unforum

[krystyn]

[ThaJinx]

[imbri]

Re: dumbwaiter

[Phaedra]

Well, okay, so the question becomes:

What do we do about it?

So far, we've been asking for a sort of unorganized altruism -- people who do not frequent IRC have put out general pleas for people who do to keep the forums updated.

There's been a little improvement, I think, but not a great deal, and clearly not enough in terms of people who aren't in IRC feeling involved.

So, maybe we need a more organized effort.

This is just an opening suggestion, and I'd love for someone else to improve/refine it, but here goes:

What if we had two pairs of people coordinating updating the forum with what happens in chat during update periods? I think we'd need pairs, because for one person alone to be bouncing back and forth between the forum and chat would probably make them miss a lot of what happens in IRC during updates.

Basically, what I'm thinking of is one person in IRC would be watching the channel and summarizing, via private query, for another person, who would then be describing that summary on the forum and reading comments on the forum and relaying anything helpful there to IRC.

I say two pairs of people 1) because I prefer redundancy in my systems, and 2) because updates can stretch out for a pretty long time.

This won't, unfortunately, completely solve the problem -- the forums would still be slightly behind chat, but as chat is a real-time interaction medium and the forums are not, I don't think a slight lag is avoidable.

Perhaps -- and I'm not trying to make more work for you, Jinxie, just to have a single, centralized coordination center for this Saturday, and while I won't be here on Saturday afternoon, I'll be happy to help in any way I can prior to Saturday -- we could combine this with the IRC-graveyard coordination by the Legion of Spectres?

[krystyn]

[krystyn]

FWIW - I am not currently proposing a system of organization, because I think that the stuff that's beginning to crystallize organically is really great - it's quite amazing what can occur when people are really listening to each other and taking their cues from the whole experience, rather than just their part.

Man, I sure do sound like a commie pinko hippie patchouli peace sign flashin' fool. But it's true. The IRC/DC Graveyard Games communications really stand out in my mind as a good example of what happens when necessity guides us. It was exhausting, even for those of us online, and even remained exciting and fun when we found that the Date of Death puzzle was fubared - we listened to each other, ascertained what was most needed, in that moment, and did it. There were plenty of people on-hand to help explain the current sitch to people just dropping in, too.

I just have had this itchy feelin' since Day 1 that trying to organize around perceived outcomes is going to continue to kick us in the behind. Hard.

[Phaedra]

[rose]

suggestions

[Clayfoot]

A wiki isn't quite right: It's designed to be changed and left that way for awhile. Unfortunately, lots of folks (like me) are forbidden to use IM off network from work. We want something that tracks and preserves all the messages like a forum thread, but with the near realtime immediacy and exchange of IM. It's possible that something like that already exists. This example site is close to what I'm thinking (Thanks to Robogriff for the link):

http://www.themidnightcoders.net/examples/messageserver/chat/mapchatajax.htm

We don't need the Google maps and so forth, but we could use that thin browser client idea to create a logged IM-like environment for rapidly unfolding events.

[rowan]

Re: dumbwaiter

[rose- not logged in]

wiki

[krystyn]

If I could just get my brain into gear, I'd be more involved in the deaddrop wiki for this game. SuperJerms, imbri, and others have been great about doing what they can to make that thing workable and informative. It does need more eyes, though, and a bit more fleshing out.

[johnny5]

I'm completely out of the loop as IM, IRC, and LCP are blocked here, but I'm glad to add an uninformed opinion wherever I can.

1. Saving Matt: I don't see what was so collaborative here. From my vantage point, Ego could have solved it alone as he knew about the floor plan map. Feel free to flail me with enlightenment.

2. Scrollback: Fine if you run mIRC or similar, but has anyone ever tried to scroll back on the UF chat client? It's ~ useless.

3. Saving Matt vs. ILB: I would liken this to the "email the flea" solve where everyone was emailing commands to the flea hoping to get the right combo to free la Princesa. !attach dumbwaiter

feh

[krystyn]

I agree that it was not necessarily a collaborative solve.

However: our adorably flustered Trainee did indeed approach that weird line of meta with me when I called - I hardly even got to say anything about why I called before he launched into some sort of incoherent exclamation of how they had an 'idea,' and then he got frustrated with me and hung up. Even an FBI Trainee should know better than to assume why someone has called, you know? I could've been narc'ing on my neighbors ganking my wireless to download hentai, for all he knew. He never ever asked me specifically what my purpose for calling was, to my recollection.

Before that happened, the conversation was open-ended. Why mention the 'idea' to some random person? Game-wise, it's a cue, right? Again, I am cool with what happened, but the cue I was given led me to believe there was at least some form of collaboration happening.

Finding out well after the fact that much of the problem-solving was happening in IRC was somewhat frustrating, in that light.

I think the event was an interesting one, and I think the people who called and talked to Roger did a great job.

[aliendial]

And PS -- the cloudmakers got Mike Royal to save the Red Knight WITH NO PRIOR TRAINING AT ALL - no prior live interactions whatsoever. Sean Stewart made it up and ran with it.

It caused the same kind of frenzy and people-feeling-left-out-because-they-went-to-lunch while at the same time the people who were on the thread coached each other through more and more calls to make it happen. Forums and IRC were full of nimble resourceful people, and there was then (as there was yesterday) enough people around to capitalize on the opportunity and finally do what the PMs hoped we would. Small window of opportunity. A blip on the plotline that we got to touch. It can only be that much.

Or, to use a more appropriate metaphor - that was the hand, we played it as best we could. Next hand.

I say less second guessing and pointing of fingers and more "hey we saved Matt"!!!!!! And "I helped"!!!! (well, not me, but you know what I mean)