WEB FED NEWS YEARBOOKS
Earthdate July 1999


INSIDE SCOOP


FED FUNNIES


OFFICIAL NEWS
by Hazed


What was in July 1999's Official News:

THE MONTH IN BRIEF
LETTER FROM ALAN LENTON
SOL EXPOSE HIJACKED BY DEMI-GODDESS
THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT
WHO IS THE GATEKEEPER?
REAL LIFE NEWS: ALIEN LAW SUIT

THE MONTH IN BRIEF

The controversy of the month was the issue of adult material on planets as Hazed tightened up the rules and provoked rebellion from the anti-authoritarian POs.

Summer in Fed saw players getting together in the Sun, with a Florida Fed Meet and an LA Feedmeet.

Independence Day was celebrated in Fed by a puzzle planet, solved by Fancy.

LETTER FROM ALAN LENTON

Two events which have happened recently have made it necessary for Interactive Broadcasting to look again at our rules governing what players can and cannot do with their planets.

The first is the furore surrounding GeoCities's attempt to claim the copyright for all material published on their site, and the second is the outcome of a web pornography trial in the UK.

Talking to players it is clear that there exists some confusion about who owns what when it comes to player planets. This is because there are two separate issues here. The first issue is who owns the material that you write.

The answer is - you do. It is yours to do what you like with. By putting it in Federation you are granting us the limited right to use it on your planet, but you are free to repeat it in other games, or wherever else you wish. It is entirely yours, and IB has no say over what you do with it.

An entirely different issue that sometime get confused is the question of who owns the planet. The answer to this is equally unequivocal - Interactive Broadcasting owns the planet, because it is part of Federation, a game which they own.

IB grants you the right to operate your planet within the rules of the game, but in the last analysis the planet belongs to IB. This is not an arbitrary decision on IB's part, it reflects the reality of the many legal systems in which we operate (remember that the US legal system is only one of the systems that applies).

One common thing about those legal systems though is that they all hold IB responsible for anything that appears in our game - they make no distinction between the bits that we wrote and the bits that you wrote. If you write obscene material, it is IB that is held responsible, not you. Unlike the ISPs we have no defence of being a 'Common Carrier'.

Which brings me to the UK trial I referred to earlier. The directors of IB are British citizens, and so, not unnaturally, are subject to British Law. The trial was the prosecution of a British citizen for running a pornographic web site in the USA. The trial judge made it quite clear in his ruling that the site was subject to British jurisdiction.

This means that what IB allows in the game has to meet the requirements of the UK Obscene Publications Act, and unfortunately, some of the things we have allowed previously are not going to pass muster. In these cases we will have to ask you to change what you have written.

Since Federation started, we have tried to avoid dictating what people do with their planets, but now, as the Internet grows up, those of us who make a living from it are having to cope with governments and laws, and probably eventually taxes. Childhood and innocence for the online community have now passed, and we are all adults, and subject to the constraints of society.

I'm sure you will understand that both Hazed and I would have a great deal of difficulty running Federation from a prison cell! It would, no doubt, be 'interesting', but it is an experience that we have decided to forgo. We don't intend to pre-screen planets, but we will act on anything inappropriate that our attention is drawn to.

Finally, I have to say, that when I was designing Federation, everyone else in the then nascent online games business laughed when they heard that the essence of the game was not going to be players killing one another (and orcs). "Doomed...", they said, "Who on earth would want to play a game that wasn't about killing other players?"

When those same people heard that I was going to let ordinary players add to the game without being supervised, the doom-mongers were rolling in the aisles - they couldn't imagine a more effective recipe for disaster. Well here we are on the threshold of the new millennium, still here, and few of those who scoffed have games online now.

And over the years there has been only a very small amount of abuse of the trust that we reposed in the players. Far less than there seems to be, actually, because the abuses tend to get a higher profile than those who don't abuse the trust.

I'm proud of you all. Over the years the people who play Fed have proved again and again that we don't have to treat people as morons who need to be protected from themselves. Thank you.

Alan Lenton
London, England
24 July, 1999

SOL EXPOSE HIJACKED BY DEMI-GODDESS

Over the last few months, Duke Antimatter has entertained readers with the stories behind some of the features of Federation DataSpace. We've learnt why the planet shop on Mercury is called Slarti's; where the phrase "Mind the Gap" which you hear on the Venus shuttle comes from; and the origin of Fedruckers bar on Castillo.

The Duke's research has not gone unnoticed. I've had my eye on him. Now, I have decided enough is enough. We can't have just anyone revealing Fed's secrets to the public - who knows what they might publish! No, if anyone is going to tell all the real stories behind the things you find in Fed, then it's got to be someone who understands that some things are better left unsaid...

So who better than me, the demi-Goddess Hazed, to tell you what's what. After all, I've been around for centuries. I've seen it all. Been there, done that, wrote the manual. And I know when to keep my mouth shut.

Starting next week, then, a brand new series, loosely based on Antimatter's Sol Expose, will bring you the stories behind such things as the Tinguey, Kleinbottle Way, monopoles, and the Marillion. And much, much more.

If there is some particular aspect of Federation whose origin you are interested in learning, mail Feedback@ibgames.com and ask.

THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT

I do hope there's somebody out there reading this. It's not entirely certain. Not that I think our regular readers will suddenly decide not to read this week's new - but the world may have ended by now.

July 4, 1999 is the date that Nostradamus predicted that the world would come to an end. At least, that's the way some people interpret his rather cryptic prophecies - they are written in medieval French and so are pretty obscure and could probably be translated and interpreted in enough different ways to make them say anything you like.

Of course, the calendar was reformed after Nostradamus' time, so the events he wrote about may not happen until August. So even if you are still here reading this, we're not off the hook yet!

Even if we do escape this one with the world intact, there's varous predictions of doom and disaster what with the forthcoming end of the millenium... oh dear, maybe I should just stay in bed until it's all over one way or the other.

WHO IS THE GATEKEEPER?

Rumors have been flying around Fed DataSpace. Well, there are always rumors flying about in Fed, it's as if rumors are the fuel that keeps the Galaxy running. This time, the rumors concern a mysterious new figure... The Gatekeeper.

There is much speculation: Who is he? Why is he here? What is his purpose? And why does he spend all his time propping up the bar in Chez Diesel?

Some have claimed he is an alt of a famous Fedder. I can tell you that one of the few definite facts that can be revealed about The Gatekeeper is that he is not Tbar, as some have claimed!

This is what we know. The Gatekeeper is the Guardian of the Gateways. He is the Keeper of the Keys. He controls the portals to Fed DataSpace. His domain is that shadowy place between Fed and stasis.

He is, quite literally, The Gatekeeper.

REAL LIFE NEWS: ALIEN LAW SUIT

I am not making this up. Honest, I'm not.

A judge has thrown out a lawsuit by a Scarborough, Ontario, man claiming to be a Martian. He filed the suit against various cabinet ministers representing the federal government, which he says tried to kill him because hs is a Martian.

Amongst his claims are that the CIA had inserted a chip in his brain and that a drug store chain sold him poison instead of medication, all part of the assassination attempts.

Good sense may have prevailed, with the judge ruling that aliens have no standing in Ontario courts, but it costs the firms involved in the case about $10,000 in legal fees. One wonders how the case ever got as far as the court in the first place!


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