A small logistics note, as it stands, this thread will be our Membership Thread. That may change in the future, but for now, applications should be submitted here. Our IRC is #DeepEnd
Guild Membership
Masters:
Delmonte (Censor)
Machina Haruspex
The Batorys
Xirnium
Renor Xukuth
Takhisis
Wandering Argonians
Apprentices:
-The West Coast-
The Church of Starry Wisdom
Role Plays
Something You Won't Write Home About-Delmonte
Carried on a Steel Wind-Takhisis
Visitors From Afar-Xukuth
Delmonte (Censor)
Machina Haruspex
The Batorys
Xirnium
Renor Xukuth
Takhisis
Wandering Argonians
Apprentices:
-The West Coast-
The Church of Starry Wisdom
Role Plays
Something You Won't Write Home About-Delmonte
Carried on a Steel Wind-Takhisis
Visitors From Afar-Xukuth
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Our Mission Statement
The Wordsmith’s Guild has three purposes listed here in order of importance:
1: Generate high quality writing opportunities for its members.
2: Assist members with enhancing their image and prestige within NationStates’ writing community.
3: Train promising writers to not only become excellent writers, but to become model members of the forums.
The Wordsmith’s Guild has three purposes listed here in order of importance:
1: Generate high quality writing opportunities for its members.
2: Assist members with enhancing their image and prestige within NationStates’ writing community.
3: Train promising writers to not only become excellent writers, but to become model members of the forums.
Guild Conventions
Preamble Regarding Legal Theory: The Guild is a two-tiered structure where leadership on the upper tier is completely flat. It is notable that in order for a motion or function to pass, it must acquire a majority of all active Masters regardless of whether or not they vote. Therefore it is reasonable to summarize the Guild Conventions as having a “No until proven yes” mentality. They are structured to encourage writing, as is natural.
Article One: Membership will be composed of two types of members: Masters and Apprentices.
Section A: Masters are members who are recognized as having achieved excellence in writing while Apprentices are writers who, though still promising, have not achieved their full potential.
Section B: Masters are expected to be available to mentor at least one apprentice as part of their responsibilities as Masters.
Section C: Apprentices may put their names forward to become masters after a month of training under a Master. They shall do this by announcing as such in the forum and submitting a piece of their best quality work to be judged by the Masters. Their Master is encouraged to explain why he feels his Apprentice is ready or not ready. Apprentices do not have to submit themselves after a month has elapsed, that is merely their first opportunity. All Masters in the Guild will then vote on their acceptance for five days. In order for an Apprentice to advance they must have a majority of all active Masters agree. Therefore silence or abstentions from active Masters count as negative votes.
Section D: The relationship between a Master and his Apprentice is like that between a teacher and a pupil. Apprentices do not take “orders” from their Master, the Master is simply responsible for their advancement insofar as they can assist.
Article Two: Voting shall be conducted by all Masters in the Guild. All issues, unless stated otherwise, require a majority of active Masters and all issues, unless stated otherwise, can be proposed by any Master.
Section A: Only active Masters may vote on issues.
Section B: In the event of a tie, the tie breaks in favor of however the Censor voted. Note that if the Censor abstained or did not vote, this counts as a negative vote for the purposes of this rule.
Article Three: A Censor shall be elected every other month to review the list of Masters for activity for voting purposes.
Section A: The Censor is responsible for maintaining a list, to be updated with a post on the forum every other week, of Masters’ voting eligibility.
Section B: The Censor, if no-one volunteers, is responsible for acting as Defense in cases against Guild members where the accused are absent.
Section C: The Censor may be removed from office. In order for this to be accomplished, a Master must issue the challenge against the Censor in the forums and two thirds of all Masters (regardless of activity status) must agree in order to remove the Censor. The Censor cannot vote on this issue and is temporarily not regarded as part of the voting pool.
Section D: The first term of Censor will be filled by Delmonte for the sake of convenience and organization.
Article Four: Masters and Apprentices alike both have responsibilities within the Guild.
Section A: Masters are responsible for maintaining at least one active thread for Guild members only. These threads ought to be open to all Guild members. Masters are also expected to participate in at least one other such thread run by another Master.
Section B: Apprentices are expected to participate in at least two threads run by Masters.
Section C: “Participating in a thread” entails being active in that thread, as interpreted by the Censor. But as a general guideline, regular posting in a thread is regarded as participating. Obviously a member cannot be expected to double post, however, so these requirements should be rather flexible.
Section D: Masters and Apprentices alike are expected to have a high quality In Character post on the forums at a minimum of once every thirty days.
Section E: If a Master does not uphold these tenets, they shouldn't incur punishment or ejection, but they should be considered inactive for voting purposes by the Censor. They are still allowed to participate in Guild threads, obviously.
Article Five: In order for someone to become a member, they must submit themselves in the Membership Forum.
Section A: In order for their application to be voted on, they must submit three examples of posts for judgment.
Section B: Starting with the date that they submitted their application, all active Masters will vote publicly in the Membership Thread as to the applicant’s status for seven days, until a majority of all active Masters has been achieved, or until all active Masters have voted. There are four kinds of votes:
“Yes; Master”. This type of vote means that the Master who cast it thinks that not only should the applicant be accepted, but that they should be accepted as a Master.
“Yes; Apprentice”. This type of vote means that the Master who cast it thinks that the applicant should be accepted as an Apprentice.
“No”. This vote means that the Master thinks that the applicant should not be accepted. Note that if the “Yes”’s outweigh the “No”’s, then every “No” will count as a vote of “Apprentice” for purposes of determining the Applicant’s membership status.
Silence, Abstention, or an unclear vote. For all intents and purposes, these votes count as “No”’s.
Article Six: Masters or Apprentices accused of conduct unbecoming of the Guild or against the spirit of the Guild shall be given a trial on the Internet Relay Chat channel, #DeepEnd. Any member may accuse any other member. The accused member shall pick a date and time that occurs within two weeks of the time that he or she is accused, but no sooner than three days after. If they do not do this within three days of when they are accused, the Censor shall appoint a day that meets the aforementioned requirement. The trial shall last three hours or until both sides agree to stop, whichever comes first.
Section A: Any Masters or Apprentices may attend the trial. Anyone may ask questions or make observations, but voting on matters of Guilt will be left to Masters only.
Section B: The Masters who are present must choose to agree with either the accuser or the accused. If they agree with the accuser, the accused is expelled from the Guild and cannot reapply for ten weeks. If the consensus is that they agree with the accused that no wrong has been done, the accuser is expelled from the Guild and cannot reapply for ten weeks. The only time that someone will not be expelled is if there is a tie, in which case the trial is a wash and is thrown out.
Section C: The Censor is responsible for aiding in the defense of any accused Member. He shall not have a vote in trials.
)
That being said, let's make sure we keep things more PC when we're on the NS forums, hm? I'm not particularly enamored with the sexual bits on the offsite forum, but everything else was nice and as long as it's not on NS it isn't actionable. And given that the ones on the offsite were converted from IRC roleplay and were therefore a little... difficult to decipher at times, I'm basing my vote more off of the post that was on NationStates.
