Want GreaterMUD to be Open Source?

[Vitoc]

Ever since I started inviting people to telnet in to check out this engine, I've heard "You should open source it."? Every time I've heard that suggestion I've countered with "It won't be open source.? That's non-negotiable."? There are a countless reasons why Open Source would be bad for this engine and I've posted a lot of these reasons numerous times in these and other forums.? That being said, there is one reason, and only one reason I can think of, to Open Source the engine; to get it finished in a shorter amount of time (at great expense to the overall quality of the project but apparently that's not as important as finishing the project to most people.)? So I started thinking about what it would take to get me to open source my stake in it (meaning the engine and all associated code only, the content is DeathCow's)

Although I haven't been counting, if I had to make a conservative guess, I'd say on the Telnet Game Server and GreaterMUD module I've spent over 160 hours of my personal time.? At the risk of sounding arrogant, these aren't low quality hours where I've been piddling around trying to learn the language either.? I'm a professional programmer, it's my passion, it's what I do day in and day out at work, and I get paid fairly well for it.? If someone were to ask you to work for 4 or 5 weeks full time at your job doing what you do at work right now but to give away all that time for free, what would you say?? I'm thinking it would probably be something along the lines of "Go to Hell", "Bite me", or my personal favorite "Go fuck yourself."? Giving away all that time I spent coding for free would not be fair to me, and I wouldn't ask anyone else to devote so many hours without providing some sort of compensation to them (btw, Soul, you would get a small cut for your recent contribution to the engine).

So here's my offer to those who suggest GreaterMUD should be open source.? If collectively the community donates $5000 I will put the code on SourceForge for all to see.? Alternatively, if someone or a group of people wants to purchase the rights to the engine and source on their own for the same amount (or the highest bidder in the event of multiple interested parties), they can do whatever they wish with it.? If they don't want it on SourceForge that is their decision to make, but then they can deal with all the requests to make it open source.

"OMG $5000!?!? You're crazy!!!"

Well, yes, I am crazy for spending all those hours on a text-based telnet RPG game, but I'm not crazy for asking this amount for everything I've invested into this.? Realize that I'd also be giving up any chance I had of selling copies of the engine or charging on a pay-to-play basis since if it were to go open source everyone and their mother will be able to run their own realms with their own flavors of the engine and content completely for free.? Furthermore, I'm offering my continued support of the game through the open source project.? I'll continue to contribute code, I'll continue to offer my advice, and I'll explain the code I have written to any new developers with questions.?

$5000... Metro charges what, $1000+ to purchase a single compiled copy of Major MUD and all modules?? That doesn't include the cost of WG, the content is not easily editable, you're limited to x # of users, and it definitely doesn't include the source.? If 100 people were to donate $50 on average, GreaterMUD would be open source.

"I'm not going to spend $50 just so GreaterMUD can be open sourced!!!"

Oh?? Then why should I give up all those hours I spent coding and debugging, the hardware I've devoted and managed, my broadband connection including static IP and bandwidth, etc.

This is my offer to the community, particularly the people requesting it be open sourced.? Take it or leave it.? If nothing comes of this, worst case scenario, work on the engine continues at the current pace, no biggie.? However, anyone who suggests GreaterMUD should be open sourced in the future will be referred to this thread by me from now on.

[ZLemur]

Don't do it!

We can wait   The only reason the community has been so happy about this is because of the promised quality. I'm sure you'll get some quality work out of it being open source, but at the same time, it'd be nice to have something that's only in one place. Makes the prospects of encouraging cross-realm competition and discussion. If everyones got something a little different with random tweaks etc. that, for me, would kill the experience of playing a vast multi player game. And it is vast. More players at a time than any modern multiplayer game can come up with (and do effectively).

So yeah. In short: Quality is worth the wait.

<3 Vitoc.

[Colt]

"OMG $5000!?!? You're crazy!!!"

Well, yes, I am crazy for spending all those hours on a text-based telnet RPG game, but I'm not crazy for asking this amount for everything I've invested into this.? Realize that I'd also be giving up any chance I had of selling copies of the engine or charging on a pay-to-play basis since if it were to go open source everyone and their mother will be able to run their own realms with their own flavors of the engine and content completely for free.? Furthermore, I'm offering my continued support of the game through the open source project.? I'll continue to contribute code, I'll continue to offer my advice, and I'll explain the code I have written to any new developers with questions.?

$5000... Metro charges what, $1000+ to purchase a single compiled copy of Major MUD and all modules?? That doesn't include the cost of WG, the content is not easily editable, you're limited to x # of users, and it definitely doesn't include the source.? If 100 people were to donate $50 on average, GreaterMUD would be open source.

"I'm not going to spend $50 just so GreaterMUD can be open sourced!!!"

Oh?? Then why should I give up all those hours I spent coding and debugging, the hardware I've devoted and managed, my broadband connection including static IP and bandwidth, etc.

This is my offer to the community, particularly the people requesting it be open sourced.? Take it or leave it.? If nothing comes of this, worst case scenario, work on the engine continues at the current pace, no biggie.? However, anyone who suggests GreaterMUD should be open sourced in the future will be referred to this thread by me from now on.

I vote you and Death Cow continue with what you are doing. I have said from the first that it should not be open sourced. Quality is what the users want. Now you want to talk what it will cost to buy a copy of this ahead of official release (reserve a copy), give me a Email at Colt@galaxybbs.net

[The Crazy Animal]

Don't open source it development needs to be centralized right now. Open sourcing it later well that's another issue but I think there are more licencing options to consider first.

[ghaleon]

If someone were to ask you to work for 4 or 5 weeks full time at your job doing what you do at work right now but to give away all that time for free, what would you say? Giving away all that time I spent coding for free would not be fair to me, and I wouldn't ask anyone else to devote so many hours without providing some sort of compensation to them (btw, Soul, you would get a small cut for your recent contribution to the engine).

So if you DIDNT put it as open source, how would you gain your 'compensation'? Do you plan on charging people monthly to play or something?

[Vitoc]

So if you DIDNT put it as open source, how would you gain your 'compensation'? Do you plan on charging people monthly to play or something?

Several boards running Major MUD still charge per month ($3-5), and all they're providing is a cookie cutter realm like every other realm.? We'd be running realms with unique content and well thought-out setups that have been tested.? The other model would be selling copies of the game so others could run their own realm with their own settings.

Obviously I'm not planning on getting rich off of this, but any compensation is better than none.? Running and maintaining a server isn't free, and I'll be less hesitant to spend any hours on GreaterMUD when I could be working on something I might actually receive compensation for.

Btw, you never answered... Would you work fulltime 4-5 weeks at your current job for free so the "community" could benefit from it?

[ghaleon]

My full time job isnt coding a mud so I cant answer that accurately. But if you count all the other work I have done with online games, then Yes I would. I've done a lot of work and spend a lot of time working on mud edits, forums, bbs settings/issues. I've helped Invisi get his ragnarok server going, I've set up modules for all kinds of games over the years, etc. But I don't see it as a job, more as a hobby, as well as most of the people that create new muds out there (mudconnector.com). That is why most of the mud bases you see (diku, aber, tiny, lpc, etc) are all open source.

I'm not trying to put you or your work down here in anyway, but if you see this whole 'creating a game that was popular in the 90's' as a job thing, its time to find yourself some newer work. We all put hours into this game, be it testing, adding content, or coding; except not all of us are looking for a paycheck at the end of the week.

[The Crazy Animal]

Almost all of those big open source muds were not open source when they started. Most of them were coded by students and or professors at universities and left running via the universities infostructure during the early days of the internet. Secondly most of them were past from programmer to programmer with in the schools for years until they were finally open sourced and released to the general public. Third if I remember correctly all of the open source muds were infact complete and working prior to being open sourced.

[Vitoc]

My full time job isnt coding a mud so I cant answer that accurately. But if you count all the other work I have done with online games, then Yes I would. I've done a lot of work and spend a lot of time working on mud edits, forums, bbs settings/issues. I've helped Invisi get his ragnarok server going, I've set up modules for all kinds of games over the years, etc. But I don't see it as a job, more as a hobby, as well as most of the people that create new muds out there (mudconnector.com). That is why most of the mud bases you see (diku, aber, tiny, lpc, etc) are all open source.

I'm not trying to put you or your work down here in anyway, but if you see this whole 'creating a game that was popular in the 90's' as a job thing, its time to find yourself some newer work. We all put hours into this game, be it testing, adding content, or coding; except not all of us are looking for a paycheck at the end of the week.

My full time job isn't coding a mud either my friend.?

Is Ragnarok free?? Why not?

There's a difference between trying to make money off of something (Ragnarok) and trying to recover some of your losses (GreaterMUD).? I tried the donation thing and I've gotten a single used IDE hard drive so far.? Furthermore, it seems like you think there's an entire legion of skilled C# programmers out there waiting in the wings who are willing to spend countless hours working on a Major MUD clone.? If this were true, there would have been an open source clone years ago.?

Since you aren't a C# programmer but you are so generous with your time and you really want GreaterMUD to be open source, why not work for the next few weeks at work and just buy GreaterMUD with the money you make there and open source it yourself?? It's the same thing as if you were a C# programmer and you were willing to invest that time programming.? I'm willing to bet after you dropped $5k worth of your time into this project you'd be a little less eager to share the source with everyone.? If not, then I challenge you to put your money where your mouth is.

I don't think you'll ever understand why I feel the way I do about open source, but statements like yours remind me why I feel the way I do.? Anyway, It's time for me to get ready to go to work at IGN now, where they understand that programming is a real job requiring skill and experience.?

[ghaleon]

No one is saying programming isnt work
No one is saying programming isnt a real job
No one is saying you have no skill
No one is saying you have no experience

Don't act like I'm coming down on your Vitoc, because I'm not. All I'm doing is discussing the ideas of making GreaterMUD open source. That is all.

[kalus]

If your writing GMUD to make money then your doing it for the wrong reasons.  Wanting $5k to make the GMUD code open source is about the most ridiculious thing i've ever heard.

[DeathCow]

About as ridiculious has handing your hobby over to someone else to work on.

[ZLemur]

Wanting $5k to make the GMUD code open source is about the most ridiculious thing i've ever heard.

I suspect that's the point. I think deep down inside he doesn't want to go open source, but because people keep asking him about it, he's throwing a bone. Could be wrong, but that's my guess.

[Cornellian]

I think the fundamental idea here is the following, and I will use finance as an analogy:

Vitoc does not want Greatermud to open sourced. Others do want Greatermud to be open sourced. Vitoc has compromised by offering a FREE option to the "open source advocates" to buy the source code for $5,000. It seems as though people are angered because they were given the option to do something rather than not having the option at all..and that is ridiculous.

In finance (my area of expertise) if I were to give you a free option to do something (i.e. the ability but not the obligation to buy a stock for a given price at a later date) it would be called arbitrage (options ALWAYS have a premium attached). Here, Vitoc has given an option to the mud community for free and many of you are complaining about the price...well here is the beauty of the option, you don't have to excercise it..if $5,000 is too steep for you don't buy it and accept the status-quo. Vitoc owes us NOTHING, this project is HIS hobby and many of you ingrates are bitching because he won't share it with you. Majormud is by and large an obviate game that many of us still play, Vitoc stands to make next to nothing for his efforts (or at the very much less than if he committed his time elsewhere) and yet people here want MORE ....$5,000 is not ridiculous, demanding something for nothing (Greatermud) getting it and then demanding more for nothing (Greatermud to become open sourced) THAT is ridiculous.

[ghaleon]

It seems as though people are angered because they were given the option to do something rather than not having the option at all..and that is ridiculous.

Damn people.. Whos angry?? I'm just discussing the option of turning this into an open source project.

Here, Vitoc has given an option to the mud community for free and many of you are complaining about the price...well here is the beauty of the option, you don't have to excercise it..if $5,000 is too steep for you don't buy it and accept the status-quo.

There is no 'set' price yet.. so how are people complaining?

Vitoc owes us NOTHING, this project is HIS hobby

We already covered this. It is not his hobby it is his job.

and many of you ingrates are bitching because he won't share it with you.

Maybe you dont know the difference between bitching and discussing. Post a quote that you thought someone was 'bitching'.

$5,000 is not ridiculous

Great! Then when can we expect YOUR check to arrive?