Mystique

Mystique is the author of a large number of MUF programs used in the early days of FurryMUCK and a few other MUCKs. Some of her notable works include the original throw.muf, skunk-effects.muf, and others.

There has been some controversy regarding Mystique and what could be called "excessive" license agreements in her MUFcode, which sometimes even claim to supersede government legislation! One of her license agreements is at the end of this article.

Mystique's code has been banned from being used in a critical role on some systems (like FurryMUCK) due to the fact that she has been known to @purge all her code and leave when she doesn't get her way, because the license agreement gives the MUCK administration little recourse after such a @purge, and also for security reasons. (see below)

Mystique appears to have vanished from the fandom; this has made pretty much all her code legally unusable since she requires herself to be present on the systems it's used on, and in control of the code.

Provision number seven (this time, it's personal) was added when a MUF code audit was done on FurryMUCK. This audit, led by Slipstream, Points, and Lynx, uncovered such abilities embedded in the code such as: illegal teleportation (to rooms Mystique did not own and were not set LINK_OK), illegal penny acquisition, and the ability to spy on users of the code without their knowledge. Mystique was stripped of her MUCKER3 bit, and the code subsequently removed by the author. Amusingly, while the bulk of the code-parsing work was done by Points, he was never mentioned in any of Mystique's EULA's.

Mystique MUFcode license agreement:

[ editor's notes ] Hereafter: 1. Mystique will be referred to as the Author. 2. Control is ownership of said item, able to change, manipulate, replace or remove without exterior assistance. 3. Authorities are those who maintain, operate and govern the usage of the muck within and outside of the virtual environment. This includes the title Wizard. Terms of Usage: 1. Use of this program is by permission of the Author ONLY. 2. NO editing or cross-muck transfers [known as porting] of this program are allowed. Those who do so, are committing the act of Piracy, punishable under local laws. [ Copyright is a federal law, not local. ] 3. The Author must be of verifiable, connectable presence and in Control of this program during ALL usage. If this program is removed from the Author's Control, all of it's operation WILL be terminated immediately. 4. NO muck shall operate this program without the consent of the Author. Doing so, circumvents all muck policies, AUP or legislation [on any media] regarding restriction of legal obligations and places all muck Authorities in the act of Theft, punishable by local laws. [ Mystique-law trumps federal law? Good luck. Also, copyright infringement isn't theft. ] 5. This program does NOT apply to any policies which require replacements found prior to shutdown. If this program is to be replaced, it remains in Control OF the Author, until a replacement IS found. The Author retains the right to shutdown this program at any time. [ Once again, the rules don't apply to Mystique! ] 6. Muck Authorities must adhere to all of the above policies or the Author maintains the rights to remove this program at any time, without warning. [ You will do what I say or I'll take my toys and go home. Wahhh! ] 7. The Author requires that the characters Slipstream or Lynx [or variants there of], are *NOT* of official embodiment [known as Wizard or Authorities]. If said become such, this program's operation will be TERMINATED and removed, until such time when they are not. [ Now it's personal. ] 8. The Author retains the right to maintain, change or replace this program at any time without restrictions. [ Including add back doors, hmm? ]