that justifies your answer.
I remember his past mistake (a minor one in my opinion) but it can hardly be considered pertinent for this discussion.
Actually, I find his theory about how Cyan feels about Uru is as plausible as any other.

Also it seems to me that most people here forget a simple fact: Cyan is no longer that big, mysterious, faceless corporate entity we loved to hate. Cyan is nearly gone. It is 2 guys with a small team of programmers doing small projects like iPhone games and MQ Online. The little they have done until now for open-sourcing MOUL already taxed their resources.

Don't worry, I have not turned into a Cyan-worshipping zombie. You know I have never cared too much about Cyan's opinion about what we do. I don't care about FCALs, RAWA's canon or Cyan's IP rights. I'm grateful for what Cyan did, but now they have become irrelevant. I wish they would just release what they have and forget about Uru.

I'm reminded of two quotes from The Heavy
"Waaa.. waaa... Cry some more!"
"You are so small! Ees funny to me!"

Seriously, though: You have no business telling the guilds (this or others) how they should run themselves. Especially considering you were the one who made the fake Guild hoods without the permission of those Guilds.

You criticize others when they get frustrated in the bureaucracy of Uru, when they have spent years and years donating time and money hoping for progress, when now progress is within sight but Cyan yet again wastes time and caters towards the pant-wetters. You use their frustration to try and convince others to celebrate delays. You criticize others who have years of knowledge (and as near to expertise as you can get) with Uru's inner workings, the very people we need, and drive them from Uru. All the while you seem to be a complete idiot on the subject yourself. You don't even know the common courtesy of asking for permission before setting up fake neighborhoods!

Now you come here spewing garbage and goading others. I think your a worthless troll who has no interest in growing Uru.

[Tweek]

Given that Cyan started, created and built an amazing legacy with all the Myst games and MOUL, I am going to have to side with them and I will tell you why.

Yes they did, but that legacy has died, it died when prologue closed in my opnion. I have sided with Cyan since I first started floating around the community in 98, but no longer.

If I and my brother created what they did, I wouldn't be in such a hurry to give it away. And if I was going to give it into open source, I would take all the time it takes to make sure it didn't get carried off by others.

Erm, kinda defeats the point of open source if you don't want it off running on it's own legs.

Carried off by others my best guess would be those hacking, setting up their own servers and wanting to take it unto themselves as they see fit.

Well given that it's the hackers that have the knowledge to set up the servers, not surprising there. And yes if it was open source that means people would take aspects of it in what-ever direction they choose, again that is kind of the point of open source.

It is clear enough that there is much more to MOUL, again open sourcing at some point than most of us can really know. I only know that most things in my life that I take on to set my mind to doing never go as planned. I always have to be ready to compromise and rethink matters many times over to get it done. Sometimes the adversities make it better than I had planned and hoped for. Other times I am disappointed in how it comes out. My dad always told me “soon enough, if right”.

There was, upon a time much more to MOUL, there isn't anymore. We have fan created Ages, that majority of the community shun because it goes against the Blue Lords of Cyan. We have fan created Ages, that Cyan themselves continue to ignore. We have story for MOUL that broke canon and rules set in place by Cyan over the years, a story that is now difficult to follow without contradictions arising.
We have a community, hostile and zealous of anything that doesn't conform to Cyan's will, who guard the shattered ruins of a game and look at it, still seeing a grand city, of utopia where everything was light and nothing was dark. We have a community where the people who truly care about the storyline and canon can be counted on one hand, a community who has a ridiculous sense of self entitlement, of being spoon fed everything little thing.

Yeah sometimes life doesn't go as expected, sometimes what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger, but in the case of Uru, it didn't happen.

The only thing hurrying ever did for me on a project was put it further behind and cost more, than if I had just taken the time. I learned over the years that those who want you to hurry up, are the ones who usually have the least to lose if it goes wrong. CYAN may never get circumstances to line up well enough to get open source MOUL going. I only know that if it were me, I wouldn't give out anything until I knew I could keep it from being . . .

There is not hurrying, and there is being scared to make a move, and I have long felt Cyan doesn't have the rocky mountain oysters to do what is needed (further illustrated by the veralun incident).
I have been patient. I've followed Uru since the first images of the Tree and Shaft were released. I spent 8 years waiting for a game that never happened. You'll forgive me for not wanting to wait any longer.

I think the URU moddding community as a whole needs to be more open. Less of this DRC-like slowness and more production threads. There's no point at the moment hiding what you're doing for maximum impact when you release - so little is released that anything to look at and talk about would be refreshing... :\

You want the modding community to be open? Sure ok, tell you what, I'll go post on the MOUL forums about what I'm building... Oh wait, I can't my posts will be removed, of course the question raises whether the post will be removed before or after the Believers of Blue cast out another witchhunt.

Do you not perhaps think, that the slow DRC style may be because a lot goes into Age building? I build all my stuff by myself, in my spare time, which is split between RL issues, dealing with my kids and other fun and games. So me managing to build an Age in 6 months is rather impressive in my opinion.

Also, it isn't always about maximum impact. Do I go ahead release information about what I'm doing? Ruin the storylines I want people to discover? Ruin the parts of information I want people to piece together themselves? I'll go with a no on that one.

We hide what we hide, because we have to, be it from protecting our projects, or from getting away from the Believers of Blue.

Personally, I still say to hell with it all, to hell with the Believers of Blue. GoW should go ahead and set up their own shard, put fan Ages up on it and go and forge ahead by themselves.

[D'nial]

It is true that Cyan doesn't have to cater to us if they don't want to, because they are free. However, it is also true that we, the customers, don't have to support a game that gives us nothing in return because we are free, with the added bonus that we are not trying to maintain a company. Cyan has given every indication that they actually WANT to make Uru accessible to its fans. Those of us who move for change within Cyan do so because we think that both the fans and Cyan would be happier if the effort to open-source Uru were a success. The sense of self-entitlement that some members perceive other members to have is not a valid accusation.

[BAD]

I just wanted to point out that this guild at isn't pretending or faking being the Guild of Writers. Sure it isn't THE D'ni or Cyan World's Guild of Writers, but it is what it is. Dustin, I understand you didn't mean to flame this group or others, but you could have easily used less offending words. I am not telling you you are wrong or bad for what you wrote, merely that I felt a bit like you have this chip on your shoulder in terms of the groups that popped up due to Cyan's attempts to create exterior game play around Uru.

Remember that Cyan themselves asked that these groups be formed, not the other way around. Remember that without the people here, much of the designing process of age creation would not be as refined as it is. It is arguable that these people would have done what they did without the group, but lets not dwell on the past.

The only thing I request is that you give the people here respect for what they do. They may not have any greater claim to open source Uru or anything else for that matter, but they do deserve some respect. This isn't just a message to Dustin... This message is for everyone. We all could use a little respect around here in terms of how we feel. I don't think anyone is wrong or right in their opinions or feelings in this situation. Justifications on both sides merely is distracting from the real problems.

Perhaps we could turn this conversation into one about finding solutions to the growing apathy. One idea I liked was setting up a MOULa test server without worring about Cyan.

But to be fair, Jahmen creating the hoods in Moulagain isn't a big deal. Besides, in some sense, guildofmessengers.com, guildofwriters.com, guildofmaintainers.org, etc are the ones pretending/faking to be the real guilds. (This isn't a flame against these organizations, I'm just pointing out that they don't really have a greater claim to anything.)

[diafero]

Just a side-note: Quoting completely out of context is very unfair, Jahmen. You can make anybody say anything that way.

It is true that Cyan doesn't have to cater to us if they don't want to, because they are free. However, it is also true that we, the customers, don't have to support a game that gives us nothing in return because we are free, with the added bonus that we are not trying to maintain a company. Cyan has given every indication that they actually WANT to make Uru accessible to its fans. Those of us who move for change within Cyan do so because we think that both the fans and Cyan would be happier if the effort to open-source Uru were a success. The sense of self-entitlement that some members perceive other members to have is not a valid accusation.

Over the last years, Cyan has done a lot that indicates that they want to continue to run Uru, true. But they haven't done that much to indicate that they want a fan-driven Uru (they said a lot, but in the end, only actions speak). Okay, we got the 3ds Max plugin, which is awesome, albeit useless for those many that can't get it from a friend or so and don't want to pirate it. But still, a good sign. At the same time, we have bad signs like the often discussed MOUL forum rules. So far, they released *nothing* getting us towards open-source. Am I the only one thinking that if nothing moved within a year or two, the bets are quite low?
Cyan is aware that the online-playing part of the community is split in those that visit MOUL, and a lot of separated groups running their hidden Shards to also play fan-ages online (and escape the loads of bugs found in MOULa). Yet they don't seem to have any interest in fixing that situation.

[N. Sigismund]

Let's try and cut down on the anti-Cyan rhetoric. If many are desperate to be rid of them then I would advise them to be so, and stop caring about what people say on an internet forum or the actions of a tiny game developer. However, I will comment on one thing -

We hide what we hide, because we have to, be it from protecting our projects, or from getting away from the Believers of Blue.

This is a counter productive view. If all modding communities were as paranoid about project-protection and the opinions of irrelevent voices on the internet as this, we would never see amazing modding projects come to fruition. You need community cohesion, and refusal to even consider being more open in development is not going to help towards that cause whatsoever.

The fact is, as it stands this level of spittle in the community is as helpful to the ultimate goal - a viable open source version of Uru - as snowshoes are to crossing the Sahara. There seems to be little point in this entire operation if outspoken members of the community remains selfish, full of resent, paranoid and arrogant. These are strong words, but they in my opinion aptly describe the greatest problem - that people are giving up and leaving not because of stagnation or Cyan's actions, but because they're sick to the back teeth of the endless resentment that hallmarks this community. What's the point contributing when everybody is out for a fight? Does this community merely exist as a platform for flame wars?

[ddb174]

Having an open-source client and other tools would indeed be nice, but it's not the ultimate goal. A much, much bigger goal is to be able to produce Ages, for use either offline or online. And that has been entirely successful.

As for the fights, I like to say: Flamewars are Uru's only repeatable gameplay^^