A serious proposal to Cyan. Can WE get MORE up and running?

[Jamey]

Hey everyone.

I've been thinking about how MORE has not been going anywhere for a while, and looking over a post I made on the MOUL forums here and I got an idea. (I may quote a bit from this topic, but it's a different idea than what I posted on the MOUL forums)

I'm really feeling like I want to help Cyan in any way I can to get MORE up and running and to get money to them as soon as possible. I feel that Cyan needs MORE now more than ever, because if they do get MORE up and running right now, and get people paying those 6-month fees, they may be able to get financially back on track.

But right now, Cyan does not have the time or money to work on MORE at the moment, and there is currently nothing we have been able to do about it, which sucks. This got me thinking about our community. We indeed have a very powerful dedicated community that has accomplished so much. I know that we, at the Guild of Writers (and at the other guilds) have many unique different talents here and I was thinking we could use them to our advantage now.

So, what if (Approved by Cyan) we were able to assist Cyan with getting MORE up and running in terms of getting everything set up such as the client system, etc? Basically all the stuff Cyan cannot do at the moment, we can do, while being instructed by Cyan about what we need to do. The GoW has accomplished so many things, as well as all the other guilds. And I think if we were instructed by Cyan what we needed to do, it could really work!

I'm really taking this topic very seriously and in preparation for sending a proposal to Cyan covering all the aspects of what we are going to do, and how we are going to pull it off. I really think if all of us put our talents together, we could really have a shot at making MORE a reality.

So, who's in? Who can provide what talents to make this thing happen?

[BAD]

Moved to off-topic.

[Grogyan]

You can definitely try, same we as we tried to get a hold of Cyans' Max plugin, i'm not optimisic.

[J'Kla]

I am beginning to feel Cyan want us to pack up and go away. They want to move on to other things but they want to keep The Myst franchise and Uru in all it's incarnations in a small box somewhere a reminder that they once did some good stuff.

I once asked about licensing the engine for another project and was told no they wanted to keep it for their own projects.

A great deal of what has been done in the past with Uru is generic they have specifically vetoed reverse engineering of the "Plasma Engine" and it's authentication engine. However it is known that there have been illegal underground shards.

Surely it is not beyond the realm to take the I/O knowledge to construct a black box clean room version of UU/MOUL/MORE?

Is it morally correct for Cyan to say to their fan community "We can't work on this because the industry won't fund us". While also saying "We won't take your money and you can't do your own thing with this either".

If Cyan don't have the money to pursue MORE do they have the moral high ground to stop the community in it's "pursuit of happiness" (I believe I am right in believing this is enshrined in the American psyche). Would they have the money and/or will to pursue a legal challenge of an attempt to produce a clean room code version of the "Plasma Engine" produced outside of the USA?

There are going to be people who don't like this discussion. I don't believe I am the only person to feel that I have been used more than once. I am deeply unhappy that Cyan are cavalier with the feelings of the community willing to have us bark like a "good dog" to get Game Tap to dig in their pockets for a project. Willing to use our voices to get back control of their possessions only to throw us a morsel that allows us to play in the back yard with Blender and CC.

Hey I like playing with the toys in the back yard but I want us to stretch ourselves to play in the park with our friends. It's becoming clear that Cyan just does not believe we can be "good dogs" allowed to play in the park. They only want us on the leash to show the industry they have performing players that they can show off if they need us.

[Rabbit]

I am beginning to feel Cyan want us to pack up and go away. They want to move on to other things but they want to keep The Myst franchise and Uru in all it's incarnations in a small box somewhere a reminder that they once did some good stuff.

I will say that if that were the case, Cyan - on MOUL's demise - would have simply not bothered with Uru MORE and just leave it dead and buried. But fan pressure persuaded them that there is a demand for Uru and thier actions started the ball rolling to bring back MORE.

They didn't have to do anything, but they did and that must count for something.

But now, times have changed and maybe attitudes in Cyan have as well and perhaps MORE may be more trouble than its worth. Personally, Uru could potentially be profitable to Cyan and I would rather pay a little extra in subs to ensure MORE's longevity.

However, for now, we can only wait. But people will not wait forever. The ball is in Cyan's court. Do they run with it or bat it back to the fans and them run with it? Or do they throw it away so nobody can play with it?

[J'Kla]

I will say that if that were the case, Cyan - on MOUL's demise - would have simply not bothered with Uru MORE and just leave it dead and buried. But fan pressure persuaded them that there is a demand for Uru and thier actions started the ball rolling to bring back MORE.

Cyan wanted the rights to MOUL back from Game Tap so the vocalised support of the community was in their interest. Also if in the future they want to roll out the community to support another bid on the computer industry if they have MOUL in the back pocket and the community on a lead (I believe I already said that) to bark pleasingly.

[GregW11]

I think they will, since that post (hard to believe it was only a couple of months ago) stated that they are "only working on fully funded projects."

While I don't think that MORE will become a fully funded project right away, if enough fans show support and show that they really want this, eventually we could persuade Cyan to bring it back.

All that's left to do is wait...

[Nalates]

J'Kla, that sounds too cynical for me to buy into. I don’t have any evidence to disprove it. But I do think Cyan’s actions and behavior support Rabbit’s less cynical view.

The essence of what is American ideas of freedom and ingrained traits of pursuing happiness do not include walking over or taking some else’s rights.

So while one could go overseas and drive up the cost of litigation, doing so is not the moral high ground. Choosing to develop overseas to avoid litigation would seem to indicate foreknowledge of the intended actions as less than a moral or ethical choice.

With Cyan reacquiring all the rights to Uru from GT they did not take on any obligation or debit to the fans. It is their IP to do with as they choose, promote it or bury it. To say Cyan wanted the right to Uru back seems obvious. But what evidence do you have as to the reason Cyan wanted those rights? To accuse of negative motivation without evidence is liable and certainly not on moral ground.

I’ve never felt the victim to any of Cyan or GT’s marketing. When I renewed with GT in late 2007 I was feeling the familiar twinges of the first LIVE shut down. I made my decision and renewed anyway. That was no one’s choice but mine.

My postings and hopes for Cyan’s acquiring rights to Uru were not induced by Cyan. Those were from my desires and hopes. Nor do I see Cyan as devious enough to be manipulating the fans as you suggest.

I agree time is running out. Something needs to happen. I suspect Cyan has an idea in mind that they have yet to decide is unworkable. Until they change their mind, our legal, moral, and ethical choices are limited. Our community is already splitting between other games. An illegal shard ignoring Cyan’s rights would be of questionable ethical nature and would certainly split the community farther.


And GregW11’s point I have yet to understand. “[…]if enough fans show support and show that they really want this, eventually we could persuade Cyan to bring it back. All that's left to do is wait...” Huh? Waiting convinces how?

I think I understand J'Kla’s desire to put push Cyan and make something happen. It’s waiting I don’t understand.

[Grogyan]

Someone still needs to foot the bill for the maintenance of the server, and provide support if it breaks down, this alone is why cyan want people to donate US$10 per year or 6 months.

So for the possibility of say 10,000 of subscribers (which is optimistic), that could in theory pay for someone knowledgeable in the server code.

I still want to make marker games and share them offline and compatible with CC, this alone seems to be a bug bear

[J'Kla]

Yes I am Cynical yes with a capital C.

As for developing in another country as a ploy to avoid prosecution. I live in another country.

As for server costs UU ran on no income and OK it was not as big as D'Mala or MOUL but for both development work and small scale enjoyment it was more than adequate.

I would like nothing better than Cyan to come out of the woodwork and join in this debate. As it is I reserve the right to believe that while Rand may believe in fan support in the best interests of the fans. The Cyan the corporate line has all the appearances of profit driven pretectionism.

As for IP rights I have no problem with respecting those rights thats why I suggest Black Box, Clean room development of our own Shard Server. We are allready using Blender and Python both open source.

To quote John Lennon "Theres nothing you can do that can't be done" Cyan have built two versions of the server and given our source of tallent surely we should also be able to do that task.

Linus Torvalds showed us that sometimes the arogance to try produces results, Linus believed he could produce a better operating system than the big corporations and the Liux phenomenon is his baby with the "Plasma Server" Shard runs on Linux boxes shouldn't that tell us something.

Reverse engineering of the "Plasma Engine" is definately not the moral high ground. Blocking clean room development would smack of corporate protectionism. Two wrongs don't make a right. So I seek that third way. We look at the behavior of the plasma engine and mimic it with new code.

Cyan won't let us have the "Plasma Engine" to play with our only other option is to build our own.