HidingInTheLight

From what the post on the front page says you are better off waiting.

It's likely that the beta build 53 will be released before 1.4. Nothing you can do before that version is released, other then the thing you don't want to do, leave a comp running all day to let time pass.

And then read farther down on the mojang site where it says They are giving you permission to do so. Except, that is what was being suggested. That the people who had modified it, wouldn't be willing to share the entire modified redpower world file. Then it was said that distributing that wouldn't breach the copyright, which it does. Read the full thread, then get involved.

Except, mojang's terms of use allow for you to create mods, plugins, and texture packs. And they allow users to distribute those. http://www.minecraft.net/terms Her using their work, is well within the rights given to her by their terms. Eloraam's terms dictate that you not distribute modified versions of her code. Fair use allows for you to modify it and use it yourself, however you're not changing a significant enough portion of her work for Fair use to allow you to distribute it. I think you are the one in need of looking up how fair use and copyrights actually work. Now, do I think Eloraam is going to sue anyone for distributing a modified version of her mod, no. But she would have the legal footing to do so.

Correct. That falls under Fair Use, you can modify anything for your own personal use, the legal issue comes once you distribute those modified files. I know I didn't include that in my original quote from you, but that was what lead into the portion of your original post I did quote.

You don't sign anything saying you won't print counterfeit money either, or sell copies of movies you purchased, or software you purchased, the fact you didn't sign anything doesn't negate the copyright. You agree to the copyright by downloading it.

Are you using the newest version? (47f) Have you found any ore breaking surface rocks? How about while using a sluice?

How Villages/Towns/Cities should work, my take on it. First off I'm going to rename the Home Stone to Founding Stone. A founding stone would require (x) {(x) will represent a configurable option that can be set by the admin, I'll most likely use that again as I go} amount of people to provide some item (perhaps a petition or ballot) that would get used in building the founding stone along with other TFC materials. The person who builds it would be the mayor/leader, etc of the village. { Requiring ballots, or petitions from other players would limit 1 person towns, 5-10 would make a good default I think} Founding Stones would only allow for a very small village (x)chunks by (x)chunks. {I'm thinking 5 chunks by 5 chunks as a default} with the Stone being in the center chunk. Founding Stones could be upgraded, upgrades should be easy at first, 128 charcoal as an example for the first upgrade. Starting upgrades might increase the village size by 2 chunks in all direction, later upgrades that are more expensive could increase the town by 5 chunks in all directions. Max city size would be a configurable option, the distance between Founding stones would also be a configurable option. Some servers could allow overlap of cities at there maximum size, causing tensions between the cities, or allowing them to build the 2 cities together. {Not sure how the overlap area would work with the rest of my ideas coding wise, but that's no so much my problem} The Founding Stone, would have an interface, that the mayor could open up and drop the required upgrade items in, and a button to commit the changes. A text field to name the city. Anyone could click on the stone, and it would show them the name, and how much area the city occupies currently, what the next upgrade will cost, and how much of that has been supplied already, who the mayor is, I'm sure more info could go in it as well. Zoning. Once a town has been founded, the mayor would need to zone out the available chunks within the town's boundaries. This doesn't need to be over complicated, perhaps 2 zones, City and Private. Chunks zoned as private would be sold/given/rented {Mayors choice} to people that want to live in the city. City zoned chunks would be for roads, common ares, markets, etc. I'm thinking of modified signs as the zoning markers, can be placed on the ground or hung on a wall. City Zones. Again something that could be configurable. Either anyone could build in City Zones, or perhaps the mayor could set builders for that city in the Founding stones interface. Private Zones. Private Zone Markers would have an interface allowing the current owner to give ownership to someone else. It's be nice if they could be picked up and moved around within the chunk with out causing problems with the ownership, if that's able to be coded.. More to come. This got long and I'm getting tired

I don't really believe he is trying to force anything on the players, just to provide the tools to them to help facilitate those functions. An economy is easier to setup if there is a currency already there. Yet if a server choose to use a bartering system instead of the in mod currency, nothing would stop that from happening. I do agree about factions, I'm more of a co-op player myself. Providing the tools to establish towns, doesn't necessarily pit one town vs. the other. They can still live in peaceful co-existence.

The parts that can't be agreed upon are the parts that need to be discussed. Honestly, I don't care that everyone doesn't agree with my ideas, I like that everyone is weighing in on it. The more ideas we spit out, the more possibilities Bioxx and the rest of the devs have to consider when they ultimately make their design choice.

Obviously there aren't 1000 on at a time, but you have a player base of that many. With that large of a player base, it's likely that at least 10-20 are on at any given time. Enough to notice a griefer, and stop it. If a server only has a total of 50 players total, it's likely there will be times that only 1 or 2 people are on, there maybe even be times when a griefer would have the server to themselves.

Don't get me wrong, I think it's possible on a certain server(s), under the right conditions, indeed you may have done it on your server. But TFC isn't being designed for, or atleast my ideas aren't for, a single server with 1000's of players like you have. A system in TFC needs to be designed for multiple servers of varying sizes. A server with 50 members won't be able to mount as strong of a defense vs the griefers.

In my eyes, the mayor of the town, would control the sales of the individual plots. At least the initial sale. The current owner, would be able to sell to anyone. The mayor could prevent anyone from buying up all the land or mineral rights initially. The likelihood of someone coming in and buying out all the current owners is small but possible. That would be incentive for the mayor to not overcharge in taxes, to use the tax revenue for the betterment of the town. (Hiring guards, buying supplies, paying people to mine, paying people to build roads, building community bloomeries, etc) A mayor, that overcharges, or doesn't use the funds to better the city, would find himself voted out, or in an abandoned city.

As Gekkey and bsb have mentioned, it was actually something I was thinking about while sleeping, activating the protections only while the player is offline, would be acceptable. PVP could still happen, but it would limit griefing. I'm perfectly happy defending my property while I'm there to defend it, It's the time I'm offline that I'm more concerned about.