01 May, 2011, Idealiad wrote in the 21st comment:
Votes: 0
I definitely agree with Tracker, money saved is money earned, and there are plenty of other factors you can look at to ascertain the longevity of a game other than how much someone pays for their hosting.
01 May, 2011, Runter wrote in the 22nd comment:
Votes: 0
Tracker said:
Runter said:
I'm not sure I'd have faith as a player in a game where the admins couldn't fit in 5 dollars a month to their budget for the sake of a game they supposedly put a lot of time and effort into.


There are many people in the younger generation coming up that enjoy programming and would like to get into it. Some of them actually have some great ideas and make some awesome games. Aside from that type of person, just because someone can't afford the $5 shell doesn't mean that they can't make a quality mud or should be thought of differently. It's hard economic times and some people need to save money. This is one way of doing it with the various free mud hosts out there.


I think if they can't afford 5 dollars a month they probably don't need to be running a public game without a big disclaimer that they're unreliable. I mean seriously, if you're relying on the kindness of strangers to host your product do you really have any stability? Fly by night operations for some reason in the mudding community are a dime a dozen. Maybe these free hosts help add to that problem.

Oh, and there's a big difference between "I don't want to spend unnecessary money." and "I can't afford to spend a dime."
02 May, 2011, Twisol wrote in the 23rd comment:
Votes: 0
It's actually not very hard to run a server on your personal computer, anyways. The only real hitch is port forwarding, which isn't even hard to do, it's just not obvious.
02 May, 2011, Cratylus wrote in the 24th comment:
Votes: 0
This may sound a bit curmudgeonly but…

I don't think there's really much need for free mud hosts, and in fact, I think what they're
*most* likely to foster efficiently are security hazards.

A contributing member of the mud community will find some way to satisfy her curiosity and
creativity that doesn't rely on the kindness of a complete stranger. A free mud host was a
meaningful thing in 1995, when the world wasn't stuffed to the gills with cable modems,
DSL, FIOS, etc. Now it has the distinct feel of being offered a *whole bunk* in a camper
up on blocks in someone's front yard, next to the dog pen and above the septic.

I'm not entirely unsympathetic to the poor. There was this one guy I knew who was running
a mud while literally, no fooling homeless, performing his admin tasks on the mud running on
borrowed space only when the public library was open. Special cases like that, I will accept
cannot reliably afford $5/mo.

Everyone else. Please.

-Crat
http://replay.web.archive.org/2009043014...
02 May, 2011, Runter wrote in the 25th comment:
Votes: 0
02 May, 2011, kiasyn wrote in the 26th comment:
Votes: 0
best. website. ever.

I will sneak your chances in the mud banner ads up for $5
not really
02 May, 2011, Rarva.Riendf wrote in the 27th comment:
Votes: 0
Quote
Oh, and there's a big difference between "I don't want to spend unnecessary money." and "I can't afford to spend a dime."

Most players could not be bothered to spend a quarter either…so what exactly is the problem when it is free for players as well ?
02 May, 2011, Runter wrote in the 28th comment:
Votes: 0
Rarva.Riendf said:
Quote
Oh, and there's a big difference between "I don't want to spend unnecessary money." and "I can't afford to spend a dime."

Most players could not be bothered to spend a quarter either…so what exactly is the problem when it is free for players as well ?


As already said multiple times, stability. Here today, gone tomorrow problems. I think free hosts are more fit for pre-production. It's a farcry from comparing joe-shmo free mud host to an established host that has some level of accountability. Money isn't really the issue here. The issue is that free hosts aren't like having a gmail account for your emails. They're more like hosting your emails on some anonymous guys box in his basement. With only his word he won't do anything nefarious.
02 May, 2011, Rarva.Riendf wrote in the 29th comment:
Votes: 0
Quote
The issue is that free hosts aren't like having a gmail account for your emails. They're more like hosting your emails on some anonymous guys box in his basement. With only his word he won't do anything nefarious.

I would like to know how nefarious could be a mud admin against you, since the only thing he basicallt have access to is the last ip you connected from.
Remember:a free game is not a service you 'rely' upon. Hell it is not like any big compagny ever canceled a paying for game either..
Free has nothing to do with unreliable. It only hae to do with:why paying when you can have it for free with absolutely no difference.
My mud needs basically 35mg of ram (typical ROM) and at most a fraction of a percent of current cpu power and a computer that is on 24h/24. A lot of machine have those to spare, and provide it for free. Why exactly would it be 'more reliable' by paying for it ? And why a 'free' player should be concerned anyway ?
02 May, 2011, Runter wrote in the 30th comment:
Votes: 0
Rarva.Riendf said:
Quote
The issue is that free hosts aren't like having a gmail account for your emails. They're more like hosting your emails on some anonymous guys box in his basement. With only his word he won't do anything nefarious.

I would like to know how nefarious could be a mud admin against you, since the only thing he basicallt have access to is the last ip you connected from.
Remember:a free game is not a service you 'rely' upon. Hell it is not like any big compagny ever canceled a paying for game either..
Free has nothing to do with unreliable. It only hae to do with:why paying when you can have it for free with absolutely no difference.
My mud needs basically 35mg of ram (typical RM) at most a fraction of a percent of current cpu power and a computer that is on 24h/24. A lot of machine have those to spare, and provide it for free. Why exactly would it be 'more reliable' by paying for it ? And why a 'free' player should be concerned anyway ?


Nonsense. He has access to any data you're collecting from your users. Do you have a big disclaimer on your mud "don't use a password you don't want me peeking at?" If that data is encrypted (and most muds dont/do a poor job) it's still crackable. It's a shame you don't seem to value even the privacy rights of your players. Considering you have no way of confirming if your data has even been breached in the first place. But why would you care, right?
02 May, 2011, Tracker wrote in the 31st comment:
Votes: 0
Runter said:
Rarva.Riendf said:
Quote
Oh, and there's a big difference between "I don't want to spend unnecessary money." and "I can't afford to spend a dime."

Most players could not be bothered to spend a quarter either…so what exactly is the problem when it is free for players as well ?


As already said multiple times, stability. Here today, gone tomorrow problems. I think free hosts are more fit for pre-production. It's a farcry from comparing joe-shmo free mud host to an established host that has some level of accountability. Money isn't really the issue here. The issue is that free hosts aren't like having a gmail account for your emails. They're more like hosting your emails on some anonymous guys box in his basement. With only his word he won't do anything nefarious.


This is a very valid point, and I completely agree that most free mud hosts are for pre-production. However, you can't really stereotype all of the free mud hosts out there, but I can see how some of them (that are currently running) have ruined it for the rest of us. Some of us do actually have a VPS that has a great amount of allocations and are hosted in an actual data center, not some kid's basement. Just because it's a free mud host doesn't mean it's not stable, either. You're probably thinking that because the people who usually run the free mud hosts don't really care if the server is up or down, or if data is lost or not. I'm a bit different when it comes to these type of things, mostly because of the monitoring I've set up and it bugs me when I keep getting emails about services being down (only really has been apache, but still).

In the end, my services may not be for everyone but there are those out there that are in need and when those people come about, I am here to offer them the service. Why am I offering this? To learn, improve my knowledge and help the communities. Don't want it? Think it's irrelevant? Don't get it and move on. Just my perspective anyway.
02 May, 2011, Rarva.Riendf wrote in the 32nd comment:
Votes: 0
Quote
Nonsense. He has access to any data you're collecting from your users.

Practically that means a username, a pword, and an ip. I have never been asked for more, and I would not give more to a mud either. AndI do not ask for more as well.
But you are right, having a paying for server/provider provides so much more security…(facebook..huhu)
02 May, 2011, Runter wrote in the 33rd comment:
Votes: 0
Rarva.Riendf said:
Quote
Nonsense. He has access to any data you're collecting from your users.

Practically that means a username, a pword, and an ip. I have never been asked for more, and I would not give more to a mud either. AndI do not ask for more as well.
But you are right, having a paying for server/provider provides so much more security…(facebook..huhu)


Yeah, and I'd hate to get evil corporations involved in your security when some anonymous internet personality could do it for you.
02 May, 2011, Kline wrote in the 34th comment:
Votes: 0
Runter said:
They're more like hosting your emails on some anonymous guys box in his basement. With only his word he won't do anything nefarious.

We don't all provide services from our basements :) While I do have a multitude of basement dwelling Linux servers in my home, all my "free hosting" services are provided on a VPS in a real datacenter simply due to the fact I don't want other people "that close" to my personal data I keep on my basement boxes. Point well taken, though :P
02 May, 2011, Runter wrote in the 35th comment:
Votes: 0
Kline said:
Runter said:
They're more like hosting your emails on some anonymous guys box in his basement. With only his word he won't do anything nefarious.

We don't all provide services from our basements :) While I do have a multitude of basement dwelling Linux servers in my home, all my "free hosting" services are provided on a VPS in a real datacenter simply due to the fact I don't want other people "that close" to my personal data I keep on my basement boxes. Point well taken, though :P


Well, in your case Kline, I'd probably trust you… But there have been some free mud hosts in the past that looked shady at best. And when you're using last generation hosting (Which most free hosts are going to do) you're talking about sharing boxes on the same filesystem. Permissions, bugs, and all sorts of problems can be made by mistake that could compromise your users information. I just don't like it.
02 May, 2011, David Haley wrote in the 36th comment:
Votes: 0
Rarva.Riendf said:
Quote
Nonsense. He has access to any data you're collecting from your users.

Practically that means a username, a pword, and an ip. I have never been asked for more, and I would not give more to a mud either. AndI do not ask for more as well.
But you are right, having a paying for server/provider provides so much more security…(facebook..huhu)

Rarva, you missed that Runter was talking about the host admin, not the MUD game admin.

So for instance, there is full access to your source code, your data (not that I think mining MUD data would be particularly valuable, but hey), anything your players say, and so on and so forth.

And many people do use the same passwords everywhere, so that information is actually worth a lot to people with bad intent.
03 May, 2011, Rarva.Riendf wrote in the 37th comment:
Votes: 0
Quote
admin, not the MUD game admin.

Actually I did not missed it at all. There are so many disgruntled worker everywhere that the problem is probably worse than a scripkiddy that would not have the actual skill to exploit his power over the data.
You all perfectly know that most of the data breachs are from insiders/stupid people anyway. But we are still talking about mud hosting, so basically nothing that should have any usable info in the first place. (free hosting for free games….duh)

Quote
And many people do use the same passwords everywhere, so that information is actually worth a lot to people with bad intent.

Yep. I have this problem for my own passwords..but after a while, I ended up just using different one for everything related to money, and the same for everything else (that I backup anyway).

Any of you trusting Sony more than a free hosting btw ?…..huhu
03 May, 2011, melopene wrote in the 38th comment:
Votes: 0
David Haley said:
I wonder how much money these students spend on beer… :wink:
Honestly I think there's a psychological impact of paying… people see "$60 a year" and think it's a lot of money, whereas these same people might also cheerfully buy a latte a day at Starbucks for $4 or whatever. It's a fairly well-known effect: many small numbers are less scary than a single bigger number, even if the totals are similar.


Sure, beer and smokes go into my budget, as does everything else. Oddly enough, I was able to afford hosting as an undergrad, but PhD life is hell, and living expenses are at least 4x greater than as undergrads. Spend two months waiting to hear back on whether your dissertation proposal is complete crap or actually worth researching, Then spend another month waiting to get a phone appointment to hear whether your 6 hours worth of revisions were up to snuff. Then tell me that a case of american pisswater doesnt' belong on the grocery list. :D

In fact, this month I had a nice $75 donation ready to send to my host - however, after the storms hit, every penny of that went to tornado relief. I will have my summer funds within 3-4 weeks (and dear dog, I hate to imagine how bad my repayment will be after a decade of student borrowing), and will spend my 'extra' expenses on sending money to my host for his gratitude and rewarding builders. Ironically, my friend with the ISP did set up a linux box a week or so after I established myself with said host, and would be willing to give me space, for free, permanently - but after his ISP got whacked by the tornadoes, I think I'm staying put.
03 May, 2011, Runter wrote in the 39th comment:
Votes: 0
Quote
Any of you trusting Sony more than a free hosting btw ?…..huhu


Yes.

Also, you just admitted that you think the free host admin is a "scriptkiddy" who can't exploit your data. Not that you even trust him, just that you think he's too incompetent to actually follow through. If that's true, that probably means he's incompetent in other areas. Like setting permissions on his shared box. Or any number of things that can compromise security. You've a already said you think the privacy of your users isn't important. (Just their passwords, email address, ips, whatever, right?) Actually, your entire last post was pretty contradictory to your entire position.
03 May, 2011, David Haley wrote in the 40th comment:
Votes: 0
Rarva said:
But we are still talking about mud hosting, so basically nothing that should have any usable info in the first place.

+
Rarva said:
Yep. I have this problem for my own passwords

Quod erat demonstrandum.

Rarva said:
Any of you trusting Sony more than a free hosting btw ?

Yes, I have more confidence that Sony, or any other major company, will make appropriate efforts to safeguard data. Will they sometimes screw up? Well, yes, of course. It's just that the data you put on such services is more valuable.

A more appropriate question here would be comparing apples to apples. Would I rather trust Sony or a free host with credit card information? (let's say I was hosting a for-pay game on a free host, collecting user CC information)

melopene said:
Then tell me that a case of american pisswater doesnt' belong on the grocery list. :D

Well, sure. I get that, I really do… I'm definitely not one to never go out and buy a beer or two or three. Ultimately, it's a question of priorities. I'm just saying that $5/month really isn't that much, considering how much many people spend on stuff they don't really need. If somebody is dedicated, or wants to appear dedicated to their hobby, it just seems that $5/month isn't that much to ask. Of course there are always exceptions to this, but even most kids on allowances should be able to swing this.

melopene said:
Ironically, my friend with the ISP did set up a linux box a week or so after I established myself with said host, and would be willing to give me space, for free, permanently - but after his ISP got whacked by the tornadoes, I think I'm staying put.

Well, tornadoes aside, it seems dangerous to me to rely on somebody giving what seems to be an under-the-table service at the ISP.
20.0/65