Somethings that bug me about the BZ1 community...

[Firestorm29]

"BAN List Recommendations: Battlezones worst offenders"
So how does posts about what a few hackers did effect you?
What is illegal there?

Last time i saw a picture of spock, he looked a little different.

"battlezone1.net/wall/"
Ok it has pictures and a state, was the pictures available else where online?
I still see nothing illegal.

It also has his name not to mention it seems like public knowledge about at least his work, and I've had people slip me in PMs about Dx's work and such. Not to mention I've seen things posted in chats about someone shop lifting or something like that. I also remember being reading about the Privacy Law of 1971 which at least bans the use of atleast two methods of identification, which would include things like living areas and pictures. I'm quite sure at least that law is still in effect for those who runs things like servers.

[General BlackDragon]

In america, perhaps...

[Apollo]

Privacy Law of 1971 hmm.. I don't think that applies to the internets, they don't even apply to any businesses that sell everyones private info.

Whoes real name? Spock said it's not his name or picture, spork released his info, Harrison's info is on public records anyone can get online.

"someone shop lifting or something like that"
This sounds like nonsence, anyhow i still don't see what any of this has to do with you in the slightest.

If you go into other games i'm sure you'll see similar. Many clan servers have odd rules etc...

EDIT:
I'm awear of one business that if they find their software on a file share they release the full name and location of the person whoes name bought the software and publicly berate them.

[HitchcockGreen]

Yes, I recall our conversation about a third, "neutral" server, Firestorm. It wouldn't break the bank. You can do it easily for about $27/month U.S.

I played around with one for a couple of months.

The issue I see there is that no one will ever see it as being truly neutral, no matter what effort you put in to that effect. You know it would likely still be excluded from the bz1.net installer. That's their prerogative.
A third server, which may very well require it's own installer, may only further fracture the community.
Or maybe it wouldn't. For the price to get it up and running (it'd be really easy to run both anet and your forum software on the same VPS for that same monthly price) it would be worth a test, I guess.

Personally, I don't see any issue with having three, four, five, ten servers.

As for rumours and back talk....well that's been going on for a loooooong time.
The bz1.net wall of shame used to be much worse, IIRC, before it was forced off the forum and onto a different host.

[Zax]

Remember, if you don't have a pic of yourself available for his wall of shame, he'll give you one. At least one that I know of pic is guaranteed fake. I won't say who to not undermine anyone

[General BlackDragon]

Sorry, allow me to correct this sentence...

The issue I see there is that no one will ever see it.

[Firestorm29]

Privacy Law of 1971 hmm.. I don't think that applies to the internets, they don't even apply to any businesses that sell everyones private info.

Whoes real name? Spock said it's not his name or picture, spork released his info, Harrison's info is on public records anyone can get online.

"someone shop lifting or something like that"
This sounds like nonsence, anyhow i still don't see what any of this has to do with you in the slightest.

If you go into other games i'm sure you'll see similar. Many clan servers have odd rules etc...

EDIT:
I'm awear of one business that if they find their software on a file share they release the full name and location of the person whoes name bought the software and publicly berate them.

If I'm quoting the law right, it applies to anyone that has access to one's private info. I think it applies to only owners and admins, which would mean while Spock doesn't own the BZ1.net server, whoever does maybe sitting on a time bomb.

My viewpoint isn't about these abuses, being illegal or not, affecting me personally. I personally don't have much to hide, either in real life nor in the BZ world. Like I said above, it can be a major turn-off for those who would be my target audience. The work I would place into making the Let's Play and possible FAQ to show tricks and such would be a complete waste if the shooting around of, even if it's fake info, could still cause many to be quite disturbed and turned off by this. Like I said before, Blizzard with Starcraft 2 almost lost a massive chunk of their player base trying to use RealID. Plus, how would the newcomer know this info floating around is fake? I'm trying to view this with what I've seen with big name games since there's a good chance they will see and could want to play BZ.

I've been in other communities and servers other than BZ, like Mechwarrior 4, Starcraft 1 and 2, Touhou, visited Sonic and Megaman forums, and I've played quite a few online console games. I haven't seen someone's info used the way it is in the BZ2 community, real or fake.

Yes, I recall our conversation about a third, "neutral" server, Firestorm. It wouldn't break the bank. You can do it easily for about $27/month U.S.

I played around with one for a couple of months.

The issue I see there is that no one will ever see it as being truly neutral, no matter what effort you put in to that effect. You know it would likely still be excluded from the bz1.net installer. That's their prerogative.
A third server, which may very well require it's own installer, may only further fracture the community.
Or maybe it wouldn't. For the price to get it up and running (it'd be really easy to run both anet and your forum software on the same VPS for that same monthly price) it would be worth a test, I guess.

Personally, I don't see any issue with having three, four, five, ten servers.

As for rumours and back talk....well that's been going on for a loooooong time.
The bz1.net wall of shame used to be much worse, IIRC, before it was forced off the forum and onto a different host.

The problem is I don't have that much breathing room at the moment to comfortably support a server, I should pretty soon though.

When I say neutral, I mean I'm going to try and make all efforts to either strain out the politics or allow it only under certain conditions. As far as installers are concerned, I was kicking around either linking to all know installers, or just host them, which may be the only way to allow the users to access all the servers. Basically, I'm going to try and take an approach where I'm not going to hide anything. I'm going to point out BZ1.net, I'm going to point out BZC, BzE, BZ 1998, and whatever alphabet soup you want to through at me. I'll allow discussion as long as it's civil. I won't allow things like trying to convince the userbase I'll host to be advertised to one or the other being evil or trying to destroy BZ. I hope this makes sense.

In america, perhaps...

The only thing that matters is where the server is, the owner can be in another country and still be persued under US law if their US server is performing illegal activity. That's why Wikileaks is not in the US.

[HitchcockGreen]

Sorry, allow me to correct this sentence...

The issue I see there is that no one will ever see it.

Lol. I sort of danced around that point but I think everyone knows that'd be the case.
which is why I said it'd likely require yet another installer.

[Firestorm29]

Sorry, allow me to correct this sentence...

The issue I see there is that no one will ever see it.

Lol. I sort of danced around that point but I think everyone knows that'd be the case.
which is why I said it'd likely require yet another installer.

Depends how you go about it. As far as I know, BZ 1998 still uses the original session ID number, so if someone turns off that write protect, if is still exists... So, I don't think it's required... Personally, I'd like to avoid needing yet another installer to access another portion of the fanbase is possible. I don't want people to requires 3 different installs to play the game in another server, it makes servers lists pointless.

[General BlackDragon]

Nobody needs another installer, they just need to make sure their server.dat isn't set to "read only", thats all

[Apollo]

Mechwarrior 4, i have that sitting around and never played it, do you know if the models can be ported to and from MW4?

Well if you make a server i'll help out on the technical end as much or as little as you need but if you make use of an installer, i would hope you try a small patch that applies to the cd installer, only add needed files, no mods like BZ1998 etc. The stock game should be supported over all others. Any patch should not be an illegal one.

"evil or trying to destroy BZ"
The evil Spock picture i'm sure is on the net somewhere...
As far as destroying Bz goes, the bz1.net/org guys keep banning everyone for no reason and still wonder why there are less and less players, need i say more? I hope you make a server that has no server bans, just like Activision.

[HitchcockGreen]

I don't see any reason for bans at all unless someone is going to extreme lengths to disrupt the server (i.e. DoS attacks on the server itself). Given that there would likely be a few that show up only to drive players off I'm curious to hear how you might handle that, Firestorm.

Mechwarrior 4, i have that sitting around and never played it, do you know if the models can be ported to and from MW4?

Thinking walker upgrade?

[Firestorm29]

Mechwarrior 4, i have that sitting around and never played it, do you know if the models can be ported to and from MW4?

Well if you make a server i'll help out on the technical end as much or as little as you need but if you make use of an installer, i would hope you try a small patch that applies to the cd installer, only add needed files, no mods like BZ1998 etc. The stock game should be supported over all others. Any patch should not be an illegal one.

"evil or trying to destroy BZ"
The evil Spock picture i'm sure is on the net somewhere...
As far as destroying Bz goes, the bz1.net/org guys keep banning everyone for no reason and still wonder why there are less and less players, need i say more? I hope you make a server that has no server bans, just like Activision.

It maybe some time before I start this server. It's part of a plan I made with someone, I need to PM him to be sure if it's ok to release what I want to do. I'm sure it'll be ok, just a courtesy thing.

Welp, those individual files still exist on the internet. 1.4 patch, large assets, the patch for the .dll that controls connections for better broadband service, and I think the patch to silence the MAG. If you've never played BZ from an patch not made with Dx's MAG sound file patch, you'll find yourself announcing to the whole neighborhood "I'm CHARGIN MAH LAZAH!!". It's that bad.

Bans are going to have to exist, Eddy was/still is doing a banless server, the problem is that allows trolls and such to run rampant. The internet has changed very much over the 12 years since this version of Anet was release. The things is, you shouldn't ask for a banless server, what you should be asking for is a server that is responsible with it's bans and uses them only when appropriate.

Personally though, I'd love to have a better option than IP bans, which was a goal of my plan to build an anti-posing program, but it's spiraling out of control because I want to release it for others to use and I keep on finding vulnerabilities that others would exploit. It's getting to the point where it turning more into a professional type of program, much outside my level of programming. I really dislike the idea of IP bans since it's more like carpet bombing a town to take out a drug house. A smart-bomb would be better, if I had one.

As far as Mechwarrior 4 is concerned, you'll have to ask the guys at MekTek. They're the ones keeping Mechwarrior 4: Mercs going. I'd recommend giving Mech 4 a go if you haven't, it plays better online because of a large graphics tone down, and things are a bit more simplified from the past series.

...

Mechwarrior 4, i have that sitting around and never played it, do you know if the models can be ported to and from MW4?

Thinking walker upgrade?

Mad Cat vs Grlzzlies and Thunderbolts, now there's a sight to see! XD

[SnakeEye]

is there really a need for yet another anet server when we already have 3?

[Psychedelic Rhino]

I skimmed over the thread and it reminds me of the dozens of threads I've seen before regarding the damage 2 or 3 individuals have done since 2004.

However at this point in time, I really don't see a point in stirring up the fecal matter again. For all practical purposes, there's no one playing now, either on the 911 servers or "the other one". I, and others, have done mass emails a few times now and the most we get is a small spike of maybe a dozen players that check out the game for a couple weeks and it settles back to around 12 players.

This thread may be relevant if someone has plans to market/expose BZ1.5 or BZE to new people. If so, I'd love to hear about it.

Most, if not all, of the players left playing at the 911 servers know the history of the troublemakers and how to deal with them. I haven't played on 'the other server' for 2 years now, and that has pretty much solved my issues with those individuals. The only nonsense since leaving, is the owner of 'the other server' coming into the BZE lobby and stirring up angst, but I haven't seen that in a year or more.