I think he meant playing them online against other people.
A few advantages/disadvantages, everyone needs to have the map in great detail, ie they will have to download it from a common site, unless it's one of the few that came with the game.
Everyone wlil pretty much know the map in intimate detail, which kills some of the randomness of it.
The maps can pose interesting situtations and ensure fairness.
Situtations such as create one strong empire and 3 weak ones and see if the strong can hold out 3v1.
Huge pile of gold in the middle with all the wood stone on the outside near each civs starting location, who can dominate the center wins, yet the gold pile is so big many civs can harvest it at once.
Massive army, massive defense, but no can you muster the strength to crash his defensive before time runs out?
the editors allow for amazing variaty in winning situations and can set up games of high interest, problems are getting enough people interested in play to make the games common to many people so its feasable to set up such a game, and then to get people to actualy create the games
If all this could be done, I think the games could be very fun and challangeing and a new twist for those bored with rm.