Multiplayer without the player?

Brad Wardell (of drengin.net) has some interesting thoughts on multiplayer, and what to do about the fact that most people who play online are assholes. You heard me. Assholes. I know it, you know it. Unfortunately, it's a heck of a lot easier for a developer to program network code than legitimate AI, so more and more we find ourselves shelling out our $50 for the "pleasure" of spending time online with the Legions of anonymous 15 year-old megalomaniacal jerks.

Speaking of anonymous jerks... if you head over to Something Awful, you can sample the vitriol that oozes out of someone when their tolerance for mean, selfish behavior gets breached. I don't blame him one bit. Rock on, brother! (note: since I suspect that his perfectly appropriate verbal gesture is going to get replaced at some point, I'll include the full text in the extended portion of this post.)

From www.somethingawful.com on 20010926:

I LOVE THE INTERNET

The server can't stay up under the current enormous load of people visiting Something
Awful. SA has been crashing up to four times a day now due to the sheer number
of people visiting the site and has had downtime periods of up to 10 hours a
day. Since I don't run ads on the site (and even if I did I wouldn't earn any
money from them), I really can't afford to buy a new supercomputer webserver
that can handle the load of people visiting a free entertainment site which
Zack and I run solely as a hobby. I don't know what will happen next, but currently
the server is in ruins because of all the traffic SA gets and it takes (on average)
over seven minutes to load a page. I am tired of calling to get the server rebooted
four times a day and having to wait on hold for up to an hour each time.

So instead of having more people come to this site and send me angry emails
demanding I "FIX THE FUKING SERVER U FAG. PS: UR NOT FUNNY AND UR SITE
SUX U FAG" and bitching that they want their free entertainment faster
and more efficiently, I'm replacing the site with this message. Enjoy, and welcome
to the New Internet Economy!

- Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka

PS: If you want to donate
money to the "Get a Fuking Good Server U Fag" fund, you can do so
here, but I think we all know that accepting donations isn't a permanent
solution to the current pathetic mess that the Internet embodies. If I get enough
money I'll buy a new server and this crisis will be moved a half-year further
away, at which point the eventual increased traffic to SA will cause it once
again to crash four times a day.

PPS: If you've got a gripe with me asking for donations, you can cram
it and shove your 14-year-old, "Rage Against the Machine" fanclub-member,
greasy-ass bloated skull into the garbage disposal. I've been with three different
ad networks in the past two years, and over that time I've been scammed out
of over $40,000. Zack and I write this site for free, taking all our spare time
to provide you with entertainment and ask nothing in return. If you want to
continue to read the site, some of you will have to donate so we can afford
a decent server to handle your traffic.

The term "Internet advertising" is a oxymoron and the only sites
out there able to stay afloat are ones that throw thousands of XXX-porn popups
all over your screen like bloody vomit from a drunken hobo's mouth. I have no
interest in displaying countless "HOT TEEN CUMSHOTS" ads on every
page of this site and I am sure you do not either. I guess that's a mistake
on my part since those will eventually be the only sites left in a year.

PPPS: If you're a slimy Internet ad marketing asshole who has a proposal
for me to harvest my users' email addresses so you can spam the unholy hell
out of them, I am going to kindly request that you make your head explode. I
have no interest in selling the email accounts of people who visit my site so
you can swamp them with thousands of "WHAT'S NEW! BUY OUR SHIT" emails
every second. I hate you and would like to see your various limbs get eaten
away by industrial acid. In fact, if you have ANY ad schemes for me to "make
money quick," you should probably delete your email and instead use your
free time to resubscribe to your anthropomorphic transsexual micro-fetish furry
pay site. You guys are balls of compressed phlegm and I don't want anything
to do with you.