Member Discussions

Seems to me that all of these 'Ethics' questions when they aren't dealing with the Ethics of Pay per Play, or License Breakers are usually of one mold.

So and so got pissed at so and so, for some reason that's too much to go into on these boards, so I left and started up a mud much like the first one. Now So and so, is harassing me, or is saying the my players are harassing him.

Now I understand the fondness that we all remember from our first mud (in my case the first 15 or so! I liked to play different themes and different types) but honestly. Is it that hard to a) find another game to play, and take some of your friends with you? or b) Start a mud that is different to a distinguishable degree from mud a?

Where's the Ethics part come into it? Well, I tend to work with companies that have non-competition clauses in the contracts. If I were to leave work and go to work at some place nearly Identical, and my previous employer found out? Wow. Sucks to be me. So I'd go to work with a company that is similiar but is not directly competing.

The analogy is close enough for comparison.

(Comment added by Ashon on Thu May 26 18:46:39 2005)

ACK, I almost forgot, I do however enjoy the endless problems, faked logs, and animosity between people who do this. It keeps me smiling.

No, it's the ultimate response to "I'd like to see you do better." You have a problem with the way the implementer runs things, the best form of humiliation is to beat him at his own game.

And it doesn't always have to go sour, you know. I started a MUD much like the one I left. Far as I can tell there is absolutely no animosity between us and them. *shrug*

But, isn't unethical to base it on the same concept? I'd like to see you do better, is a broad demand. And do you have to take parts of their player base? Is that Ethical?

You have the right to build whatever kind of mud you like, in good conscience, as long as you do not steal or otherwise use without permission the content of the other mud. That's just the way it is. Competition is what has made the world what it is today. If part of their playerbase comes to you, then they should have done a better job holding on to them. That's how I see it.

The problem I could see would be if you logged on and copied room descriptions. Other then that, using ideas is what a MUD is about. There's nothing unethical about reading a book and using their ideas, so why would there be something wrong with playing a MUD and using their ideas. You are doing all the work yourself. As time went on, the two MUDs would diverge apart as you starting putting more and more unique stuff in to fit what you think is best.

(Comment added by Marquoz on Fri May 27 13:09:34 2005)

Thinking about it, bad example on the book, if you plan to base the entire MUD on a book, get permission first.

I didn't ask if it was your right. I asked if it is Ethical?

From Dictionary.com:

eth*i*cal:
Being in accordance with the accepted principles of right and wrong that govern the conduct of a profession.


Sure you can make any mud that you want, sure you can even break licenses. The question posed, is why is it considered Ethical to do such?

Thinking about it, bad example on the book, if you plan to base the entire MUD on a book, get permission first.

Wouldn't that apply to the mud as well? Sure it's not published, and no one is making money off of it. But you should have permission.

"I didn't ask if it was your right. I asked if it is Ethical?"

I said "in good conscience", implying that I thought it was ethical.

I said "in good conscience", implying that I thought it was ethical.

But doesn't basing your concept on someone elses tread on IP Violations? It may not be registered IP, but it's on the same levels.

I would say that every work we do, is based on something we have seen, heard or felt from somewhere else.

(Comment added by glimblade on Fri May 27 20:57:56 2005)

At least to some degree.

But doesn't basing your concept on someone elses tread on IP Violations? It may not be registered IP, but it's on the same levels.

Infringement in a legal sense is a balance between the rights of the author and the public. What is law is very close in spirit to the consensus on ethics. When you are talking about putting up a mud based on someone else's mud there are three things to consider...

1) code - Are you writing your own implementation or copying another's implementation. Concepts, systems, ideas are not protected under copyright. However implementation is. Translation into another language is infringement. There are some structural protections.

2) creative works - Stories and characters enjoy greater copyright protection than code. Works of literature are protected beyond literal copying as author's settings and characters are also protected.

3) data - Works of reference or databases do not enjoy copyright protection. A database of phone numbers, a table of armor classes, a hit table, table of elements, statistics, etc. However don't mistake works of literature that happen to be stored in a database as not protected. Areas/Zones are not works of reference regardless of the storage format. The effects of a spell are not copyrightable, while the creative text or help or description of a spell are.

Anyway that's part of the law and coincides with the majority ethical view in most western countries. One can quibble about software patents, trademarks, length of copyright, etc... But as far as muds are concerned we're most always talking about copyright infringement.

One thing that is not part of the law, at least in the US is plagiarism. Plagiarism can be blatant infringement and it can be fair use under the law. That is it's quite legal to use unattributed quoting and borrowing that would be considered a fair use defense under the law, but unethical in academic and scientific circles. You can get booted out of university and sanctioned for misattribution even if using works in the public domain. That's just one case where ethics is not ensconced into law.

In academia it's often considered unethical for claiming origination of ideas, and considered ethical to give credit where credit is due. For instance if I claimed I thought of and invented the Metzner shell sort algorithm that would be considered unethical. Again there's no legal protection. Anyway some of these credit issues rear up in mud arguments. Of course my position is if I know where I got the idea I'll credit it. If I don't remember I guess I can't, which is ethical, as opposed to claiming the idea for my own which is not. I'm not talking about explicit license requirements for attribution or credit above. That's infringement.

My answer is no it's not unethical in a general sense per your question with all of the above as caveats.

:-)

I agree with you sincerely, beat em at their own game... describes my MUD situation soooo perfectly :P