Making MUSH of the Brain

Posted on August 2, 2004 in Online Gaming Silicon Valley

I had a brief discussion with a friend who had been through something of what I had been through. The two of us had been “gods” of MUSHes or “Multi-User Shared Hallucination” — a variety of game server which allowed for its users to create personal objects and appearances. Together we reflected on what we didn’t like about the environment. It’s not dissimilar to other web and net environments where a single individual runs a special piece of script allowing for creative input from the users. And for pretty much the same reasons, it puts extreme stress on the users and the caretaker.

I was a “god” of the MUSH known as Darkweb for about a year and a half. In the course of this time, I shared an addiction to drama which went beyond the role-playing that we supposedly gathered for. The boundaries between the real and the unreal blurred for me and more so for many of the players.

MUSH gods commonly get into it because they have been elsewhere and decided for themselves that they can do it better. Often they’ve stood up against a person who has driven her or himself so crazy that every code breakdown and every dissent becomes identified with a personal attack — more than that, actually. Words become weapons and the temptation of power overwhelming.

As a god, you gain the power to “kill” people by destroying their accounts. Because so many people come to identify with their characters so much, this becomes problematic. The addiction to drama which I mentioned figures into the offline life. People hold grudges for petty slights. It becomes a game to crash the server. Small minds who have no life of their own become obsessed with capturing the server from you. You worry if the money you put into the environment is worth it. And there is always that temptation of power, the desire to use the ability to destroy the hard work of others or expropriate it for yourself.

What gets lost in MUSH is the sense of a roleplaying game. Perhaps part of the trouble is the classic “I hurt those who I can’t see” mentality that invades some brains when they sit down at a computer keyboard. Part of the trouble is that it is difficult to “qualify” people for play and still maintain a healthy population for interactions. The god — who came there for the joy of the game — often finds her or himself mired down in dismal politicking. Accusations fly whenever you make a decision. At times, you lose your temper. If you are smart, you apologize. But you do not give up your power.

I’ve seen this situation destroy many many fine people. It worked its evil on me, but not so completely that I couldn’t wake up one day and walk away. The insane wars that were waged over nothing, the gossip, and the jealousies sliced into my backbone and filleted me repeatedly. You never know who is attacking until word or pictures from an eyewitness reach you. Too often you discovered that some of your worst self-positioned enemies and, yea, even your friends, concealed drug habits, alcoholism, sexual predation, failed marriages, mental illness, depression, and child neglect. One couple who hectored me particularly badly used to mock me for not having children. A mutual friend went to visit them at their home in Soccoro, New Mexico. During the entire time she visited, these champions of parenthood stayed on the computer. Their guests were forced to go out for their own meals. They watched as the children of this couple begged for attention and received none. “Mommy, tell me a story,” said one child. Mommy was too busy fighting her all-important wars on the MUSH, fighting me and any other god who didn’t let her and her husband bend the rules any which way they desired.

If you are going to run this kind of environment, I think there are several things which you must keep in mind. I did some of these things right (*) and some wrong:

• Share the burden with others. Get help.*
• Remember that everyone who contributes to the game deserves your thanks. Everyone who writes a piece of code, makes an interesting character, deserves your thanks. Money alone does not drive any online organization. It is a mistake to disparage nonmonetary contributions.*
• Respect the creative property rights of others. Get permission for anything you use. Know your copyright law.*
• Apologize when you are wrong.* You are human after all.
• Don’t view critics as enemies. 1/2*
• Don’t take personal attacks from users personally. They don’t know you.
• Don’t make the mistake of ceding power when you apologize unless it is necessary for your sanity. An apology is only a concession of error on one count. It does not make you wrong about everything.
• Take the concerns of parents seriously.*
• Take plebiscites of your users on important questions.*
• Don’t impose anything on your users without their consent or, if you must act unilaterally, without giving them the ability to opt out.*
• Acknowledge the need for changes but pace yourself in implementing them. 1/2*
• As you stand for the rights of others to their intellectual property, so, too you must stand for your own rights.*
• Let people have their say. I believe that nothing marks an asshole better than letting him speak for himself. If you censor him, it probably goes to show that he might have been right about you. You can ban him, but leave the evidence standing.*
• Give out positions not as favors but because people can truly help. 1/2*

Over all, I believe that I acted fairly. I shared power. I encouraged self-development. The code my programmers created was turned into Open Source. My temper got the better of me, but at least I knew to apologize. And I learned some hard lessons about a particular subculture of control freaks. When I saw that it was either become like them or remain sane, I chose my sanity.

Since leaving MUSH, I have seen similar situations elsewhere. I feel nothing but sympathy for the owners of such sites, driven mad by the ongoing drama and pressure to produce. Some of them have gone so crazy that they do not know their friends or their enemies. A few knew to let go, to not make war. The legend of obsession with power is common to the medium. I suggest that it is only a legend. Most gods are not concerned with power over others: what they dread most is loss of power over their own time. The trap that many fall in is that they set out in the spirit of fun. But that is soon robbed by the conflicting creative demands of those who come to the place. You cannot, as in blog, simply tell the person to get his own site. You either need to compromise, open source your code, or become a tyrant. The smart people do one of the first two things. The foolish opt for the third and pay the price in self-respect and destruction of the dignity of their users.

After MUSH, I turned to designing my own web sites and, ultimately, to blogging and photography. I based my life online on the lessons I had learned: You cannot depend on others for your happiness. You must be yourself in all things. That is my word to those who struggle to create creative communities. Show compassion for yourself. Be a person, not a god. All else will fall into place.