The Rejected Times

[Railana]

Yes, we've noticed that the mods don't read the forum: I think the point is that we'd like them to, not that we'd like to work around that inconvenience.

Some mods do read the GA. Obviously not all do. The same applies to every forum - the GA's not a special case. I know you'd like to see more mods active in the GA - as has probably been said before, do feel free to send us nominations if you think there are players we should be considering as potential mods.

All right, I'll bite. I formally nominate Gruenberg as a candidate for GA moderator.

He has a good grasp of the GA rules - well, as good of a grasp as anyone can have, given the long string of contradictory and nonsensical moderator rulings to date - and, while an accomplished resolution author in his own right, he's always willing to assist others with their own drafts, even those that other GA regulars tend to write off as lost causes.

He'd certainly be a better GA mod than most of the current ones if only because he actually participates in the GA!

[Todd McCloud]

Wasn't Mall modded for his activity in the GA, among other things?

[Chester Pearson]

Wasn't Mall modded for his activity in the GA, among other things?

I believe that was Mousey. Mall has never been a prolific GA author.

[Ikania]

Wasn't Mall modded for his activity in the GA, among other things?

I believe that was Mousey. Mall has never been a prolific GA author.

Though a particular July shitstorm says he never should have been modded in the first place... man, that was a long time ago. At least for me.

[Railana]

Wasn't Mall modded for his activity in the GA, among other things?

I believe that was Mousey. Mall has never been a prolific GA author.

...which makes one wonder why he was appointed for being a "well-known GA regular".

[Chester Pearson]

I believe that was Mousey. Mall has never been a prolific GA author.

...which makes one wonder why he was appointed for being a "well-known GA regular".

He used to fairly active in the GA, just not as an author. If anyone should be modded for the GA, it is Kenny. He knows WA law inside and out, and he is able to pull up links from the depths of hell it seems. In fact I may follow protocol, and officially nominate him....

[Todd McCloud]

I believe that was Mousey. Mall has never been a prolific GA author.

Though a particular July shitstorm says he never should have been modded in the first place... man, that was a long time ago. At least for me.

Eh, they'll get over it. Or retire, lol. ANd yeah, Mall was chosen for some GA prowess, fwiw.

IMO, and I don't mean to have this derail into a 'where a mod should be' convo, but I think that NS Sports is more pressing than GA. But there's already been several threads in technical going back and forth on that.

Also going on the record with saying I'd support Kenny as a GA mod. Guy knows his stuff and is good to work with (he's been doin good stuff over on NSwiki with me. Fun times. Which reminds me... speaking of projects... *looks over at NSwiki*)

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

Of course R/D isn't the only part of the game, but it's the only part of the game in which players are essentially harassed and trolled by other players, totally against their will and without moderator intervention. That warrants a greater response from site administration than, basically, we'll get to it if and when we get to it. I'm not concerned about changes to make things better for raiders or even defenders, but rather regional natives who are confused and upset by raids.

Accusations of trolling go in moderation or should be filed via a GHR.

Because we can;t be nice in a raid, oh no. Because every TBH occupation I've participated in so far hasn't received at least some level of positivity from the native region. Becuase there certainly aren't action in raids that *have* been reported as trolling and punished accordingly, while there are others that have not been. Because no two regions have ever declared war on each other and used R/D gameplay against each other in that manner (cough GGR cough). It's all trolls, right? Yep.

Thanks for the line, Sol

Also, Sedge touched on this, but I'd be willing to bet money that more people left this game bored from the 2002 appearance than ever did due to R/D. The most nations ever signed into the forums at once is even 600, while the world has over 120 thousand. While granted a chunk of those are puppets, many of them are just people who raise nations, even school classes. IIRC it's even been said somewhere that the majority of players or regions of something are from school classes. The Rift update, among others, affects every single person who plays, as compared to the small number that actually appear to exist beyond their own nations. One of the largest region tags out there is "Passworded," with 479 pages of regions in that category. 295 of them contain regions with only one nation. Less than 100 pages have regions with more than three people. Only 30 or so pages have more than 10. Even considering again raided and refounded regions, or puppet regions, we're talking thousands of regions of just people and their RL buddies or puppets, safely locked away, too small to be noticed by raiders. The ones that have lost a founder and been opened are mostly declining to nothing anyways. The tag raids tend to either give a poke of activity or do nothing at all, if all they look at is their nation page anyways. So then it's the big raids that make people leave? The ones that actually lead to regional refounding? Alright, so we're already talking about a small if vocal portion of the population. Even then, losing a region is no excuse to quit. A region is just a name, it's the people that make or break the game. Take your buddies, pick up, and move somewhere else together, and live happily ever after. Of use it as an excuse to quit after months of considering it and losing interest. Up to them, I guess.

If so many people were really so buggered by raiding, perhaps you'd have people for your liberations, rather than a need to blame admin for defender inadequacies.

Also, by the way, raiders will adapt to whatever changes come. They can only make things more challenging, and half of what we do today is search for an actual challenge in raiding You know how hard it is to find a good target that hasn't been hit in the past two years or so? So few....

[Ikania]

Though a particular July shitstorm says he never should have been modded in the first place... man, that was a long time ago. At least for me.

Eh, they'll get over it. Or retire, lol. ANd yeah, Mall was chosen for some GA prowess, fwiw.

IMO, and I don't mean to have this derail into a 'where a mod should be' convo, but I think that NS Sports is more pressing than GA. But there's already been several threads in technical going back and forth on that.

Also going on the record with saying I'd support Kenny as a GA mod. Guy knows his stuff and is good to work with (he's been doin good stuff over on NSwiki with me. Fun times. Which reminds me... speaking of projects... *looks over at NSwiki*)

I was actually about to say that SkyDip would make a great GA mod, but I realized that I haven't seen him in forever. He seems to have CTE'd rather suddenly, do you know what happened?

[Todd McCloud]

Eh, they'll get over it. Or retire, lol. ANd yeah, Mall was chosen for some GA prowess, fwiw.

IMO, and I don't mean to have this derail into a 'where a mod should be' convo, but I think that NS Sports is more pressing than GA. But there's already been several threads in technical going back and forth on that.

Also going on the record with saying I'd support Kenny as a GA mod. Guy knows his stuff and is good to work with (he's been doin good stuff over on NSwiki with me. Fun times. Which reminds me... speaking of projects... *looks over at NSwiki*)

I was actually about to say that SkyDip would make a great GA mod, but I realized that I haven't seen him in forever. He seems to have CTE'd rather suddenly, do you know what happened?

Nope. Haven't seen him around the SC in a while as well.

[Frattastan II]

All right, I'll bite. I formally nominate Gruenberg as a candidate for GA moderator.

Not formal enough!

[The Blaatschapen]

All right, I'll bite. I formally nominate Gruenberg as a candidate for GA moderator.

Not formal enough!

For extra formality, wear a tuxedo.

[The Dark Star Republic]

I know you'd like to see more mods active in the GA

I would not. I would like to see the existing mods active in the GA perform competently. There are half a dozen mods familiar-ish with the WA now, yet moderation is far less effective than when it was just two people, Fris and Hack, doing 90% of the WA (or as it was then, NSUN) moderation.

If Kryozerkia will not post in the forum, then it doesn't matter if you appoint fifty new mods: the system will not work.

Anyway thanks for responding: you would not believe how rare it is to actually have a game mod answer a player post about the WA. I've started a discussion on the categories and when we have something approaching a concrete suggestion I will flag it up.

[Glen-Rhodes]

But, much as reform is needed, the WA needs a proposal category system of some sort. Abolishing categories altogether would leave an organization whose mission is already extremely vague - the WA has no real statement of purpose beyond "improving the world one resolution at a time" - completely bereft of any sense of itself.

I don't know why this is always immediately ruled out as an option, because it seems to me that it's the most obvious solution. The problems with the existing categories stem from their exclusivity and specific effects. Adding new categories or changing existing ones isn't going to solve the issues you've brought up.

As previous debates have shown, there's the default assumption that any new categories absolutely require a trade off --- environmental resolutions will always need negative economic impact; social and economic rights will always need to hurt business and trade; etc. I remember the #WAElites channel on IRC when we were first seriously discussing category reform, and the central concern there was that categories shouldn't have an entirely positive effect. The whole opposition to breaking apart the Social Justice category was that a certain group of players -- who tended to oppose Social Justice-type resolutions -- feared that making it an easier category to work with would encourage resolutions they didn't like, so they pushed the idea that serious negative consequences were a good thing.

Concentrating on stat effects is a total red herring. Nobody cares about stat effects when drafting a resolution. They care about the substance of the policy. There are only two times we get bogged down in stat effects. The first is when somebody is trying to knock down a proposal they don't like by claiming there's a category violation. The second is when we have debates about categories themselves, and stat effects are used to make new categories either politically palatable or to fracture support for new categories. The best thing that could happen for the WA category system to give up the notion that stat effects are at all important to the WA game. I will never understand why people fear "sever[ing] the WA from any remaining connection to the game mechanics." The only people who think the WA has any real connection to the game mechanics are those in the GA, and only ever when we discuss this specific issue.

When we get rid of a stat effects, what's the purpose of having categories? The only thing I can see, which I honestly haven't heard before, is that "anything could be considered" is a bad thing. I'm not sure that's true. The GA does a decent job of reining itself in on "pointless domestic issues not suitable for international law." And while "groaning omnibuses" sound terrifyingly boring, is there really a reason to oppose cross-category proposals altogether? The category system isn't really there as a quality control device-- that's what the community itself is for.

Proposal Category System Creaking At The Seams?

My overall interest in the GA is low, but being one of the few "stats people" I'm actually quite interested in GA proposal categories. We do have some further changes planned - these were put on hold while Ard was away at the end of last year, but they're still going to happen (eventually - yes, I know). If players have suggestions for re-working categories, I'm more than willing to listen, and give input on their feasibility. If the discussion happens in the GA, someone just needs to let me know where, as I don't generally read that forum.

You'll be glad to hear, then, that these discussions have happened many times before. Unfortunately, this was nearly 3 years ago and the fundamental issues that stymied discussions back then still exist today.

I know you'd like to see more mods active in the GA

I would not. I would like to see the existing mods active in the GA perform competently. There are half a dozen mods familiar-ish with the WA now, yet moderation is far less effective than when it was just two people, Fris and Hack, doing 90% of the WA (or as it was then, NSUN) moderation.

What's the phrase? Don't expect old dogs to learn new tricks?

He used to fairly active in the GA, just not as an author. If anyone should be modded for the GA, it is Kenny. He knows WA law inside and out, and he is able to pull up links from the depths of hell it seems. In fact I may follow protocol, and officially nominate him....

Yeah sure, if you want more of the same from possibly the least objective person in the WA game. But, what the hell, you guys should get the opportunity to reap what you sow. Given that basically all WA mods have come from that same friend group, I'm sure they'll gladly welcome your nomination of Kenny. Might as well throw the rest of Antarctic Oasis into the suggestion box, too!

[Unibot III]

I think a lot of the issues with the GA stem from an attempt to bridge the WA with the in-game stats; so I agree with Glen-Rhodes.

[The Dark Star Republic]

the central concern there was that categories shouldn't have an entirely positive effect.

Well, that's just silly. The Human Rights category has no negative effect: all it does is increase civil freedoms. For most NSers, who are either left-libertarian or right-libertarian, but rarely left- or right-authoritarian (just look at the scatter on the NS General political compasses: all in the bottom two quadrants), that's not a negative.

But this is exactly the point my article made, with regards to development goals: trying to "balance" categories hamstrings any real discussion of them. There's no need for a proposal to advance economic goals to have "oh and by the way it kills your environment/poisons your citizens/corrupts your government".

What's the phrase? Don't expect old dogs to learn new tricks?

I have no idea what you mean by this. Fris and Hack were great mods: it's the new dogs that are the problem.

[Unibot III]

But this is exactly the point my article made, with regards to development goals: trying to "balance" categories hamstrings any real discussion of them. There's no need for a proposal to advance economic goals to have "oh and by the way it kills your environment/poisons your citizens/corrupts your government".

Exactly.

[Glen-Rhodes]

What's the phrase? Don't expect old dogs to learn new tricks?

I have no idea what you mean by this. Fris and Hack were great mods: it's the new dogs that are the problem.

Who chose them and who oversees them?

[RiderSyl]

I have no idea what you mean by this. Fris and Hack were great mods: it's the new dogs that are the problem.

Who chose them and who oversees them?

Shh, you're disrupting the party line!

[The Dark Star Republic]

Who chose them and who oversees them? ;)

Shh, you're disrupting the party line!

What's the party line, out of interest? I only see a handful posting on this issue, all of whom have drastically different views on the WA.

As for "overseeing", Fris has made it clear he's not willing to overrule the newer WA mods. So I guess, no one.

[Chester Pearson]

He used to fairly active in the GA, just not as an author. If anyone should be modded for the GA, it is Kenny. He knows WA law inside and out, and he is able to pull up links from the depths of hell it seems. In fact I may follow protocol, and officially nominate him....

Yeah sure, if you want more of the same from possibly the least objective person in the WA game. But, what the hell, you guys should get the opportunity to reap what you sow. Given that basically all WA mods have come from that same friend group, I'm sure they'll gladly welcome your nomination of Kenny. Might as well throw the rest of Antarctic Oasis into the suggestion box, too!

Right now I will take anything that will improve the current situation. I do have a feeling as to why Kryo keeps her peace on the WA forums, and doesn't do much, But I would prefer not to delve back into that again.

[RiderSyl]

As for "overseeing", Fris has made it clear he's not willing to overrule the newer WA mods. So I guess, no one.

Overruling and overseeing are not the same thing.

[The Dark Star Republic]

As for "overseeing", Fris has made it clear he's not willing to overrule the newer WA mods. So I guess, no one.

Overruling and overseeing are not the same thing.

Actually, that's true: it was just that oversight that meant when a mystery mod who wishes to remain anonymous was about to wrongly pull the trigger on Nuclear Arms Accord and delete it...no, wait, that's exactly what happened anyway.

Seriously, what point are you trying to make?

[RiderSyl]

That your logic is flawed.

Arguing that because newer mods' decisions aren't being overruled, nobody is supervising the newer mods? No matter how you try to spin it, that doesn't make any sense.

[The Dark Star Republic]

Arguing that because newer mods' decisions aren't being overruled, nobody is supervising the newer mods? No matter how you try to spin it, that doesn't make any sense.

Then I'll repeat the example: why did this "supervision" allow Nuclear Arms Accord to be deleted? Or a different one: why didn't this "supervision" correct the decision not to delete Repeal Rights & Duties, necessitating a discard?