Success Sooner Than Expected: Open Source Uru

[JWPlatt]

Life!

Tom Sowa's Spokeman Review article concerning Open Source Uru:
http://www.spokesmanreview.com/blogs/tx ... =8731#more

I had originally planned to take my time to develop and submit a proposal to Cyan with my ideas about Open Sourcing Uru. Those ideas included protecting Cyan revenues with two SDKs while open sourcing the rest and structuring it around a single, public Cyan shard, with more root shards at Cyan's option to license, plus private guild shards for testing. I knew my own ideas would take some upfront effort from Cyan development. And I knew if they would even take it seriously, it could take a while before they would be ready to consider and implement something like that. Apparently, they agreed without even hearing from me, and have left it to the fans. That is, except for their awesome content which they will offer from their own servers. I like that they will still be in control of their IP and hope they license it well to make it worthwhile for themselves.

So, it would appear my little project was a resounding success with no help from me, though I secretly hope Cyan saw some of my incessant posts on the topic and considered them worthy.

Now what? I hope the greater purpose of open sourcing Uru can somehow find some ideas to implement here. I hope it makes a difference.

[Papa G]

Open source projects have always been a success.
It will be wonderful that now our favorite game will be open source!
I don't know any programming (yet), so I don't have much to contribute, but I'll see what I can do to help.

[Ned]

Well I am here if needed.

I own a game company, and have been on Cyan's backs for years about doing something with UrU.

I will happily devote my resources, servers, and team to the UrU project should the code be released, and I'll be happy to manage a serious team if there came to be one forming.

Not to speak badly of the guilds, but I have talked with them many times in the past and outisde of being serious UrU fans and smalltime devs, I think a core dev group could evolve just as easily without them.

So I'll lend my resources when asked if something more than "lets play" babble is announced, or I am called upon.

Ned the MOOSE.

[JWPlatt]

Welcome.

Any value, experience, ideas, and projects you can bring to OpenURU.org are appreciated. Resources, projects, and people will drive OpenURU.org going forward whether it's code, story, content, research, or just for the fun of it. OpenURU.org is about doing things, not just talking about doing things. Members are encouraged to turn their discussions into tangible results. OpenURU.org would like to respond with any new resources projects require.

Regarding Guilds, open source exists in the Real World. It's my thought that in an Out Of Cavern/Character (OOC) world, where OpenURU.org is solidly planted as an open entity without pretense toward the D'ni Guild structure, a guild is just another group, or company of people, trying to get something done. This is to be respected. The unfortunate thing is that guilds carry with them an In Cavern/Character (IC) construct of hierarchy in the fiction of the D'ni civilization. So that's often how they are established, and basing an organization on a discontinuous fiction doesn't always work, if ever. It does well as a mechanism for the story of Uru, but seems to interfere not only with their own operations, making them heavy in hierarchy, but also the public perception of them - often unfairly. Putting people into an artificial environment often produces uncharacteristic behavior modeled on that environment. So people end up doing things they normally wouldn't do as individuals in real life. If guilds, their members, and the public simply treat themselves as part of a collaborative company of regular people, they'll get along much better. Put the same company of people anywhere else and they'd be no different than any project here.

The world of open source is an equal opportunity for everyone. No entity, group or guild can be a gateway or have control over Open Source Uru unless they can persuade the public that they have something of value to offer. Cheers to any contributions you wish to make.

[Mac_Fife]

Welcome Ned.

Indeed, anyone bringing skills or resources to the party is most welcome and in that vein I'd like to remind everyone that in the System Concepts forum we have threads for declaring skills, tools and facilities that could be made available to help get Open Source URU off the ground .

[Ned]

Thanks for that post Mac_Fife.

Sure I have seen these boards, but until something is actually started I am cautious about posting my details across these boards like a big neon sign advertisement screaming "Game Company Offering Help" who knows how much spam I'll get because of that.

In short I am a fully funded, and backed game company with a team of over 15 full time pro's with a lesser team from backer at call-on-request of a hundred more devs. All specializing in 3d worlds.

So I could paste my name across every board in the place, but I would rather sit in the quiet chair until something gets started.
My team are super anxious to get to work with URU, it has been one of our long term goals. So suffice to say when it starts, we have all that is needed and more if the need requires it

Hahaha..a disclaimer: I am not from Cyan Worlds playing a joke lol

[admin]

until something is actually started I am cautious about posting my details... I would rather sit in the quiet chair until something gets started

This is wise counsel. These kinds of miracle arrivals tend to attract extreme cynicism. Details are best left alone until it is appropriate to tangibly demonstrate any relevant reality behind them.

To all, please keep any cynicism in check.

That said, even superheros could list Excel or even C++ as a skill without revealing who they are.

[AlKaera]

Regarding Guilds, open source exists in the Real World. It's my thought that in an Out Of Cavern/Character (OOC) world, where OpenURU.org is solidly planted as an open entity without pretense toward the D'ni Guild structure, a guild is just another group, or company of people, trying to get something done. This is to be respected.

Thanks for the respectful remarks JW. And I agree that the Guilds are rooted in the structure of canon, Cyan's IP. Let me say in defense of the GoMe, that we communicate the happenings going on around us, whether they are IC or OOC. IC is definitely harder these days without a cavern or even UCC to explore as a fully functioning Ages, which they are not. Since the OpenSource announcement and because of it and the other work we find others doing, we have eliminated our information ties to Second Life and There as there is more and more to cover closer to the Uru community at large.

Lastly, this new offer, by Ned, as remarkable and forthcoming as it is, may remain for the GoMe only an item of great interest, as yet not newsworthy. I speak for me, not the GoMe but will be sure that it is discussed in light of it's potential to open source, rather than newsmaking.

[Ned]

Lastly, this new offer, by Ned, as remarkable and forthcoming as it is, may remain for the GoMe only an item of great interest, as yet not newsworthy. I speak for me, not the GoMe but will be sure that it is discussed in light of it's potential to open source, rather than newsmaking.

Thankyou for the insightful post Alkaera.
A mere point of interest is at least a point of call for when the code becomes available.
Should we be able to throw a cavern up and host a simple in-URU meeting then I am sure I can reveal more of what i can offer and I am indeed satisfied with that option.

I know there are alot of so called 'pirate servers' around even a friend of mine had one. While we are waiting on the code, are we yet free to publicly launch a small attempt for guild / dev meetings?

This could be of great benefit to the fans in knowing that things are indeed happening, and of equal benefit to those of us behind the scenes in developmental planning.

I am not certain how Cyan would treat this issue if it were to be adressed as I also do not know if they have lowered the restrictions for the code launch formally yet. But it would be a great start to it all me thinks

Mod Note: Corrected quote tag.

[Mac_Fife]

I know there are alot of so called 'pirate servers' around even a friend of mine had one. While we are waiting on the code, are we yet free to publicly launch a small attempt for guild / dev meetings?

Probably not. If I've correctly understood the story so far on the underground shards, then these are running "Until URU" client and server code with a workaround to avoid the need for a Cyan Auth server. The released Open Source code will be the GameTap MO:UL code as it stood at shutdown (possibly with some minimal tweaks to allow shard selection and a de-centralised Auth). The differences between the two versions is large enough that running a UU-like configuration would really be taking a step backwards, besides which the Open Source licence will only apply to the MO:UL version of code, so any UU shards will remain "illegal".