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Lydia Lightfoot · **08-29-2015, 04:04 PM**

(08-29-2015, 03:55 PM)Oli! Wrote: Right now, I don't think we're dealing with individual reactions to intrusion; these can range anywhere from being angry, to not caring at all, so they don't really have that much gravity except for in specific circumstances; the argument is more geared to whether or not people are allowed to have private conversations in /say, which they are, because there's no way to actually stopÂ them from doing so.

Inability to prevent someone from doing a thing doesn't make that thing allowed or justifiable.

One can't prevent me from peeing on the sidewalk, but in general most modern societies agree that's not permissible (and moreso than being socially unacceptable, being caught in the act may warrant arrest).

By your own words earlier, people who make such RP faux pas may not care if they get blacklisted, and so that's no punishment to them, and therefore they have no deterrent at all. Okay.

So what if a person doesn't care if they get arrested, is it okay for them to just go around peeing on sidewalks to their heart's content?Â

Or is it still not acceptable behavior, regardless of their shrug toward consequence?

**Unnamed Mercenary** · **08-29-2015, 04:15 PM**

[[steps in as a mod]]

Small plea to remember to be kind and considerate to other users on the forum.

There have been a few comments in this thread that are skirting too close to the fine line between a discussion and people making snide comments/callouts.

[[takes off the mod hat]]

Let's not forget that everyone in-game is paying for the game. There are also no "rights" within an Online Game. There's an End-User License Agreement, yes, but there's no rule that requires one player to interact with another player.

There is a common courtesy to keep private RP private though. Within my time playing the game, there have been multiple scenes where people have basically done he Bob, Jane and Frank example. (Especially in the Quicksand!). However, like most RPers, I would bet that Bob, Jane and Frank probably all have "walkups welcome! in their search info, which does create an implicit agreement that if they're RPing someone public, that the public can, and maybe -should-, react! ...if the RP was not supposed to be open, then it should not be typed openly. Simply as that.

From a personal example, I actually started a few fights in the Quicksand back in the day. (Ask Kage about it some time!). While Kage and I had planned our scene out for the most part, it was still emoted in /em and we spoke in /say. There was a SURPRISINGLY LARGE group of people who immediately tried to react to it. Something that we both accepted. We later had to take it outside because there was a rising number of OOC tells and comments such as "can you please not have this closed off scene somewhere where there's already a massive chat scroll?" and once someone made that intention known IC, we did! The character I was even RPing at got yelled at by a few people later for his behavior. (All IC)

Had we done the same exact scene in /party or in a linkshell, nobody would have looked up. Personally, I would find it kinda rude for an untouchable scene to be RPed out in the open like that.

--

But let's make another proposed scene, one I've also seen in the Quicksand a lot.

Characters Alice and Jimmy are sitting on the stools having a conversation. Alice tells Jimmy that she's recently bought some -very- strong poison and plans to murder her husband with it. One of the fellows besides them Mr Steel, the Brass Blade, who has been following a string of recent murders by poisoning in his own RP. Steel turns to Alice and as an official law-enforcement officers, asks her to hand over the poison. Jimmy, who has been silent the whole time since Steel turned around suddenly says OOC "((omg, this is a private scene.))"

Steel's player follows with an OOC message of "((Then why are you talking about it in a bar? And loud enough for everyone else to hear it?))

Would we still argue that Alice and Jimmy are perfectly fine to continue their scene ignoring Steel?

Should they not have picked a more appropriate method of having a "quiet" or "private" conversation if they did not want other people to involve/intrude?

Is Steel's player somehow going leaps and bounds beyond consent because his game client picked up the public chat next to him?

Oli! · **08-29-2015, 04:32 PM**

(08-29-2015, 04:04 PM)Calliope Cloverbloom Wrote:
(08-29-2015, 03:55 PM)Oli! Wrote: Right now, I don't think we're dealing with individual reactions to intrusion; these can range anywhere from being angry, to not caring at all, so they don't really have that much gravity except for in specific circumstances; the argument is more geared to whether or not people are allowed to have private conversations in /say, which they are, because there's no way to actually stopÂ them from doing so.

Inability to prevent someone from doing a thing doesn't make that thing allowed or justifiable.

One can't prevent me from peeing on the sidewalk, but in general most modern societies agree that's not permissible (and moreso than being socially unacceptable, being caught in the act may warrant arrest).

By your own words earlier, people who make such RP faux pas may not care if they get blacklisted, and so that's no punishment to them, and therefore they have no deterrent at all. Okay.

So what if a person doesn't care if they get arrested, is it okay for them to just go around peeing on sidewalks to their heart's content?Â

Or is it still not acceptable behavior, regardless of their shrug toward consequence?

There are many ways you can be stopped from peeing on the sidewalk. Tackled by a passerby, tazed by a police officer, having your urine caught by a cup, who knows. The point is that just about any action done in meatspace can be stopped through physical interference. Not the case in Roleplay, where any interference at all has to go through the person being interfered with, who then makes the choice of whether or not they want to go with it or not. Therefore, this situation would be more akin to someone coming up and asking you whether you would allow them to stop you from peeing on the sidewalk, at which point you decide yes, no, or to ignore them.

And for the sake of addressing how things work In-Game, Yes, the inability to stop someone from doing something makes it an Allowed practice. There's nothing in the game's terms of service saying that it isn'tÂ allowed, and there's no way that we can stopÂ it from being allowed on our own terms, therefore meaning that, for all intents and purposes, it is allowed.

When we speak about what is Allowed, there are two possible ways in which it could be viewed. We can view it in terms of a social standpoint, where people set the rules of what is and isn't allowed to be done, with those rules being enforced in a capable way that actually affects people's decisions. The alternate is what people can and cannot do in a purely physical sense, moral and ethical decisions aside.

Peeing on the sidewalk isn't acceptable behavior from the moral standpoint of most people. If someone doesn't care about the consequences of peeing on the sidewalk, and no one is around to stop them, then yes, they're allowed, or able, to pee on the sidewalk. Society and others around them might not agree, and the rules of said society might say that someone is then allowedÂ to take them to jail for it afterwards, but there is no hard and fast rule embedded in the fabric of reality that says "under no circumstances can you pee on this sidewalk."

This is not the case in MMOs, in which there are hard and fast rules encoded into the basis of our virtual reality that stop us from interfering with people that are doing certain things. If we were able to suddenly stop people that are peeing on the sidewalk anywhere, from any place, then logically peeing on the sidewalk would not be allowed, because you physically cannot do it.

Regarding your earlier example about events in public parks: That's actually not how things work, either legally, or in terms of public acceptance. If someone has a birthday party in a public park, you are not allowed to take their privately paid-for cake and eat their privately paid-for food just because they are holding the party in a public location. You are allowed to sit at the park bench they're using, because thatÂ is public property, but all the things that make the event an event, balloons, people, food, gifts, etcetera, are off-limits to you both legally and morally unless they allow you to partake.

In real life, you couldÂ go ahead and take their food and their balloons anyway, because you have the physical ability to do so. In MMO Roleplay, this is not the case. You have no physical ability to do anything without approval.

For the sake of Simplicity, let's divide the two parts of Allowed into two different words. Socially Acceptable, meaning what is permitted by a group, and is therefore subjective and flexible, and Able, which is physical, absolute, and refers to the Ability to Do. It is not Socially Acceptable to pee on the sidewalk, but I am nonetheless Able to do so.

The party that determines what is Socially Acceptable is the one that is overseeing a closed system. This could be a society, a country, a guild, a game environment, and many other things. We, the Players, do not have control over the Game Environment. The Developers and the Game Masters are the only ones that do so. Their "Laws," the Terms of Service, do not prohibit having a private conversation in a public channel. Additionally, the World of the Game does not prohibit this. In the eyes of the Overseeing Party, it is therefore Socially Acceptable, and within the system of the Game, you are Able to do so. In both systems, therefore, they are Allowed.

We the players are not the governing body of the game's overall system (i.e. public environments and channels), and are therefore unableÂ to enforce what weÂ may deem to be Socially Acceptable in those contexts. We are, however, able to enforce such in smaller groups, such as Friend Groups, Linkshells, and Free Companies. Although they are Able to do something, just as they are in the game's overall environment, we may not deem it Socially Acceptable, and remove them from our controlled environment as a result. Within other controlled systems, however, it may be deemed as being Socially Acceptable, and therefore tolerated by the members of that group.

The conclusion that we come to, therefore, is that in the eyes of the Governing Body in which all systems are contained within the premise of this game, having private conversations in public places is both Socially Acceptable and something that you are Able to do. This is true, because they have absolute, inalienable control over both the Terms of Service, and the World of the Game. Therefore, as long as someone pays to access this system, they have the Right to engage in that activity. We may shut them out from our smaller, controlled areas as a result, but they are nonetheless within their overall rights to do what it is they are doing.

Oli! · **08-29-2015, 04:43 PM**

(08-29-2015, 04:15 PM)Unnamed Mercenary Wrote: Would we still argue that Alice and Jimmy are perfectly fine to continue their scene ignoring Steel?

Should they not have picked a more appropriate method of having a "quiet" or "private" conversation if they did not want other people to involve/intrude?

Is Steel's player somehow going leaps and bounds beyond consent because his game client picked up the public chat next to him?

I would argue that neither is going beyond their rights in the game, because it is not a binary situation.

It is one person's right to overhear something in a public channel. It is another person's right to ignore that fact. Neither has the ability to stop the other from doing either action. Additionally, neither is able to force the other to acknowledge their action.

To distill the answer, yes, Alice and Jimmy are perfectly fine to continue their scene, and ignore Steel. In addition, Steel is perfectly fine to listen in on the conversation, and attempt to interact. However, neither party is able to make the other conform to their interpretation of events. Whether or not Alice and Jimmy should have or should not have picked a private location is subjective, and therefore inarguable on any grounds that is removed from a moral background.

Where does this leave us? I don't know, but that's physically the way that things work.

Lydia Lightfoot · **08-29-2015, 04:49 PM**

(08-29-2015, 04:32 PM)Oli! Wrote: There are many ways you can be stopped from peeing on the sidewalk. Tackled by a passerby, tazed by a police officer, having your urine caught by a cup, who knows. The point is that just about any action done in meatspace can be stopped through physical interference. Not the case in Roleplay, where any interference at all has to go through the person being interfered with, who then makes the choice of whether or not they want to go with it or not. Therefore, this situation would be more akin to someone coming up and asking you whether you would allow them to stop you from peeing on the sidewalk, at which point you decide yes, no, or to ignore them.

Um, no. No other human has control over the function of my bladder, thank you. They could tackle me, taze me, etc, but they literally can't stop me from exercising bodily functions, nor can they inhibit the effect of gravity upon the results. The sidewalk got wet. Sorry.

Regarding the rest, I feel at this point that you may be arguing for the sake of arguing, and I'm going to disengage from that. It's unproductive.

Oli! · **08-29-2015, 04:52 PM**

(08-29-2015, 04:49 PM)Calliope Cloverbloom Wrote:
(08-29-2015, 04:32 PM)Oli! Wrote: There are many ways you can be stopped from peeing on the sidewalk. Tackled by a passerby, tazed by a police officer, having your urine caught by a cup, who knows. The point is that just about any action done in meatspace can be stopped through physical interference. Not the case in Roleplay, where any interference at all has to go through the person being interfered with, who then makes the choice of whether or not they want to go with it or not. Therefore, this situation would be more akin to someone coming up and asking you whether you would allow them to stop you from peeing on the sidewalk, at which point you decide yes, no, or to ignore them.

Um, no. No other human has control over the function of my bladder, thank you. They could tackle me, taze me, etc, but they literally can't stop me from exercising bodily functions, nor can they inhibit the effect of gravity upon the results. The sidewalk got wet. Sorry.

Regarding the rest, I feel at this point that you may be arguing for the sake of arguing, and I'm going to disengage from that. It's unproductive.

Then in that case, that would fall under the category of Able, which I outlined in the second part of my post. When Morality is removed, you are AllowedÂ to pee on the sidwalk, because you are physically AbleÂ to do so. So, the answer in that scenario would be Yes, you are Physically Allowed to pee on the sidewalk, though it may not be Socially Acceptable. I expressed such a little further down after the portion that you quoted.

Also, I never argue solely for the sake of argument. I argue for the sake of increased understanding regarding people's motives and outlooks on the way they conduct themselves. As I've stated beforehand, I don't necessarily morally agree with everything that I'm stating. The reason why I am arguing it nonetheless is that we can achieve a greater amount of communal cohesion and understanding by recognizing the reasons why someone may choose to do something, or what they may be thinking when they do something, regardless of whether or not one agrees. The end goal, at least for me, is to have someone think "huh, here's a few reasons why someone might not want me to intrude on their RP despite being in public, maybe I can use my new understanding to see where they're coming from next time I'm in this situation," instead of blacklisting them outright because of an initial disagreement. And to be honest, I actually kind of find the accusation that I'm only arguing for the sake of arguing or being confrontational a little on the rude side. :/

D'aito Kuji · **08-29-2015, 05:22 PM**

(08-29-2015, 03:49 PM)Jana Wrote:
(08-29-2015, 10:36 AM)Oli! Wrote: While yes, not doing it in public is the easiest solution at first glance, the problem arises of where to have it in the first place.

Party chat or tells, even in the middle of the Quicksand, have been used for private RP since there was RP in the game. If people wanna RP in /say and get pissy when people enter their range and reply, they should have considered it beforehand.

I suppose I just presumed if people were RP'ing in public it was more or less an invitation to join if there seemed like there was a reasonable opportunity. If two characters are PDA'ing I feel like I could say "ew gross!" Â I wouldn't but I think it should be expected that someone might.

The way I usually get involved in RP is to speak to NPCs as though there were other PCs. Â I've had some negative feedback here and there but it's mostly been positive.

I've also done public RP in the Drowning Wench and expected (hoped) that others would join in. Â I don't understand why anyone would do public RP in an RP game and NOT want others to join in. Â I feel like public RP is an invitation. Â That's my intention anyway. Â If a group is standing together and not saying anything (or speaking only in /em) then I presume it's private.

Anthony Valron · **08-29-2015, 05:34 PM**

(08-29-2015, 03:21 PM)Edda Wrote: When it comes to roleplay, and even situations in real life, there is really only one clear answer: Don't. In no way is it ever acceptable to just waltz up to anyone you have had no prior interaction with and engage them in any way, shape, or form. It is rude and disrespectful. Even so much as emoting your character's annoyance or interest in the conversation between two friends is highly inconsiderate and should be avoided at all costs.

As anyone who knows me can tell you, I recently removed the "walk-ups welcome" blurb in my search info, and I would encourage any and all roleplayers to do the same. If someone is roleplaying publicly, that does not give you the right to engage them if they are a complete stranger. If I have a need to introduce my character to someone new, then I will arrange for it to be done so through an existing, mutual contact, just like how ever other normal person meets new people in real life.

For more information on the issues regarding engaging strangers in any way, please refer to this article. Though it is written for IRL purposes, I think it can be applied to roleplay as well.

I'm sorry, I highly disagree with pretty much everything you just said!

I Roleplay an Ishgardian Highborn. If you don't understand the connotations to that, he's an entitled, self-confident and xenophobic snob.

My character was in a room in Dragonhead, waiting for another to enter for a meeting.

He expressed his annoyance with a two-line emote that didn't engage so much as speak to state of mind.

--------------------------------------

I engage strangers all the time, in real life. It's my job. I'm a political science major and I was in charge of many public events for a national-level congressional campaign in which I had to interact with and socialize with the general public.

To make such a blanket statement reeks of ignorance and elitism, as well as a great deal of entitlement in saying that we must abide by your rules.

(E: for those who don't understand, it's the onion quoted and I'm feeding the satire with my own satire)

Renata Lynn · **08-29-2015, 06:04 PM**

If I don't want people joining in my rp, I take it to /p or /t. Simple as that. But. I am also the person who will shoot someone a tell saying "hey your char is talking about blah blah and my char blah blah blah. Would it be alright it my char came up and blah blah blah?"

But that's for where there is already an existing rp going on. Otherwise, I send a tell asking if they're ic before I engage them.

Eratika · **08-30-2015, 12:23 AM**

To be honest, if there is RP going on in a public place in /s where everyone can see it.. Then I think it's pretty much up for grabs to have your character butt their head into it in some way. Though, as courtesy goes would be nice to ask for permission in /tell before doing so, but that doesn't happen all the time.

Impromptu RP is one of the best.

However, I see nothing wrong with the /em that Anthony did.. all that seemed to be was his character addressing what was going on around him in character.

LiadansWhisper · **08-30-2015, 01:28 AM**

(08-29-2015, 03:21 PM)Edda Wrote: When it comes to roleplay, and even situations in real life, there is really only one clear answer: Don't. In no way is it ever acceptable to just waltz up to anyone you have had no prior interaction with and engage them in any way, shape, or form. It is rude and disrespectful. Even so much as emoting your character's annoyance or interest in the conversation between two friends is highly inconsiderate and should be avoided at all costs.

As anyone who knows me can tell you, I recently removed the "walk-ups welcome" blurb in my search info, and I would encourage any and all roleplayers to do the same. If someone is roleplaying publicly, that does not give you the right to engage them if they are a complete stranger. If I have a need to introduce my character to someone new, then I will arrange for it to be done so through an existing, mutual contact, just like how ever other normal person meets new people in real life.

For more information on the issues regarding engaging strangers in any way, please refer to this article. Though it is written for IRL purposes, I think it can be applied to roleplay as well.

Really?

Because here, people do that all the time. Â Seriously - all the time. Â In fact, if you don't smile and acknowledge people here, you are considered to be rude and snobbish.

Shoshopu · **08-30-2015, 09:36 PM**

(08-30-2015, 01:28 AM)LiadansWhisper Wrote:
(08-29-2015, 03:21 PM)Edda Wrote: When it comes to roleplay, and even situations in real life, there is really only one clear answer: Don't. In no way is it ever acceptable to just waltz up to anyone you have had no prior interaction with and engage them in any way, shape, or form. It is rude and disrespectful. Even so much as emoting your character's annoyance or interest in the conversation between two friends is highly inconsiderate and should be avoided at all costs.

As anyone who knows me can tell you, I recently removed the "walk-ups welcome" blurb in my search info, and I would encourage any and all roleplayers to do the same. If someone is roleplaying publicly, that does not give you the right to engage them if they are a complete stranger. If I have a need to introduce my character to someone new, then I will arrange for it to be done so through an existing, mutual contact, just like how ever other normal person meets new people in real life.

For more information on the issues regarding engaging strangers in any way, please refer to this article. Though it is written for IRL purposes, I think it can be applied to roleplay as well.

Really?

Because here, people do that all the time. Â Seriously - all the time. Â In fact, if you don't smile and acknowledge people here, you are considered to be rude and snobbish.

I hate to spoil the joke, but the article is the from the Onion...

LiadansWhisper · **08-30-2015, 11:01 PM**

(08-30-2015, 09:36 PM)Shoshopu Wrote: I hate to spoil the joke, but the article is the from the Onion...

That's what I get for reading the article on my phone browser. Â ._.

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Edited Title; Public Space OOC/IC issue~

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