Phones (Sorta)

It's been a long time since my last post here on WYR - sorry about that.  Life got sorta crazy after Christmas and my time online for the past few months has been almost zero.  But things are starting to settle down again and I'm able to get back to my online pastimes and interests.

I recently, on this side of the monitor, had to finally let go of my landline phone (or POTS lines as they're also known).  Basically it is a phone that IS wired (old copper phone lines) and works even when the Internet and cell towers aren't working.  They also have far better sound quality and continuity than today's cell and VOIP phones...  But whatever you think about POTS or traditional landlines, good or bad, doesn't matter as they are being discontinued everywhere.  Anyway, because of all the phone switching, it brought up some fond memories of our attempts to create a "phone system" for WhuddleWorld.

Does anyone remember the phone system?  In the first days of WhuddleWorld there was a single phone you could access from Whuddleville (if I'm remembering correctly), and you could open a "live chat" with another logged in Whuddle.  Now chat wasn't planned as an option because of our younger demographic, so deciding to do the phone system was a bit nerve-wracking.  Our goal was to make sure that the kids that visited WhuddleWorld were protected, and that WhuddleWorld kept to a more all-inclusive, general audience (G) type conversation.

And after a number of trial and error sessions, we ended up deciding a Private Message program (dressed up as a virtual Answering Machine) would be a better/more workable option.  Kind of historic really - Facebook had not opened to the public yet, so other than Bulletin Board systems (which were the big "thing to do" at the time), no other website had implemented a form of instant messaging like WhuddleWorld.  Kinda cool, eh?

Sketching ideas for the WW phone system

Sidenote:  Our programmers were some of the best - truly.  Because of how WhuddleWorld was transitioned, they got very little credit for creating some of the most efficient and innovative programs or "apps" (before apps were a thing) on the net at that time. I really was lucky to work with some of the brightest and most talented artists, programmers and administrative support staff!

Anyway, back to the phones...HEH!  Really not too much to say.  The system was meant to keep WhuddleWorld immersive. So you had to have the right coin in your inventory, and if you did you had to walk to the right parts of the world to get to the phone.  Then it would bring up a dial-pad and you had to have a number to call.  And then you could leave a message (a dm/pm basically) on their Answering Machine.

We also had a WW shopping network that made use of the phone system - but I think I'll do a whole post on that another time. LOL!

Here are a couple images of the phones. I wish we had more, but most of the phone dialing and messaging was done on the fly, creating layered images from pieces. Still, a fun bit of WW nostalgia to be sure!

1st Phone on WhuddleWorld    

2nd WhuddleWorld phone (Nature's Nook)