The Old(est) Nations of NationStates

[Sardakhar]

Exactly as the title states. Now that NS is 10 years old, I'm personally interested in finding out about the nations that have existed for a long, long time. Anyone's been here for, say, 7 years or even more? I know there are a few nations from as early as 2004 still holding on here. Perhaps one, or two from 2003? Sailing on the waters of NS without sinking into the great abyss of nonexistence all the time?

I don't think there's anyone from 2002 (with the exception of Maxtopia, but it's dead and resurrected a few times).

Anyway, what is the oldest nation (again, with Maxtopia's exception) still on NS? Will you please show up here?

[San Leggera]

Anyone's been here for, say, 7 years or even more?

Many. Ballotonia and The Blaatschapen, for two.

[The Republic of Lanos]

Maxtopia is the oldest officially but Max let it CTE so he can play in secret.

[San Leggera]

Maxtopia is the oldest officially but Max let it CTE so he can play in secret.

Maxtopia still exists... for now.

[Sardakhar]

Anyone's been here for, say, 7 years or even more?

Many. Ballotonia and The Blaatschapen, for two.

God, more than 20 billion people in each country, and I have to wait for probably 7 to 8 years to reach that landmark! Too bad I can't simply ask the mods to add more people to my country, but I'm not sure I'm going to be happy with it.

Maxtopia is the oldest officially but Max let it CTE so he can play in secret.

Yeah, but now it's resurrected again, apparently to mark the 10th anniversary of NationStates.

Maxtopia is the oldest officially but Max let it CTE so he can play in secret.

Maxtopia still exists... for now.

You are right.

[San Leggera]

Many. Ballotonia and The Blaatschapen, for two.

God, more than 20 billion people in each country, and I have to wait for probably 7 to 8 years to reach that landmark! Too bad I can't simply ask the mods to add more people to my country, but I'm not sure I'm going to be happy with it.

There are many more with a similar population level. I do remember there being a way to find them but I can't recall it.

[Jamie Anumia]

I believe Korinekia has the largest population out of all nations currently still existing. I'm not sure how to find the oldest nations though, since population isn't a completely accurate indicator.

[Argyres]

Winnipeg was around near the very beginning if I remember right (late 2002). I'm pretty sure Eureka was as well.

As the above poster mentions, population alone isn't completely accurate if the nation has CTEd before (I started in July 2003, for example, but am well behind on population).

[Jamie Anumia]

As the above poster mentions, population alone isn't completely accurate if the nation has CTEd before (I started in July 2003, for example, but am well behind on population).

In addition, population growth isn't consistent over each day which can over time allow younger nations to overtake slightly older nations.

[Fabistan]

I've been here for a while.

[Southern Patriots]

I've been here too long.

Perhaps we 7+ nations should sail away to the Undying Lands and leave NationStates to the noobs.

[Bears Armed]

Any nation with 'Antiquity' given as its date of founding is fairly old.

[San Leggera]

Any nation with 'Antiquity' given as its date of founding is fairly old.

Some nations (such as Frisbeeteria) are Antiquity nations, but had their founding date put in manually by admins after they proved when they were founded.

[Luna Amore]

Exactly as the title states. Now that NS is 10 years old, I'm personally interested in finding out about the nations that have existed for a long, long time. Anyone's been here for, say, 7 years or even more? I know there are a few nations from as early as 2004 still holding on here. Perhaps one, or two from 2003? Sailing on the waters of NS without sinking into the great abyss of nonexistence all the time?

I don't think there's anyone from 2002 (with the exception of Maxtopia, but it's dead and resurrected a few times).

Anyway, what is the oldest nation (again, with Maxtopia's exception) still on NS? Will you please show up here?

There are a few from 2002. There are many from 2003. I joined in June 2003 and this nation isn't even in the top 500 of populations worldwide. Some oldies are still hanging on.

[Romanar]

I'll hit my 7 year mark this February. It's a little scary to think about how many nations are older than mine!

[Dub Dizzle]

There are plenty of 2002 nations in Wysteria...the Bruce (1041st nation created), Equus (1044), the Grendels (1155), Righteous Lefties (1166), Ummagumma (1925), the Zocalo (2364) and a few more.

[Galiantus]

Wow. Look at one of the oldest national happenings in the game:

•4 years 262 days ago: Maxtopia relocated from Lazarus to Lazarus.

*goes to technical*

[Frisbeeteria]

Some nations (such as Frisbeeteria) are Antiquity nations, but had their founding date put in manually by admins after they proved when they were founded.

I actually joined past the Antiquity cutoff, which occurred when national birthdays were added as permanent parts of the nation. I believe it happened in mid-2003, but the details weren't recorded in the early ChangeLog.

[Luna Amore]

Some nations (such as Frisbeeteria) are Antiquity nations, but had their founding date put in manually by admins after they proved when they were founded.

I actually joined past the Antiquity cutoff, which occurred when national birthdays were added as permanent parts of the nation. I believe it happened in mid-2003, but the details weren't recorded in the early ChangeLog.

Looks to be around late November 2003 based on the member list.

[Frisbeeteria]

Looks to be around late November 2003 based on the member list.

Nicely researched.

Note that the forum member list isn't an accurate gauge of total NS population. A nation appears on the member list ONLY if they clicked the Forum link since we moved to this forum. I would think that more than a few Antiquity nations and puppets have been plugging along for a decade without ever visiting the forums. Most of my puppets have never visited the forums and therefore don't show up on the members list.

Overall, I think the OP has drastically underestimated the number of nations that have been in continuous operation since the early days. Even though it's not a perfect measure, the next Population census should give a better picture.

[San Leggera]

Some nations (such as Frisbeeteria) are Antiquity nations, but had their founding date put in manually by admins after they proved when they were founded.

I actually joined past the Antiquity cutoff, which occurred when national birthdays were added as permanent parts of the nation. I believe it happened in mid-2003, but the details weren't recorded in the early ChangeLog.

Oh, my mistake, then. I do recall some nations having their join-date added to their nation file, though, but I can't remember for the life of me where I saw it.

[The Bruce]

I was the 1041st nation to be created in NationStates, in December, 2002. A day earlier and I might have been the 500th nation created (things got a bit exponential, when it came to nation creation in those days). They used to have a game tool where you could see the list of nations and their creation date order, but when NS Forum went over to Jolt they sadly lost that particular tool.

Population remains an imperfect method for determining nation age, owing to all the 'population bug' nations out there whose populations would only be possible if they were playing months before NationStates even existed. The population bug meant your nation population grew at double speed and you could have 4 issues a day, but it also meant that you could CT from inactivity twice as fast. There were a lot of 2003 nations that were affected by the population bug, until it was finally fixed. When you see the biggest nations in the NS World Report for population, almost all of them are beneficiaries of the population bug.

Even nations that were unaffected by the population bug are affected by daily population gain variances that over time have them become significantly larger than nations many months older than they are.

[Errinundera]

Errinundera was founded on Christmas Eve in 2002. We CTE'd for a couple of years so our population is only 17 billion.

[The Bruce]

I'm pretty certain that aside from the Violet (construct) that the first actual nation created was Elbonia, as a beta nation before NS went public. Elbonia CT'ed many years ago. There is currently a nation called Elbonia, but I don't know if the current holder of that nation name has any relation to the original player.

[San Leggera]

I'm pretty certain that aside from the Violet (construct) that the first actual nation created was Elbonia, as a beta nation before NS went public. Elbonia CT'ed many years ago. There is currently a nation called Elbonia, but I don't know if the current holder of that nation name has any relation to the original player.

According to the Boneyard, that nation is the antiquity one.