Ok, maybe this is just my patent idealism (yeah, I still haven't lost it) but I remember back in the good old days of UO we used to be able to hack the system, create our own servers, and play them. Is there still a way to do that in today's games? Or is there still a way to do that with UO?

Man, I look back at those years and I remember a group of pioneers. I remember running the guantlet into Trinsic the first day of gameplay and losing everything and having to work my way up from nothing to earn GM Tamer status. I remember guild wars before they were game sanctioned and I remember the KGB taking over an entire continent the day Seige Perilous came into play.
It seems to me that while the games devolved we never did. I would love a game like back in the day, I would love us to simulate a game like that! But this is a symptom of the current American world, afraid to extend hemselves, afraid to earn anything. We want to really play? Hell, I think we might have to create something ourselves.