Briefly: Items not done by you, slowly decay and tear over time.
Items done by you is not affected in any way. This is effective
after the next reboot.

Explanation: As you know, BatMUD has become much more stable over
the years. We don't really have any big crashes that would cause
eq to disappear. Nowadays, boot doesn't take your worn items
either. Items are pretty durable in general (they kind of have to
be, otherwise tanking would be even more painful). This leads to
a situation where there is a steady flow of new items into the
game, but nothing (or very little) ever leaves the game.

There are many ways how to deal with such an inflation. On some
games, all items lose their magical properties over time. On others,
you are required to pay large amounts to upkeep items. We've now
tried to be less extreme, while at the same time giving more
incentive for players to make their own items. Damage taken by
items in this manner is very small, it only becomes significant
over longer periods of time. Read: items you did yourself are
consumables, not trophies.

++ Gore