Just stick to the damn question, people... Oh, wait, I must be new here. Or not. Or... argh ! Anyway, a short (? yeah right...) recap for the ADHD-like attention span posters.
PayPal *IS* the most frequently used "online money transaction" tool: pretty easy to use, damn convenient too most of the time, (barely) acceptable service cost (for small sums), etc. Because of that, most people that *CAN* use it will use it, and tend to forget other alternatives IF their main purpose ISN'T cashing in massively (for instance, a sourceforge project team with a donate link... as opposed to, let's say, a MMOG with a bazilion customers).
THE PROBLEM starts when you find somebody that only has a PayPal-donate link, you wish to donate a *small* amount of money to them BUT you're unable to use PayPal to donate (not a resident of one of those 45 "supported" countries).
THE BOTTOM LINE / QUESTION ? Let's rephrase it, so people will understand the gist of it: does ANYBODY know of anything PayPal-like (i.e. being able to pay relatively small amounts of cash to somebody else without leaving from the computer) that works on a more... "global" scale ?...
Dang, now that I start thinking about it, you'd have a pretty hard time doing something like this "the easy way". However, there's a small (possible) workaround here, but it would require the cooperation of several telephony companies... I mean, heck, the pr0n-sites have some of the most innovative ways (easy ones too) to separate you from your money while giving you what you want almost instantly. The next logical step of PayPal would be to start using some relay-billing services in cooperation with the phone companies, so that you won't require a credit card at all to authorise a "deposit" to your PayPal account.
The answer to the initial question is, anyway, pretty easy: there is NO EASY way right now, but it might be in the future.
I have no ideea how much of it is wishfull thinking, but I certainly hope some other company TOO, and not only PayPal manages to reach "this level" - there's a thing or two to be said about competition and the obvious advantage for the customer...
Well, it's a tradeoff issue... do you prefer that:
a) all bugs get published "public" - each and every person can snoop around and either help fix it - or instead try to exploit it (even moreso, keep on exploiting it on "unpatched" systems long time after)
OR
b) all serious bugs get published "privately" - only "core contributors" get to see it and try to fix it - the rest of the population might not even know the bug exists until a patch is released (moreso, you might not even know what the bug was)
"Johnny, get of that pr0n DVD download, your mother and I can't look at the rerun of Survivor because of your leeching !" -- angry father, user of the experimental service
[joke mode enabled] Even more impressive is the fact that they managed to fit a CD-drive on an assault rifle. Kind of reminds you of the Beverly Hills Cop 3 gun... what was it called, "Annihilator 2000" ?
...that would be the P2P structure of the client/network. Connections between Skype and Kaaza (developer-wise) have never been secret, and even more - they admit the base concept is the same, they just "took it one step further".
Now, unless you want to have a single server (or cluster of servers) that handle your login, friend's logins, routing between you two and so on and so forth, you'd just have to bear with those "unknown connections" - they're (most of the time anyway) just some other Skype users.
But hey, if it looks like spyware to you or you're paranoid, don't use it. Nobody forces you to.
... corporate executives start to realise it's cheaper to use the internal phone system than calling their employees from their mobile whenever they're both inside the building;)
Technically speaking, that's correct for almost everything... I mean "next thing you know, IT IS winter, and that before you know (/realise) it". Heh. My bad;)
And another (small but vital) piece of information: you completely neglected the fact that the speaker is Japanese. I'm not aware of your personal experience with Japanese manufacturers, but I can tell you this (which is afaik "public knowledge"): a Japanese will always do whatever it takes to "save face".
This means that yes, on some small degree they will admit that something is wrong, but will also try to explain to you that this is the best possible solution that he could come up with, and announce nothing will be done to change it. Soon after, a solution will appear, and be presented with as small "attention attracting" as possible. That's just the way it works - you will get a better product soon, just don't rub it in too much, it's offensive.
Again, personally, I believe this to be (overall) a superior system to the "western" one, where sometimes blame is admitted but nothing gets done.
You are correct, Sony did fuck up here, I wasn't contesting that.
However, I personally don't have issues with such things. I grew up in "communist Romania", and I got used to working with what I have (even if things changed lately) : right now, my keyboard is 9 years old (space bar is now the caps lock, instead of caps lock I have a hole, wasn't using that anyway ; also, the "big" Enter key sticks if not pushed in the lower right corner), my mouse is 4+ years old (have to clean it 2 times a day to keep it moving, have to push exactly where the pressure switches are under the buttons, the mouse wheel is sometimes spinning without spinning the inside mechanism, etc). I have several other KBs and mice in the house, I just never use them - I got to enjoy the fact that I am the only one that ever uses that KB and mouse.
So, ok, Sony did a mistake. A design mistake nevertheless - the fact that they chose not to have the damn handheld a few milimeters wider. I'm quite sure that after the NEXT few thousand units, a new "PSP 1.1" will be announced, that will be wider and have an "ok-working" button, no matter what the speaker said about gamers having to conform. However, I personally would like to have the first, un-modified version - and be the only one comfortable enough to play it.
Yes, this is only MY oppinion here. I'll bet 99% will disagree. Just wanted to make it clear why.
Well, if the building would get mass-produced, and in 0.6% cases (see article) the gate would stick open or close... and in some other cases would squeak and be a bit harder to open/close... then I'd say that overall, we have a small problem.
Now, if you chose to not use that gate anymore (maybe use it more carefully, less often, etc) OR if you chose to bash the head of the architect with a 2x4 instead - now those are completely different choices.
Analogies apart... for god's sake, it's a BUTTON. If you KNOW the switch is not directly in the middle, just damn push the outer part of it, where you know the button's pressure sensor (switch) is ! Or, if you're so unhappy, take it apart, move the "hole" in which the button is a few milimeters and be happy about it (and have a funny-looking handheld, but, hey, that's the trade).
Actually, AFAIK it's "Anno Domini", short for "Anno Domini Nostri Jesu Christi" (latin for "[in] the year of our Lord Jesus Christ"). Also, most "biblical researchers" nowadays tend to place the actual birth to the year we know as 4 BC (or even 8 BC).
But, yes, I was confusing something (not the meaning of BC/AD, but the "accomplishment" related to it) - you'd have to forgive the lack of precision of an insomniac close to bedtime - you got the ideea anyway, didn't you ?
I'm sorry, but *some* people find it flattering to have a "something" (chemical compound, bacteria, virus, plant, landscape/landmark, street, village, school, building, etc) named after them - the closer that "something" is to what they wish (or just are) to be remembered by (in this case, THGTTG "trilogy in five parts"), the better.
So, excuse me for not sensing the "un-fitting-ness" of naming a (even very small and otherwise anost) space object after somebody who is remebered for his "space humour". Also, for the less open-minded, do I have to remind you why we live in a year labeled "A.D." (as opposed to "B.C.")? I'm quite sure somebody else's demise date can (under cetrain circumstances) also be more memorable than his birth date.
But, please, if you wish to argue about the degree of appropriate / not appropriate, then by all means, please bring a more solid argument.
Short version: Earth gets destroyed by aliens building a Hyperspace Bypass, but that was only an excuse, as the Earth was in fact a giant "living" computer created to find "the ultimate question" (about, of course, "Life, the Universe and Everything") to which the answer (42) was already found (but the question was uncertain), and a group of philosophers and psychologists wouldn't have liked to have the question coming out (so they contracted the Vogons to destroy Earth before it could finish the calculations)... and so on.
I'm sorry to get into this flame war, but I just couldn't resist...
CrazyJim, you first start off by claiming "I'm a world class game designer", then mention you never actually finished any work, then finally admit "my ideas are [...]upgrades on a good thing, refinements [...] I'm not original, I'm a game player. I play a game into the ground and see what's missing". Now, from that, one could extrapolate either that you have no clue about what you're talking about OR that you spend too much time lamenting and not enough doing something.
Anyway, until you actually ACCOMPLISH something (pitch your ideeas to some game studios ; heck, start an open source project if nobody else wants to do it), you have no right to claim being a "World Class Game Designer". A "World Class Game Player" yes, but that's still a long way from "Designer".
This is under no circumstances meant as a personal attack - it's just stating some facts, and giving you a harsh, but friendly advice. Almost nobody remembers the second person that claimed inventing the radio, now does it ?
Well, looks like they haven't learned much from their old mistakes, but are trying to avoid the consequences... smart move targetting heavy bandwidth apps for now.
In the long run, if they can't significantly drop manufacture prices to (let's say) 150% or even 200% of "regular" (by that date) RAM, the boost in speed a computer with "XDR DRAM" will get compared to (again, let's say) "PC800 RDRAM" will be not significant... and I'll bet (regular) people would rather choose 8 GB of "PC800 RDRAM" over 2 GB of "XDR DRAM" any time of the day.
Bottom line: they're either stuck with "speciality hardware" (like graphic cards or high-end servers) or they have to drop (manufacture) prices rapidly if they want to keep selling.
[naive 3rd world country fanboy mode] Oh no, you mean Farscape got CANCELED ? Damn you, Salazaaaar ! [/sarcasm]
Now, seriously, if you want to compare acting between Enterprise, Stargate and Farscape - please, DO NOT make the mistake of comparing the acting skills of the cast with the contents of the script. The Berman&Braga team surely spelled "doom" all over the Gene R. legacy...
Or heck, compare the acting in 1st season of TNG with the last season of TNG - you can surely see a drastic improvement. Anyway, Scott Bakula has had his acting "skills" brushed up significantly in "Quantum Leap" (he kind of first but got better), and is pretty convincing as Captain of the Enterprise, even much earlier "into the show" as Patrick Stewart was able to do it in TNG (it took him almost 2 seasons to stop acting "Gurney Hallecky" - and don't get me started on "Life Force").
However, I don't get how you can claim the acting in Farscape could have been ahead of the acting in Stargate ? Again, we're back to the "script contents" vs "acting quality" dilemma... although the scripts in Farscape didn't strike me as revolutionary either.
For a "FP attempt", the poster sure hit the right spot (by accident?)
If you read the article, the main problem is that some frequently used internal IBM applications only run (so far) on IE. So the users end up using Wine or VMWare (heh, sounds like my apartment mate here).
So, the problem it's not that it won't work at all, it's just that *somebody* lacked the foresight to migrate all day-to-day applications to that "customised Red Hat Linux distribution" IBM uses. And now, the problems finally hit the fan.
The first thing to consider here is a SINGLE server (or server group) that handles/stores user login info, character data, equipment/inventory, etc. Whenever you login to the game, wherever you chose to play, you only have a single login name/pass and you always have the same gear. The "security" issue would therefore be limited to internal communication (between the login/auth server/servers and the game-area server you play on).
Now, wether you pick the option of a HUGE world with zilions of players inside at the same time (and segment the areas based on virtual land surface and/or average number of players hanging around) OR you keep some form of "sharding" active (but more like "parallel universes you can travel between), you can partition the players yourself between physical servers.
Picking the "huge world" option, I doubt there would be a big problem in simply enlarging all landmarks' surface size by a factor of (let's say) 100, so 10 times more in each direction, but keeping the "relative to player" detail level at the same quality. You'd have to add at least 20-30 times more "respawn" points to keep the revive travel time the same, and you'd have to add some quick ways to travel between (now) remote locations - so yes, a lot of work. Now, the beauty lies with the fact that each and every major city and immediate surrounding area can be run on a single server (or even on two servers - one handling the "outside", one handling special places like auction houses), while other (less frequented) areas, much larger in virtual surface, could be run on a single server.
Now, nobody says you can't have a certain small "transition" area (where any interaction with the server environment or other players would be limited), which would be handled by both servers of the neighbouring areas - it's just like you have the player on both servers (so maximum x3 datastream for the players there - including server-to-server data). Also, nobody says you have to have your "main login server data" updated non-stop ; once every hour or on logoff is more than enough.
BOTTOM LINE: Well, I think you're overcomplicating a simple issue - it doesn't *HAVE* to be a O(n^x) problem !
...I wonder why they never moved beyond the "realm" concept and put together a single, huge, continuous world (where different areas would be physically located on separate servers, even with several servers serving a single area or sharing area serving wherever needed). As far as I know, the only MMOGame that ever attempted that approach was EVE-Online, and they have a record of a bit over 10,000 clients logged on and playing at the same time.
Personally, I find the entire concept of realm "sharding" to be archaic and absolete.
You can try a lemon tree ; sure, you'd have to wait a couple of years (or buy an older plant) before you can actually get a lemon out of it:p Anyway, the plant smells nice and it's quite resilient - my sister had a larger one in her room for almost 15 years.
Slashdot Mirror
Just stick to the damn question, people...
...
Oh, wait, I must be new here. Or not. Or... argh !
Anyway, a short (? yeah right...) recap for the ADHD-like attention span posters.
PayPal *IS* the most frequently used "online money transaction" tool: pretty easy to use, damn convenient too most of the time, (barely) acceptable service cost (for small sums), etc.
Because of that, most people that *CAN* use it will use it, and tend to forget other alternatives IF their main purpose ISN'T cashing in massively (for instance, a sourceforge project team with a donate link... as opposed to, let's say, a MMOG with a bazilion customers).
THE PROBLEM starts when you find somebody that only has a PayPal-donate link, you wish to donate a *small* amount of money to them BUT you're unable to use PayPal to donate (not a resident of one of those 45 "supported" countries).
THE BOTTOM LINE / QUESTION ? Let's rephrase it, so people will understand the gist of it: does ANYBODY know of anything PayPal-like (i.e. being able to pay relatively small amounts of cash to somebody else without leaving from the computer) that works on a more... "global" scale ?
Dang, now that I start thinking about it, you'd have a pretty hard time doing something like this "the easy way". However, there's a small (possible) workaround here, but it would require the cooperation of several telephony companies... I mean, heck, the pr0n-sites have some of the most innovative ways (easy ones too) to separate you from your money while giving you what you want almost instantly. The next logical step of PayPal would be to start using some relay-billing services in cooperation with the phone companies, so that you won't require a credit card at all to authorise a "deposit" to your PayPal account.
The answer to the initial question is, anyway, pretty easy: there is NO EASY way right now, but it might be in the future.
I have no ideea how much of it is wishfull thinking, but I certainly hope some other company TOO, and not only PayPal manages to reach "this level" - there's a thing or two to be said about competition and the obvious advantage for the customer...
Well, it's a tradeoff issue... do you prefer that:
;)
a) all bugs get published "public"
- each and every person can snoop around and either help fix it
- or instead try to exploit it (even moreso, keep on exploiting it on "unpatched" systems long time after)
OR
b) all serious bugs get published "privately"
- only "core contributors" get to see it and try to fix it
- the rest of the population might not even know the bug exists until a patch is released (moreso, you might not even know what the bug was)
Well, I guess (some) people prefer "version B"
"Johnny, get of that pr0n DVD download, your mother and I can't look at the rerun of Survivor because of your leeching !"
;)
-- angry father, user of the experimental service
Wouldn't you love that ?
I always wondered how much "18 months Minnesota prison in Salussa Secundus time" is... Google calc seems to reject my querry ;)
[joke mode enabled]
Even more impressive is the fact that they managed to fit a CD-drive on an assault rifle.
Kind of reminds you of the Beverly Hills Cop 3 gun... what was it called, "Annihilator 2000" ?
...that would be the P2P structure of the client/network. Connections between Skype and Kaaza (developer-wise) have never been secret, and even more - they admit the base concept is the same, they just "took it one step further".
Now, unless you want to have a single server (or cluster of servers) that handle your login, friend's logins, routing between you two and so on and so forth, you'd just have to bear with those "unknown connections" - they're (most of the time anyway) just some other Skype users.
But hey, if it looks like spyware to you or you're paranoid, don't use it. Nobody forces you to.
... corporate executives start to realise it's cheaper to use the internal phone system than calling their employees from their mobile whenever they're both inside the building ;)
Technically speaking, that's correct for almost everything... I mean "next thing you know, IT IS winter, and that before you know (/realise) it". ;)
Heh. My bad
[joke mode]
That's the start of Google Grid, and next thing you know, it's E.P.I.C. before you know it ! [/joke mode]
And another (small but vital) piece of information: you completely neglected the fact that the speaker is Japanese.
I'm not aware of your personal experience with Japanese manufacturers, but I can tell you this (which is afaik "public knowledge"): a Japanese will always do whatever it takes to "save face".
This means that yes, on some small degree they will admit that something is wrong, but will also try to explain to you that this is the best possible solution that he could come up with, and announce nothing will be done to change it. Soon after, a solution will appear, and be presented with as small "attention attracting" as possible. That's just the way it works - you will get a better product soon, just don't rub it in too much, it's offensive.
Again, personally, I believe this to be (overall) a superior system to the "western" one, where sometimes blame is admitted but nothing gets done.
You are correct, Sony did fuck up here, I wasn't contesting that.
However, I personally don't have issues with such things. I grew up in "communist Romania", and I got used to working with what I have (even if things changed lately) : right now, my keyboard is 9 years old (space bar is now the caps lock, instead of caps lock I have a hole, wasn't using that anyway ; also, the "big" Enter key sticks if not pushed in the lower right corner), my mouse is 4+ years old (have to clean it 2 times a day to keep it moving, have to push exactly where the pressure switches are under the buttons, the mouse wheel is sometimes spinning without spinning the inside mechanism, etc). I have several other KBs and mice in the house, I just never use them - I got to enjoy the fact that I am the only one that ever uses that KB and mouse.
So, ok, Sony did a mistake. A design mistake nevertheless - the fact that they chose not to have the damn handheld a few milimeters wider.
I'm quite sure that after the NEXT few thousand units, a new "PSP 1.1" will be announced, that will be wider and have an "ok-working" button, no matter what the speaker said about gamers having to conform.
However, I personally would like to have the first, un-modified version - and be the only one comfortable enough to play it.
Yes, this is only MY oppinion here. I'll bet 99% will disagree. Just wanted to make it clear why.
Well, if the building would get mass-produced, and in 0.6% cases (see article) the gate would stick open or close... and in some other cases would squeak and be a bit harder to open/close... then I'd say that overall, we have a small problem.
Now, if you chose to not use that gate anymore (maybe use it more carefully, less often, etc) OR if you chose to bash the head of the architect with a 2x4 instead - now those are completely different choices.
Analogies apart... for god's sake, it's a BUTTON. If you KNOW the switch is not directly in the middle, just damn push the outer part of it, where you know the button's pressure sensor (switch) is ! Or, if you're so unhappy, take it apart, move the "hole" in which the button is a few milimeters and be happy about it (and have a funny-looking handheld, but, hey, that's the trade).
Actually, AFAIK it's "Anno Domini", short for "Anno Domini Nostri Jesu Christi" (latin for "[in] the year of our Lord Jesus Christ").
Also, most "biblical researchers" nowadays tend to place the actual birth to the year we know as 4 BC (or even 8 BC).
But, yes, I was confusing something (not the meaning of BC/AD, but the "accomplishment" related to it) - you'd have to forgive the lack of precision of an insomniac close to bedtime - you got the ideea anyway, didn't you ?
I'm sorry, but *some* people find it flattering to have a "something" (chemical compound, bacteria, virus, plant, landscape/landmark, street, village, school, building, etc) named after them - the closer that "something" is to what they wish (or just are) to be remembered by (in this case, THGTTG "trilogy in five parts"), the better.
So, excuse me for not sensing the "un-fitting-ness" of naming a (even very small and otherwise anost) space object after somebody who is remebered for his "space humour".
Also, for the less open-minded, do I have to remind you why we live in a year labeled "A.D." (as opposed to "B.C.")? I'm quite sure somebody else's demise date can (under cetrain circumstances) also be more memorable than his birth date.
But, please, if you wish to argue about the degree of appropriate / not appropriate, then by all means, please bring a more solid argument.
When in doubt, ask Google.
Short version: Earth gets destroyed by aliens building a Hyperspace Bypass, but that was only an excuse, as the Earth was in fact a giant "living" computer created to find "the ultimate question" (about, of course, "Life, the Universe and Everything") to which the answer (42) was already found (but the question was uncertain), and a group of philosophers and psychologists wouldn't have liked to have the question coming out (so they contracted the Vogons to destroy Earth before it could finish the calculations)... and so on.
Rest in peace, man who made me laugh hardest ever - we don't need an asteroid named after you, but it sure sounds nice to hear somebody else cares.
...use a (cell)phone and talk to the user in front of the other computer :P
;)
A joke ? In some cases, yes (I meant the other user, har har).
Secure ? Depends on the user on the other end too
I'm sorry to get into this flame war, but I just couldn't resist...
CrazyJim, you first start off by claiming "I'm a world class game designer", then mention you never actually finished any work, then finally admit "my ideas are [...]upgrades on a good thing, refinements [...] I'm not original, I'm a game player. I play a game into the ground and see what's missing".
Now, from that, one could extrapolate either that you have no clue about what you're talking about OR that you spend too much time lamenting and not enough doing something.
Anyway, until you actually ACCOMPLISH something (pitch your ideeas to some game studios ; heck, start an open source project if nobody else wants to do it), you have no right to claim being a "World Class Game Designer". A "World Class Game Player" yes, but that's still a long way from "Designer".
This is under no circumstances meant as a personal attack - it's just stating some facts, and giving you a harsh, but friendly advice.
Almost nobody remembers the second person that claimed inventing the radio, now does it ?
I have to admit I only saw a *real-life* Apple ONCE in my entire lifetime, and that was about 10 years ago. The rest were pictures on the net.
In my (?defence?), I live in Romania, and I highly doubt there's more than a couple thousands of them within the borders of the country.
Well, looks like they haven't learned much from their old mistakes, but are trying to avoid the consequences... smart move targetting heavy bandwidth apps for now.
In the long run, if they can't significantly drop manufacture prices to (let's say) 150% or even 200% of "regular" (by that date) RAM, the boost in speed a computer with "XDR DRAM" will get compared to (again, let's say) "PC800 RDRAM" will be not significant... and I'll bet (regular) people would rather choose 8 GB of "PC800 RDRAM" over 2 GB of "XDR DRAM" any time of the day.
Bottom line: they're either stuck with "speciality hardware" (like graphic cards or high-end servers) or they have to drop (manufacture) prices rapidly if they want to keep selling.
[naive 3rd world country fanboy mode]
Oh no, you mean Farscape got CANCELED ?
Damn you, Salazaaaar !
[/sarcasm]
Now, seriously, if you want to compare acting between Enterprise, Stargate and Farscape - please, DO NOT make the mistake of comparing the acting skills of the cast with the contents of the script. The Berman&Braga team surely spelled "doom" all over the Gene R. legacy...
Or heck, compare the acting in 1st season of TNG with the last season of TNG - you can surely see a drastic improvement.
Anyway, Scott Bakula has had his acting "skills" brushed up significantly in "Quantum Leap" (he kind of first but got better), and is pretty convincing as Captain of the Enterprise, even much earlier "into the show" as Patrick Stewart was able to do it in TNG (it took him almost 2 seasons to stop acting "Gurney Hallecky" - and don't get me started on "Life Force").
However, I don't get how you can claim the acting in Farscape could have been ahead of the acting in Stargate ? Again, we're back to the "script contents" vs "acting quality" dilemma... although the scripts in Farscape didn't strike me as revolutionary either.
For a "FP attempt", the poster sure hit the right spot (by accident?)
If you read the article, the main problem is that some frequently used internal IBM applications only run (so far) on IE. So the users end up using Wine or VMWare (heh, sounds like my apartment mate here).
So, the problem it's not that it won't work at all, it's just that *somebody* lacked the foresight to migrate all day-to-day applications to that "customised Red Hat Linux distribution" IBM uses. And now, the problems finally hit the fan.
The first thing to consider here is a SINGLE server (or server group) that handles/stores user login info, character data, equipment/inventory, etc. Whenever you login to the game, wherever you chose to play, you only have a single login name/pass and you always have the same gear. The "security" issue would therefore be limited to internal communication (between the login/auth server/servers and the game-area server you play on).
Now, wether you pick the option of a HUGE world with zilions of players inside at the same time (and segment the areas based on virtual land surface and/or average number of players hanging around) OR you keep some form of "sharding" active (but more like "parallel universes you can travel between), you can partition the players yourself between physical servers.
Picking the "huge world" option, I doubt there would be a big problem in simply enlarging all landmarks' surface size by a factor of (let's say) 100, so 10 times more in each direction, but keeping the "relative to player" detail level at the same quality. You'd have to add at least 20-30 times more "respawn" points to keep the revive travel time the same, and you'd have to add some quick ways to travel between (now) remote locations - so yes, a lot of work.
Now, the beauty lies with the fact that each and every major city and immediate surrounding area can be run on a single server (or even on two servers - one handling the "outside", one handling special places like auction houses), while other (less frequented) areas, much larger in virtual surface, could be run on a single server.
Now, nobody says you can't have a certain small "transition" area (where any interaction with the server environment or other players would be limited), which would be handled by both servers of the neighbouring areas - it's just like you have the player on both servers (so maximum x3 datastream for the players there - including server-to-server data).
Also, nobody says you have to have your "main login server data" updated non-stop ; once every hour or on logoff is more than enough.
BOTTOM LINE: Well, I think you're overcomplicating a simple issue - it doesn't *HAVE* to be a O(n^x) problem !
...I wonder why they never moved beyond the "realm" concept and put together a single, huge, continuous world (where different areas would be physically located on separate servers, even with several servers serving a single area or sharing area serving wherever needed).
As far as I know, the only MMOGame that ever attempted that approach was EVE-Online, and they have a record of a bit over 10,000 clients logged on and playing at the same time.
Personally, I find the entire concept of realm "sharding" to be archaic and absolete.
You can try a lemon tree ; sure, you'd have to wait a couple of years (or buy an older plant) before you can actually get a lemon out of it :p
Anyway, the plant smells nice and it's quite resilient - my sister had a larger one in her room for almost 15 years.