[Q] Regarding programs and recruitment telegrams.

[21st Century Rome]

Apologies if this is in the wrong forum, not sure if this goes in technical or moderation, but I guessed and put it here.

So, I just had this idea that would be fairly easy to write, but I wasn't sure whether was legal or not. And I figured it's always better to ask in cases like this. :)

I see that the API states "You must use this API if you want to send telegrams with a script or browser tool. Using a script or tool to send telegrams from the regular Telegrams page is a violation of our Script Rules, and may lead to deletion of your nation as well as penalties for the region for which you are recruiting."
Which I interpret as meaning a program can't automatically send telegrams from the nation page automatically. But what I had in mind was a program that used the API to get the new nations in the world, then function as a clipboard manager to format the nation names to paste into the "To:" box. Then after pasting, it could change the clipboard to have the template key. Thus, it would greatly speed up the process of manual recruitment. However, it would still be me clicking on the boxes to paste things in and clicking the send button. So, I'm not sure if this is legal or not, and figured I'd ask before I did anything about it.

If it is illegal, I'll just stick with the good old fashioned API approach.

[South Estarieken]

I've seen a mod answer this before (Sorry, was not able to find the post), but as long as YOU are physically pressing the send button, it doesn't matter how you gather the nations to send it to.

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

Wrong, sir.

Not to overly impatient but did this get missed? It's been almost 2 weeks, and I just wondering what the legality consensus is on this use of scripts ... ?

Yeah, I saw it, and realized it was a sticky issue, and postponed dealing with it. Sorry about that.

My provisional, just-what-I-think advice is it would probably be deemed illegal. If you like, we'll go ahead and start a discussion on exactly what shall and shall not be deemed legal for "manual recruiting." But we've recently enshrined the three methods of recruiting (manual, stamps, API) so they are isolated from one another when competing for delivery priority. This creates a new advantage for scripts and tools if they are permitted compete in the "manual" space rather than the "API" space. To avoid them stealing this advantage from genuine manual recruiters, we need to regulate this fairly strictly.

My feeling is that manual should be reserved for truly manual recruiting. Otherwise, there's no good place to draw the line. Once a tool can fill in all the fields, a human can "manually recruit" without looking at the screen, and that's not what I consider to be manual recruitment.

The only valid alternative I see is: "Manual recruiters can use whatever tools they like, so long as they're present at the PC." This makes sense if we decide there really aren't any truly manual recruiters, in the sense of players who write recruitment TGs using no tools or add-ons, and so no reason to force anyone to act that way.

[21st Century Rome]

Wrong, sir.

Yeah, I saw it, and realized it was a sticky issue, and postponed dealing with it. Sorry about that.

My provisional, just-what-I-think advice is it would probably be deemed illegal. If you like, we'll go ahead and start a discussion on exactly what shall and shall not be deemed legal for "manual recruiting." But we've recently enshrined the three methods of recruiting (manual, stamps, API) so they are isolated from one another when competing for delivery priority. This creates a new advantage for scripts and tools if they are permitted compete in the "manual" space rather than the "API" space. To avoid them stealing this advantage from genuine manual recruiters, we need to regulate this fairly strictly.

My feeling is that manual should be reserved for truly manual recruiting. Otherwise, there's no good place to draw the line. Once a tool can fill in all the fields, a human can "manually recruit" without looking at the screen, and that's not what I consider to be manual recruitment.

The only valid alternative I see is: "Manual recruiters can use whatever tools they like, so long as they're present at the PC." This makes sense if we decide there really aren't any truly manual recruiters, in the sense of players who write recruitment TGs using no tools or add-ons, and so no reason to force anyone to act that way.

Alright, that was what I sort of expected. Alright then, thanks. :)

[Shizensky]

I have a tool that filters all of the new nations on the list on the left side. When I click them, it opens their nation page up in an iframe on the right. You can send the telegram through the iframe, then click a button back on the left "Recruited" or whatever you'd call it, that removes them from the list, gives the recruiter credit for sending the invitation, and clears the nation from your iframe.

It's still manual recruiting, all it does is eliminates the need to physically move between the Feeders. I tend to opt for caution when I write my scripts so I don't know if there's a way to automate this anymore, but because I don't want to risk getting in trouble, I haven't tried. This is about as fast as I'm willing to push it.