Rules for Age Content

[belford]

Pryftan: "No matter what, putting Ages on Cyan's server will be an ordeal"

Or maybe it will be as easy as posting KI-mail to an imager.

But saying "Cyan's server" is a distraction from my point. I don't *care* whether it's the main server, a testing server, an offline test system, or whatever. (That was the only point of my comment about a "separate nexus or server or shard".)

There will be some means of putting Age content in front of other players. We will do that constantly throughout an Age's development cycle: first for draft feedback, then for rounds of testing, then for feedback, then for bug fixes. (And the bug fixes never end, as you know. :-)

Different players are interested in different phases, of course. We'll do everything we can to make it clear to people what's buggy, what's in a finished state, what we consider finished.

The point is: once you put an Age out there, it's in the community. And anybody who wants will come along to see it. And that's a good thing, for all the reasons I mentioned above.

The only way to *prevent* this... would be to craft GoW and GoMa membership policies to exclude most players. (Did you not think that's what you meant? But it's the only thing you could have meant. If everybody can be a part of the Writing group, then "us" includes anybody. If everybody can be part of the Maintainer group, then "the testers" includes anybody. There's no other distinction to be made -- except the distinction of who *wants* to take a look; and that's their choice, not yours.)

[Pryftan]

We're not smarter or more discerning than those "Gametap customers" you folks are going on about. And if Guild policy is to treat other players as mere consumers, then you can bet those other players will treat the Guild as a bunch of arrogant windbags who aren't worth paying attention to.

We may not be smarter or more discerning, but we're a hell of a lot different then the first-time Uru player wandering into Uru. That's what we're referring to as "Gametap customers" - people who aren't lifelong Myst fans that will never desert Uru no matter what happens. (Count how many people DIDN'T say they'd played Myst forever in the "Introduce Yourselves" thread.) And it's not US that are treating them as customers, it's Cyan, and we have to understand and work with that viewpoint.

Understand me when I say this has NOTHING to do with what we think would be great. Yeah, it'd be great to show people what we're working on. This has nothing to do with that and everything to do with Cyan's position. They simply WILL NOT allow us to have all sorts of halfway finished and bug-ridden Ages all over their servers. It makes no sense at all for them to do that. It will NOT draw more people to Uru, it will only drive away those who don't fully understand the difference between Cyan content and user-generated content. Even if it wouldn't the concern that it would will lock Cyan in place.

I've said, many times, that we should and will work out a system for hosting Ages ourselves. And there's nothing at all wrong with people who really want to check them out going through the process necessary to check them out. But there's no way Cyan can risk people who DON'T want to visit buggy Ages accidently wandering there.

[DaveRamos]

I have not looked through this entire thread, nor have I liked through the entirety of these websites. I just thought I would post it to add to the discussion..

http://www.copyright.gov/ all the facts straight from the mouth of the US Government

http://www.ipo.gov.uk/copy.htm The UK has one too.

[belford]

My position on Cyan's position is, one, I'm not counting their chickens until they crack the Egg. And, two, my posts are addressed to them as much as to us.

How this plays out will depend crucially on interface. *Will* player content be in a separate Nexus, or a separate Uru server, or what? We don't know. I think we all recognize that it'll make a huge difference in how players (both naive and not) perceive different categories of content.

If you're imagining that a Book appears in the Museum and it links you to a grey square in empty space, no. That's not what I'm talking about.

[Pryftan]

I'm imagining, just for example, an Age mostly complete, but stepping on a particular footstep region crashes your game. The screen reverts to the main Gametap client, and confused players revert to something else.

Any unfinished Age we submit has the potential for that to happen.

[Kierra]

All fan made ages must be (IMHO) *complete* and bug free to be eligible for release on Uru Live (excepting instances where storyline permits objects/items to be added or areas "opened" in later updates)-- no half finished ages.

Not only is it unsightly, but unprofessional.

Leaving your work half finished also creates the likely-hood that you may get "burnt out" on the project, as with what happens with so many fanfic writers.

I know I certainly don't want to see half finished ages on Uru Live that end up dead in the water.

~Kia

[Jennifer_P]

Having seen some fanfic sites where people are allowed to release stories in chapters, and others where they release them completely, and having been irritated and overwhelmed by the number of incompleted works in the former, I firmly support some kind of obvious division between complete and incomplete Ages. I think that completed works should be stored somewhere that lends them authority and a higher level of IC seriousness, as befits a work accepted into the Uru canon, while unfinished Ages should be stored somewhere equally accessible to all, but obviously in the "Enter at your own risk, not finished, undergoing revision, OOC, etc." category.

[BAD]

OK OK, I am not going to get involved in the arguments going on, but I do have a very important point to raise about "rules" for content.

Every rule you have there needs to fall under one rule.

Any age creator can make or use any derivative content from Uru or the story of Uru as long as they have specific written permission from Cyan's legal team.

As for the current argument, it is needless. Either move it somewhere else, or drop it please.

[Pryftan]

No, I don't agree at all BAD. If we have to go to Cyan specifically for every instance we want to even discuss an Age that has D'ni material, it'll be silly. If instead we set up a list of rules that we promise to work within and have them approved by Cyan, they'll already know we won't do anything that breaches their copyrights, plus it'll help us earn their trust. Then, when a Writer wants to work on a new idea, they don't need to have an open dialogue with a company it's nearly impossible to talk to directly in order to work on their idea. They'll have rules, supported by Cyan, to work within.

And the current argument is pretty focal in terms of how we percieve and work with Cyan.

[BAD]

We have no right as a group to force anyone to use those rules, as long as they have permission to use their story, art, or anything else they make, from Cyan. There is no reason for us to submit a set of rules to Cyan, they will most likely ignore it.

The rules are good for us to use within the guild, don't get me wrong, but Cyan is going to want to be aware of every single piece of work we do that is intended to go into anything affiliated with Uru.

We should be careful about making to many rules too. We don't want to paint ourselves into a corner and stifle people's creativity.

EDIT: The argument is pointless. There is no need to discuss something that is up to Cyan to decide. The only way it will be settled is by submitting ideas for ages to Cyan and seeing what they approve or deny. You all can argue about what you think will happen, but you won't get an answer until you test the waters.

Remember I am speaking from experience, not conjecture. That is how Cyan will deal with things. Don't believe me if you want.