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Mar 18, 2006, 2:20am

Alright, this is a long post about a feature that's a complete shot in the
dark, but I just thought it would be a great addition to the community...

What I thought would be a great feature for worlds under 4.1 is something
like an "empowered" zone. 4.1 adds zones, which are small areas that allow
the builder to control quite a few environmental effects regardless of the
world settings. The "empowered" zone is basically this idea on steriods,
only instead of being created by an object, it is created by the world
caretaker. This sort of zone would be set on the server, perhaps regardless
of height so that basically everything in a rectangle between point x and
point y is controlled by citizens who are set as zone CTs by the world CT.
These special zones would not only be able to control the environmental
effects 4.1 zones control, but also would be able to change backdrop and
grant citizens some special rights like public speaker, eminent domain, and
"zone eject." I think that this would be an excellent feature for
communities in large building worlds like AlphaWorld like OffWorld, Horizon
City (if it was still active), or SW City, where they would be basically
given the ability to police their own communities and deal with vandals,
disputes, and troublemakers without having to wait for PKs or GET to deal
with it. There have been many experiences I've had in my past in SW City in
which having the ability to "zone eject" someone from the city would be
handy (basically a zone eject just bans the user from that particular zone
for x amount of time, with a max set by the world CT. Instead of kicking the
troublemaker from the world, it just bumps them back to GZ). I'm sure other
folks who have been in charge of communities before have also wished they
could do the same.

I think that this would also solve a couple disputes in AlphaWorld, too,
such as the "raging" debates over things like changing the world backdrop or
ambient lighting. If a community wants a day/night cycle, they can allow a
bot to control their zone and make it happen. For folks who aren't in that
zone, they just see the default AW settings. Likewise for the backdrop, if
the community wants to change the backdrop, maybe even use a skybox, then
they can. Folks who want to see AW in the state its been in over the past
years wouldn't be affected unless AWI changes the setting. I mean, for the
most part we can use add-ons like AWE to change the backdrop and emulate
night time (our "night mod" which came out around halloween), or even make
seasons (winter mod), so this would just make it easier for communties to
customize the way people see their little area of the world.

There of course would be limits. Obviously, one of these special zones could
not change object paths, cell data limit, enable/disable terrain, or maybe
change the ground object. The world CT would have control over every zone in
the world, so world rules can still be enforced. These zones would only be
granted to communities which have shown that they'll be active and growing
members of the community...basically towns that have grown to acheive quite
some size and probably have enough land to contain any new growth for at
least 6-12 months. This is basically just a check to make sure that this
community is "worthy" of being granted a zone (which makes it sort of a goal
for communities to strive for, which may help spur growth), and also to make
sure that they wont be constantly bugging the world CT with "ok we've
expanded our town outside of the zone, please extend it." The only big
problem I see is just setting the zone so that only the cities are under the
influence of the zone. I'll use SW City as an example just because I'm most
familiar with it. We have the Irenic Ocean as our border with the rest of
the world, so our zone would be marked by that. There are small communties
along the outside of the Irenic, and out of fairness to them, the zone
wouldn't envelop those small communities (this would prevent large towns
from engulfing small towns and deleting them to make room for expansion and
abuses like that). Basically once an avatar steps foot in our city limits,
what they see is governed by how our zone is set. Of course, if a town is
abusing its power, the community will basically shun it, and nobody will go
there. If nobody goes there, there are no more abuses (since a zone CT
obviously can't delete objects anywhere in the world), and then the zone
falls stagnant, and eventually gets stripped of its status as a zone.

I really think that this would make large towns 10x more appealing, as when
you look at a town like SW City, it would cost thousands to have our own
world, which is the only real surefire way we have of keeping the peace in
the city on our own, and these zones would not only make us able to use AW's
great environmental features to our advantage but also make it much easier
for us to make sure that people in our city do not get harassed.
Unfortunately, I don't think that the browser will ever get this, but it
would just be so nice if it did...

Please share your thoughts,
-CMM

Mar 18, 2006, 4:22pm

I love this idea. Its so well thought out, and it tackles so many
problems at once...

-Solves the age-old problem of the people who don't want change in world
options vs. the ones who do
-Gives citybuilders a goal
-Lets citybuilders be that more creative
-Gives Public Building Worlds more appeal, and more important, gives an
in-depth sample of world ownership to prospective buyers (;D)
-Allows what would at one time require a long-winded system to be issued
directly by the involved parties (GET, for example.)

Don't glance by this one AWI, its a winner :D

-Hyp

Mar 19, 2006, 12:36am

[View Quote] Well as it so happens... Evo has a special XML zone defenition format...

By a strange co-incidence, it also has an XML world attributes defenition
format.

Guess what happens when when you load the latter into the former and have
the 4.1 SDK for session specific world attributes.

--
- Mark Randall

"We're Systems and Networks"
"It's our job to know"

Mar 19, 2006, 6:03am

Let me guess... People are forced to use your huge bot to do something
that should be built into the browser? Gee.

-Joe

[View Quote]

Mar 19, 2006, 7:39am

*checks RAM useage* 1.6MB...yea, huge :P


[View Quote]

Mar 19, 2006, 8:00am

Although I don't agree with the exaggeration by joeman, he does have a
point.. Citizens should not need to go and download a bot to do something
that should be in the browser.

Regardless, I have nothing against Strike's bot.. But if the feature is that
well formed, it may as well be in the browser.

[View Quote]

Mar 19, 2006, 1:15pm

It should be in the browser, but that doesn't mean its a bad idea for
someone to tackle the problem using a bot
[View Quote]

Mar 19, 2006, 1:16pm

While we wait for another year for this feature to be possibly
integrated into the browser, may i add
[View Quote]

Mar 20, 2006, 7:37pm

Ive found the Evo really useful for editing the world atrributes and giving
citezens rights to my world without the hassel of fiddling wiht writing in
the cit no through the clunky browser interface. Its saved me a whole lota
bother- good on Strike for making somethign that tackels these areas I say-
and makes those who choose to use it's life much easier for world owning-
and when they could be in the browser. Maybe they will be added sometime...
sometime... in the far far far off future.. when we have all passed away...
But until then, we can work aorund it and make out lives easier by using
inovative solutions like the Evo offers.. I agree theses things should be in
the brower,,, but they arnt!!!
Hmm doesnt that say something? ..

"Never trust a Hippie" ~John Lydon ~ The Sex Pistols~


[View Quote]

Apr 8, 2006, 3:46pm

I think that that is a very good idea, maybe needs a little fine tuning but,
you basically have it perfect :D, nice to see there are people still
thinking outside of the box...

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