OFFICIAL NEWS

Yubina

I don’t want to know everything or specific numbers, just some more information than we already have. And more advertising on things that are going on behind the curtain, to make all see that there is a lot going on. And maybe to attract more volunteers.

Not just to you but to those who claim its cheap and base this off of hosting plans for fps game servers (i know of the one of those personall in that list) you put a mmo on one of those that server will chock to death. They are capable of maybe 64 simo not 100s . I did a netstat on my con. There are a total of 3 servers i can see from my end.
shard.ryzom.com
shards.ryzom.com
server-ipip-ip.whatever (did not copy it down as it is just a rev dns for a raw ip.)
shard.ryzom.com is the log in server once logged in it goes to close wait
shards keeps a active established connection this is the play server
the 3rd server-ip... is the chat server (can only see it when your in megacorp.io do to log in happening in the background and megacorp acting almost like a proxy you wont see shard. pop up there. But the active connection to the chat server you do see.

So even if it only cost them 100ish per month per server for a colated remote hosting service plan (it cost way more) the real cost is tripple what every one wants to believe. As with out doubt ryzom has 3 servers minimally hosted on 3 seperate machines. Chances are its really 6 physical machines for redunency purposes to prevent things like mobs becoming unresponsive or chat going down or players not being able to log in. So 1 server each at any given time is powering ryzom probably load balanced between the 2 per part. Now this is assuming of course they are using one play server for every region of ryzom and not multiple physical macines 1 or 2 per region. Just because we only have one play server does not mean that ryzom runs on one machine.

As for your own thinking the problem would still exist. Even if the ryzom devs said it was costing them between 3k and 10k a month etc people would still say well they made their money for the costs after just x people so they should reduce the ammount we pay etc etc.

The owners are not just doing this to give us a game to play they are doing it to also make money. And truth of the matter is they are operating on a shoe string budget. They have employees etc. Again even if it only cots them a 100 a month to host the server theres still their employees pay checks. If and i sure they do have a 3d art team in the us the starting slary is 40k usd for a 3d artist out of colledge. Thats what they should make most will work for way less just for their portfolio. But the point is they have programers artists admins who keep the servers going likely a on call contracted tech to fix the hardware or a service plan to next day deliver parts/full servers etc. Break all this down by the month and you got minimally a few grand per month not 100...

What they are doing with this idea is working to increase profits so they can do more for ryzom when it comes to content bug squashing etc.