New TG system: Q&A Thread

[Darth Radix II]

While I love most of this new system. I feel the Stamps and mass messaging to other regions, especially feeders, to be a cataclysmic change that should be reconsidered. It is an unfair advantage to some and completely distorts recruiting

[Christian Democrats]

Will somebody please remove these regional tags: "No GA Campaigning" and "No SC Campaigning"?

The new system seems to render these tags wholly unnecessary.

[Cromarty]

No. Those tags are useful.

[Christian Democrats]

No. Those tags are useful.

No, they aren't.

http://www.nationstates.net/page=tgsettings

The new telegram settings allow players to opt out of receiving WA campaign telegrams.

[Cromarty]

No. Those tags are useful.

No, they aren't.

http://www.nationstates.net/page=tgsettings

The new telegram settings allow players to opt out of receiving WA campaign telegrams.

The tags prevent people wasting their time sending out TGs if using an autotger.

[Delegate Vinage]

No, they aren't.

http://www.nationstates.net/page=tgsettings

The new telegram settings allow players to opt out of receiving WA campaign telegrams.

The tags prevent people wasting their time sending out TGs if using an autotger.

With Aurelia's one no longer working. Is there even another one

[95X]

Since the new system is now live, thought I'd chime in one more time to state any concerns/reservations I'd had are gone. Oh, and Generally speaking I like the graphics that've been rolling out slowly over the last few weeks (ex., dismiss all issues, RMB preview, RMB post, etc.)

[Atmos]

...Likewise, I might be interested in subscribing to a hypothetical telegrammed-news-network (which I'm envisioning of doing), without leaving my region etc.

My recommendation would be combining those two options: (1) Doesn't have a button to move somewhere, (2) Is a separate category for "organizations" or "activities" or "miscellaneous" or something along these lines. I could see this being used for news media, opinion polling, roleplaying, defending, raiding.. etc. any activity or cause that doesn't fit into the traditional "region recruitment" block.

EDIT: Another thing would be interregional protests, invitations to join interregional conferences or world fairs (like the one I ran last year) and all sorts of "fourth estate" kinds of things.

EDIT2: New NS Software, like NSEconomy and the Gameplay Compass.

Exactly. I'm fully in support of a few additional categories that could be implemented and blocked individually and would have no regional recruitment button. Ideally, categories such as Roleplay, News, Events, and Misc (for everything else), should be considered for implementation. That would let each nation fine-tune what they're interested in receiving, and let those of us promoting various non-recruitment activities get better visibility towards an audience interested in the topic.

Also, with the regional tag-clouds becoming more important in terms of mass TG targeting, it might be good if a few more regional tags were added. Such as the glaring absence of a "News Service" tag, for those regions devoted to NS news.

While I understand a large part of the vocal player-base in this discussion is primarily concerned with promoting recruitment, and the other half with protecting themselves from it, there are other activities in NationStates that players partake in. Ones that unfortunately sometimes get "shafted by association", when their operations overlap the Recruitment and/or R&D activities. It would be great if these activities could be recognized and supported through the new TG system, instead of being thrown out with the bathwater.

[Cerian Quilor]

If Founders are supposed to be able to do stamp-esque things in their own regions without using stamps, is there a way for us to be able to send a telegram that only hits people automatically as they arrive in our region, in the same way stamps allow queing up of all new nations, even before they're created?

[Luna Amore]

Two questions:
Could the Deleted folder show you how long ago you deleted the telegram so you know when it will be auto-pruned?
If your inbox hits the limit, will the excess automatically spill over into custom folders?

Loving the new system anyhow. Thanks for all the hard work!

[Charlotte Ryberg]

So I searched but couldn't find this in the thread. Could someone point me to a description of what the "External" filter does?

Hovering over the name should pop up "Mass Telegrams of unspecified type."

It's the category assigned to telegrams that aren't explicitly addressed to you and don't fall into any of the other groups (recruitment, campaign, regional).

There should be a "regional announcement" option because when mass telegrams arrive I am hoping to advise my members on the ideal telegram type settings.

[Cerian Quilor]

Hovering over the name should pop up "Mass Telegrams of unspecified type."

It's the category assigned to telegrams that aren't explicitly addressed to you and don't fall into any of the other groups (recruitment, campaign, regional).

There should be a "regional announcement" option because when mass telegrams arrive I am hoping to advise my members on the ideal telegram type settings.

The filter appears to allow you to filter out TGs from 'region' which means regional announcements will probably be a catagory.

[Charlotte Ryberg]

There should be a "regional announcement" option because when mass telegrams arrive I am hoping to advise my members on the ideal telegram type settings.

The filter appears to allow you to filter out TGs from 'region' which means regional announcements will probably be a catagory.

I removed the additional countries that I wanted to send a copy for their adaptation... and such an option still isn't coming up.

[Oneracon]

No. Those tags are useful.

No, they aren't.

http://www.nationstates.net/page=tgsettings

The new telegram settings allow players to opt out of receiving WA campaign telegrams.

And what if they are a delegate, like myself, who doesn't mind receiving GA telegrams but could care less about SC telegrams?

[Auralia]

The tags prevent people wasting their time sending out TGs if using an autotger.

With Aurelia's one no longer working. Is there even another one

I'll fix it once the new API comes out.

[Delegate Vinage]

With Aurelia's one no longer working. Is there even another one

I'll fix it once the new API comes out.

*swoons at your feet*

[Cerian Quilor]

The filter appears to allow you to filter out TGs from 'region' which means regional announcements will probably be a catagory.

I removed the additional countries that I wanted to send a copy for their adaptation... and such an option still isn't coming up.

I said 'will be' not that it is yet, Charlotte.

[Server Hamsters]

Why can I not send mass TG Recruitspam?!?1

... because they've been so busy writing this code, they forgot to feed me. Buy supporter accounts. I'm hongry. Once Mass TGs go live, you're gonna see my little wheel spinning like a tornado!

[Galiantus II]

Yep, and we'll need to fix that.

As I see it, we have two options:

• Let recruiters disable that "Move to @@REGION@@" button when they're recruiting for an organization but don't want the recipient to change regions; or
• Create a new category for non-region based recruitment, which doesn't include the button, and which people can choose to block or not.

The first option is simpler, since players can check one box to block all forms of recruitment. The second option is more flexible, which would suit people who are open to region-based recruitment but not something like the UDL, or vice versa.

Right now I'm thinking the first one makes more sense, but this is something we'll observe and refine as we go, with input from the people affected.

But doesn't the first option treat all recruitment the same? I mean, most people I talk to, like to join the UDL, specifically because they don't want to join a different region (that would be unloyal), but they want to help out with the defender cause. Likewise, I might be interested in subscribing to a hypothetical telegrammed-news-network (which I'm envisioning of doing), without leaving my region etc.

Hmmm. Maybe players could create their own TG channels for regional groups, non-regional organizations, and political groups. Other nations would ask to join the channel, the owner of the channel would choose whether or not to let you into the channel, and then he can mass-TG those on the channel. If it turns into spam, channel owners could be punished, and players could leave the channel any time. Perhaps founders and delegates could join their entire region to the channel, so messages are automatically forwarded to all the residents of the region, barring the individual settings of residents, of course.

The only question is, would this be a free service, like it is for Founders and Delegates? Or would all TGs sent through the channel require stamps? Remember, players would voluntarily subscribe to channels, and could leave at any time. What I would like to see is how this could be used to create political parties, secret societies, etc.

My recommendation would be combining those two options: (1) Doesn't have a button to move somewhere, (2) Is a separate category for "organizations" or "activities" or "miscellaneous" or something along these lines. I could see this being used for news media, opinion polling, roleplaying, defending, raiding.. etc. any activity or cause that doesn't fit into the traditional "region recruitment" block.

Why not replace the button with a link to the forums of the organization? Of course this should be limited to forum sites, but at least extraregional organizations would find the same utility regions do.

Also, I agree this new system could use more categories. Opinion polling, news, and all those other usages could be put to good use through this new system.

[Sichuan Pepper]

@ Galiantus II
Sounds to me like you want to create sub-groups in the new system to send out telegrams to with a saved list of members.
Naturally if you were sending out invites to join a group it would come under recruitment rules and be tagged as recruiting.

I think a problem we are having is that nations view invitations as being different from recruiting.

On a different subject but still in relation to the new TG system
Something I saw earlier and is concerning to me. The following quote is in regarding to AutoRecruiter Scripts.

Consider charging for its use Auralia. Last time these things were legal I charged the Kingdom of Denmark founder $30/mo to use mine. People are willing to pay.

Surely this sort of thing would be against NS Rules? Is there a policy on this?

[Lordieth]

Are we allowed to automate the process of creating the template with tag:api?

If we're going to be able to use scripts with the new API, I'd like to be just able to upload the message to my script, and let it get the key and do the rest.

Also; if I want to keep a template for future use, will I be safe to do so? I know a time limit hasn't been mentioned, but if I want to create a few variants and switch between them, it'd be good to know they'll stick around and I won't have to worry about them.

A special rate limit applies (planned to be approx. 1 telegram per 20 seconds for non-recruitment TGs

Does this mean sending recruitment TGs is going to be slower than that?

[Galiantus II]

@ Galiantus II
Sounds to me like you want to create sub-groups in the new system to send out telegrams to with a saved list of members.
Naturally if you were sending out invites to join a group it would come under recruitment rules and be tagged as recruiting.

I think a problem we are having is that nations view invitations as being different from recruiting.

Yes. That is essentially what I would like to see. This could be used for all sorts of things - news, regional organization, political parties, military orders, event planning, etc. I understand invites to join such groups would count as recruitment or regional communication, under the current rules, and until you pointed out nations view invitations for these sorts of things differently than recruitment, I wasn't going to press the point. However, if we are going to create consentual communication groups, we may want to differentiate between recruitment and group invitation.

The only possible problem I can see with a system like this is that these groups could become alternative forms of recruitment (i.e. you invite someone to a group, and then use the content of the group to send them recruitment stuff). News groups based in specific regions may appear to borderline this practice, as well.

I will start a thread separate from this one for further discussion on this topic.

[Unibot III]

The only possible problem I can see with a system like this is that these groups could become alternative forms of recruitment (i.e. you invite someone to a group, and then use the content of the group to send them recruitment stuff). News groups based in specific regions may appear to borderline this practice, as well.

Here's my problem with this being a problem: so what? If people are forming groups, activities and events and doing stuff in NS to promote their regions through these activities. That's healthy for NationStates!

Anyways I've suggested a general category for stuff beyond regional recruitment already and I hope [violet] thinks it over.

Yep, and we'll need to fix that.

As I see it, we have two options:

• Let recruiters disable that "Move to @@REGION@@" button when they're recruiting for an organization but don't want the recipient to change regions; or
• Create a new category for non-region based recruitment, which doesn't include the button, and which people can choose to block or not.

The first option is simpler, since players can check one box to block all forms of recruitment. The second option is more flexible, which would suit people who are open to region-based recruitment but not something like the UDL, or vice versa.

Right now I'm thinking the first one makes more sense, but this is something we'll observe and refine as we go, with input from the people affected.

But doesn't the first option treat all recruitment the same? I mean, most people I talk to, like to join the UDL, specifically because they don't want to join a different region (that would be unloyal), but they want to help out with the defender cause. Likewise, I might be interested in subscribing to a hypothetical telegrammed-news-network (which I'm envisioning of doing), without leaving my region etc.

My recommendation would be combining those two options: (1) Doesn't have a button to move somewhere, (2) Is a separate category for "organizations" or "activities" or "miscellaneous" or something along these lines. I could see this being used for news media, opinion polling, roleplaying, defending, raiding.. etc. any activity or cause that doesn't fit into the traditional "region recruitment" block.

EDIT: Another thing would be interregional protests, invitations to join interregional conferences or world fairs (like the one I ran last year) and all sorts of "fourth estate" kinds of things.

EDIT2: New NS Software, like NSEconomy and the Gameplay Compass.

[Flibbleites]

So we're supposed to use this interface to recruit for non-regional entities? But the interface assumes that I'm recruiting for the region I'm in. :/

Yep, and we'll need to fix that.

As I see it, we have two options:

• Let recruiters disable that "Move to @@REGION@@" button when they're recruiting for an organization but don't want the recipient to change regions; or
• Create a new category for non-region based recruitment, which doesn't include the button, and which people can choose to block or not.

The first option is simpler, since players can check one box to block all forms of recruitment. The second option is more flexible, which would suit people who are open to region-based recruitment but not something like the UDL, or vice versa.

Right now I'm thinking the first one makes more sense, but this is something we'll observe and refine as we go, with input from the people affected.

I can some up with a third option, we leave it as is, and anyone recruiting for something other than a region can just include in their message something about ignoring the link.

No. Those tags are useful.

No, they aren't.

http://www.nationstates.net/page=tgsettings

The new telegram settings allow players to opt out of receiving WA campaign telegrams.

Yes, but only on an all or nothing basis. The tags allow us to tell campaigners that we only want to hear about GA (or SC) proposals. So until we get a way to block campaign TGs on a per council basis they still have a use.

[Eldarion Telcontar]

When will Mass TGs be allowed?

And are AutoRecruitment TG Scripts allowed at this point?