[MUD-Dev] Re: WIRED: Kilers have more fun

[J C Lawrence <claw#under,engr.sgi.com>]

On Tue, 23 Jun 1998 10:25:46 -0700 
Mike Sellers<mike#bignetwork,com> wrote:

> No you see -- that's precisely my point.  We will never have
> "perfect code" like this.  Nor will a game be enjoyable for long if
> it's up to the GMs/sysops/etc to zap people from on high.  This is
> why I called it *social* engineering.  We can't create code to make
> sure that no one annoys anyone else, but we *can* create code to
> make sure that the players can create their own social mechanisms to
> deal with such situations.  We can't provide technological or
> central-business-oriented solutions to what are inherently
> distributed social issues.

Back in the early days of this list one of my more connon chants was,
"That's a social problem, not a technical problem!"  Attempting to
aolve social problems by technical solutions is damn near a recipe for 
disaster.  Providing technical tools for solving social problems by
social means is much more promising.

Not that this adds anything new to what you said.

-- 
J C Lawrence                               Internet: claw#null,net
(Contractor)                               Internet: coder#ibm,net
---------(*)                     Internet: claw#under,engr.sgi.com
...Honourary Member of Clan McFud -- Teamer's Avenging Monolith...