TMI-2 (tmi.iastate.edu 5555) announces A Conference on MU* Ethics to be held at TMI-2 on Wednesday, February 17th, at 5:00 pm Pacific Standard Time. All members of the MU* community are invited to attend and share their opinions on the topic of standards for user behavior. With regret, due to the fact that TMI can only handle a finite number of connections, priority may have to be given to users with a special interest in the subject, such as users with the authority to represent the players or the administration of their mud on this issue. The purpose of the conference as a whole is to increase understanding between admins and players about what standards of behaviour each expect and are prepared to give, and to exchange information about the desirability of various possible MU* behaviour policies, their legal implications, and how well they actually work in practice. The conference will focus on the following three topics: 1. Rights, Privileges, and Obligations Do players possess any rights at all, and if so what are they? Do administrators incur any obligations by opening a MU*, either under law or ethically, and if so what are they? Does a player implicitly agree to any rights/obligations by remaining logged onto a MU*? What restrictions are places on MU*s by Usenet or by law? We intend this part of the conference to help clarify people's ideas about what they may expect to exist at all MU*s and when a MU* player or admin has violated the law or another user's rights. 2. Privacy and Harrassment What privileges are commonly granted to users by MU* admins, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of doing so? Is a MU* required to guarantee the privacy of users? If not, is a MU* that does not guarantee privacy required to state that fact explicitly? Is a MU* administrator required to enforce some code of acceptable behavior between players on the MU*? If a MU* does not enforce acceptable behavior, must the MU* explicitly state the fact that it does not? If it does, must it make the standards of acceptable behavior on the MU* know to its users? Under what conditions may a MU* admin make a user's private behavior known to other users, or to the community as a whole? We intend this part of the conference to help guide new MU* admins in choosing wise policies to enforce on their MU*s. 3. Code Ownership Who controls the code that makes up the MU*? Who has the right to change it, add to it, or delete it? Are existing MU*s in compliance with existing intellectual property law? How much imitation of another wizard's work is acceptable? When does imitation become piracy? When does a wizard give up control of his code to the MU* administrator? We intend this part of the conference to clarify people's expectations of code ownership, and help reduce the incidence of MU*s being destroyed by arguments over code control. Pre-Conference Submissions and Post-Conference Records At the Singlenesia ethics conference, many participants felt that too much time was spent stating positions and not enough time was spent discussing them. To avoid this problem, TMI-2 is receiving pre-conference submissions which will be made available to the public. Such submissions may come in two forms; position statements or proposals for the approval of the conference. Anyone is welcome to make submissions. Position statements should clearly address one of the above topics, and should not be longer than 5000 characters. The best position statements will be selected for presentation at the conference. Preference will be given to statements which discuss one issue in detail rather than those which discuss many issues in little depth. The authors of selected statments will be given time to present their statements and compare them to others on the same topic, with general discussion following the presentations. Proposals for the approval of the conference will be voted on at the end of the conference. Any registered attendee will be permitted to vote. At the end of the conference, a list of all submitted proposals and the results of the votes on them will be made public. Proposals should not be longer than 100 words and are subject to the approval of the conveners. Proposals which are very similar may be combined into a single proposal with joint authorship, if all authors approve. In addition to the proposals, logs of the conference will be available to the public at TMI-2. Both statements and proposals should be mailed to beeman@cats.ucsc.edu, and should be clearly labeled in the subject header as either statements or proposals for the ethics conference. Schedule of Events: February 12th: Last day to submit statements and proposals. February 14th: Accepted statements and proposals made public. February 17th: (all times Pacific Standard) 4:30 pm. Pre-conference get together. The basic features of LP MUDs will be discussed for non-LP attendees. 4:45 pm. Registration. 5 pm: Opening statement by conference conveners. 5:10 pm: Conference moves into meeting rooms, one per topic. Presentations of position statements. 5:30 pm: General discussion of topics. Amendments to proposals may be made. 7:00 pm: Voting on amendments. Final proposals taken to voting room. 7:15-7:45 pm: Informal discussion of proposals, and voting. 7:45 pm: Votes tabulated and results announced. Plans made for next conference, if attendees desire another round. 8 pm: Conference adjourns. Facilities The conference will take place in the TMI-2 conference center. This facility features four meeting rooms in which discussion will be held. These rooms have a number of features designed to enhance discussion such as permitting a single attendee to speak uninterrupted, silencing or ejecting unruly participants, a built-in clock to time speakers and votes, logging of meeting proceedings, and echoing to an observation room. The conference center also features a voting room where users may vote on the proposals before the conference, a registration room, and a wet bar and discussion area where people may withdraw for public or private informal chats about the issues. Discussion in each meeting room is controlled by a moderator. Individuals wishing to serve as moderators are encouraged to volunteer: to do so, send mail to beeman@cats.ucsc.edu. Anyone wishing to inspect the conference center before the meeting and learn how it works in more detail is invited to do so. Log into TMI at any time and type "conf" in the start room. You will find yourself in the entrance to the conference center. Please feel free to re-post this notice anywhere that non-usenet reading users from your mud might have access to it. Conference Conveners: Douglas Reay ( Pallando@TMI-2) Adam Beeman ( Buddha@TMI-2) Steve Schmidt ( Mobydick@TMI-2)
