the dangers of licensing and copyright laws. this is a valid example of what i believe is a major issue in current laws regarding commerce. most laws regarding business are designed by lobbyists who wish to ensure their current business models are not affected by advances in technology. the war on piracy, the rising prominence of subscription, rental, licensing, and the implementation of copyright protection technology are all examples of businesses vehemently holding back an inevitable loss of profits due technological advancements. businesses need to evolve with technology. today, with regards to asserons call, a majority of the players of this game could have hosted this on their cell phone. why not just release the source code to the public? the reason that companies must privatize their creations in such a manner is an uncertainty of generating revenue.
lets consider ddo for a moment. if ssg didnt exclusively host the servers, this would saturate the available server pool. with so many servers to join, servers would need to incentivize play on their own. it might start with minor edits like run speed and xp buffs but ends with abilities that override ddo store money pits. it is inevitable. why join the khyber with 50 ping and spend money on xp pots when u can join the khyber with 200 ping that gives 50% more xp for all quests? that is one example of how their current business model could suffer. why would a business license their content to ssg for use in a game, if neither entity stands to profit? if either entity might breach a pre-existing contract through these actions?
another drawback to custom/user made servers is game balance. it is impossible to control all the variables when a game server is released on that scale. somewhere, a server will exist that has 100% named drop rates, or permanent god mode, or user commands to grant XP. servers where you donate money for those abilities. these are threats to a game longevity, which makes them threats to its profitability. The goal is to make money- not lose it.
these are great arguments for why current business models should avoid client hosted servers. however, i believe that this only proves that the business model itself is outdated. a better business model would be to remove the cost of hosting, and allow clients to take that burden by granting their wish for "user hosted servers"
i think the next step for game software, is some form of p2p based server, that exists solely on the computers of its players. comparable in implementation to bitcoin or torrenting, the code would exist on all players computers simultaneously, and be modified on each PC in real time. this could in theory allow a game to have unlimited space, and unlimited life, as long as it existed on that network. it would eliminate the issues of lag by localizing non vital communication, it would eliminate the cost of outsourced hosting resources in exchange for cheaper inhouse programming and maintenance resources. this type of implementation could also address the concerns of user modification through syncing and hashes. finally, it would serve to lump all servers- client and commercial, into one global entity- granting unparalleled unification of players.
i think all business is too unwilling to evolve due to the risk of failure. media industry needs to realize that downloading files is easier than buying a CD. news industry needs to learn that people have the internet and fact check. and gaming industry needs to learn the value of its clients.
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