12 Aug, 2013, donky wrote in the 1st comment:
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Whatever happened with this? Nobody had the time and energy to invest despite volunteering?
12 Aug, 2013, Idealiad wrote in the 2nd comment:
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Nothing happened. There was a bunch of discussion on the forum and wiki. I think both are down currently.

I'm annoyed that the wiki is down, since I summarized a lot of the discussion there, which would have been useful for reference if anyone took another go at it. I should have backed that up myself. I asked Drakkos about it in an email on 9/24/2012, and again on 10/26/2012, but he's replied to neither. I sent those to the same email address he used for all the other IR communication.

So, since he didn't reply, my take on it was that Drakkos got bored of the project and he just dropped it. No big deal, I've certainly drifted away from building projects in the past without much communication, though I would hope I'm better about that now. Anyway, given all that I was surprised to read this on his blog the other day:

Quote
A while ago, in a burst of uncharacteristic hopefulness, I tried to initiate a community project to resurrect the Imaginary Realities mud e-zine [11]. The first thing that happened was certain individuals with no stake in its success decided that they didnt much like the way I had gone about it. Thats fine, Im a big boy and used to how these kind of things go. What I rapidly realised though was that while there were a large number of people who would like to see an Imaginary Realities return, and a large number of people who were happy to dictate from a distance how it should look, there was a very small proportion who were willing to actually contribute anything other than criticism. I floated it as a test balloon, clear from the start that I could do it alone but I wouldnt. What became very obvious before long though is that I almost certainly would be doing it alone beyond the first or perhaps second issue, and all Id get for my trouble would be aggravation. The MUD community is very much why we cant have nice things.


I guess I'm one of the lot who took his nice things away? Who knows.

edit: wow, I'm really bitter about this! thanks donky for giving me the opportunity to vent :sad:
12 Aug, 2013, KaVir wrote in the 3rd comment:
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I offered to contribute, I also created a mockup PDF as a proposal for how it might be presented, and I strongly recommended that we should focus on just producing something to get the ball rolling before people started losing interest (the format and style could always be changed later, the important thing was creating the articles). Sadly my suggestions were ignored in favour of further discussion, which slowly ground to a halt as people lost interest.

Perhaps we could add an articles section to MudBytes? TMS has one, and while it's dead now it had some nice contributions back in the day. Even if we just collected a few articles, it might bring MudBytes more hits - but if it takes off, the articles could be formatted into a PDF e-zine.
12 Aug, 2013, Orrin wrote in the 4th comment:
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Idealiad said:
I guess I'm one of the lot who took his nice things away? Who knows.

edit: wow, I'm really bitter about this! thanks donky for giving me the opportunity to vent :sad:

From what I remember you were very positive about it and added a good deal to the wiki. I don't blame you for being bitter. I was quite excited by the idea initially, but I think I was envisaging something quite different to what Drakkos had in mind.




12 Aug, 2013, plamzi wrote in the 5th comment:
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KaVir said:
Perhaps we could add an articles section to MudBytes? TMS has one, and while it's dead now it had some nice contributions back in the day. Even if we just collected a few articles, it might bring MudBytes more hits - but if it takes off, the articles could be formatted into a PDF e-zine.


If MudBytes doesn't want to branch out in that direction, the MUD Portal CMS (Joomla) lends itself very much to article authoring. I added a "Reviews" section yesterday, can easily make it a child of a larger "Articles" section, that's if there is someone willing to admin it.
12 Aug, 2013, Idealiad wrote in the 6th comment:
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There is quite a large articles section here at MB, though maybe it doesn't stand out within the overall archive repo, and much of it has a more technical slant than the old IR.

I think an Articles section at MP would be good too anyway. I like that PDF idea for here too.
12 Aug, 2013, Davion wrote in the 7th comment:
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We have an articles section. If you're worried about the wiki style edits, I can protect articles from edits.
12 Aug, 2013, donky wrote in the 8th comment:
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I'm going to offer people a simple alternative. On 13th of October, I'll add a new issue on imaginary-realities.disinterest.org. If you want to include an article, please contact me at my email address. The only limitations will be that it is primarily MUD related, and not a piece of non-fiction.

There will be epub / mobi releases and if possible to generate, PDF as well. Links to forum posts for discussion each article will be included in each form of publication - ideally in a special sub-forum here. All files will be downloadable, with MD5 checksums provided, from an open directory on my web server. All of these things require minimal work on my part, which will ensure it will happen. Pinkfish used to complain about the effort he put into each issue back in the day, and I do not plan to be in the same boat.

If anyone wishes to have a say in the process, email me, and I'll make a mailing list (email messages come to me, forum posts not so much).

If it looks like this is taking off I'll contact Drakkos and do what it takes to get him on board. Maybe he'll host it on imaginary-realities.com.
12 Aug, 2013, Tyche wrote in the 9th comment:
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donky said:
…not a piece of non-fiction.

I'm confused. You want fiction?
13 Aug, 2013, quixadhal wrote in the 10th comment:
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I once met a man from Nantucket,
Who carried some MUD in a bucket…
13 Aug, 2013, Idealiad wrote in the 11th comment:
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I think I'll do an interview…in that case a work of fiction will be far easier to produce! ;)
13 Aug, 2013, donky wrote in the 12th comment:
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Tyche said:
donky said:
…not a piece of non-fiction.

I'm confused. You want fiction?

Sorry, only non-fiction :grinning:
13 Aug, 2013, donky wrote in the 13th comment:
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In response to email query, I'll make the rough article submission deadline date October 13th. Actual publication date will be when the articles are processed, ideally no later than a week after. But best to email before writing to double check article is in scope.

Here's the wiki on Internet archive. I believe the summaries are there Idealiad.

I aim for the first release to judge whether people are willing to provide content. After that, it can be evolved towards what involved parties want, whether that's the ideas in the summaries or whatever. Also in the long run, I just want to get this thing started not to manage it unless I have to. Ideally I'd want to be a reader, or article writer, in the long run.
13 Aug, 2013, Kaz wrote in the 14th comment:
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I am suddenly interested.

donky said:
I'm going to offer people a simple alternative. On 13th of October, I'll add a new issue on imaginary-realities.disinterest.org. If you want to include an article, please contact me at my email address. The only limitations will be that it is primarily MUD related, and not a piece of non-fiction (sic).


Out of curiosity, in what format would you prefer article submissions? Would a link to a Google Document suffice?
13 Aug, 2013, donky wrote in the 15th comment:
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Kaz said:
Out of curiosity, in what format would you prefer article submissions? Would a link to a Google Document suffice?

Just provide it in whatever format you like. It'll get converted to marked up HTML which will be used for the web pages, and e-book formats.
13 Aug, 2013, donky wrote in the 16th comment:
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Drakkos is on board, and has offered to host it on imaginary-realities.com.

I'm at the point now where everything is official, and the first issue is going to happen. There are offers for articles coming in, and I've got more people I plan to hit up for articles that would be of interest to me.

Please email me if you wish to contribute and let me know if you wish to write something and if you are not sure of what we can brainstorm ideas.
14 Aug, 2013, Idealiad wrote in the 17th comment:
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donky said:
Here's the wiki on Internet archive. I believe the summaries are there Idealiad.


Thanks donky – see how bitterness and common sense don't mix? ;)

I've put all the information in one doc, https://docs.google.com/document/d/1P76u... .
14 Aug, 2013, donky wrote in the 18th comment:
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Alright, here's a vague selection of the content lined up:
  • Challenges unique to mobile mudding.

  • From mudders to professional game developers.

  • Someone interviewing a builder whose work particularly impressed them.

  • Giveaway of a license for an iOS mobile mudding software.

  • The development of a MUD and the software it's based on from beginnings to opening.

Of course, this is a laid back endeavour, and whether people come through on their offers is up to them and however their life is going. :lol:

Here's possible content which I've requested but have yet to hear back:
  • Editorial from Pinkfish.

  • State of the mudding scene in a particular country.

  • State of development of a given piece of MUD software, and where it's going.


And there is still some content which I still to try and line up. But I'm getting the feeling I should cap the amount of articles soon, and shift additional ones to a second issue.
14 Aug, 2013, KaVir wrote in the 19th comment:
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I'm going to be contributing. I'm also pinging Chaos, to see if he's got any advice about making the articles more reliable.
14 Aug, 2013, donky wrote in the 20th comment:
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KaVir said:
I'm going to be contributing. I'm also pinging Chaos, to see if he's got any advice about making the articles more reliable.

That's a good point. If someone in a position to write up a set of guidelines for ensuring the best possible approach is taken for that, can do so, then I'll ensure it's followed for all articles. And perhaps they'll be willing to do a prepublication run over the articles to ensure that the correct approach is taken.
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