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Jazuela · 12-31-2005, 08:00 AM

To mud administrators, this is definitely a traffic exchange. But to players of muds, who have no stake in which games succeed and which fail, no vested interest in which games bring traffic here and which don't, this is a resource. It's where we come to look for available games that suit our interests. And isn't it interesting, there are VASTLY more players than there are mud administrators. Thing is, it's the admins who are the most vocal and prolific on this forum, which is only one part of the website. The biggest part, the most obvious part, the part that people see most prominently when they come for the first time, is the list itself.

This is why I offered the suggestion of splitting the list into two sections. Side by side, with the commercial games on the left and the non-commercial games on the right. That way, no one gets "front and center" except those who pay for the banner ads at the top, which is as it should be anyway.

It has nothing to do with communism. It has to do with the function of this website from the perspective of the *majority* of visitors - the players themselves.

I, and most of the people I know personally who mud, came to Topmudsites for the first time because we were looking for a mud to play. Not because we had any desire to bring traffic to the site. Our game wasn't even listed, so it was impossible to use the voting system to come here. We were trying to find out what was available as an alternative to what we were already playing. This is just a dozen or two of people I personally know. The 11th person that I know, of this group, might know another dozen or two people. The 14th person of this group might know another dozen or two people. Do some guestimate work and add it all up, and you've got a couple hundred people all coming to Topmudsites who are NOT using it as a traffic exchange. And that's just in -my- circle of "people I know". Grab a couple percentage points of the entire mudlist's playerbase, and you can easily be well into the thousands of people who come here because they're looking for new games to play, and NOT because they want to promote a traffic exchange.

Topmudsites IS a listing service, a resource for mudders. It's one of the two most prominent ones on the internet for English-speaking people (and for many who speak English as a second language).

If you ditched all "resource" capabilities and left in 'only' the traffic exchange capabilities, this website would very quickly become either totally vacant of substance, or become the "Iron Realms Secondary Website," since their players comprise the majority of people who click on their own site's little button to come here.

12-31-2005, 08:00 AM	#85
Jazuela Senior Member Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: New England Posts: 849	To mud administrators, this is definitely a traffic exchange. But to players of muds, who have no stake in which games succeed and which fail, no vested interest in which games bring traffic here and which don't, this is a resource. It's where we come to look for available games that suit our interests. And isn't it interesting, there are VASTLY more players than there are mud administrators. Thing is, it's the admins who are the most vocal and prolific on this forum, which is only one part of the website. The biggest part, the most obvious part, the part that people see most prominently when they come for the first time, is the list itself. This is why I offered the suggestion of splitting the list into two sections. Side by side, with the commercial games on the left and the non-commercial games on the right. That way, no one gets "front and center" except those who pay for the banner ads at the top, which is as it should be anyway. It has nothing to do with communism. It has to do with the function of this website from the perspective of the majority of visitors - the players themselves. I, and most of the people I know personally who mud, came to Topmudsites for the first time because we were looking for a mud to play. Not because we had any desire to bring traffic to the site. Our game wasn't even listed, so it was impossible to use the voting system to come here. We were trying to find out what was available as an alternative to what we were already playing. This is just a dozen or two of people I personally know. The 11th person that I know, of this group, might know another dozen or two people. The 14th person of this group might know another dozen or two people. Do some guestimate work and add it all up, and you've got a couple hundred people all coming to Topmudsites who are NOT using it as a traffic exchange. And that's just in -my- circle of "people I know". Grab a couple percentage points of the entire mudlist's playerbase, and you can easily be well into the thousands of people who come here because they're looking for new games to play, and NOT because they want to promote a traffic exchange. Topmudsites IS a listing service, a resource for mudders. It's one of the two most prominent ones on the internet for English-speaking people (and for many who speak English as a second language). If you ditched all "resource" capabilities and left in 'only' the traffic exchange capabilities, this website would very quickly become either totally vacant of substance, or become the "Iron Realms Secondary Website," since their players comprise the majority of people who click on their own site's little button to come here.