Book Publishing

That makes my soul hurt.

 

It makes me want to write the craziest stuff I can think of.

Really though, I totally understand what you're saying. But you have to remember that in this roleplaying world we're all ourselves and the people of Earth are not really "traditional roleplayers" they're just people. So in that context, I have no problem with it. There will be books and art that is just amazing, and then there will be the 100 volume "Adventures of ElfminsterTehDude". Just like in any roleplayed world, there will be good works and there will be bad (very bad).

 

That's not really the case, though. We're all ourselves and such if we actually role play. One of the precepts of the role playing experience is that we are, in fact, wholly displaced into another world--not just looking into that world through a computer monitor. In the context of the game, tomfoolery and shenanigans should have real consequences, except we can't enforce those consequences due to the limitations of the game and restrictions placed on players.

 

Oh dear.

The TTP on this one will be near instantaneous with ACSII art.

 

I'm sure there will be filters of some sort for anything that may be considered obscene....

 

Fortunately, we possess two of the greatest weapons against ASCII art of all time: variable-width font and trim().

MWAHAHAHA

 

I think that can be easily proven false.

 

We're zapped in cyberspace like Freakazoid,

 

So how about we meet weekly at FireLotus tavern for a good old bookburning?

Which brings me to the next point, if someone writes filth (the bad kind, not the good kind the ladies seem to like) then there should be some ritual like book burning that I can perform in-game which will report it off-game so that Portalarium can remove the writing/printing privileges of that individual.
I'm thinking of things that break real laws. Death threats or the most obvious one being actual copyright infringement, for example printing chapters of BotA.

 

2:10

Then the dude opens his eyes. Seems pretty well in line with what I said.

 

The world that RG has created is one where everyone is roleplaying by default. That's my point. Because we're all "ourselves" we don't lose knowledge of where we came from or who we are. If in the real world we like to watch the Real House Wives and are very concerned about global warming, that doesn't change when we play this game (even if we're roleplaying). We are who we are.

Which is probably the reason that most NPC's will and should HATE Avatars...on the whole we're entirely silly.

 

As far as I know, the Printing Press is intended to printing a single book, NOT push a player book to the loot tables.

And yes, any book created in game will have to adhere to our Terms of Service agreement, which can be reviewed here. As you can see, both plagiarism and obscenity violate those terms.

 

Thanks for clarifying that for us FireLotus!

 

How does a book make it into the loot tables then?

 

Right, but if that's actually the case, there should be forces in that other world that stop us from being complete twats. There will be no such forces in New Britannia--no non-consensual bar brawls, no police (in most places), no looney bins, no Adderall. Those are human elements that NPCs simply can't supply, and since the rules of the game prevent users from enforcing them too, you can't really claim that everyone is role playing. People who let themselves sink into the world of New Britannia and become part of that lore while playing the game will be role playing, even if, like you said, they know and remember where they come from. But the people I'm talking about are the ones who flaunt the fact that its a game and abuse the rules of the game to disrupt the "fun factor" for others. Those people aren't role playing because their characters are well aware that the world in which they find themselves is not real and cannot respond to their transgressions in any meaningful way.

 

Funny!

Really, I do believe "in this world" everyone is roleplaying by default. And there are forces that keep people in line (see Terms of Service, Moderators, Customer Service, Developers, and various mechanics). Look, I'm a roleplayer, and you probably wouldn't mind my brand of roleplaying one bit, so we'll probably see each other in game (hopefully). But in this selective multiplayer world, I don't draw a distinction between roleplayers and non-roleplayer from a social standpoint. I do however draw a line from a mechanic standpoint (the combat and magic system being a perfect example of something that is not designed for roleplaying).

I guess it's just easy for me to see and hear people doing things that have nothing to do with the world of New Britannia and simply say "Tourists" and move on.

 

One way, possibly, is through the Scholars "Sisters Grimm" Contest...

 

Sure, and I think that would be a good way. But I hope it's not the only way.

The people in the Scholars (guild organization, I guess that's what they are) are very talented and good people. But I'd like think they don't have a monopoly on deciding what is good and valuable to read.

I guess it would be nice to see a kind of "green light" program where if enough people recommend a book, Portalarium would consider adding it to the list and giving the author some kind of reward if they accept wide distribution in the game.

 

Perhaps a publishing interface that, for significantly more in-game currency, verifies certain minimum submission requirements are in place, checks for main body text plagiarism, and filters/prevents profanity, before allowing it to be included in the submission queue for approval. Once ruled upon, the player would receive a letter or whatever type of in-game communique is used from the Great Library of Brittany (or some such "governing body") appraising them of the decision. The in-game currency cost would have to be sufficiently high to help prevent the queue from being flooded by those who are just spamming submissions.

 

Good thoughts there. I think that makes sense to have regardless, even for basic personal books.