Jan 13 2009
Wikipedia takes on Threshold RPG (part 3)
EDIT: I promise this is the LAST POST ABOUT THE WIKIPEDIA incident for a while. The next post will be much different! 
This is the last part, and for a while I hope the last time I’ll blog or post on this issue. There are role playing games that need my developer attention, and I loathe having my real work interrupted by this sort of thing. In this last section, I will focus on the bigger question that has arisen from the whole sordid mess:
What should fans and developers of MUDs/MMOs do now?
Again, I direct you specifically to the full article about Wikipedia’s war on gaming history and Threshold :
We need to start recording MUD and MMO history now. We need to do it in an organized fashion that will be respected not just by the hacks at Wikipedia, but by an academic or other legitimate researcher. MMOs seem huge and mainstream now, so it is hard to imagine people considering them insignificant. But that is how we felt about MUDs 10 years ago, and nowadays many gamers don’t even know what a MUD is (or they are dismissive of them in the extreme).
This is a cautionary tale for people with interest in any obscure or niche topic. Wikipedia cannot be relied on to preserve history or information about non-mainstream topics. The current culture actually discourages it. It is our responsibility to find better ways to preserve such information, lest it be lost to the vicissitudes of time.
The first step is establishing the Mud Connector and Top Mud Sites as reliable sources. We need to help the owners of those sites do what they need to clean up things, codify policies, and write a coherent history of their site. Ideally, the two sites will keep a history of the OTHER site, so the historical information is not “self published.
Once we have that, other things can start to fall into place. Staff reviews will count again (hopefully). Articles will count. Mud listings might even count.
Then MUD owners need to really crank it up a notch and work every connection they have. Get mentioned in every newspaper, magazine, or journal article possible. And when they get mentioned, SAVE IT.
