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#### The Parable of the Sandbox

Seven giants once gathered together and created something wonderful - a huge sandbox where it was possible to play endlessly and build anything one wanted. Into the sandbox they imagined glitchen and set them free to play however they pleased. "Do whatever you like," they said. "Only do not harm one another. All may play and none may command others."
The glitchen rejoiced and played. For a time they simply ran through the sand from one part of the sandbox to another; the sun and sand were enough to keep them happy. Then one glitchen thought, "I will build something - a castle!" He went off into a far corner of the sandbox and began to build an elaborate castle of sand. Others came to help and the castle rose, tall and beautiful.
Another glitchen thought, "I will make sculptures from the sand," and soon a group had created a sculpture garden filled with lovely statues. Still another glitchen found some pebbles and, feeling contemplative, smoothed the sand and placed the pebbles into intricate patterns that led him down winding paths of inner peace.
The giants saw how the glitchen were creating beauty in the sandbox and they were happy.
Then other glitchen saw what these had made and said, "You have no right to dictate what will be in the sandbox. The giants imagined us free to do whatever we want throughout the sandbox and you are limiting our freedom." They kicked down the sand castle, stomped all the sculptures into nothingness and stirred the swirling pebbles of meditation into a meaningless jumble. They laughed and exulted in their freedom as they ran throughout the desolate wasteland of sand.
The giants wept.

Posted 12 months ago by Hawkwell | Permalink

### Replies

- Nice story, It's always nice to put a message in the story and we can all learn from it
  Posted 12 months ago by Santa Clause | Permalink
- I am guessing that this is one of the threads he refers to:
  www.glitch.com/forum/genera...
  "i never bragged that i had killed all of the residential trees, just the regular streets. i then threatened to start the residential streets.
  it was less of a boast and more of a tactic. i tried reasoning with the preservists and was shot down. i tried making them see that i could use their behavior for my personal enrichment but was cheerfully told to go ahead and get rich. so far the only thing that seems to make any difference at all is the wholesale killing of every wood tree i can find, which is going pretty well so far."
  Just quoting one avatar, not me, in his exact own words.
  Posted 12 months ago by Dotcom | Permalink
- Prequel to the story: Many glitchen found a beautiful garden where they could go to play. There were many and varied resources and it was a lovely and joyous place.
  Then one glitchen came in with bulldozers and said "NO, this cannot be a beautiful garden for all to enjoy! It must be a castle!"
  The other glitchen who had been enjoying the garden, said "Can't we share the garden? You can have a castle and we can still have the variety and the beauty."
  But the one glitchen gathered his friends and said, "NO. We have declared it to be a castle and a castle only, and so a castle it shall be!"
  And the Giants were saddened that a few glitchen refused to share.
  Posted 12 months ago by Audaria | Permalink
- I understand the argument "But they are using space and sand that others may want to use." **IF** there's lots of space and lots of sand and it's all very similar, then I can't see using that argument to claim that people are refusing to share or to justify the person who kicks down the sandcastle. This is a reason for building a large sandbox with lots of sand.
  When there's a large sandbox with lots of sand, it's silly to say that people who build sandcastles are refusing to share the sand.
  Posted 12 months ago by Splendora | Permalink
- You're right Splendora. Of course. The thing is, many glitchen had already found that particular corner of the sandbox to be lovely as it was and had built their own communal castle. They built a castle of varied resources and community that thrived on wilderness, not on a disciplined group. Just because no "artist" had laid down an official claim for that area, does not mean that it was not being used and loved. Then a few people came and decided that it could not be as it had been. Those who had been using it and enjoying it were told that it could only have ONE resource. The earlier glitchen suggested it have both, but the "artist" insisted that it had to have ONLY a castle. Therefore, it is not silly, but dead-on accurate to say that those people (the "artist") are refusing to share the sand.
  Posted 12 months ago by Audaria | Permalink
- I was not aware, when Tiny Speck opened up Glitch to new players in September, that early beta players who "had already found" a particular public street could dictate its potential content forever. I was not aware, when I bought a house in Buckward Vale, that a player with a house in Estevan Meadows had a prior claim to the entire "neighborhood" including the public street of Wickdoon Mood.
  I think it's worth quoting what Blanky said about this issue: ( www.glitch.com/forum/genera...
  "Having a player-maintained street of wood trees is definitely a lovely example of emergent game play. I've strolled through Wickdoon Mood and been gratified to find wood trees there, and have contributed to maintaining them myself."
  Posted 12 months ago by Dotcom | Permalink
- It's worth quoting what Blanky said about this issue:
  Emergent gameplay is constantly in flux: tree-killing campaigns are just as much a part of this dynamic as Wickdoon Mood is itself.
  Posted 12 months ago by WindBorn | Permalink
- Perhaps you should consider who is trying to "dictate (the) potential content forever." Perhaps you should be aware that only one group has staked a "claim" to any street. Perhaps you should quote Blanky's entire post, rather than picking and choosing.
  Posted 12 months ago by Audaria | Permalink
- The childishness and stubbornness evidenced by both sides of the endless war over pixel trees is exhausting for the non-involved.
  Posted 12 months ago by ✰ Lorelei ✰ | Permalink
- @ Windborn, tree poison and tree antidote both exist, also making it clear that tree poisoning is an acceptable part of the gameplay.
  @ Audaria, there are about a hundred individual players of Glitch whose gameplay includes planting wood trees on Wickdoon Mood. About fifty of those individuals are members of a group, two or three of its members have, as individuals, had angry run-ins with a small number of other people concerning wood trees. These isolated incidents have been blown way way out of proportion, in my opinion.
  There are about three individual players of Glitch whose gameplay includes repeatedly poisoning every wood tree in Wickdoon Mood. For two of these individual players of Glitch, gameplay also includes repeatedly poisoning all wood trees anywhere in Ur. All these gameplay styles are acceptable to Tiny Speck, but none of them suggests your motive here is "Can't we share?"
  Posted 12 months ago by Dotcom | Permalink
- oy. do we have ANOTHER whiny little wood thread?
  did anybody notice that while this is going on, there are no whiny little mining threads?
  blah, de blah blah, blah.
  you are not very glitchy. not glitchy at all.
  if there are four snork blooting hoover weedwon in the sharing why can't we all just get along nyah nyah belnderizer then i will have to whoop, whoop, whoop dingsingdingding turn over ANOTHER million currants and it's no hair off my paintbrush.
  Posted 12 months ago by flask | Permalink
- Can you guys please leave this thread? He's not even a wood hippie member! He could be referring to wood trees, herb gardens, etc.
  Posted 12 months ago by Rook | Permalink
- and some guy wrote a transparent little parable that fools nobody and the giants were sad, because people call horseapples cabbages and want everyone to carry it around on a pillow.
  i'm going to stand to one side and take potshots and then i'm going to stand on the other side and ask people to notice how SHINY my halo is and then when that doesn't work i'm going to shout that everybody loves me and gives me presents and by GOLLY LOOK HOW MANY FRIENDS I HAVE AREN'T I AWESOME?
  and the giants are crying.
  steve the paper tree is sad, too.
  and puppies will die.
  and no more rainbows will ever come to happy land because it isn't very glitchy.
  Posted 12 months ago by flask | Permalink
- Heavy handed morality! Woo!
  Posted 12 months ago by Ernest | Permalink
- @Dotcom: Were you present at the early conversations? Or any conversations in which I was involved? Have you ever heard me say that street or any other had to be all anything? Have you spoken to anyone in that group (or non group) who has had a conversation with me? Even Rook, if he's honest will say that I have always said, when asked, that I would be fine if even one tree was allowed to be anything other than wood. Were you present on that street today when I arrived to find 2 empty plots, one cherry tree, and one wood tree? If so, did you then see me tend both plots, but not plant because I did not have a wood tree bean, and tell the members from the group who were present (one of whom is my friend) to plant whatever they wanted, that I would leave them empty since there was already a cherry tree?
  So, saying that I am unwilling to share is both untrue and pointless. At least you didn't specifically call me a troll this time. I'll give you credit for that.
  Posted 12 months ago by Audaria | Permalink
- and the carrot did go forth into willea, the land of motor oil and used toaster parts and she saw that it was all gloopy, so she raised up both rollerskates and cied mightily "oh, that i had seven snowflakes, that i might come to most handy demolition hankies!"
  and then she sneezed.
  she was a hundred and fourteen years old when this happened, and mizrag was her lapdog.
  and the giants were sad.
  sad, sad, sad.
  sad.
  steve the paper tree is grumpy.
  Posted 12 months ago by flask | Permalink
- @ Audaria, in fact you were one of the "reasonable people" I had hoped to please when I worked to persuade others in the wood-group to do exactly what I thought you had been asking for, three wood trees but one non-wood tree. The first non-wood tree I planted there was a cherry, and once again I was thinking of what I thought was your preference.
  Posted 12 months ago by Dotcom | Permalink
- AND LOOK HOW SHINY AND REASONABLE I AM!!!
  LO, I AM A PARAGON OF VIRTUE AND I AM BELOVED OF ALL THE PEOPLE.
  YOU WILL BE MY POTATO AND I WILL BE YOUR TIRE IRON FOREVER, AS I LIVE AND SNORKEL.
  yea, verily.
  Posted 12 months ago by flask | Permalink
- Oh yeah, we need to chill. We really do. But there are some questions and ideas lurking here that are kinda important to some of us, and there are reasons for that which have nothing to do with wood trees. Maybe I'll say more about that later.
  For now I'll say this: The thing about parables is that they can be interpreted in different ways. That's part of their charm and also their limitation. I didn't read the OP's parable as being about a specific place or specific events. If the OP intended it to be read as such, that didn't work for me. As the parable is about sand, if I post any further here, I'll continue to talk about sand. And when I say "sand," I mean sand.
  Posted 12 months ago by Splendora | Permalink
- Another possible example was the secret room in Uralia, where the Sandbox group encouraged people to put out small gifts plus some notecards that named brand-new quests.This inventive use of a public space outraged some other avatars, who (I heard) would regularly come there and grab every item. The first few times I saw the place, it looked like the clubhouse of some generous hobos, with food, drinks, bubble, planks, etc. lined up across the floor. Excited avatars, some new and some old, were talking about all the gifts there and all the new quests. One day, a level 40-something avatar came while I was there and wordlessly hoovered up gifts and notecards, from left to right. After that, for a while, the room alternated between having a few gifts there and having not much. The last few times I went there, it was just empty -- no quests, no gifts, and no people.
  Posted 12 months ago by Dotcom | Permalink
- "Even Rook, if he's honest will say that I have always said, when asked, that I would be fine if even one tree was allowed to be anything other than wood."
  True story. I though you said that I was being honest by saying so... oh well.
  Um Zeo Ki also would have the same to say.
  Posted 12 months ago by Rook | Permalink
- Dotcom, I appreciate you trying to broker a solution. I really do. I'm going to give you the whole tale, from my perspective. One time. I am quite certain, based on previous experience, that certain people will take what I say and try to turn it against me. That's ok. I don't enjoy being called names, but I know who I am. You seem like a reasonable person too.
  First, I want to say that FLASK has been cruelly maligned. Flask is my friend and long before the "wood wars" began she went around Ur doing good. She made things for the sole purpose of giving them away. Not selling them. Giving them away. She made up little games and gave away prizes. She is and always has been one of the good guys. So, when I see people using the terms "griefer" and "troll" in the same sentence as "flask" my heart breaks a little. And I get angry.
  Not so very long ago, there was no one trying to make Wickdoon Mood a wood preserve. I went there often. I was actually happy when I found a wood tree or two. I nurtured them. Then, one day, all of the trees had been replaced by wood trees and there were notes lying around asking for them to be left as wood. I did not want all wood trees there, so I took a couple of them out whenever I found this situation. I was not alone, because often all of the wood trees had been replaced. The notes grew progressively nasty and began to refer to the people who didn't support the wood trees as "greedy." This rubbed me the wrong way.
  One day, I happened to go there when the writer of the notes was there. FLASK also happened to be there. I asked the writer why they ALL had to be wood trees and was told the "rare" story, which I refuted. FLASK IM'd me, advising me to not be confrontational, but to just change one of the trees later if I wanted to. When I got home, the tree outside my house, which had never been changed, was replaced with a wood tree. I viewed this as a direct attack. Right or wrong, that is how I saw it.
  Then, the notes began to speak of a "Wickdoon Wood Preservation Group." The people who "defended" the wood trees became more and more abusive. Yes, I mean abusive. I even reported one of them. I did not do so lightly. That is all I will say about it, because as far as I'm concerned, once a situation has been reported, it's in the hands of TS. Meanwhile, I stopped watering and petting wood trees in the wild. Ever. I relished the chance to harvest and clear in the same way that I had previously relished the sighting of a wood tree. FLASK and I never talked about it, but by the time I heard that she was poisoning all wood trees on sight, I was doing the same. I just didn't like them any more.
  I was called names. I was harrassed. And when I said anything, I was told that it was my own fault. That I was the bad guy. Somehow my wants constituted childishness, while those who wanted wood trees were supporting a noble cause. ROOK and I had a good conversation about how we both felt. We both listened. We did not agree, but neither of us called the other names. I know that I shouldn't lump all of the people who want wood only on Wickdoon into one category, but after so many attacks, it's hard not to. Even though I have a friend in the group - the 'official' group. I can't say his name, because his group hates me. Not that they even know me, but they hate me. So, yes, I do know that not everyone on "that" side of the argument is horrible, but I have had so many bad experiences with people from the group (and apparently people who just pretend (?!) to be part of the group) that I now assume the worst. That's what happens. Maybe I should be above it, but I'm not. Maybe the people who disagree with me should be above it, but apparently they're not either.
  I would never presume to speak for FLASK. We do not consult each other about the kind of game that we choose to play. I witnessed some of the harassment she received and I received harassment myself. Perhaps it really was only a small number of people doing it. Still, when you're all saying basically the same message, it's hard to differentiate between you (or them, whichever.) I have not actively joined FLASK's annihilation program, but I support her choice to continue for as long as she sees fit. I have not been in her shoes. Perhaps since I've admitted to lumping (most) of you together, you want to lump me in with FLASK. That is fine by me.
  For me, the biggest issue has always been about a group arbitrarily making decisions that they then expect me to abide by. I have never been a fan of 'mob rules.' And I don't like anyone trying to force something down my throat, then calling me names when I refuse to swallow it.
  I picked this fight. Not FLASK. I remain willing to compromise. From what I have observed, there are many among you that are not. I still go to Wickdoon, and nine times out of ten, find four wood trees. And I find the same people there making sure that I cannot change even one of them to something else. So, while I'm certain that someone or other will take what I've just said and try to turn it against me, my only request is that you turn it against ME. It's my turn. (And no, flask, I'm not trying to be noble. It really is my turn.)
  Posted 12 months ago by Audaria | Permalink
- Rook, sorry. I didn't mean to imply that you wouldn't be honest. It's just an expression. And thank you for confirming what I said.
  Sure, this COULD be about something else entirely. But, really, it doesn't seem to be, does it?
  Posted 12 months ago by Audaria | Permalink
- The only interesting part of this is why TS will only allow 1 piggy to be stolen, but other forms of "emergent" destructive behavior are met with a simple caveat emptor.
  Potions of animal youth are only recent additions, and as far as I know nobody has bothered to "emerge" in that direction.
  Posted 12 months ago by Sturminator IX | Permalink
- You guys are strange xP I just like the grocery store and the metal rock near my home in Estevan :)
  Posted 12 months ago by Liza Throttlebottom | Permalink
- I think the obvious next step is for someone to start a campaign to turn all trees in Ur into wood trees. Because then people would actually have something to whine about, instead of boo hoo a whole street is wood trees.
  Posted 12 months ago by Shiromisa Kaya | Permalink
- @Audaria, my fault for misreading. My eyes "opened" when you said it was your favorite street, then I was like... crap, at least I could be one less person to kill a tree that's non-wood on the street and still have wood. I just wanted to say to you that since I really didn't have much of an influence in the group at that time, and that there were most of the members at the time and maybe one or two that still are, willing to keep the street fully wood because to use it was just one street. And pretty much what Helium Penguin said, which is that anyone could easily have started their own 'preserve' of bean, bubble, etc and keep a street a monoculture.
  Here's pretty much what they had to say: prntscr.com/50jva
  Posted 12 months ago by Rook | Permalink
- If public locations are saddled with a dynamic of recursion to the mean, in part because of the technical inability to preserve distinctiveness, in part because of some players' regarding it as a personal affront, then Glitch as a game will devolve to the state of a glorified Farmville, because the limited opportunities for emergent play will be confined to gated communities, out of sight of the majority of players, especially new ones.
  It'd be good to have some sense of how things stand, both from TS in terms of their general philosophy for Glitch's public spaces, and from the most vocal opponents of any shaping of public locations, in terms of their willingness to tolerate any technical changes that would provide greater protection to such shaping.
  Posted 12 months ago by Holgate | Permalink
- Buy my tree posion!! I have good deals on antidote too!
  Posted 12 months ago by Sue Chef | Permalink
- What I would be interested in knowing is TS's philosophy and the general direction of their future plans regarding the shaping and sharing of what are deemed to be player "owned" spaces. Will it be possible not only to make such spaces distinctive, but also to preserve that distinctiveness while sharing the space with those outside one's circle of trust, e.g. with new players? I'd also be interested in the views of other players on this.
  Posted 12 months ago by Splendora | Permalink
- That, Splendora, is an excellent point, and I think it points to a kind of synthesis -- might it be possible, at some point, for some now-public spaces to be granted a kind of 'custodial' status, so there are smoother transitions from 'public map' to 'player-managed public areas' to 'player-owned areas with public access' to 'player-owned areas with controlled/private access'?
  As I've hinted here and elsewhere, I've seen a number of virtual environments where public spaces are essentially vacated and player activity retreats behind closed doors, and the usual result is stagnation. It's not an easy problem to solve, but I'd like TS to take a shot.
  Posted 11 months ago by Holgate | Permalink
- seven giants imagined a sandbox, and four others went off to giggle when a bulldozer came in.
  steve the paper tree is crying.
  and everybody should bring me sammiches. steve told me so himself. that would make him feel better.
  Posted 11 months ago by flask | Permalink
- Don't do drugs, kids.
  Posted 11 months ago by Holgate | Permalink
- I Only worship the Great Paper Tree!
  Posted 11 months ago by Anya Karenya | Permalink