I haven't tried this, but you might want to take a look:
http://www.planeshift.it/download.html
I'll play it eventually. It's a community-made mmorpg. Very bright potential. You can fight, write books and cook (for roleplaying), do other crafting, and the goal is to produce things to do other than just fighting alone. I see that as a good thing because too many games put all their efforts on combat skills.
That would be a good community to join if you're a potential hobbyist developer. Sure, you don't make any money from it, but I think niche games will only truly shine in community-based avenues.