Community
A set of official forums are provided by Jagex on the RuneScape website. On the forums, players are able to participate in game discussions, arrange to buy or sell items, post suggestions for game improvements, vote in polls, and otherwise interact with the community. Unlike many MMORPG official forums, the RuneScape forums have limited features. A user can set an avatar and have a separate display name, but cannot set an automatic signature. User profiles only display the number of posts a user has made along with the option to disable smileys. Users cannot use text formatting, post links, nor display images. The privilege of posting on the forums is limited to paying members, as well as free players with a total level exceeding 350.
Between 24 September 2002 and 9 December 2004, players could submit questions via e-mail to the RuneScape gods, which were published in the form of letters. On 26 September 2005, a new feature known as Postbag from the Hedge was introduced, where players can submit questions via e-mail to a non-player character in the game. Players can also submit original RuneScape related artwork (such as sculptures, comics, drawings and paintings), some of which is displayed in a gallery on the RuneScape website.
During various holidays, including Easter, April Fools, Thanksgiving, Halloween and Christmas, Jagex hosts a holiday event in a specific location in Gielinor. Players who successfully complete the required tasks during the event receive a reward such as an item or an emote, allowing the player character to perform a gesture conveying an emotion. Holiday items released prior to 2002 are tradable among players, and due to their rarity are worth significant amounts of money on the player market. Holiday items after Christmas 2002 are untradable and limited to one per player, and can also be retrieved if lost.
Various RuneScape fansites have been established by players, which are a source of information about the game. In the early days of RuneScape, the official website had a page which listed links to several fansites, but has since been removed. In order to provide players with an alternative, Jagex introduced the Knowledge Base, which offers information on gameplay, the main RuneScape rules, and account security. On 22 November 2011, the Knowledge Base was converted into a community-editable wiki. For account security reasons, Jagex discourages the discussion of fansites within the game or the official forums – and a rule specifically prohibits sharing web addresses. A major fansite has criticised Jagex for not recognising fansites' contributions to the development of its game. However, as a result of announcements made in 2009, Jagex has promised to increase communication with fansites.
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Famous quotes containing the word community:
“The community which has neither poverty nor riches will always have the noblest principles.”
—Plato (c. 427–347 B.C.)
“Every community is an association of some kind and every community is established with a view to some good; for everyone always acts in order to obtain that which they think good. But, if all communities aim at some good, the state or political community, which is the highest of all, and which embraces all the rest, aims at good in a greater degree than any other, and at the highest good.”
—Aristotle (384–323 B.C.)
“The community and family networks which helped sustain earlier generations have become scarcer for growing numbers of young parents. Those who lack links to these traditional sources of support are hard-pressed to find other resources, given the emphasis in our society on providing treatment services, rather than preventive services and support for health maintenance and well-being.”
—Bernice Weissbourd (20th century)