Should the WA be restarted? (OOC discussion)

[Omigodtheykilledkenny]

Your argument's been gutted, don't dig yourself further in with pointless dithering over whether someone is truly "active" or not. If I and several other GA players have already pledged to resubmit our work without much drafting/revision, then it's not a reset so much as it is a rerun marathon. Even Fris was compelled to resubmit Rights and Duties after the last reset, and he hadn't been involved in legislating for at least four years.

But would Rights & Duties be allowed to pass? If it really was plagiarized from the UN draft of practically the same name, wouldn't that make it illegal? And even if it was legal, would it pass?

I don't know. I'm still somewhat perplexed that a mod like Fris could get away with such a hack job; at any rate I really truly distrust virtually all of Rights & Duties strongest critics, and am positive that they anything they could come up with to replace it would be much, much worse, so I would not fancy any means of getting rid of it, repeal or reset. No matter how bad it is.

[Excidium Planetis]

So, a restart would:

• Get rid of that horrible abomination that is WSA.
• And remove all the repealed resolutions and repeals as well, cleaning up the passed resolutions list.
• Allow minor tweaks to good resolutions that will likely not be repealed for their minor errors.
• Result in some major resolutions needing to be redrafted and discussed (GA#2 is particular, possibly more) because they are either illegal or not passable today.
• Possibly drum up some activity.

All in all, I see a lot of benefits to a restart, and the only downside is a huge logjam at the beginning with all the major resolutions going up to be voted on again.

Half your reasoning is that it will remove legislation objectionable to you. Your personal hit list isn't a sufficient reason to tap the reset button.

I made 5 points, only one of which removes a resolution that is currently in force. Stop with the strawman.

That is a huge understatement. "Huge logjam," i.e. probably years worth of resolutions. I have, by myself, about a month of resolutions I would want back on the books.

EDIT: This is, of course, not out of malice. If some new player expressed interest in covering one of the issues my resolutions had covered, I would gladly abide them, but if not, I'd definitely want those issues covered from an IC perspective ASAP.

While I did perhaps not realize how big of a logjam it would be, "years" is a bit of an exaggeration. There are only 4 years worth of resolutions (a little over 365 resolutions times 4 days each), and most of them are either repealed or are repeals. I haven't yet finished my list of all currently in force resolutions (I've put off doing it for a long time), but I'd say there are between 100 and 150, which makes a little over a year to a year and a half of resolutions. That's a long time, sure, but not really that long. Just imagine what the voting for "Best Resolution of 2017" would look like, with almost all the GA resolutions on the books up for vote. It'd be like a "Best Resolution of the WA".

[Araraukar]

It is perfectly acceptable to discuss the game mechanics of the WA here. Take your snobbery elsewhere.

But Delegates having gameside powers has nothing to do with WA. (EDIT: At least not the side of WA that GA concerns itself with.)

If he was talking about Delegates having too much power in WA votes, then sure, that'd belong here, and is a real issue. Should Delegates show an interest in WA? Yes, it's too bad it can't be enforced by anything or anyone. Should that be handled internally by those regions? Yes, because Delegacy is first and foremost a gameside feature that only marginally affects the GA (approvals and voting). Their gameside functionality has nothing to do with GA. That complaint doesn't belong here.

And complaining about mods and uninvolved mods should probably go into the Rule Change Summary one, or the Rules Consortium.

[Excidium Planetis]

[snip - realized this was the wrong topic]

[Minoa]

I would back a refresh, to challenge the writers to think how they could do it differently from 2008.

[Lovesickcatboy]

Wouldn't the Passed Resolutions list look a lot smaller if Repeals were appended directly to the affected resolution, rather than listing them as separate articles? You could even remove repealed resolutions to a separate list altogether.

Either option would make the Passed Resolutions list less daunting and more welcoming for new players, without forcing the staff through another reset.

[Araraukar]

Wouldn't the Passed Resolutions list look a lot smaller if Repeals were appended directly to the affected resolution, rather than listing them as separate articles? You could even remove repealed resolutions to a separate list altogether.

Either option would make the Passed Resolutions list less daunting and more welcoming for new players, without forcing the staff through another reset.

I don't think anyone's made an argument for which that would be a remedy.

EDIT: And we can't force the staff (Max and admins) to do anything they don't want to, we can only discuss this amongst ourselves, trying to come up with pros and cons for the various facets of the issue.

Also, apparently I can't spell anymore. Heading to bed now, nn.

[New Axiom]

Personally, I think the World Assembly and it's real life counterpart is a mess of political BS. In the WA, a single delgate can change the resolutions momentum just becuase of their sheer anoint if endorsements. This eliminates the whole concept of voting, especially since the little delegates, like in my region, will have almost no say in these resolutions becuase of the super delegates. So, I think the WA should be restarted, but the "more votes with more endorsements" thing should be cut out.

[Christian Democrats]

No, I much prefer Knootoss's idea of sunsetting resolutions after five years or so if they passed with less than __% support.

[Aclion]

Personally, I think the World Assembly and it's real life counterpart is a mess of political BS. In the WA, a single delgate can change the resolutions momentum just becuase of their sheer anoint if endorsements. This eliminates the whole concept of voting, especially since the little delegates, like in my region, will have almost no say in these resolutions becuase of the super delegates. So, I think the WA should be restarted, but the "more votes with more endorsements" thing should be cut out.

There's not need to eliminate the additional votes for delegates. After all each vote the delegate has (is supposed to) represent the approval of a world assembly member so it makes sense that delegate with more approvals representing more members should have more influence.

This assumes of course that endorsements are a representation of approval of WA policy and not a result of something unrelated to the WA.

[Christian Democrats]

Personally, I think the World Assembly and it's real life counterpart is a mess of political BS. In the WA, a single delgate can change the resolutions momentum just becuase of their sheer anoint if endorsements. This eliminates the whole concept of voting, especially since the little delegates, like in my region, will have almost no say in these resolutions becuase of the super delegates. So, I think the WA should be restarted, but the "more votes with more endorsements" thing should be cut out.

There's not need to eliminate the additional votes for delegates. After all each vote the delegate has (is supposed to) represent the approval of a world assembly member so it makes sense that delegate with more approvals representing more members should have more influence.

This assumes of course that endorsements are a representation of approval of WA policy and not a result of something unrelated to the WA.

To reduce the lemming effect, it's been suggested in the past that votes be hidden for the first 24-48 hours.

[Wallenburg]

There's not need to eliminate the additional votes for delegates. After all each vote the delegate has (is supposed to) represent the approval of a world assembly member so it makes sense that delegate with more approvals representing more members should have more influence.

This assumes of course that endorsements are a representation of approval of WA policy and not a result of something unrelated to the WA.

To reduce the lemming effect, it's been suggested in the past that votes be hidden for the first 24-48 hours.

That could actually be quite helpful. I support a 24-hour delay before publishing votes.

[Ovybia]

To reduce the lemming effect, it's been suggested in the past that votes be hidden for the first 24-48 hours.

That could actually be quite helpful. I support a 24-hour delay before publishing votes.

That may be an idea but I think regional votes and the vote of one's WA delegate should still be shown at all times.

[Wallenburg]

That could actually be quite helpful. I support a 24-hour delay before publishing votes.

That may be an idea but I think regional votes and the vote of one's WA delegate should still be shown at all times.

And why is that?

[Omigodtheykilledkenny]

Uh, maybe because this is a game, and a politics-based one at that, and part of the game is learning how to deal with common political complications, such as the bandwagon effect? (For more info on bandwagon politics, see, Trump, Donald, presidential campaign of.)

[Wallenburg]

Uh, maybe because this is a game, and a politics-based one at that, and part of the game is learning how to deal with common political complications, such as the bandwagon effect? (For more info on bandwagon politics, see, Trump, Donald, presidential campaign of.)

Then why complain about lemmings at all?

[Tinfect]

That could actually be quite helpful. I support a 24-hour delay before publishing votes.

That may be an idea but I think regional votes and the vote of one's WA delegate should still be shown at all times.

OOC:
They are.
http://www.nationstates.net/page=UN_del ... /council=1

[Excidium Planetis]

That may be an idea but I think regional votes and the vote of one's WA delegate should still be shown at all times.

OOC:
They are.
http://www.nationstates.net/page=UN_del ... /council=1

Context. Ovybia was obviously saying that if a 24 hour delay before publishing the votes was implemented, regional votes should still be seen.

[Araraukar]

Uh, maybe because this is a game, and a politics-based one at that, and part of the game is learning how to deal with common political complications, such as the bandwagon effect? (For more info on bandwagon politics, see, Trump, Donald, presidential campaign of.)

But in real life if you don't support (endorse) the candidate (Delegates can't be elected beyond their region, so the simile doesn't quite work) that your neighbourhood (region) has decided to rally behind, they can't kick you out of the neighbourhood. Gameside that can very well happen, and indeed does happen. I don't pay much attention to regional politics as I don't care about that part of the game, but there's been enough threatening region-wide TGs flying around for me to be aware of it.

To make WA a truly representative democracy, don't make endorsements count just for Delegates, but for everyone! EDIT: Would also make regional politics matter more, since if every WA nation in a region endorsed everyone else, the Delegate position might not be as stable as it has been. But I digress...

[Separatist Peoples]

Uh, maybe because this is a game, and a politics-based one at that, and part of the game is learning how to deal with common political complications, such as the bandwagon effect? (For more info on bandwagon politics, see, Trump, Donald, presidential campaign of.)

But in real life if you don't support (endorse) the candidate (Delegates can't be elected beyond their region, so the simile doesn't quite work) that your neighbourhood (region) has decided to rally behind, they can't kick you out of the neighbourhood. Gameside that can very well happen, and indeed does happen. I don't pay much attention to regional politics as I don't care about that part of the game, but there's been enough threatening region-wide TGs flying around for me to be aware of it.

To make a truly representative democracy, don't make endorsements count just for Delegates, but for everyone!

If you did that, the GCRs would control the WA entirely. At the moment, they just act as a counterweight that affects the initial swing. At the end of the day, the voters outweigh the delegates by a metric fuckton. That would go away when you consider that TNP's entire oligarchy of established regional officers all have upwards of 300 votes apiece. And that's just TNP.

[Araraukar]

If you did that, the GCRs would control the WA entirely.

With lemming effect they basically do already.

At the end of the day, the voters outweigh the delegates by a metric fuckton.

...what's that in Imperials?

And yes, in sheer numbers. But you know as well as I do that the superdelegates stacking early has become the way to win a vote in the majority of cases. Very rarely do individual nations swing the vote the opposite way from how the large delegates voted.

That would go away when you consider that TNP's entire oligarchy of established regional officers all have upwards of 300 votes apiece. And that's just TNP.

Yes, but that situation wouldn't stay stable for long, once people realized that with more endorsements they could have a more significant effect on the outcome. It would certainly make the gameside aspect of WA more lively!

But, again, not really got a lot to do with WA restart. My original idea was that the WA was restarted as is, just with a clean slate on resolutions, and the newly tweaked rules in effect. Of course, if anything else actually comes out of the Rules Consortium, that would make sense to incorporate to the new world order.

[Separatist Peoples]

If you did that, the GCRs would control the WA entirely.

With lemming effect they basically do already.

That effect requires cooperation from the masses. It does not always work. I cite to you the WSA, the worst blunder in the history of this game.

At the end of the day, the voters outweigh the delegates by a metric fuckton.

...what's that in Imperials?

Its generally used to imply superlative quantity with the Metric standard included to emphasise this point. The inclusion of the term is, however, fundamentally a misuse of that standard, as the Imperial Fuckton (2000 Imperial Fuckpounds) denotes a slightly greater measure of fuckweight within Earth's gravitational pull than does the Metric Fuckton (1000 Metric Fuckilograms).

And yes, in sheer numbers. But you know as well as I do that the superdelegates stacking early has become the way to win a vote in the majority of cases. Very rarely do individual nations swing the vote the opposite way from how the large delegates voted.

That's a big assumption. Its equally possible that the delegate votes are indicative of how the population will vote.

That would go away when you consider that TNP's entire oligarchy of established regional officers all have upwards of 300 votes apiece. And that's just TNP.

Yes, but that situation wouldn't stay stable for long, once people realized that with more endorsements they could have a more significant effect on the outcome. It would certainly make the gameside aspect of WA more lively!

That just keeps marginalizing the little guy's vote. Small regions would be entirely ignored as a demographic.

[Louisistan]

Uh, maybe because this is a game, and a politics-based one at that, and part of the game is learning how to deal with common political complications, such as the bandwagon effect? (For more info on bandwagon politics, see, Trump, Donald, presidential campaign of.)

But in real life if you don't support (endorse) the candidate (Delegates can't be elected beyond their region, so the simile doesn't quite work) that your neighbourhood (region) has decided to rally behind, they can't kick you out of the neighbourhood.

Technically, they can and it's a common enough practice called gerrymandering.

[Imperium Anglorum]

But in real life if you don't support (endorse) the candidate (Delegates can't be elected beyond their region, so the simile doesn't quite work) that your neighbourhood (region) has decided to rally behind, they can't kick you out of the neighbourhood. Gameside that can very well happen, and indeed does happen. I don't pay much attention to regional politics as I don't care about that part of the game, but there's been enough threatening region-wide TGs flying around for me to be aware of it.

To make a truly representative democracy, don't make endorsements count just for Delegates, but for everyone!

If you did that, the GCRs would control the WA entirely. At the moment, they just act as a counterweight that affects the initial swing. At the end of the day, the voters outweigh the delegates by a metric fuckton. That would go away when you consider that TNP's entire oligarchy of established regional officers all have upwards of 300 votes apiece. And that's just TNP.

If that were so, Europe would have 17 943 votes with 47 nations having vote tallies above 100. The North Pacific would have an immense number of votes (which will take at least 15 minutes to tally up, so I'll be back with an edit) 122 080 votes with 312 players having more than 100 votes, totalling to 68 866 votes between those 312 players. SP is correct here. The North Pacific would be the only region in the game which would matter.

Yes, but that situation wouldn't stay stable for long, once people realized that with more endorsements they could have a more significant effect on the outcome. It would certainly make the gameside aspect of WA more lively!

That just keeps marginalizing the little guy's vote. Small regions would be entirely ignored as a demographic.

To be absolutely honest, I don't see that as a major change from the status quo. They are already mostly irrelevant as far as voting goes. This idea just changes mostly irrelevant to entirely irrelevant.

[Unibot III]

As someone who joined the WA right after its creation, all I will say is it's a double-edged sword: with the resolutions cleared, it gave some room for innovation, cultural change, early movers - but the brunt of that pioneering was done by veteran players who were quite domineering. Because it was a change that was forced upon them, I think the surviving vets got pretty domineering, territorial, more conservative because they felt if they let little things go, their game was going to be threatened. It made for a nasty playing environment because we were at our throats - and so I enjoyed pioneering in the SC more because it didn't have the generational baggage. I was more free to do the early moving in the SC now that others assume a fresh new GA would offer to future players.

All I'm saying is, the generation that came after me - the Sciongrad's and Wrapper's - they're the people who will be most affected by a change like this, and if they feel like this move was forced upon them by newbies and retirees, they'll take it out on future players - it could cause another big rift and end up not inspiring any of the opportunities for newer players that's been promised.

As much as I'd like to see GA#2 off the books.