FEichinger's story.

FEichinger

Feb 7, 2013 18:08

So, then, this is gonna be 12 lines of chat. Wheeeeeeeeee.

Mahesh

:) thanks..

FEichinger

A little over ten years ago, I "discovered" the Internet. That was still the era of animated gif website backgrounds and LSD-contrasts in websites, mind you.

It started with a relatively large German online tabletop community. I was pretty young at that time, but I kinda missed an opportunity to get fellow kids together, both forums and the so-called Meta-Game were lacking in regards to children. So, at first, I contacted staff via forum messages, suggesting to, maybe get something like that up, to give a little corner specifically to kids.

jokerdino

All the people in US: buy more stuff from target.com so I can get the latest android phone as gift from my sister

(she works on the database backend of target.com through outsourcing)

uhm, TMI?

FEichinger

A few months later, we had our annual tabletop con in Munich, where they had a booth. Since I kinda hadn't heard anything from then in a while, I thought I'd talk to one of the Admins I recognized by handle.

Marco Ceppi

I live right next to a target. So, I probably won't be doing that.

FEichinger

Feb 7, 2013 18:09

Turns out, the day before, they had set up a forum, and given me mod privileges. For the next four to five years, I was actively playing, talking, keeping track of new people, helping others on the tutoring system, and trying to set up a "town" for kids within the game.

That was when it turned sour. It began with us not finding enough people who would be responsible and serious enough - seeing how we wanted to keep it as controlled, yet with as few intervention from adults as possible - to get it running. Then I had technical problems preventing me from getting into the actual game. Years of inactivity went by, until some people started a new attempt.

jokerdino

@MarcoCeppi oh :/

FEichinger

Said new attempt actually involved me. I was asked, if I wanted to take on a role, since I had come back to the in-game activity shortly before that. Then there was the community-elected person in charge of "accepting" new towns, who required us to get a dedicated team of adults to prevent abuse - which was fully reasonable.

At that time child abductions and the such were growing in Germany. I didn't accept the decision to put them in charge of the town, though, rather than being supportive. So, I stepped out, making my point quite harshly, while the others proceeded to creating it, with a replacement person out of the "godparent" (as they called themselves) crowd.

A few weeks later, the whole town went to hell when the godparents decided to take all leading positions, and - obviously - the kids kinda didn't like it. Some heated discussions and defamations, and I ended up leaving for good, my moderator position being taken by one of the godparents.

Next, there was a niche game with great potential. This game was first launched in 2005. It had, since then, been shut down, and relaunched a while after. I joined a few months after the open beta of the relaunch had ended. The game itself had potential, but it suffered from a low population and a very very steep learning curve. It was - at that time - nearly entirely player-driven, as opposed to being a classic MMO.

jokerdino

Hm, what's going on @FEichinger?

FEichinger

Well, this player-driven aspect also included elaborate politics, which resulted in the in-game military staging a coup d'état, removing the government and causing general mayhem for a month. That was the best time that game had seen in years.

jokerdino

I blame @Mahesh.

FEichinger

Feb 7, 2013 18:10

Staff didn't like it, though. Everyone who got involved, got punished for it, yet the result was accepted - the government was removed, we had anarchy. Well, with no government, the game turned stale. There was hardly any "real" conflict, and noone really cared anymore. People left. Many people left. The lowest population this game had ever seen. It was in that state for an entire year, also because no patches were rolled out.

jokerdino

It looks like your autobiography.

FEichinger

Then, the publisher took over development, while the original developer worked on different projects and subsequently joined the new Infernum publishing company, alongside many Frogster veterans. During this time, I got involved with the community a lot.

jokerdino

(jk)

FEichinger

I began advancing within the community, made a name, and provided insight on various development topics. Nexeon, a few months later, started a VIP program. A way to get leading community members - including myself - involved in the development process, by using them as free Quality Assurance. We were given patch notes to discuss and evaluate, and had some of the upcoming plans to discuss.

jrg

@FEichinger so you're saying that you burnt your hand.

FEichinger

Feb 7, 2013 18:12

A few weeks before that started, suspicious punishments happened. Whenever anyone discussed the still very low population, or criticized patches, got suspended or banned. Staff abused their privileges in-game, placed themselves in charge of factions with godmode characters, the community started to rebel.

Among them, a user that had very much renown in the community, for both great suggestions, great leadership and a long history, way longer than mine. Well, he got permabanned from the forums by staff. It took him three days to get the ban lifted through the pretty reasonable forum admin. Once he was back, he put a post up, yet again criticizing Nexeon and announcing he would leave for good. He did.

jrg

oh man, you burnt your hand, hard.

FEichinger

As did I, when exactly the same happened to me, a week after. I don't recall exactly what it was that got me banned, but as far as I remember, I complained about how the recent patches pretty much negated a full suggestion of mine that had gained much community acclaim. I left for good and I haven't come back to this day.

In recent times, I have been involved with a large Star Trek gaming group, a bit on the forums of the Escapist, and a couple of people here and there, nothing I'm majorly involved, though.

So, those were the gaming parts ... As for programming, I'm a Web Developer, and I have, for the most part, built stuff on my own. I didn't collaborate with people much, because it usually took more time introducing them to the system, than building what they'd need to build on my own. Crowdsourcing and Open Source on the other hand is something I support, but don't feel like doing for such projects, which, essentially were intended commercially. So, I kept to myself, tinkered with it.

Yet, I do get involved. Or, at least I'm more or less trying to. I'm pretty active on Codecademy now, trying to get people into it and using it as a brain-refresher and teaching tool every now and then. And I'm slowly growing into it, participating in meta groups and sometimes answering questions on course-Q&A.

I wouldn't say that I've gotten the hang of it there yet, since I came back to it just a few weeks ago, but it's a site I always loved for its idea, it just lacked in execution the first time I was around (a year or two ago, I think) - and offered no way of helping to improve it.

The End. :P

Everyone who commented in-between, the answers to your stuff are in the edit history.

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