i've been mining for quite along time now and i've encountered all kind of miners with all kind of attitudes.
Here's my personal view on mining:
Only one mine that the whole mud has to share.
Only one starting room at the pillar

Think that there should be multiple starting rooms.
Mining laws are kept in the law commands, not many novice miners are aware of the rules. I suggest we make a sign and stick it at the pillar and the mining entrance with the mining laws.
Most of the people that i've encountered are respectful and usually always ask before they beginning mining, but once in awhile there's an idiot or a true newbie who will do something stupid.
My most frustrating thing about mining is the fact that people collapse rooms that they did not mine out themselves. I mined all the way down to 1100 ft, found my first wall of diamond after 8 hrs of mining. switched on diamond mining alt and head to the mine to find out that my hardwork tunnel is collapsed by someone. Sometimes the mine gets too hectic it is almost impossible to figure out where the entrace is to redig.
When come into a newly dug room, before you start mining, make sure you ask outload if anyone is in the room because sometimes people are invis and you may not see them. 2ndly, make sure you wait a bit before mining because some people may have switched alts and are heading to their room. Should the person who is mining there not responding, you should not mine in that room. You do not mine in someone's room without their permission period.
The mine belongs to everyone and not anyone in specific. You can not claim more than one room. You can only claim the room that you dug out or rooms that you dug into.
for example: i
* if i mine into room B, i own that room, but i would give up room A that i was previously in.
* If i mine into a cave that contains room B, C, D, E. I own all those 4 rooms. No one should be able to mine those 4 new rooms without my permission. HOwever, after i finish stripping all the resources from those rooms, i would go back to owning only one room.
Basically, the idea is that a miner can only claim the room that the miner is in and the resources that the miner has discovered.
The race for EG:
Lets say you mined straight down to 990ft and then someone goes to 970ft and mine west to create their own shaft. You may feel that this person is taking advantage of your work but this is perfectly legal. You are responsible for collapsing your own shaft if you do not want people to free load of your work. This is why mine collapse was introduced.
What if someone accidentally or intentially mined into/intersect your shaft, do they have rights to mine in your shaft also (not your room)? I'm not sure on this part because I don't think the mining law talks about this. Caretakers, what do you think?
Lets say you mined down to 1130ft, then logged off and went to lunch for 3 hrs. You logged back on and see that someone else is mining in your room. Sorry, but you've lost your shaft/room. You can not claim rooms/shaft when you're offline. This is not the same as switching between alts. This is similar to claiming a supermob when you're not on...ridiculous. Celeborn made the game for everyone who are logged on to play, if you're not on then you're not part of the game.
scenario: 2 people accidentally/intentionally mined into one single room.
The two individual share the resources if they can compromise on who gets what. If they are unablet to compromise then it's free for all. quickly grab what you can.
When you yell out to someone in the mine, dont expect to have them yell back at you because sometimes they don't want to yell is simply to avoid getttin summoned by leaches. New miners are usually unaware of this and sometimes think that the other miners are being unfriendly.
Spam: sometimes when you are mining with a group of people, you are badly spammed. Sadly there isnt much to prevent this besides the use of some clients. I would like to see celeborn do something to ease the spam from minning. Seriously do we really need to see "Matthew digs up shalestone (9) and drop it on a stack?"
Bots: lets all admit it, most of us don't stare at the screen while we are mining for obvious reasons. If we are not chatting we do other stuff like surfing the web, checking email, programming triggers, or trying to mine and watching the tv at the same time. Others simply don't stare at the screen because it hurts their eyes. I know that the mud does not approve botting while mining, but the current mining system encourages exactly that. I would like to see a new mining system that does not rely on triggers and discourages botting. Besides, when someone log on and watch triggers for hrs is not the way.
" you find nothing "
This is the biggest **** !!!
you spend 8-14 hrs of mining, finally you spot a wall of diamond north. You mine north with your diamond miner and the messeage that you recieve is " you find nothing!" This is perfectly fine, but what's frustrating is that your diamond skill did not raise by any and the diamonds in the wall is now gone. This is like a catch-22. You can't mine diamond (succesfully or unsucessfully) because your skill is low, but you can't raise your skill because you're not sucessfully, or unsuccessfully mining them.
I'm not sure if this made alot of sense, but you'll understand my point when you try to learn diamonds or jades...
suggestions:
mitrill/adamantite mining picks need to be upgraded. They do last longer than bronze picks, but they don't last long enough to make them useful. As a result, adamantites/mitrill are not worth using for picks. I don't know if this is intended or not, but this is how it is.
since we can fix almost anything that we wear, even an piece of armplate made out of light, why can't we fix picks? I know this option is probably not very useful to bronze picks, but it would be very useful for meteorite/adamantite picks. Besides, it would make things a bit more realistic.
Ocardus and i already pointed this out, but it would be nice to have 2 more additional starting rooms at the pillar in shalestones.
create more mines. I like the idea of having the mines on the world map in mountains and such. I don't know how challenging the coding may be, but it would be very cool . for example: ores and gems can only be found at mountains, clays near rivers and etc...
the ability to purchase a mining patch for your citadel. wouldn't it be cool if you can purchase or rent a small mining room in your citadel and you can simply mine down in private away from all the chaos? (i know this is a crazy idea)