when myst online was going to shut down, the players rallied together to fund the operation. i don't know the details, but from what i know the company listened

when myst online was going to shut down, the players rallied together to fund the operation. i don't know the details, but from what i know the company listened and set up a donation meter to share the funding status of the server operation. the servers will keep running as long as there is enough funding to keep the people needed for that. if there is additional funding they may spend that on features and bugfixes. they also allow community contributions, and i think the first of those contributions have gone live not to long ago. in the end i think besides releasing the sources this kind of crowdfunding is the most likely way how an online game can be kept alive.