[Discuss] Fined for inactivity (attn: Titans/Tom)

[Eric]

In all honesty there was a time i would go to great lengths to try to 
stay connected to the game even whilst on vacation... let me tell you 
that time is long gone.  I have rarely been one that has the ability or 
the inclination to inform people that I will be going inactive... as I 
never planned to be inactive and frankly never thought it was anyones 
business if I was... same goes for realms that I have had control of... 
activity has always been optional... you know the light weight game part.

But go on vacation and decide that spending time with my 80 year old 
aunt (her birthday was the event) and with my family that I never get to 
see (most I last saw some 30 years ago, and at the current rate might be 
never again) and when I get back from 11 days away from the game I find 
that my character Dyre in Ethiala has been fined... for, of all things, 
inactivity.

It is odd that it happened.  One reason that FE is a interactive RP 
Island and I didn't do any interaction to get fined for... because I 
didn't even get on a computer for 9 days much less log into BM to cause 
trouble to warrant a fine.  Another reason would be of course that fines 
are RP and inactivity is OOC... that is a big no no on all worlds.  Last 
of course is that Tom decreed that the next person to say /inactivity, 
/or use it as an excuse to punish/ /would be zapped... and as i 
understand it the Ethiala "Senate" was warned that Tom forbade 
punishment for inactivity.

I did not making an initial in game report to the Titans because my 
goodies had run out and I wasn't not even sure I would play again, 
especially with BM being so tied to IRL, so I did nothing with my 
account and had no inclinations to until I had a good RP experience with 
a Ethiala player... rather a RP encounter out of game... something that 
was more satisfying than anything that Ethiala has offered to day which 
is a whole lot of "I am going to go ____ my net access will be dodgy at 
best".

Which is all part of the point.  The game I started playing was one were 
a person could involve themselves as much or as little as suited them.  
IRL was not intruded upon by the game unless the person did it 
themselves.  Now the game, or rather those players that tend to run 
things, demand the game have equal footing with other things in a 
persons life.  Like the plethera of online games for those without lives 
and/or real friends, conform or be cast out societies that has a log in 
(conversely /"keep us updated on your real life"/) or be punished mentality.

To be frank I thought I would get time to play a bit (I did do part of 
the set up for FE while vacationing in the same place).  I got there and 
things didn't work out.  So I get fined?  And part of it to prove a 
point... the point of "We need to know what people are doing every 
second or we will fine innocents" tripe.  Well how about people letting 
others be and using IC punishments for what people do, instead of what 
they don't do.
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