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[CU] Response to Citizens Union Proposal (Community)
[CU] Response to Citizens Union Proposal // Communitygoober kingAug 7, 2001, 7:23pm
Here's the response I just received from Rick concerning the Citizens Union Proposal,
word for word. Feel free to post your responses here, since it's obvious Mr. Noll *does* read these newsgroups, but apparently doesn't read emails that get sent to him... [View Quote] facter facter@awsupportAug 7, 2001, 7:31pm
Personally I think AWDEbate might be a good place to start, as I also agreed
that the CU you have proposed is fundamentally flawed in that it is not representative of the community as a whole, but, unfortunatly, only of those within this newsgroup. As well as Rick, I'd also be happy to be a part of organised debates and discussions in AWDebate. Facter AW Support. [View Quote] wingAug 7, 2001, 7:39pm
Sure did take the M60 to that idea. Interesting how he took the ideas of a few idiot children to be the overriding factor (Boycotts,
etc.) when you stated that the Union reps would weed through that muck for them, and present in an organized fashion the desires of the community. However, he himself states that [View Quote] agent1Aug 7, 2001, 7:40pm
I'm sure he's referring to the conversation I had with him. One way to implement custom avatars is to add a field to every citizen record that allows people to specify a URL to grab the RWX file from. This would allow avatars that people could change whenever they wanted to. AW already has all of the code necessary to download, cache, and display avatars, so getting them from a different location shouldn't be *that* hard. The only problem that might occur would be with the additions to the citizen database and uniserver->browser protocol. Without looking at AW's code, I can't know how hard changes to those systems are.
-Agent1 [View Quote] j b e l lAug 7, 2001, 7:54pm
*shrugs*
You have to realize his standpoint, Goober, he IS willing to work with the community, but is NOT willing to change his current goals and ideals for the company. He also IS NOT willing to work with people who he feels can be a threat to the community and program. Not neccesarily that *YOU* are a threat, but this type of "union" runs a high risk of coruption and private-party rule. Although I would have liked to see the Citizen Union Succeed with AW, I understand why it will not at this point. My suggestion to you is to continue with your plans, and when the 7 of you meet, meet with AW staff if they are willing, if not then meet with eachother and share ideas, send the chat log out to AWC and they can do with it what they will. After time, if all goes well, I am certain AWC will be more then happy to re-consider they're position on this subject. [View Quote] wingAug 7, 2001, 8:08pm
OOPS! Damn ctrl-enter.
My reply continued inline below. [View Quote] >I believe my last letter showed the difference between the > COMMUNITY and the COMPANY. While neither can exist as a whole without the > other, some decisions are made solely by the COMPANY. In effect, the COMMUNITY is already standing seperate from the COMPANY, with only a few pillars still supporting the structure. Techtalk, where we mindlessly present ideas to Roland, who has little power to implement them, the monotony only broken by new releases. Tech support, and precious little actual involvement in the community are all we have to stand on besides Roland. In response to Facter, the union would not be a reflection of only these groups, but anyone who wishes to provide somthing to be reflected. If these newsgroups are the only entities that provide material, then it is a truly sad shape that the community is in. Already, we are divided. Tourists, citizens, those who care, those who don't, and those who don't know. Everyone is taking sides. If the children are allowed to run rampant in their revolution, a fairly large boycott or the like is quite possible, if not inevitable in the future. By that time, the community's mainstay events, the Cy Awards, Festival and the like, will have been torn to pieces, the cys truly becoming a popularity contest, and the Festival, rather than being a celebration of another year of a strong community, will become just a time for preteen warmongers to plan their next year of "resistance" against AWC. Look at the universe logs. Out of the total number of named citizens, how many log in at least once a week? With each week, you'll notice it decline. People are leaving, and at an alarming rate. In June two years ago, I had fifty people on my contacts list. How many of them still use the program? Three... [View Quote] wingAug 7, 2001, 9:14pm
*shrug* The simplicity that it was to add the URL to each citizen's webpage would be the same simplicity that it would be to add the
URL to a custom av. Instead of passing it to the internal browser, pass it to be rendered. [View Quote] sw chrisAug 7, 2001, 10:02pm
I'm on Rick's side about custom avs. Never say something is easy unless
you've done it yourself. :) For all we know, the code could be very touchy to work with, or royally buried under tons and tons of other code. SW Chris [View Quote] john viperAug 7, 2001, 10:03pm
I got my damn hopes up again. Gotta stop doing that!!!
More response intertwined: > Here's the response I just received from Rick concerning the Citizens > Union Proposal, word for word. Feel free to post your responses here, > since it's obvious Mr. Noll *does* read these newsgroups, but > apparently doesn't read emails that get sent to him... He must not read the newsgroups very well -- if he did he would understand this was a public meeting, basically just a huge whiteboard that everyone could splash their ideas on, and that the bad ones would be weeded out by the representatives, and not just sent on to AW in the form of a demand. Rick, if you perchance are reading this, I don't think that you understood exactly what the purpose of CU would be. It would not be a way to undermine your decision-making power in AW (Any entreprenuer could tell you that it is a terrible idea for the customers to ABSOLUTELY CONTROL the development of a product). The difference between Active Worlds and, say, MS Word is that Active Worlds is not just a tool or a utility, it is a community area that would simply not exist if the users did not visit it every say. Once you buy Word, you never have to buy it again (except new versions, but thats another discussion), and you never even have to use it -- Microsoft already has their money. Active Worlds, on the other hand, once purchased, has to be used. Half the fun is no longer there if there are no other people to talk to. Anyone can build 3-D works of art... just run out and get some kind of design software or other. $500 for something halfway decent. Okay, let me try to veer back on topic here. Anyways, the CU would be a way to COMMUNICATE the NEEDS of the COMMUNITY TO and WITH the COMPANY, as well as a way to COMMUNICATE the NEEDS of the COMPANY TO and WITH the COMMUNITY. Not only would the community be IN NO WAY taking control of the company, but also, you could help us UNDERSTAND some of the decisions that the company is making, rather than stupid rumors being spread as hatred engulfs everyone. (I personally would not like the idea of being hated by people -- and if you can explain your actions to maybe make them less angry, why not?) In the mix, we would also be able to communicate our NEEDS with the company, and get the company's feedback on our needs. ALSO, you mentioned some of the negative results as recorded in the chat log of the CU meeting. You will also notice this line very near the top: "Goober King: This thing is essentially a brainstorming session, so if you guys have any ideas, don't be afraid to speak up" The PRIMARY RULE of a brainstorming session is that NO IDEA IS A BAD IDEA. Basically, you set up this big huge white board, and give everyone a dry-erase pen. Everyone writes up their ideas, from feasible ones such as telegram muting, to less feasable ones such as killing all Pokemon. These are both good ideas, but one is more possible than the other. MANY IDEAS COME OUT OF A BRAINSTORMING SESSION. In the actual monthly Citizen Union Board Meetings, which contains members of the COMMUNITY as well as members of the COMPANY (maximum of 10 or so people total, DEFINITELY not public), you work TOGETHER to sift through EVERY idea, deliberating over all of them, keeping, sorting, and prioritizing the more feasible ones (giving GOOD REASONS for each), and tossing out (with GOOD REASONS) the the less beasible ones. The chat log that you saw was the PUBLIC meeting, in which ANYONE can put forward ANY ideas. These ideas are then taken out of the chat log, put into a nice list format, and then organized and edited during the monthly board meetings. Does THIS sound like a plot to ruin Active Worlds? Does this sound like we are trying to damage the company? A prime interest of mine is business, and I see no flaw in any logic herein. You lose no power, but what you do lose is people who hate your guts for stupid reasons, as well as confused citizens. We gain no power over how the company runs, but what we do gain is security in our ideas being listened to, as well as happiness, and believe me, when you have happy customers, business WILL BE GOOD. > [View Quote] -- _____________________________________________ Jeff Tickle (John Viper, #296714) jviper at jtsoft.net http://www.jtsoft.net sw chrisAug 7, 2001, 10:20pm
Just a forewarning... long post down here. :)
Just a quick question... did you tell them representatives would be elected? Also... AWDebate stole the fire. :) Like the battle between BetaMax and VHS, similar standard, but only one idea won out. I think what they said one of their deciding factors not to support the citizens union is because the suggestions would be dug through and only the ones to meet the representatives' criteria would be presented. The inherent flaw in this is that the reps might have their own agendas. But then again that's what the elections are for. :) What I found odd about this is that AWDebate decided to have an open forum where everyone could talk and that the Citizen's Union, sensing Rick and company would not want to weed through all the useless and agenda-driven suggestions, decided to weed through the suggestions for them to make for a more presentable format. Goober King, keep it up with the Citizen's Union. Restructure it a bit according to what Mr. Noll has layed out in his letters to you though. May I suggest that you don't call it a union? Because it shouldn't be. Unions can be driven by who's on top. I've heard of lots of stories where many union members didn't want to strike, yet its brass decided they should. Perhaps that's what was communicated to Mr. Noll through the name. However, CU has far more potential than just communicating with AWC. It could also communicate user's wants to The Cy Awards, AW Festival, AW Reunion Committee, ABN, etc., as well as to AWC. I say wants because that's what we want. Rick and company, I'm glad you're making more visible efforts for community development and whatnot. Please keep it up. SW Chris sw chrisAug 7, 2001, 10:35pm
agent1Aug 8, 2001, 12:08am
From talking to Roland, it seems it would be easy to implement the way I suggested, but it would cause lots of problems. Roland described what they were to me and I agreed that the way I suggested wasn't the best way to go about it.
Rick: Can't. Roland: Can't, because ... -Agent1 [View Quote] facterAug 8, 2001, 1:01am
> I'm sure he's referring to the conversation I had with him. One way to
implement custom avatars is to add a field to every citizen record that allows people to specify a URL to grab the RWX file from. This would allow avatars that people could change whenever they wanted to. AW already has all of the code necessary to download, cache, and display avatars, so getting them from a different location shouldn't be *that* hard. The only problem that might occur would be with the additions to the citizen database and uniserver->browser protocol. Without looking at AW's code, I can't know how hard changes to those systems are. See, those things are only *one* small part of the implementation of custom av's, which, mind you, I am a great supporter at the company. You forget so many other things, like policing of the avatars, poly counts and how to make it so someone cant bring in an incorrect avatar, or an avatar that has a flaw in it and causes everyone to crash on a badly rendered model..etc etc etc - things like routines to put in the browser to reject avatars, because surely you dont think we at the company should go through an approve manually every avatar that gets submitted?... Thats only one thing that needs to be put into place with custom avatars, there are so many, many more...just letting people whack them in, sure, it could probably be done without too much hassle I guess (im not a c programmer, I dojnt know), but you also have to think of all the peripheral things that go along with it. Taking all those things into account, you start to get a very, very big undetraking.... F. F. > > -Agent1 > > [View Quote] agent1Aug 8, 2001, 11:34am
Encrypted Transmission from Roland, sent Tue Aug 7, 2001 4:50 PM:
No adding such a field isn't difficult,the problem is that is a woefully inadequate implementation of custom avatars...it is much more complicated than that...we've talked about the issues many times at tech talk. Encrypted Transmission from Roland, sent Tue Aug 7, 2001 4:55 PM: Examples of some of the issues are...if it uses textures, where do they come from? If it uses sequences, where do they come from? How do you specifiy what sequences it uses? How and where does it get cached? Encrypted Transmission from Roland, sent Tue Aug 7, 2001 4:55 PM: How do you prevent other people from stealing it? How do you prevent people from using avatars that are too large...both in terms of file size, physical size, and polygon/vertex limits, textures, etc? How do you determine what those limits should be? -Agent1 [View Quote] moriaAug 8, 2001, 3:20pm
and once again this is not followed through... sure the abililty to add a
url is easy... but what about the code to not allow custom avs in worlds under worldowners control where they dont want custom avs.. what about guarding against 100ft high genitals wandering around as a custom av, what about all the intricacies of rendering if there 40 people around all trying to download each others avs at the same time.. what about the protection features for ratings on world, what about someone that decides its fun to drop into a world and use a 500k polygon avatar to disrupt that world. Its this type of stupid half assed "its easy to do" comment, which completely destroys any credebility of putting forward ideas NOT completely researched. THINK before you say something is easy from all sides, not just your own myopic viewpoint. This is a prime example of exactly why Goobers idea, excellent though it is in concept will NEVER work. Moria [View Quote] iceyAug 8, 2001, 3:30pm
agent1Aug 8, 2001, 3:51pm
The method I suggested *is* something that would be easy to do, the only reason it's not is for the reasons mentioned already. So it's not a technical limitation, really. Enzo told me that he was open to suggestions and so I chose custom avatars as a half-joking example.
-Agent1 [View Quote] goober kingAug 8, 2001, 3:58pm
It's obvious that quite a few people still don't seem to "get" the purpose of this
Union, so allow me to explain: The Union is *not* for pushing the community's ideas through the AWC management and getting them implemented. The Union is *not* about dictating to AWC what should and should not be done. The Union is *not* solely for the people here in the newsgroups. The Union is *not* out to destroy AWC and is *not* in any way, shape, or form planning to "threaten AWC if our demands are not met." What the Union *is* for is presenting the communities ideas, no matter how far-fetched, to the AWC management for the *sole* purpose of getting their opinions on such ideas. If the AWC management were to say at one of the private meetings, "Yea, we could do that. It shouldn't be a problem." then we would ask them to implement the idea. If, however, they were to say "Sure, it's a good idea, but we just can't do that." then they would be expected to explain why it can't be done, and that's it. There would be no attempts to argue the point or try and convince them otherwise. All the Union is looking for is confirmation that these things can be done, or explanations as to why things can't be done, nothing more. All of this was *clearly* stated in the Proposal I posted here previously (see [CU] Citizens Union Proposal) and sent to various AWC employees, yet as far as I can tell, the only people who actually *read* the thing were John Viper and Wing. Everyone else seemed to think the meeting log was some sort of official, binding discussion that was to be the entire basis for the Union, when that was entirely *not* the case. To all of those who think there's no way in hell this idea could work, I suggest you go back and actually *read* the Proposal and take it for what it is. *That* is what the Union will be based on, not some impromptu bullshit session. What kind of organizer do you people take me for, any way? :P -- Goober King Now where'd he put that Reading Comprehension book...? rar1 at acsu.buffalo.edu wingAug 8, 2001, 4:31pm
Mmmmmmm. Textures should be searched for on the world's OP, then the SAME DIRECTORY AS THE AVATAR ZIP, then in the relative
directory to the avatar zip ../textures/texture.jpg Same with seqs, AW path, then same dir, then ../seqs Preventing theft... Don't make the avatar URL publicly available, except if someone is watching cache. Filesize should be a locally set limit. I honestly can't think of any way to control physical size except for *eject*, and custom avs should be a RIGHT so people will use them sensibly anyway, at least until a feasable universal system can be devised. Perhaps having the browser generate a registry on the fly and not rendering the av if it exceeds dimensions set by the world owner, and poly/vert counting on the fly as well to operate based on user defined limits, though this is kinda far off, or is it? [View Quote] wingAug 8, 2001, 4:31pm
RAWER!
I thought Eep was negative. We need to toss up ideas, find out the problems with them and fine-tune implementation ideas. Read my other post for some altered custom avs implementation [View Quote] agent1Aug 8, 2001, 5:01pm
Another way to help prevent theft is to put all of the files that need to be cached into one large file. The whole thing could be encrypted and have a header with offsets and lengths of the "files" in the package.
-Agent1 [View Quote] eepAug 8, 2001, 5:47pm
Simple zip encryption would suffice. However, it's where the zip password is transferred where the security issue is...perhaps in the citizens settings in a separate "avatar/object password" field similar to the privilege password field...
[View Quote] > Another way to help prevent theft is to put all of the files that need to be cached into one large file. The whole thing could be encrypted and have a header with offsets and lengths of the "files" in the package. > [View Quote] laraAug 8, 2001, 7:49pm
Hi moria,
I'm getting a bit lost. I understand your response about custom avatars not being the greatest idea at this time. I didn't, however, quite understand how this automatically follows: > This is a prime example of exactly why Goobers idea, excellent though it is > in concept will NEVER work. > > Moria As I understand Goober's idea (regarding a Citizens Union - nothing to do with anyone else's specific ideas about custom avatars), the Citizens Union would be open to everyone. The C. U. would announce a meeting that anyone could attend, perhaps once a month. AWC people could be there, of course - or not be there. It doesn't really matter whether AWC attended the big open meetings or not. No one expects AWC to sit in on the open Citizens Union meetings or answer questions there at all. It's *after* the open meeting, that 5 representatives of the C U (still no involvement yet for AWC) would sit down and thoroughly look at what was brought up at the wide open meeting. Discarding (or at least setting waaaay aside) any patently silly ideas and ideas they already knew absolutely could *not* be implemented. Sifting through the big meeting chat log to find suggestions that at least appeared *possible, maybe*, in order to come up with a couple of the most likely things (not necessarily the most requested things) to present to AWC. I don't want to speak for Goober King, but again, as I understand it, he's not talking about trying to push a whole wish list forward at once. It seems to me he plans to have just a few reasonable, knowledgeable citizens (the 5 C.U. representatives, whomever they might be) meet privately in-world with anyone AWC chooses, to have a civilized, quiet, rational discussion something like this: "Here are a couple of things quite a few people are asking for...any chance you guys could work this into the program? If so, roughly when? If not, we'd like to be able to tell people why this particular thing can't be done, or perhaps could be done someday, but not in the foreseeable future." Very much like what you have said right here, Moria, about *why* custom avatars is not a feature to be expected. A reason. Expressed by AWC itself to the 5 C. U. representatives in a private meeting. Not at a big open meeting. If there is a misunderstanding that Goober King's idea is to set up a group to fight with AWC - to demand "you add this feature because the loudest shouters want it", I'd agree that would never work. I don't think that's what Goober King is proposing at all. I'd think AWC would welcome having *formal* and *reasoned* (not argumentative) input from 5 C. U. representatives - representing not their own personal agendas, but what the 5 C. U. reps had distilled from the wide open meetings of the Citizens Union and from responses to the C. U. website each month. As for "putting foward ideas not completely researched", I think just hearing a researched reason from AWC's point of view as to why a specific request (presented by the 5 C. U. reps) is a "no go" or a "not right now", would go a long way toward helping regular users understand why something many might want was not going to happen. Sure, you'll still have people arguing ad infinitum, but it won't be the 5 C. U. reps arguing with AWC over things, or the C. U. website bashing AWC. The C. U. reps would simply present a request or two at a time in private, hear AWC's reponse, perhaps discuss the pros and cons a bit with them, accept AWC's decision, publish AWC's reason on the C. U. website and move on to the next item the next month. I see it as a way of letting people actually see AWC's reason for doing or not doing something instead of having people get third or fourth-hand info from "someone who heard that someone on the newsgroup said that someone at AWC said..." this or that. Of course AWC owns the software and has no obligation whatsoever to give any reason to any customers about anything AWC chooses to do or not do. I think, though, that AWC does understand the value of the "community" aspect of this program. The majority of users may not think of it as a community. The majority probably go about their business of enjoying whatever they enjoy out of it quietly - with never a word or a request. On the other hand you'll always have some who heckle, badger and bash, no matter what. It's the community minded, regular users that I think the Citizens Union is really aimed toward - an effort to be a bridge between what many people would like to see happen and what AWC can or can't do. A voice (via the C. U. website) for people to see actual *reasons* why AWC will or won't implement something, rather than feeling a request has simply dropped between the cracks or received no further attention than a "thanks for your input, your opinion is valued, we'll consider it." Seeing a request discussed and dealt with (albeit buffered from the madding crowd ;) just between the 5 C. U. reps and "whomever" from AWC. Possibly the C U website eventually might come to be regarded almost as a features FAQ sheet. :-) Once AWC had gone on record with reasons given to the 5 C U reps in private meetings, people who continued to ask for features that had already been covered by the AWC-CU Reps could be referred to the C U page to see WHY a particular feature wasn't on the drawing board - might be "someday" - or might never be. Possibly workable? Best regards, Lara [View Quote] kelleeAug 8, 2001, 8:07pm
Gawd Lara, you know how to express it....all thats left to say is....
Sounds good to me :o) [View Quote] wingAug 8, 2001, 9:46pm
[View Quote]
They won't understand that either. A large stick with "Reading Comprehension" scribbled on it in crayon would be more effective. Sad
that even with so many native English speakers they still can't understand a simple concept between them. Perhaps you used too many abbreviations and words longer than four letters. Some of them just don't understand that this isn't just about features. It's about giving the community somthing to grab onto. Right now we're climbing the buttered cliffs of life without any handholds. As Rick himself said, the company and community cannot survive independently. I'd be just fine if NONE of the community's features were implemented just as long as it was clear that it didn't go in one ear and out the other or never even reaches the first ear. If you can't figure out what I'm saying, good for you, take some reading classes casayAug 8, 2001, 9:51pm
Said to my self that I wasn't going to post in this NG again since it's
reached new lows but I feel the need to respond to the custom avatar issue that was brought up by Rick. He stated - . One such idea is "custom avatars", they refer to this as "simple". I assume this must come from a very high level programmer for it to be "easy". Does this show the level of misconception and naivete we are supposed to expect? Dear Rick, On several occasions, over several years I have discussed the capabilities/possibility of custom avatars with Ron, Roland and Hamfon. None ever said it would be 'easy'. I believe all have told me that it is possible. I've always felt that the best solution to adding custom avatars would be to add a path within the browser to some folder on AW's server that would contain the avatars and seqs. I've also suggested several times that AW charge a small extra fee for people to be able to have their avatars/seqs on that server to help pay for the server space and the person to maintain it. Of course security would have to be the highest. A world option would need to be added so that world owners could set whether they allow custom avatars to be used or not. I personally feel that AW should made privacy, removal of the green checkmark, and custom avatars one of their top priorities. Years ago Blaxxun added the capability to have custom avatars as their browser would allow downloads of them from various sites. Now Atmosphere ( although I don't think it comes close to comparing to AW, had that ability too. I do not understand why AW has not added the capability for custom avatars. People within a community need something tangible to identify with. That's what keeps them coming back. Custom avatars would help in that area a lot. I don't feel that I'm under any 'misconception' as to the overall issue here. I'm also far from naiveté when it comes to AW. I do honestly feel that the reason we still have the green checkmark and no custom avatars is because the company hasn't made them a priority issue. Please correct me if I'm wrong but I've been asking about these same issues for years and I've been told it IS possible. Thanks for you time and looking forward to a reply, Sincerely, Casay casayAug 8, 2001, 10:14pm
[View Quote]
Yes, I've brought it up in Tech talk several times as has others. I'm sure
there's logs of it. > Encrypted Transmission from Roland, sent Tue Aug 7, 2001 4:55 PM: > Examples of some of the issues are...if it uses textures, where do they come from? If it uses sequences, where do they come from? How do you specifiy what sequences it uses? How and where does it get cached? Have the avatars, seqs, and textures all on 1 server. Charge small fee for people to have their custom avatars placed there. Make a new cache file in the browser. Yes, possibly a new avatars.dat file would have to be generated for each avatar but put a size limit on the dat file. 1 avatar could have say 10 actions period. Also have total sum limit of seq files themselves. > Encrypted Transmission from Roland, sent Tue Aug 7, 2001 4:55 PM: > How do you prevent other people from stealing it? How do you prevent people from using avatars that are too large...both in terms of file size, physical size, and polygon/vertex limits, textures, etc? How do you determine what those limits should be? > Have them on the same sever with as much security as is possible. We can't prevent people from stealing objects now as it is. Limit the avatar file size, limit the seq file sizes, limit total amount of texture file sizes. Have a way for people to test compatibility within the browser to prevent crashing. Some kind of testing program like rwxmod ( or the long awaited program Shamus is/has created.) Physical size limits - allow only humannoid and animal style avatars scaled to size to start with. Possibly have scale as large as a car. Blaxxun had scale size limits I believe but I may be wrong. Determining limits can't be that hard and seems a bad excuse for not implementing it. Jeese, we worked with a 64 vert limit for years. If you want my .02 I think a 1200 -1500 vert limit for avatars would be very reasonable. I think MyTwoKeys avatar, Summer, was right around 2000 verts and that was one of the most detailed avatars of it's day and still is today. 5 textures on an avatar , high rez, 256x256 at ~192Kbytes each = 960Kbytes ( so round it off to 1000) So, there ya go Roland, the same answers we've been giving you for years and the same solutions you've had that I know of. I know you've been thinking about it for a long time and wouldn't be suprized if you basically have it all figured out by now. I do realize that you're going to have to do some changes within the browser programming. Yes, it will take time. Bottom line here..... Time is what you need I think. Time from Rick and JP to allow you to take the time to figure this out and implement it in the code. Casay <snipped> de deAug 9, 2001, 9:32am
i dont know if this has been asked before or if it is posible to do
i am a newby on this would it be posible to implement in the option feature to not have telegrams from any people then the one on my contact list "wing" <bathgate at prodigy.net> schreef in bericht news:3b71cf49 at server1.Activeworlds.com... [View Quote] e n z oAug 10, 2001, 2:45pm
Hi Casay,
Thanks for writing. I am sorry if my personal letter to Bob implied anything negative towards you. I also did not realize that he was posting it on the newsgroup. My comment was not meant to start a debate of "custom avatars". I wrote, "I assume this must come from a very high level programmer for it to be "easy"." Please let me explain: My comment was taken directly from a quote I recieved from a user who represents himself/herself as a CU member. My comment did not say that custom avatars was "impossible". My comment was that this CU member was refering to the project as "easy" and "simple". It was obviously coming from a source that was either an extremely talented programmer or was misinformed as to the complexity of writing 3D multiuser software. The fact that something can be done does not mean it will be done or be done immediately. Custom avatars can be done. The solution you describe to handle custom avs is well thought out and very close to one which we have considered. But, there are several other ways which may be end up more difficult to do, but far more satisfactory for long term goals and usability. Sometimes the seemingly easiest solution that just gets plugged in ends up haunting you years later. You need to make sure your solutions are going to work for years and foresee problems which may crop up later as to backwards compatibility. This is why software devwelopers are called "architects". Both Blaxxun and Atmosphere had the liberty to begin developement after AW. This means they have the advantage of observing a working system. They can develop on a different track and add features they thing they need without having a preexisting structure. Their developers have not put in "building" which I am sure some users would feel "easy" since they have seen it in AW. Until AW has only one version (3.2) which includes software rasterizers, making 2.2 unnecessary, it does not make sense to add signifigant features like "custom avs" to 3.1. If we did, those changes would need to plug back into 2.2, making developement time at least double. And might it be prudent to determine whether polygonly jointed avatars running seq files was the standard we wanted to follow. Perhaps skin and bone avatars might be a better standard since it has become accepted by most every 3D game? Perhaps we need to allow people to bring in avs from their game into AW? Do we keep support of old formats while accepting the new? Do we allow any texture or geometry or will that be abused to that offend the majority? These are issues that the architect decides while taking into consideration the goals of the end user be she corporate or consumer. I assure you that I personally have custom avs very high on my wishlist and look forward to the day we have them. I must also say that my personal wishlist does not drive the direction of AWC. My personal wish is sometimes based on what I want as an AW user and does not reflect the realities of doing business. There have been many features added which are more important for the stability and compatiblity of future versions of AW as a platform. These are where we have put the majority of our focus of late. While I know this is disappointing to some, I assure you we are working very hard not only to keep AW fun for our users today but also developing it for the future. It seems that everytime we begin a new version there are features which people feel are necessary and often "easy". Even while they are being added, other features are suggested or even deemed as "more necesary". The phrase "to many cooks" comes to mind. Activeworlds by its nature is an iterative process. Everyone who works on it or uses it becomes part of the system which makes it better. While many might feel that "custom avatars" are the top of the list there are just as many who would like "multi-universe capability", "mirrors", "guns", "voice chat", "flash support","privacy", "block swear words" or even "more animals". While all of these may be important, not all can be done at once. AW is growing and getting better, pleae be patient with us. We do listen and many times take the suggestions which often are relatively naive, such as, "why not just add a checkbox, that can't be to hard?" and take the time needed to make it work in the real world. Please realize that everytime we add new features they are added into a version which needs extensive testing both inhouse and beta. These upgrades take time, especially when they involve the complex issues of late. Even if a solution is "easy" adding it to a spec which is nearing completion is not feasible. Doing so would extend the inhouse testing even further and make the beta test more difficult. We would be adding complexity beyond that which exists and therefore make everyone wait even longer. This would not be wise either for business or community goals. We are very near to a beta release of 3.2 and I am sure there will be features that make everyone happy. As to future versions, custom avatars are on the list, whether we are able to include them in 3.3 is just not decided as of yet. Thank you for writing, Rick Noll CEO Activeworlds Corp. (978) 499 0222 [View Quote] |