[REMOVED] NationStates Helper

[Knootoss]

My reply to this is the point I was trying to make across in my first paragraph: They still do have a reason to come on the GA forums and draft ... their resolutions will likely get voted down spectacularly if it's not drafted properly; horribly shitty resolutions, do more often than not get shut down.

I disagree. The continued persistence of insta- and near-insta repeals is evidence that stupid shit still passes if the lemmings rally behind it.

And so in that sense, if angry and flustered WA Authors want to be the enforcers, when resolutions they deem to be of low quality come up to vote, they need to lobby (although often you don't even need to lobby for resolutions that use really unprofessional formatting) -- whining about this needing to be a "deliberative and consensual democracy" is a little rich. Being the enforcers of "quality" is not a god-given right and you're not entitled to easy control over authors and what they submit; you should have to work hard to establish a deterrence for newbie authors especially when it's not even clear what you define as "quality" is even "quality".

Your point is basically that actual arguments, debate and exchange and ideas shouldn't matter. The noggers should get their own scripts and counter-campaign, sending insidious telegrams of their own to try and prevent stuff from passing. Is that the point you're making here? Because I emphatically disagree and think everyone would be worse off if discussion and debate is replaced by scripted hate campaigns that are directed at the public through mass telegrams.

For me, going negative is the last resort when an author has proven to be completely impervious to argument or reason. It should be just that. It shouldn't be the rule that two sides have a campaign and that 1200 delegates are going to receive at least two telegrams every four days telling them how they should vote.

Mousebumbles, your position that each telegram should be individually different is unrealistic. I do manually send my telegram campaigns and can make quorum in less than six hours without personalizing each telegram (unless you mean putting the name down of the person you're sending it to, I do that). I sometimes personalize telegrams for people I know and I have specific arguments in mind to use on them but besides that I think authors should put more focus on the quality of their resolutions than the quality of their campaigns.

Since scripting will make resolution quality less important for getting a resolution to quorum.... you're not doing the cause of "resolution quality" much of a favour.

[Auralia]

It annoys the recipients of the telegrams sent using your lazy method. This makes it more difficult for manual telegrammers too.

Then give them a way to opt-out; I'm not opposed to that. But that's not sufficient justification to ban using scripts. As for the second point, there's nothing stopping manual telegrammers from sending a manual telegram to those they know and a template to those they don't. I'm willing to design a GUI that anyone can use if that'll change things.

It makes the game less about politics and even more still about programming language knowledge.

Not really, as per the above points and because I don't really see telegram campaigns as a particularly interesting component of the game.

It utterly removes the quorum system as a useful method of discerning between good and bad proposals

Why not send telegrams to nations who have put the proposal into the queue asking them to rescind their approval? Or why not just vote the proposal down when it comes to vote?

It will permit poor authors to bypass the GA forums and other drafting rooms entirely.

Not really, since the proposal will likely be voted down when it comes to vote unless there's a GA thread. There's bound to be problems with it.

[Unibot II]

Your style works for you, Uni, and I'm not trying to tell you (or anyone) how to write their campaign TGs. Also, I would hope that once it comes time to campaign, the quality of the resolution is already determined and set. I fail to see how anyone would be sacrificing quality of their resolution for the quality of their campaigns since no one should be campaigning until a prop has been finished/submitted. *scratches head in confusion*

I'm saying the reason why we try to put quality in our resolutions is because the hope is (1) it'll do it's objective well, (2) it's going to remain on the books forever hopefully -- you want to be proud of it's text. I don't really see the point in putting a ton of "quality" into the campaigning except what gets the job done. I still manually campaign because I've found manually campaigning can get results quicker than script campaigning; when I used to run against G-R in quorum races, I usually was able to catch up to him with hours as a disadvantage partly because I have tactics in mind to speed up the process that would be difficult for a script to implement. I like to practice my speed as a campaigner for (1) preparation for WA liberations, (2) quorum races.

[Knootoss]

If I were to design a nice GUI interface for my script, would it change anything? Because I keep seeing criticisms of how my script can't be used by the majority.

To be honest if 1) you did that and 2) the mods would for some reason beyond my understanding rule that this was a tool that they feel people should use.... I'd use it myself. I don't believe in placing myself at a disadvantage, so delegates will be able to look forward to regular anonymous telegrams from the Republic of NationStates Players for Freedom or The Free State of Swiftboat Veterans against the Freedom of Information Act where I, from the gracious position of unaccountable anonymity, shall denounce whatever the hell is at vote at the time that I don't like.

To all 1200+ delegates.

And it'll all be perfectly legal.

Woohoo.

[The Serbian Empire]

There are secret drafting boards of regions... For example, Polandia draft any legislation from a secret board and have well-read regional delegates (non-WA members allowed) and a lone WA delegate.

[Unibot II]

My reply to this is the point I was trying to make across in my first paragraph: They still do have a reason to come on the GA forums and draft ... their resolutions will likely get voted down spectacularly if it's not drafted properly; horribly shitty resolutions, do more often than not get shut down.

I disagree. The continued persistence of insta- and near-insta repeals is evidence that stupid shit still passes if the lemmings rally behind it.

Good lord, what happened to a page ago when you agreed with me that it should be players that are enforcing "quality" not admins, because you guys have no way to objectively measure "quality". I mean the current batch of instant repeals have been rather well formatted resolutions that arguably had problems with the implementation of their objectives.

Your point is basically that actual arguments, debate and exchange and ideas shouldn't matter. The noggers should get their own scripts and counter-campaign, sending insidious telegrams of their own to try and prevent stuff from passing. Is that the point you're making here? Because I emphatically disagree and think everyone would be worse off if discussion and debate is replaced by scripted hate campaigns that are directed at the public through mass telegrams.

The only difference I see between Noggers on the forums and on telegrams is that they only have to post their insidious crap once on the forum: telegrams are a negative last resort for you because you're a lazy propaganda artist. You're giving yourself way more credit than you deserve to call any "exchange of words" with you an actual argument or debate. More like playing wall-ball with an ideological bulwark.

Since scripting will make resolution quality less important for getting a resolution to quorum.... you're not doing the cause of "resolution quality" much of a favour.

Not necessarily, many greater authors like Glen-Rhodes, don't have a lot of time in their lives to sit down for a consistent amount of time and send telegrams manually. I think it would have been a loss to the game if G-R hadn't been able to get the resolutions he got to vote that he did. Other than I am very suspicious of the concept of "resolution quality", it's often just used by people to argue against resolutions written by people they don't like. That's why UNOG, a body that pretends to be the protector of resolution quality, is a personal group of like-minded individuals that although individually are all fairly good authors, do not make up the entirety of actual quality authors because it's a social group pretending to be merit-based. The whole WA Community, in fact, I'd argue is personal-based pretending to be meritocratic -- in fact I'd go as far as to argue that National Sovereigntism or International Federalism are basically one in the same philosophically for most people and the social delineation is actually just personal in-fighting and asshattery on both sides, including myself.

[Sedgistan]

The only difference I see between Noggers on the forums and on telegrams is that they only have to post their insidious crap once on the forum: telegrams are a negative last resort for you because you're a lazy propaganda artist. You're giving yourself way more credit than you deserve to call any "exchange of words" with you an actual argument or debate. More like playing wall-ball with an ideological bulwark.

Yeah, let's not have this turn into yet another one of those arguments. This is the Technical forum. Take your personal rivalries elsewhere.

[Auralia]

If I were to design a nice GUI interface for my script, would it change anything? Because I keep seeing criticisms of how my script can't be used by the majority.

To be honest if 1) you did that and 2) the mods would for some reason beyond my understanding rule that this was a tool that they feel people should use.... I'd use it myself. I don't believe in placing myself at a disadvantage, so delegates will be able to look forward to regular anonymous telegrams from the Republic of NationStates Players for Freedom or The Free State of Swiftboat Veterans against the Freedom of Information Act where I, from the gracious position of unaccountable anonymity, shall denounce whatever the hell is at vote at the time that I don't like.

To all 1200+ delegates.

And it'll all be perfectly legal.

Woohoo.

I'm not sure what anonymity has to do with this; I haven't expressed an opinion on whether puppets or main nations should be the ones sending mass telegrams.

However, I've got no problem with you telegramming delegates and denouncing my proposal, as it would be your right.

[Enrich Our Future]

New nation and new region (open to all anonymous World Assembly Political Action Committees with unlimited ability to spam delegates) have duly been created. Look forward to your improved script!

~Knoot

[Auralia]

New nation and new region (open to all anonymous World Assembly Political Action Committees with unlimited ability to spam delegates) have duly been created. Look forward to your improved script!

~Knoot

I should note the following quotation from Fris:

I'm hoping that all script users will recognize that blocking TGs is a legitimate tactic, and that using puppets to get around those blocks could be considered spam. While we don't have specific rules in place for this hypothetical problem, I feel certain that the mods can assert any needed controls on abusive users and TG spammers, just as we have been doing for years.

[Knootoss]

Doing all of your anonymous scripted telegramming with a puppet isn't "bypassing blocks". You can just do your scripted mass-telegramming with said puppet and others can block said puppet if they do not want the spam.

And as far as I'm aware, only one delegate has actually blocked Knootoss as a result of a telegram I sent them. And that had more to do with the, erm, frank exchange that followed them responding to said telegram. >.>

[Auralia]

Doing all of your anonymous scripted telegramming with a puppet isn't "bypassing blocks". You can just do your scripted mass-telegramming with said puppet and others can block said puppet if they do not want the spam.

And as far as I'm aware, only one delegate has actually blocked Knootoss as a result of a telegram I sent them. And that had more to do with the, erm, frank exchange that followed them responding to said telegram. >.>

I think there needs to be discussion over how best to identify automated telegrams so that they can be ignored if a nation chooses, but I suppose I'm fine with you using a puppet if you so wish. It seems a little underhanded, though; I certainly don't plan on using them.

[Mallorea and Riva]

Doing all of your anonymous scripted telegramming with a puppet isn't "bypassing blocks". You can just do your scripted mass-telegramming with said puppet and others can block said puppet if they do not want the spam.

And as far as I'm aware, only one delegate has actually blocked Knootoss as a result of a telegram I sent them. And that had more to do with the, erm, frank exchange that followed them responding to said telegram. >.>

I think there needs to be discussion over how best to identify automated telegrams so that they can be ignored if a nation chooses, but I suppose I'm fine with you using a puppet if you so wish. It seems a little underhanded, though; I certainly don't plan on using them.

You created and distributed a script to everyone in the game to use, and now you're worried that what Knoot is suggesting is underhanded? You realize that the ability to message every delegate in the game with the click of a button is not inherently a good thing, yes? I hope you do.

[Knootoss]

I'd rather that nobody gets to send anonymous telegrams to 1200 people using a puppet. But you know, here we are....

[Knootoss]

Note how I'd merely be annoyed, rather than screaming bloody murder as I am now, if you kept this script to yourself.

[Auralia]

Note how I'd merely be annoyed, rather than screaming bloody murder as I am now, if you kept this script to yourself.

It doesn't seem fair, though. Why should I have the right but nobody else?

[Mallorea and Riva]

Note how I'd merely be annoyed, rather than screaming bloody murder as I am now, if you kept this script to yourself.

It doesn't seem fair, though. Why should I have the right but nobody else?

Who said anything about fairness? You're the one who produced this script. The game was already fair in the sense that if you had the determination you could send out the tgs to delegates. Now you've tipped it with this, and giving it to everyone doesn't make up for that.

[Auralia]

It doesn't seem fair, though. Why should I have the right but nobody else?

Who said anything about fairness? You're the one who produced this script. The game was already fair in the sense that if you had the determination you could send out the tgs to delegates. Now you've tipped it with this, and giving it to everyone doesn't make up for that.

So are you saying that it would be permissible for everyone in NS to create their own scripts? Wouldn't we have the same problem?

[Mallorea and Riva]

Who said anything about fairness? You're the one who produced this script. The game was already fair in the sense that if you had the determination you could send out the tgs to delegates. Now you've tipped it with this, and giving it to everyone doesn't make up for that.

So are you saying that it would be permissible for everyone in NS to create their own scripts? Wouldn't we have the same problem?

Except for the rather obvious fact that only an absolutely minuscule fraction of players have the ability to create scripts that interact with the game.

[Knootoss]

Let me use this analogy: the script is a nuke.

I'm comfortable, if not entirely happy, with you having the nuke. I know you'll use it only rarely, for your own proposals, and that you are otherwise not a complete lunatic who goes about peddling far-left bullshit and "Legalise pot!11111" resolutions to the masses. (Knootoss and Auralia have similar politics IC.)

However, I'm appalled at the idea of everyone having the nuke because it will fundamentally alter the way in which this game is played in the ruinous ways that have been described by several people in the thread.

EDIT: Obligatory "Tom Lehrer - Who's Next " link to go with this analogy.

[Auralia]

Given the widespread opposition to this initiative, and the fact that I don't seem to be convincing anyone that this is a good idea, I've decided to withdraw the script from the public.

I should add that this is only postponing the debate, however; one day, there will be someone who publicly distributes a script and refuses to remove it.

[Knootoss]

Thanks Auralia <3. And well, we'll deal with that situation when we get there.

[Embolalia]

I think it would be unwise to postpone the debate. Postponing the usage of the script until the debate is resolved is wise, but as Auralia has said, there will come a day when this is again an issue.

Regarding the tag I suggested: When I made that suggestion, I had not thought of the post-quorum repercussions of auto-tg scripts. Furthermore, what I think has been missed in what I said about post-quorum autoTGs is that it would be entirely viable to TG every member. At three per minute, times 1440 minutes in a day, times four days at vote, one could reach 17,280 of the 17,326 people in the WA with an autoTG campaign. This is not currently prohibited by the rules; it just doesn't happen because it's not worth anyone's time. It would be worth your time with an autoTG script, since it would only take a couple minutes of actual interaction.

As it stands, there is no mechanism already in place for individual nations to opt out of automatic TGs. Blacklisting would be done after one had already received the TG, and would only apply to the sender in question. Regions could opt out with the tag, but only if they got their delegate or founder (if they even have one, which many don't) to add it. I imagine this would probably help encourage use of the tag. However, I don't think it's a good idea to introduce a needless issue to enable something (per-user post-quorum auto TGs) which I don't think anyone really wants in the first place.

The only sensible course of action here is a change to the rules. I really don't think there's a way around that. I think the question now ought to be, what is that rule change? Do we ban auto-campaigning on WA issues? Do we ban auto-campaigning non-delegates? Or, do we just go with a consistent, simple, effective rule that says "No automated campaigning for any reason outside of GCRs." (And, regarding the claim that this would disadvantage feeder delegates, a script fewer than 10 people. 6, if I counted correctly.)

[Knootoss]

I agree with Embo, but perhaps this should be a new thread.

[Auralia]

I think it would be unwise to postpone the debate. Postponing the usage of the script until the debate is resolved is wise, but as Auralia has said, there will come a day when this is again an issue.

I should add that I don't plan on suspending my personal usage of the script unless I'm ordered otherwise by the mods. I still find it quite useful.

I've created a separate thread to discuss the issue of mass telegrams and the World Assembly.