[kesumi]

I am looking for experienced coders to work on building a Midkemia based mud from the ground up.

Experience with C and circlemud is necessary.

I am currently in correspondance with the license holders of the midkemia world, attempting to make this an officially sanctioned project, so please email me if you want to be a part this of exciting venture.

mattcole@liverpoolfc.net

[KaVir]

Sorry to tell you this, but Raymond E Feist does not allow people to use his work for creating muds. There was a post about this in May 2001 which quoted an email in which Mr Feist described his reasoning, but the short of it was that he has plans for licensing his work within commercial online games, and ignoring your mud would reduce his ability to profit from such ventures. I can reproduce the full email if you wish.

[Jedediah]

Yeah, it's a pain, because that's such an awesome world full of possibility...

[kesumi]

I suspected a licensing issue was the reason i had never seen a midkemia mud, so i emailed midkemia press several days ago.

i have been talking with Stephen Abrams about my ideas for the project, he alerted Ray a few days ago, who appears to have given him authority to discuss the possibilty of it actually happening. From Stephen's reactions so far i am hopeful that they will allow the mud to go ahead, though i do expect a rigid assessment of the 'finished' product before they allow it to go online; i would expect nothing less!

Having said that I'd love to see the email in question.

I would still urge anyone who would like to be involved (especially experienced coders) to contact me. If this goes ahead it may be a once in a lifetime opportunity

[KaVir]

Here is Mr Feist's email:

Originally Posted by OK, let me try to shed some light on this. In the first place, I'm very sorry that your enthusiasm for my work (this to Christian) resulted in a lot of effort that seems now to be wasted. Often, those not intimately involved with questions of intellectual property rights have a tough time understanding what "harm" can arise from a fan utilizing the work of their favorite author. Without turning this into a clinic on copyright/trademark, let me attempt to give you some understanding. Forget for a moment the differences between "MUDS" and MUSHES." Consider them, rather, "on-line use." In reading what comes next, constantly refer back to that lable. I have plans for commercial, on-line services down the road. Within as short a time as two years, probably no more than five down the road. The game will most likely employ a lot of the graphic engines being developed at this time by 7th Level for the next PC/Mac/Playstation game based upon the Riftwar. For me to be able to go forward with this grand scheme, I must _protect_ those rights. Now, if a bunch of college students in East Toad Strangle State College get together and create something on the Chem Lab computer that other people are accessing, and the main Wizard is "Gandalf" or "Macros" as long as the Tolkein Estate or I don't hear about it, we're "protected." In other words, we can not (in the eyes of the law) be considered lax about protecting our rights if we are ignorant of the infringement. If Chris Tolkein or I (or David Eddings, or Robert Jordan, or whoever) find out our work is being used in this fashion, from a third party, each of us is obliged to instruct those using our individual work without permission to cease at once. If we don't, then down the road is someone decides to create a commercial use on-line, each of us faces the prospect of attempting to protect our rights when we chose not to earlier. You may have heard someone say, "It's OK as long as you're not charging money." This is wrong. Commercial or non-commercial use is irrelevant regarding the protection of those rights. If I attempt to vend those rights and a non-commercial source is out there, one which has paid no rights fees, and is seen as competing with the very company I'm doing business with, my ability to realize a profit from those rights is threatened. So, the problem is "you asked." As soon as you called my attention to this, I had to say no. Had you just gone forward and done your game on-line without calling my attention to it, I probably would never have discovered the fact. The down-side of this, of course, is that if I did after you had worked even more hours on the project, there would have been even that much more time and effort flushed. Josh Smith and the others involved with the RiftMush asked, talked to me, negotiated terms I could live with, and are working with 7th Level to deliver the game through the Internet and I have SERIOUS control over content and use. The Mush will be operated on one of 7th Level's Sun Workstations, through their domain on the Internet. Your biggest mistake, of course, was doing all the work first, then asking. The fact you did ask and then did change things as I requested, is greatly appreciated, and if I can somehow provide some token of appreciation, I would be happy to. E-mail me at raymond@cts.com and I think I can come up with something for you. But in the end we're talking about the problem faced by creators of intellectual property rights all the time. Often it's seen as a major "heartless" corporation like Paramount regarding Star Trek, or it's not understood from the "but we love your work so much, how can you say no?" perspective. But in the end it's how I pay the bills and feed my kids. I hope this provides some insight in why I had to say "no."

[kesumi]

thank KaVir, that sheds some light on the subject for me. Though, after reading that I still hold plenty of hope that my project will be approved, even if held on a tight leash.

Is anyone aware of the current state of Riftmush?

[KaVir]

Originally Posted by thank KaVir, that sheds some light on the subject for me. Though, after reading that I still hold plenty of hope that my project will be approved, even if held on a tight leash.

The world of Midkemia would make a wonderful setting for a mud, but you really should think carefully before going ahead with it, even if you do gain permission. Do you really want to put countless hours of time and effort into something that Mr Feist could turn around at any point and say "I'm creating a commercial mud now, so you're going to have to delete your work"?

This seems particularly a shame as you're building your game from the ground up, rather than deriving it from an existing codebase. Thus I would suggest that if you go ahead with this, you create the game engine in such a way that it has NOTHING to do with the world of Midkemia, and that the game world stuff is simply slotted in. That way if you suddenly lose permission to use the Midkemia setting, at least you don't lose all of your work.

[Brody]

I think the only people with permission to make games using the Midkemia theme right now would be Iron Realms Entertainment - unless that agreement with Feist has fallen through.

[the_logos]

Brody is correct, and we would not permit anyone else to build a MUD based on Midkemia. RIFTMush, incidentally, is no longer operational and will not be coming back.

--matt

[Gromble]

Originally Posted by (the_logos @ Oct. 22 2005,14:43) ...we would not permit anyone else to build a MUD based on Midkemia...

This is unfortunate for the mudding community and, IMO, short sighted on the part of the author.

It's unfortunate for the mudding community because the author's works will be limited to IRE's interpretation and implementation. I'm not saying the product will be inferior, but now the imagination and innovation applied to these works by third-parties will never be realized.

It's short-sighted of the author because, let's face it, the revenue stream generated by this text-mud enterprise isn't going to be significant - it's a niche market of a niche market of a niche market. Personally, I think it makes far more business sense to get broader exposure for his works through as many mud's as possible with the reasonable expectation that the exposure will translate in more sales of his publications.

The author need not forgoe his rights in doing so, simply by requiring and ensuring mud implementors have his permission. This is actually to his benefit as he can maintain some degree of quality control to protect his "brand".

Just my thoughts on this type of exclusive licensing.

[the_logos]

Originally Posted by (Gromble @ Oct. 24 2005,00:18) It's short-sighted of the author because, let's face it, the revenue stream generated by this text-mud enterprise isn't going to be significant - it's a niche market of a niche market of a niche market. Personally, I think it makes far more business sense to get broader exposure for his works through as many mud's as possible with the reasonable expectation that the exposure will translate in more sales of his publications.

The thing is, if it's a niche market of a niche market of a niche market (which it is) and thus won't generate much revenue for him because of the tiny size of the market, then letting people develop at will is going to be quite ineffective at exposing people to his publications, as it will reach only a relatively few people via said tiny market.

Anyway, it's his decision, of course, and he's in a better position to decide what's important to him and how he's likely to achieve that than we are.

--matt

[Delerak]

I'll make a mud based on Midlukemia(sp?) just to spite you all. I bet you couldn't get me to take it down either.

[Hephos]

Originally Posted by (Delerak @ Oct. 24 2005,03:51) I'll make a mud based on Midlukemia(sp?) just to spite you all. I bet you couldn't get me to take it down either.

Ohh i bet they could.

And damn, i wanna build a midkemia mud too! I Read the some of the books recently and they were nice (The ones about talon of the silver hawk).

[Delerak]

How much you want to bet? I'll get a good european server and tell you to #### off and laugh while doing it. You people think you can stop this?! No one can stop this!

[Maelgrim]

Hundreds of thousands of shudderworthy fan-fics of almost every created world in written and visual media, and the one aspect that has the potential to be well written and immersive gets shot down. And not just for commercial release, but for free-to-play also.

I freakin wonder about the world sometimes.

At least he had the decency to write himself. I'd have expected some rabid attourney.

But I'm a cynical bastard.

[Valg]

Originally Posted by (Delerak @ Oct. 24 2005,03:51) I'll make a mud based on Midlukemia(sp?) just to spite you all. I bet you couldn't get me to take it down either.

I hereby trademark the name "Midthievia"™ (no relation to Medthievia™) for use in the ironic debate about intellectual property rights that would follow.  I will grant the right to use it so long as the trailing ™ is included.

[the_logos]

Originally Posted by (Delerak @ Oct. 24 2005,05:53) How much you want to bet? I'll get a good european server and tell you to #### off and laugh while doing it. You people think you can stop this?! No one can stop this!

A Midkemia MUD running on stolen IP wouldn't be the first MUD in Europe that I've had shut down. They have laws and lawyers to assist in dealing with the laws there too you know!

--matt

[Delerak]

Hahaha. You think you can shut me down? I'm going to put a midkemia mud up right now and start adding it to databases. I guess I should read the books.