Help us fix old issues

[Ahma]

523 - A Family Affair

I'm kinda puzzled why my State did receive this issue, as Ahma's Civil Rights are Frightening and Political Freedoms are Superb. Also, I chose in previous issue that Nation's Economics work Democratically.

So, what's the problem? What's missing? Well, of the 3 options two are super Authoritarian. - Not my cup of tea. - And the least Authoritarian talks about how we should "Purge the incompetents" and bring "production and research closer together." What I need is an nice-fluffy-bunny option that suits Left-wing Utopias like Ahma. Or maybe two more options. One that holds on to the principle of scientific freedom. And other that responds seriously to citizens' worries and suspends funding from stupid science projects.

Or, maybe simply fix some requirements for this issue to pop up. Such as minimum level of Authoritarianism in Personal and/or Political Freedoms scale. Or, other possible prerequisite could be choosing option 2 in The Bear Necessities. = Having psycho Central Planned Economics Committee.

[Candlewhisper Archive]

The game doesn't have that level of granularity in validity criteria, I'm afraid. You definitely meet the criteria as far as the code is concerned.

Likewise, while every issue has options that aren't explored (I mean, what if you're favourite colour is copper, to go with an affinity for old school electronics, eh?) its generally considered acceptable by the team if there is a range of choices, rather than exhaustively covering all the positions.

The balance has to be struck between excessive wordiness and breadth, and between enough validity criteria for narrative sense versus excessive validity criteria shrinking the effective issue pool (and thus causing more repeats).

As editors, we track dismissal rates to see if any issue is getting that shrug of apathy more often than it should, as well as looking at the diversity of options selected. Its all very clever.

This issue is decently in the safe zone, with above average but not high dismissal, and a little skew towards a single option. Overall, its well within the middle group, stats-performance wise.

Thanks for flagging this issue for us to look at. However, while its a shame that there's no option to suit the nation you are rping, its performing adequately for purpose on a population level, and that suggests to me that an edit isn't needed.

On a brighter note, I agree there's a big gap in issues generally for nations that are anti-capitalist but also democratic and anti-tyranny. Write an issue that is suitable for those nations (i.e. one with a criteria of low economic freedom but high political freedom), and I'll be glad to edit it.

[Merni]

The issue " [nationname] - Without Cars, Going Nowhere Fast" has no option to keep the ban on cars, but in a non-authoritarian way. The only options are- immediately revoking the ban, finding cleaner fuels then revoking it, or keeping it in force because "it makes them [the citizens] easier to control"

You mean maintaining the status quo without any policy changes? Let them protest, but don't act on their protests?

That's the dismiss button, generally.

No, I mean banning cars while encouraging other transport (like trains, motorcycles, bicycles, buses, horses etc.)

[Candlewhisper Archive]

You mean maintaining the status quo without any policy changes? Let them protest, but don't act on their protests?

That's the dismiss button, generally.

No, I mean banning cars while encouraging other transport (like trains, motorcycles, bicycles, buses, horses etc.)

Valid option, but its comprehensiveness vs conciseness again.

As there's other options that let you ban cars and encourage public transport, I think its fine for that to be missing.

[Lamebrainia]

Option 3:

games like mumbletypeg

It's "mumblety-peg", with a hyphen.

[A Humanist Science]

On a brighter note, I agree there's a big gap in issues generally for nations that are anti-capitalist but also democratic and anti-tyranny. Write an issue that is suitable for those nations (i.e. one with a criteria of low economic freedom but high political freedom), and I'll be glad to edit it.

Is there a list of the known economy sector types, as broken down on a nation's economy screen? For example, I have regularly seen a few like:

• Black market
• Private industry
• Government
• State-owned industry

Is there a "worker-owned industry" category? If not, then it should exist, as it would facilitate precisely the market/democratic/not-state anti-capitalist perspective you're looking for. Such a category is very much needed.

(Although part of me hopes it doesn't happen, since I'll have to quit my IRL job to have time to write all the issues I've got in mind)

[Trotterdam]

#549:
[effect]in its new More is More campaign the government advertises obese men and women posing coquettishly with baked goods to spare their blushes

I don't understand the grammar here. Why are they blushing and why would the presence of baked goods in the picture "spare" that, whatever that means?

Can I get a response on this? I've looked in a dictionary and I can't find any meaning of "spare" that fits this usage.

For starters, it seems (based on the context) that these blushes are from arousal rather than embarrassment (they're posing "coquettishly", and the speaker proposing this option is clearly proud of his/her size), so it doesn't seem like they'd be trying to hide or play down their blushes, not that I see how baked goods could do that anyway.

Is there a list of the known economy sector types, as broken down on a nation's economy screen? For example, I have regularly seen a few like:

• Black market
• Private industry
• Government
• State-owned industry

I think that's the full list.

Adding a new one would be a task for admins, not issue editors, and so any proposals to do so should go in the Technical forum. In fact, it's already there.

[Bears Armed]

#549:
[effect]in its new More is More campaign the government advertises obese men and women posing coquettishly with baked goods to spare their blushes

I don't understand the grammar here. Why are they blushing and why would the presence of baked goods in the picture "spare" that, whatever that means?

Can I get a response on this? I've looked in a dictionary and I can't find any meaning of "spare" that fits this usage.

For starters, it seems (based on the context) that these blushes are from arousal rather than embarrassment (they're posing "coquettishly", and the speaker proposing this option is clearly proud of his/her size), so it doesn't seem like they'd be trying to hide or play down their blushes, not that I see how baked goods could do that anyway.

"Spare" in that sort of context is a standard [British] English usage of the word: In this case they'd holding the baked goods in ways that concealed the bits of anatomy whose exposure would cause them to blush with embarrassment, so this is sparing them from blushing.

[Christian Democrats]

Why do socialist nations receive Issue #384?

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=88#384

[Christian Democrats]

Issue #549 -- There shouldn't be a comma before @@RANDOMMALENAME@@ in Option 1. In Option 2, there should be a period after "you take a bite," no comma after "beams," and a period after "napkin."

Issue #551 -- There doesn't need to be a comma after the word "event" in the description, and what is "susurration" supposed to mean? Also, there could be a comma after "niece" in Option 1. The comma before @@RANDOMNAME@@ in Option 4 should be removed.

Issue #552 -- For clarity, there could be a comma after the @@CAPITAL@@ macro in the description. Furthermore, the last sentence of the description is very confusing because it's not immediately clear which pronouns are referring to which people.

#PunctuationNazism

[Candlewhisper Archive]

Why do socialist nations receive Issue #384?

http://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic ... 3&t=88#384

They don't. If you've received it, that means you've lost your little red flag, comrade. Shame on you!

[Candlewhisper Archive]

Issue #549 -- There shouldn't be a comma before @@RANDOMMALENAME@@ in Option 1. In Option 2, there should be a period after "you take a bite," no comma after "beams," and a period after "napkin."

I agree with all of these, but they're stylistic choices rather than grammatical errors. This is why I broadly dislike options that switch in and out of speech too many times - the correct grammar is unclear and inconsistent.

Issue #551 -- There doesn't need to be a comma after the word "event" in the description, and what is "susurration" supposed to mean? Also, there could be a comma after "niece" in Option 1. The comma before @@RANDOMNAME@@ in Option 4 should be removed.

Susurration? It means a whispering or rustling. As to it being used as a collective noun, I admit that's more unusual, but that's a little poetic license borrowed from Terry Pratchett, who was fond of using it in that way. It works fine.

I agree with the comma judgements you make, but again, these are stylistic preferences of different editors, not grammar mistakes, so do not need correcting.

Issue #552 -- For clarity, there could be a comma after the @@CAPITAL@@ macro in the description. Furthermore, the last sentence of the description is very confusing because it's not immediately clear which pronouns are referring to which people.

Fully disagree with that comma.

At last night's press conference in London you were mooned by three drunk young men
At last night's press conference in London, you were mooned by three drunk young men

To me, either is correct, but option 1 flows better.

As to pronouns:



I don't think it's that hard. The them going into the cells is the offenders, the them doing the throwing and the asking is the security staff. Isn't this somewhat obvious? You could wilfully pretend its ambiguous, but that requires deliberately doing so.

#PunctuationNazism

[/quote][/quote]

[Christian Democrats]

Why do socialist nations receive Issue #384?

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=88#384

They don't. If you've received it, that means you've lost your little red flag, comrade. Shame on you!

Lol. The nation on which I received it is categorized as Democratic Socialists.

As to pronouns:

I don't think it's that hard. The them going into the cells is the offenders, the them doing the throwing and the asking is the security staff. Isn't this somewhat obvious?

Yeah, but you have to think about it a bit too much in my opinion. The description would be clearer, in my view, if it said:

At last night's press conference in @@CAPITAL@@ you were mooned by three drunk young men. Security has caught them, and they the mooners, who are claiming that this was a 'political protest' against 'government and stuff'. Rather than just throw them in a cell to sleep it off, they're your guards are asking if you would like them to deal with the matter in any particular way.

[Trotterdam]

Why do socialist nations receive Issue #384?

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=88#384

They don't. If you've received it, that means you've lost your little red flag, comrade. Shame on you!

Huh. I never even noticed before that the "aggressively anti-@@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ leader" at the core of the problem is mentioned to be communist.

Oh well. Yay skateboarding diplomacy! Can I use scooters instead?

Lol. The nation on which I received it is categorized as Democratic Socialists.

But let me guess, private enterprise isn't banned? Nations with private enterprise but very low economic freedom are kind of on the edge of socialism, so they might or might not count depending on how exactly you define it.

(What I have a harder time explaining is the nations without private enterprise but with very high economic freedom...)

[Christian Democrats]

On Issue #458, does anybody select Option 2 or Option 3? They seem really crazy to me -- too crazy for anyone to select them.

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=88#458

[A Humanist Science]

On Issue #458, does anybody select Option 2 or Option 3? They seem really crazy to me -- too crazy for anyone to select them.

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=88#458

Option 2 makes me ill, but in what way is it "crazy" (other than that I should disagree with it)?

[Christian Democrats]

On Issue #458, does anybody select Option 2 or Option 3? They seem really crazy to me -- too crazy for anyone to select them.

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=88#458

Option 2 makes me ill, but in what way is it "crazy" (other than that I should disagree with it)?

Isn't it the game's policy to make at least a few options equally (un)attractive? Option 1 is reasonable: give local communities greater control over their police. On the other hand, I can't imagine anybody who's playing the game seriously choosing Option 2 or Option 3: never hold a policeman "responsible for a single error on the line of duty" or get firemen to use hoses on minority demonstrators.

I know that the issues team has access to selection statistics. Has anyone been choosing Options 2 and 3?

[Phydios]

Option 2 makes me ill, but in what way is it "crazy" (other than that I should disagree with it)?

Isn't it the game's policy to make at least a few options equally (un)attractive? Option 1 is reasonable: give local communities greater control over their police. On the other hand, I can't imagine anybody who's playing the game seriously choosing Option 2 or Option 3: never hold a policeman "responsible for a single error on the line of duty" or get firemen to use hoses on minority demonstrators.

I know that the issues team has access to selection statistics. Has anyone been choosing Options 2 and 3?

I doubt that many people who are playing according to their RL beliefs are choosing those options. But I certainly would choose option 2 or 3 for my psychotic dictatorship Tonosia. The bigger issue, as I see it, is that options 2 and 3 are too similar. You can allow abuse of police authority or ... allow abuse of police authority (albeit in a different way).

[Trotterdam]

On Issue #458, does anybody select Option 2 or Option 3? They seem really crazy to me -- too crazy for anyone to select them.

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=88#458

I set a trap for these in my script. I saw option 3 chosen in Lanawai after approximately 12 minutes, and option 2 on Purge Survivors after approximately 19 minutes.

Whether these nations are intentionally crazy, I can't tell you.

At least Lanawei also picked option #482 option 4 around the same time, and #202 option 1 yesterday, so probably not a bastion of liberty, but Purge Survivors otherwise has very liberal politics (classed as a Scandinavian Liberal Paradise and most of its recent decisions reflect this), though its name and motto are scary.

Then belatedly I thought to check for option 1 for comparison. This trap was triggered by Aesturea after approximately 8 minutes.

Of course, these are based on one sighting each, which is not very statistically reliable, but apparently they do get chosen.

See this thread for previous criticism on this issue.

[Cresage]

I think this is the right place to report this...in issue #381 ("Mamma @@NAME@@, Let Me Go"), selecting the first solution lowered both my Taxation and Freedom from Taxation stats. In every other issue I've seen, these two tend to be mutually exclusive--lowering one of them would raise the other. I haven't gotten the issue on any of my other puppets, so I can't confirm if this is a repeatable error or just a one-time glitch, unfortunately.

[Phydios]

I think this is the right place to report this...in issue #381 ("Mamma @@NAME@@, Let Me Go"), selecting the first solution lowered both my Taxation and Freedom from Taxation stats. In every other issue I've seen, these two tend to be mutually exclusive--lowering one of them would raise the other. I haven't gotten the issue on any of my other puppets, so I can't confirm if this is a repeatable error or just a one-time glitch, unfortunately.

I've seen this effect a couple times too. And I agree, it is weird. One possible explanation is that there's less tax, but tax evasion is harder (thus lowering freedom from taxation).

[Candlewhisper Archive]

I think this is the right place to report this...in issue #381 ("Mamma @@NAME@@, Let Me Go"), selecting the first solution lowered both my Taxation and Freedom from Taxation stats. In every other issue I've seen, these two tend to be mutually exclusive--lowering one of them would raise the other. I haven't gotten the issue on any of my other puppets, so I can't confirm if this is a repeatable error or just a one-time glitch, unfortunately.

You've not received that issue in the last 14 days. Can you confirm the nation involved and the date please?

[Lamebrainia]

As an election looms, a controversy arose

Why is there both Present Simple and Past Simple in a set of logically connected clauses? And I'd use a Continuous for the first one.

[Candlewhisper Archive]

As an election looms, a controversy arose

Why is there both Present Simple and Past Simple in a set of logically connected clauses? And I'd use a Continuous for the first one.

Well, if you take the whole sentence, the past simple is linked to the elderly war veteran who was thrown out of an advance polling station. The "as an election looms" is instead framing the present scenario, rather than being a connected clause, with the comma between separating the two statements as being disconnected, not connected.

As an election looms, a controversy arose when an elderly war veteran who lived in Brancaland for the past thirty years was thrown out of an advance polling station.

However, I do agree that it is unnecessary to have that linguistic clumsiness, and as so often is the case, it's the manifold roles of the simple comma that can have in the English language.

As NoQ is editor, I'll leave it to him, but I think this is a simple and reasonable change request. My suggestion:

A controversy arose when an elderly war veteran who lived in Brancaland for the past thirty years was thrown out of an advance polling station. With an election looming, other ---- living abroad are now demanding that they be allowed to vote, prompting angry responses from voters living in ----.

[Cresage]

I think this is the right place to report this...in issue #381 ("Mamma @@NAME@@, Let Me Go"), selecting the first solution lowered both my Taxation and Freedom from Taxation stats. In every other issue I've seen, these two tend to be mutually exclusive--lowering one of them would raise the other. I haven't gotten the issue on any of my other puppets, so I can't confirm if this is a repeatable error or just a one-time glitch, unfortunately.

You've not received that issue in the last 14 days. Can you confirm the nation involved and the date please?

I received it on Query 1 and answered it on July 17th, just after 11 PM PST.