Here is the post I made on the MOUL forum. It's quite a bit longer than my post here, and I'm sorry for that - If the universe played fair, I'd have had a much longer post for the GoW, since I made much more of a commitment here than I did to the general MOUL community. Unfortunately, the issues surrounding my withdrawal from general public development are simply more complex than the ones involved in my resignation as a councilor.
I've decided to stop any and all attempts at integrating my Plasma-related development work with Cyan or the general community. This has been one of the hardest decisions I've ever had to make, and I know that many of you will be disappointed by this. Hopefully this post will shed some light on what led to this decision.
I could, honestly, handle the portions of the community that dislike me and what I do. I'm happy to let them live in their bubble, and I'll live in mine. But I see the feuding that goes on here as a symptom.
Cyan has shown time and again that they are unwilling, or unable, to foster a community culture that will help open-source thrive. I believe their hands-off approach to integrating the pre-existing developer groups with the rest of the community has greatly contributed to the current situation on these forums. Their secrecy in the overall plans for open-source has allowed paranoia to flourish, and put people who should be allies on the defensive against each other.
Cyan has also shown a lack of initiative in dealing with issues as they are brought forward. For the past 5 months the company has given no guidance and addressed none of the licensing and contribution concerns that have been raised. It is my opinion that if Cyan had been more communicative about their intentions earlier, many of this problems could have been solved before they became problems.
To cite a specific recent issue: Chogon recently brought up something that I had thought was in the past, or at least being worked past. To find out it was still a major sticking point 6 months later, in a public forum post, is absolutely unacceptable. It shows not just a lack of respect for Adam and myself, but also a willingness to create a situation that would lead to even more infighting in the community.
In the same post, Chogon stated that the official plan for getting open-source contributions to Cyan is through OpenURU, a group with no regular CWE developers. I can only envision two possible outcomes from this. The first is that code never gets reviewed and pushed to Cyan. The second is that the code is pushed without being fully reviewed by people who know the codebase. Neither situation is ideal, and I think it shows a lack of foresight on Cyan's part that this is the path they chose.
I know that my team and I have more than proven our technical ability. What we haven't proven is a willingness to sit down, shut up, and let Cyan do things their way. And if that's what's needed to be able to work with Cyan, I don't see the point of open-source. Uru needs new ideas, new visions, and new minds. The hostility that Cyan and their community show towards those new minds is going to be its downfall.
I'm not killing Uru, neither is Adam or Kaelis. Nalates and Crisger are innocent, too. Cyan is killing Uru, through poor community management and policies that reward doing things their way over fresh ideas, knowledge, and skill.
If the open-source Uru landscape changes, or if I have an opportunity to work with Cyan in a way that gives more freedom to speak my mind and bring my ideas to the table, I will jump at the chance. But I've invested too much emotional energy into the current Uru, with nothing coming back. I just can't give any more. It is time for this journey to come to an end.
I will watch this thread, and do my best to respond to issues as people raise them, but don't expect more than a post or two on any given subject - I don't want this thread to become about one issue when it's supposed to be about many. I will also continue to work on Plasma-related things for my own enjoyment. The engine is still quite an interesting toy, and it has lots of unexplored potential. Whether that work will ever make it in to anything Myst-related is still up in the air. I might even show up in the Fun House now and then - I could never leave Uru completely. My heart will always long for D'ni.
I would ask that anyone who has any commentary on this please post it on the MOUL forum, as I'd like to see my parting words foster some sort of discussion over there. The thread is
here. It's here mostly for the sake of those of you who don't frequent that forum.
Miss ya.
I still believe they'll be swayed when they realize how much is going on out there "behind the scenes." Either way, thank you for being our spokesperson. 
