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Terms of Professional and Amateur to differentiate MUDs is and can serve as a loaded-attempt to institute positive and negative association on the MUDs, and individuals associated with them, subjected to such terms. Professional, due to people's incorrect understanding of the full definition of the word, is associated with a positive image while amateur is not. Professional doesn't really mean quality in every context, though many assume as much.
Likewise, the definition of a professional is highly questionable when it comes to games of all sorts, not just MUDs. The most skilled professional I know in the computer industry had no degree in the field (well, actually, he just graduated so now he does have the degree) yet had the capabilities and skills to an extent that made them more proficient than the entire computing department at the University he was getting his degree from (he dropped out of college, his degree program at the time was also non-computer-related, and started working professionally doing daily what a team of six people normally did and doing it in half the time they would have taken). Even before he was hired, he had a greater skill than those who were both "qualified" and already working in the field.
And there's more to a MUD than just the code. Do all the commercial MUDs out there employ professional economists, historians, anthropologists, sociologists, architects, linguists, etc. to design their world? Unlikely they employ even one, much less all. So, they're only professional so far as they're paid. Outside of a paycheck (or whatever substitute they receive), they're just as, if not more, unqualified as anyone else working on any other MUD when it comes to those aspects of the game.
And besides, if I were to pay my staff $0.01, would they suddenly become professionals and not amateurs, even if they were so incompetant that they couldn't spell their own name correctly 3 out of 5 times? (fortunately, they all can spell their name correctly 5 out of 5 times...I tested them! *grin*)
However, commercial denotes something's relation to the purpose of commerce, ie. the buying and selling of commodities. In other words, it's about the money. The use of the term commercial to denote any MUD which is operating for that purpose would therefore be accurate.
Now, to differentiate different commercial models would also be nice, as it would offer those visiting the site a greater idea of what they're looking at. But the use of "professional" and "amateur" would just serve as an attempt to denigrate those MUDs, and those who create and run them, that operate for the love of the medium, not the love of money.
Take care,
Jason
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