Admin Burnout and the TMI Dilemma
Tim Cantin
> What should I do with this place?
Scrap it; it's only a game. You worry too much... that's going to kill you
someday. :)
Find a nice home for a tmi.tar.Z for everyone to get a copy of, and rm -rf it
from your system. Then go home, park your butt on the couch, pop a tall,
frosty one and say, "AAaaaaahhhhh!".
-Tim (aka Terminus Est in the LP world)
--
#include "stddisclaimer.h"
/* Tim Cantin {uunet, csnet-relay}!primerd!tim || t...@s35.prime.com
Prime Computer Inc. 10-21, 500 Old Conn. Path, Framingham, MA 01701 (USA) */
flames > /dev/null 2>&1
Adam Beeman
Okay, I place this question before the collective net-mind
because I think outside advice would be helpful...
*** Historical background ***
My friend (Sulam) and I started this MUD almost a year ago. At the time
we were both getting frustrated with mud politics and people arguing about
genres and we also felt very limited by a particular mud admin we had been
working with who wanted to do things a particular way, etc... a whole host
of reasons basically, that brought us to decide to start this new mud...
At the time we started this, LPmud 3.0 was a really new thing and there wasn't
any 3.0 mudlib available on the net at all... Genesis seemed to be taking much
too long and Lars had just put out mudlib.n version 6. Warhammer 2, the mud
we had been working on, seemed to be one of the first native-mode muds,
alongside Borderline, Genesis, and what later became Discworld.
We decided to write a 3.0 mudlib from nearly scratch and support the conversion
that other muds would need to go through, and provide a base mudlib for people
to start with. It was also our hope to create a place of learning, where the
newer dialects of LPC would be taught and developed.
And thus, The MUD Institute (TMI) was born.
From the start, TMI has been an all-wizard mud. Once we had password checking
and some other basics installed, the place was open, with the understanding
that it was still undergoing changes and development, but that we would do our
best to help whoever came on. This apparently must have been either a
fantastic idea or an insanely stupid one, because before we knew it we were
bombarded with "applicants" who wanted to learn LPC, and a few hotshots from
the LP world came along... some of them stayed, others just visited... even
Lars himself logged in a few times as we were just getting started.
Eventually Lars quit working on the LPmud game driver and as his patches
grew more and more infrequent, a group formed on TMI that was intent on making
their own set of changes to the driver, in whatever ways we saw necessary.
We decided to call this driver the MudOS enhanced LPmud game driver, and
wonderful ideas were added.... (can you say "creeping featurism?" :) )
This project moved initially at a very rapid pace, and is now tapering out
to perhaps a final release before some of the primary coders devote their
energy to newer projects... as one said, "We've taken this almost as far
as it can go." There are a number of basic design limitations that we
can't solve without a total rewrite, such as multithreading.
We also put out a "distribution mudlib" for a while, which you can still get
and use, if you can get it working, which while isn't complete can be a very
good base to build a mud from. For a while it was the only one available,
other than mudlib.n, the older 2.4.5, and eventually Discworld and CDlib.
The entire mud has undergone an evolution, clearly, and many ideas came along,
some of which failed miserably and others which we're still using. I
could no doubt write quite a bit more about the mud's history than you want
to read. I'll save that for another time, and get right to the point now.
*** What's going on now ***
Seems like no mud can last forever without changing sites or admins or
general character, and when Sulam and I started TMI there was no politics;
there were people coding, we knew what needed to be done, when changes were
made we logged them into a DONE file, and everyone got to know everyone else
based on what we put into the place. The people who were worthy of greater
file access seemed to gravitate to the surface and they got it.
Now, we have this mess of "guilds" for each of the major projects the mud
holds, and guild rankings, apprentices, sponsors, this whole yucky power
structure and politics sort of thing again. We're back to what brought
Warhammer 2 down, meetings of people that got logged with tons of ideas
and decisions and nobody doing the coding afterwards...
And then Sulam quits.
He beat me to it, actually... we have both invested a tremendous amount of
time and energy into this mud, but in some ways it just isn't that much fun
anymore... Now I'm the only one left with account access to it, and
we've moved from dogstar (our old site) to a new one, and the admin of
dogstar doesn't really want TMI to return when dogstar goes back on the net.
*** The real low-down stuff ***
I'm getting sick of feeling responsible for this fairly biggish mud with a
lot of potential, and would like to either scrap it, give it away, let it
fall apart, or *something* to change the way it functions and my role within
it, since it is taking too much of my time and energy, yet if I don't log in
regularly then it always seems to crash or fall apart or something...
I'm also, sad to say, tired of "newbies" who think I'm an expert. I managed
to become an expert in a pretty narrow field, and so I've been starting to
keep a lower profile lest I get totally plastered with LPC questions... which
seems to happen anyhow. I'd like to move into new areas.
What should I do with this place?
When I've talked to people on the mud about this, most of them have begged me
not to shut down the mud or leave the mud world, and I feel like the entire
mud with a fairly large user base is depending on me to log in regularly, etc.
Now, if I were getting paid to run this mud, it might be a different story,
but since it's financially zilch for me, and less and less fun to boot...
Yes, I'd take a full time job as a mud admin, but I don't see anyone offering
me one. And a job, it is...
We're also going to need a new site eventually (like in a month or so).
Direct flames to /dev/null. If you have any thoughts you'd care to share
you can either follow-up to rec.games.mud.admin or directly to this account.
I realize this has been long, and it's still not the whole story.
If you want any other details or have the solution, or even nice
anaecedotes about how something like this has happened to you or someone you
know... mail me!
-Adam Beeman
Buddha@TMI
--
#include <std_disclaimer.h>
#define NAME "Adam Beeman"
#define EMAIL "beeman@{cats, ucscb}.ucsc.edu"
inherit SIGNATURE; // enhanced .sig virus
Kjetil Torgrim Homme
Seems like no mud can last forever without changing sites or admins or
general character, and when Sulam and I started TMI there was no politics;
there were people coding, we knew what needed to be done, when changes were
made we logged them into a DONE file, and everyone got to know everyone else
based on what we put into the place. The people who were worthy of greater
file access seemed to gravitate to the surface and they got it.
I'm getting sick of feeling responsible for this fairly biggish mud with a
lot of potential, and would like to either scrap it, give it away, let it
fall apart, or *something* to change the way it functions and my role within
it, since it is taking too much of my time and energy, yet if I don't log in
regularly then it always seems to crash or fall apart or something...
I don't think that a mud run out of someone's account will last very
long (okay, prove me wrong, but in e-mail, please :). Genesis isn't
run by Lars, it is run by CD (Chalmers Computer Society), so when Lars
gre tired, he could back out. It is a good thing that the admins don't
feel the obligation to stay.
Viking is a semi-old, medium-sized mud. It's approx. 1.5 years old,
has 2000 players and 225 wizards (you can read from that ratio what
kind of players we have). It is run by a student organization. Since
the beginning, we've had a nice flow of admins. It was Olet and Pez,
then Pez and Murky, Murky and me and currently Drevreck and me
(there's been a whole slew of others, but it was generally these
people who had the last say). The arches has generally slipped out by
being less and less on, so you may say the one who spends most time
there rules. Well, at least we've had continuity this way.
Now, we have this mess of "guilds" for each of the major projects the mud
holds, and guild rankings, apprentices, sponsors, this whole yucky power
structure and politics sort of thing again.
Anarchy will only work on small muds, some kind of 'power structure'
is necessary. It's the brown-nosing some wizards think will improve
their status that puts *me* off. I don't want wizards to humour me, I
want wizards with ideas and coding capability.
Lastly, I think burnout is rather common, and being an admin on TMI is
hardly going to help. The queries you get there will generally be a
lot more taxing to answer.
I will miss TMI. It was a great place to hang out. Also, I honestly
think the basic design of your mudlib is head and shoulders above
anything else I've seen. It is sad if it will just for nothing.
Kjetil T. (aka Tenghil)
--
``so you can make me cum that doesn't make you Jesus'' - Tori Amos
Stephen Schmidt
thought I'd send it here instead.
TMI has been down for about 10 hours, and its host machine is up and
running so I presume the driver process was killed. Is this temporary,
or is it the permanent demise of TMI? :( If the latter, what arrangments
are being made for people to recover their files, if any?
As far as TMI goes, I would think that there are enough sages and adepts
and initiates who know the system and have adminstrative experience to
keep things running in Buddha's absence. TMI has about 8 admins last time
I checked: while I doubt that these people can replace Buddha, I would
think that between them they can handle most of the essential tasks, if
one of them can be trusted with the game account.
--
Steve Schmidt <>< wh...@leland.stanford.edu
"We have met the enemy and he is us" - Walt Kelly
Kevin Allen Archie
>In article <15b5nf...@darkstar.UCSC.EDU>, <bee...@cats.ucsc.edu> writes:
>> What should I do with this place?
>Scrap it; it's only a game. You worry too much... that's going to kill you
>someday. :)
>Find a nice home for a tmi.tar.Z for everyone to get a copy of, and rm -rf it
>from your system. Then go home, park your butt on the couch, pop a tall,
>frosty one and say, "AAaaaaahhhhh!".
Damn straight. Lord knows, I'll miss TMI, a lot of good ideas got kicked
around there (a lot of bad ideas got kicked around there), but you are
under _zero_ obligation to keep it running. If it's not fun anymore, then
just get out, and know that a lot of people (myself included) appreciated
it while it lasted.
- Kevin (Caoimhin on TMI and a few others, Gooberman on Genesis)
kar...@cco.caltech.edu
Judy Anderson
Interesting article on admin burnout... I definitely sympathize. I
suffered from burnout pretty seriously last winter. (The fact that
large portions of my life were also falling apart without my realizing
it probably contributed. Or was it the other way around?) I
precipitated the creation of some MOO bureaucracy where non-wizards
take care of some of the decision making that was previously handled
only by wizards (though the wizards still take care of implementing
those decisions). I also got really firm about not answering newbie
questions. It's just *amazing* how much time can be soaked up just by
answering simple questions for newbies. Indeed, these days I don't
answer questions by anyone except those people who understand that I
don't like questions and therefore are only asking me because nobody
else who might know is available.
Someone implemented a Helpful Person Finder. This has not been a
great success; I still get pages from people *who are in the same room
as the finder* asking me newbie questions. I usually reply with
something snide about how the finder would bite them if it were any
closer...
I think the thing that helped me most with recovering from/dealing
with burnout was having a core of other users who cared both about me
and about the MOO and were willing to help me run away from the bulk
of the screaming newbies. I'd sure be happier if people wouldn't act
as though I were their slave to be available at any moment for any
length of time to answer their questions---most of which are answered
by reading existing documentation! I didn't write the documentation
for typing practice, for crying out loud!
yduJ's law of question answering: Always ask the *most* ignorant
person who can possibly answer your question. Don't waste your
guru-points on "how do I set my description?" Save them for really
tricky questions.
I used to think LambdaMOO would die a horrible death if I were to
disappear. On the other hand, I was just gone for two weeks on
vacation, and things are just fine... People missed me, which gives
me a warm fuzzy feeling inside. But the MOO doesn't *need* me. This
is good, I strive for not being needed... (Of course, I need the MOO.
It's down at the moment. So I'm flaming on the net :-)
Judy Anderson yclept yduJ 'yduJ' rhymes with 'fudge'
yd...@symbolics.com yduJ on LambdaMOO
James Waldrop
>I'd sure be happier if people wouldn't act as though I were their slave
>to be available at any moment for any length of time to answer their
>questions---most of which are answered by reading existing documentation!
This is a big part of why I resigned from TMI. Too many people were
acting as if I were on call or something. When you have 6 or 7
people asking you when 'X is going to be released' every other hour
it gets REAL old REAL quick. And that doesn't even include all the
people asking how to compile the driver, or why their objects don't
work...
Now I can tell people to bug off and not feel like a heel :)
Sulam@ TMI, Igor
James Waldrop Sulam on Lots of Places
j...@hebrew.cc.columbia.edu
---I'm not Columbia, so please don't act as if I am---
James Waldrop
>TMI has been down for about 10 hours, and its host machine is up and
>running so I presume the driver process was killed. Is this temporary,
>or is it the permanent demise of TMI? :( If the latter, what arrangments
>are being made for people to recover their files, if any?
It's up now, so I'm assuming that it's not shutdown. I think the problem
is that whereas it used to be Buddha and I logging pretty regularly,
now it's only Buddha. Obviously one person isn't going to cover the
same number of 'slots' that two people are, and no one should expect
that they would. So sometimes the mud is down for a little longer than
it used to be.
>As far as TMI goes, I would think that there are enough sages and adepts
>and initiates who know the system and have adminstrative experience to
>keep things running in Buddha's absence. TMI has about 8 admins last time
>I checked: while I doubt that these people can replace Buddha, I would
>think that between them they can handle most of the essential tasks, if
>one of them can be trusted with the game account.
An important thing is having a place to put it. A few stats for those
who think they might have a site for TMI:
It must have sysadmin approval
We use approximately 2-3% of the cpu on a Sparc LC (sparc4)
Memory is generally around 2 Meg
Disk space for what we're doing now is around 50 Meg
Sulam
Jacob Hallen
>
>This is a big part of why I resigned from TMI. Too many people were
>acting as if I were on call or something. When you have 6 or 7
>people asking you when 'X is going to be released' every other hour
>it gets REAL old REAL quick. And that doesn't even include all the
>people asking how to compile the driver, or why their objects don't
>work...
I must admit that I don't feel very sorry for you. This is exactly the
behaviour you asked for when you started TMI. "You can ask anyone
about anything anytime." You gained poularity very quickly due to this
policy, and this is the kind of price you have to pay.
When you change your policy, as I know you have done, it takes ages for the
information to filter through to every wizard and user, and some won't believe
it anyway, since it reduces their 'rights'.
As I said, I don't feel sorry for you, but you have a bit of my sympathy.
You went about things with a lot of entusiasm. A bit more foresight was all
that was lacking.
Jacob Hallen
James Waldrop
>j...@hebrew.cc.columbia.edu (James Waldrop) writes:
>>
>>This is a big part of why I resigned from TMI. Too many people were
>>acting as if I were on call or something. When you have 6 or 7
>>people asking you when 'X is going to be released' every other hour
>>it gets REAL old REAL quick. And that doesn't even include all the
>>people asking how to compile the driver, or why their objects don't
>>work...
>
>I must admit that I don't feel very sorry for you. This is exactly the
>behaviour you asked for when you started TMI. "You can ask anyone
>about anything anytime." You gained poularity very quickly due to this
>policy, and this is the kind of price you have to pay.
*James searches his post for requests for sympathy*
*James fails miserably to find any*
I was merely explaining the situation. I don't feel the need for sympathy.
As you say, I certainly should have (yes, even did) expect that sort of
thing to happen. When I said 'a big part of why I resigned', the implication
was that there were other things involved. In fact, there were. I wrote
something reasonably longish, if not so detailed, describing the 3 or 4
things that caused me to decide I was no longer enjoying myself, but it's
on TMI, where it belongs. In a followup I tend to restrict myself to the
subject I'm following up to.
>As I said, I don't feel sorry for you, but you have a bit of my sympathy.
>You went about things with a lot of entusiasm. A bit more foresight was all
>that was lacking.
I foresaw that I would get a thousand questions of all varieties, and that
most of them would probably be slightly annoying in one way or the other.
I dealt with that, and was prepared to keep dealing with that, because I
get a kick out of helping people. Certain other aspects of the job were
unforeseen, and it is the combination of things rather than any one
element that made it work instead of fun.
Sulam
p.s. It's not like I've resigned from mudding, or have quit helping people.
Instead I am no longer an admin on TMI, so I don't have to get involved with
administrative politics, but I'm still free to be helpful. This gives me
more free time, makes mudding more fun, and doesn't really cost me anything
except a certain amount of input as to where TMI heads in the future. With
that I am happy.
--
James Waldrop
j...@hebrew.cc.columbia.edu
I walk along the path muttering about signs and portents.