[PASSED] Commend Trotterdam

[Noahs Second Country]

Commend Trotterdam
A resolution to recognise outstanding achievement by a nation or region.

Category: Commendation

Nominee: Trotterdam

Proposed by: Noahs Second Country

---

The Security Council,

Frightened by the prevalence and scale of national crises facing world leaders throughout the multiverse,

Aware that a cabal of nations is dedicated to presenting solutions for the aforementioned crises in a brief, clear, and occasionally amusing manner,

Understanding that this group plays a critical role in the stability of our community as a whole, by hosting regular public discussions on international forums to analyse a wide variety of notable issues,

Praising scholars from Trotterdam for their participation as some of the most prolific, tenured and consistent associates in this group; their contributions include:

• Assisting other nations' scholars in their efforts to present solutions, checking for factual accuracy and clarity, as well as overlap with previously presented solutions to prevent potentially harmful inconsistencies,
• Bringing attention to important, yet often overlooked flaws that may arise in any documentation provided to world leaders, which could otherwise mislead them into choosing an unsuitable solution,
• Explaining any unintended consequences that may arise from policy decisions in a clear and concise manner,
• Presenting two pressing matters of their own via the satellite state of Milostein, regarding the dangers of unregulated firework use and the construction of a particle accelerator,

Applauding Trotterdam for their dedication to mapping the myriad possible ways a nation could address complex, multi-step scenarios, such as significant terrorist threats, major breakdowns in international relations, and improper management of press freedoms,,

Impressed by the international database managed by Trotterdammer scholars, which serves as the most comprehensive and widely used compilation of the following:

• Tangible effects resulting from a national response to a problem,
• Potential policy changes that may come indirectly as a result of said responses,
• Historical changes in world census rankings following these important decisions,

Awed by the conduct of these scholars in making this database free to use, while maintaining transparency in their methods of data collection, enabling all leaders to make more informed decisions without being misled,

Finally noting the impressive world census rankings achieved by both Milostein and Trotterdam in categories such as intelligence, compassion, safety, and education, upholding a benchmark standard for other nations,

Concluding that, without the contributions listed above, misinformation, errors and chaos would ensue,

Hereby Commends Trotterdam

Co-Authored by SherpDaWerp

Third attempt at a resolution, third time this particular one has been tried. I have not received a response from Trotterdam but in the past they have been indifferent to the idea, so we're defaulting to that stance.

The Security Council,

Frightened by the prevalence and scale of national crises facing world leaders throughout the multiverse,

Aware that a cabal of nations is dedicated to presenting solutions for the aforementioned crises in a brief, clear, and occasionally amusing manner,

Understanding that this cabal plays a critical role in the stability of the international community as a whole, by hosting regular discussions on a wide variety of notable issues,

Praising scholars from Trotterdam for their participation in this cabal as some of the most prolific, tenured and consistent associates; their contributions include:

• Assisting other nations' scholars in their efforts to present solutions, checking for factual accuracy and clarity, as well as overlap with previously presented solutions to prevent potentially harmful inconsistencies,
• Bringing attention to important, yet often overlooked flaws that may arise in any documentation provided to world leaders, which could otherwise mislead them into choosing an unsuitable solution,
• Explaining any unintended consequences that may arise from policy decisions in a clear and concise manner,
• Presenting two pressing matters of their own via the satellite state of Milostein, regarding the dangers of unregulated firework use and the construction of a particle accelerator,

Impressed by the international database managed by Trotterdammer scholars, which serves as the most comprehensive and widely used compilation of the following:

• Tangible effects resulting from a national response to a problem,
• Potential policy changes that may come indirectly as a result of said responses,
• Historical changes in world census rankings following these important decisions,

Awed by the conduct of these scholars in making this database free to use, while maintaining transparency in their methods of data collection, enabling all leaders to make more informed decisions without being misled,

Finally noting the impressive world census rankings achieved by both Milostein and Trotterdam in categories such as intelligence, compassion, safety, and education, upholding a benchmark standard for other nations,

Concluding that, without the contributions listed above, misinformation, errors and chaos would ensue,

Hereby Commends Trotterdam

Co-Authored by SherpDaWerp

[Tinhampton]

Full support for any proposal bearing this title.

[Bormiar]

You're going to run into the following arguments:

• Some think that NS stats hurts the game. I personally find it ranging from not very useful to harmful, because it's not very good at predicting results.
• They censored the result of an option allegedly because the option they suggested was not used. Seems petty.

[SherpDaWerp]

Some think that NS stats hurts the game. I personally find it ranging from not very useful to harmful, because it's not very good at predicting results.

I find it useful, on the rare occasion when I use it; but its usefulness heavily depends on the option, the stat you're looking at, and the position of your nation, as to whether it will help. A good point to make against those who would say "but this ruins the stats game".

However, beyond the archive of stats (link for those unaware), the sheer amount of helpful feedback Trotterdam puts out on GI is still (in my opinion) commendable. Trotterdam is one of the foremost providers of feedback (behind actual Editors like Candlewhisper Archive) and nearly everyone active in GI has benefited from that. Even if you disagree with providing detailed stat breakdowns, Trotterdam's feedback is invaluable and nearly commendable in it's own right.

They censored the result of an option allegedly because the option they suggested was not used. Seems petty.

That point is addressed later in the conversation under the second link you provided.

So this one censor outweighs the entirety of the benefit Trotterdam’s completely free, detailed, and updated database provides? Cmon now, certainly that isn’t the case.

I’m sorry, but what the fuck is this position supposed to be? So you’d rather have the results of no options than all but one? Like there’s some inherent need for the options to be treated equally? Makes no sense.

I don't think one (1) censored option outweighs the 5,100 other options (to be precise, I counted 5,111) that the stat archive includes. That's less than 0.02% of all the options. It's not worth refusing to commend over such an incredibly small negative.

---

As Noah alluded to (and Bormiar linked one of), this isn't the first time a Commendation for Trotterdam has been proposed. Links for those unwilling to search are here:
Commend Trotterdam (by The Pharcyde) - failed because the author got DEAT prior to submitting the proposal
Commend Trotterdam (by Chan Island) - failed to reach Quorum due to a late TG campaign

[Honeydewistania]

Aware that a cabal of nations is dedicated to presenting solutions for the aforementioned crises in a brief, clear, and occasionally amusing manner,

Just this line alone is enough for support

[Christ Triumphant]

[*]They censored the result of an option allegedly because the option they suggested was not used. Seems petty.[/list]

That particular argument is quite poor. It seems quite obvious to be done for humor purposes. And the one who is making that claim, there, is somewhat lacking in credibility...

[Minskiev]

Shouldn’t be ‘a cabal of nations are dedicated...’?

Actually, wait, no. Is is correct, it just reads weirdly.

[Noahs Second Country]

Some think that NS stats hurts the game. I personally find it ranging from not very useful to harmful, because it's not very good at predicting results.

For those who use the site, I assume that most take it as a suggestion rather than "x option will definitely increase my stats". In order to answer issues effectively, nations still need to read the option and gauge it in the context of their nation.

Personally, I feel like it's not really possible to actually utilize this site to boost a stat up really high, because by the time you do that you either

a) gain a solid understanding of how issues work and can reasonably predict issue effects, or

b) don't have the stat particularly high because you're just choosing based on the range of stats given, which will be inconsistent as the range is derived from all sorts of nations across the ideological spectrum.

Hence, the site actually serves as a nice stepping stone for those new to NS stats, but I doubt that anyone will become/has totally reliant on it.

I feel as if the inclusion of this database in the proposal is more because it's an impressive compilation of stat changes that nations have actually encountered in the past, and it also serves as an archive of all policy changes and effect lines, which are accurate.

EDIT: As for the censorship thing, as mentioned it's an incredibly minor detail, it's not serving to mislead anyone, nor is it particularly harmful.

[SherpDaWerp]

it's not really possible to actually utilize this site to boost a stat up really high

It's worth noting that Weather is an exception to this rule. Weather is coded in such a manner that an option will always increase/decrease it by the same amount, regardless of a nation's starting position, so it's possible to get very high weather purely from following the directions of the database.

No-one has actually done this, to my knowledge, but it is possible.

[Electrum]

Full support for this resolution. I don't really have anything to nitpick, so well done

[Bhang Bhang Duc]

First impressions are that this is a reasonably detailed draft, certainly greater than the previous two attempts at Commending this nation. However, I have some more in-depth criticism below.

The Security Council,

Frightened by the prevalence and scale of national crises facing world leaders throughout the multiverse,

Aware that a cabal of nations is dedicated to presenting solutions for the aforementioned crises in a brief, clear, and occasionally amusing manner,

Understanding that this cabal plays a critical role in the stability of the international community as a whole, by hosting regular discussions on a wide variety of notable issues,

Praising scholars from Trotterdam for their participation in this cabal as some of the most prolific, tenured and consistent associates; their contributions include:

• Assisting other nations' scholars in their efforts to present solutions, checking for factual accuracy and clarity, as well as overlap with previously presented solutions to prevent potentially harmful inconsistencies,
• Bringing attention to important, yet often overlooked flaws that may arise in any documentation provided to world leaders, which could otherwise mislead them into choosing an unsuitable solution,
• Explaining any unintended consequences that may arise from policy decisions in a clear and concise manner,
• Presenting two pressing matters of their own via the satellite state of Milostein, regarding the dangers of unregulated firework use and the construction of a particle accelerator,

I don't know the nation and have never been involved in GI, but I'm assuming they are not and never have been an Issues Editor? Because if they were I think this would be right out as an attempt to circumvent R1.

Okay, so assuming they're not how many nations are in this cabal? (Oh you've used cabal three times in this section - I know I'm being picky but it's a little repetitive.) Is it five, ten, twenty? Does Trotterdam do a majority of this work or is it split equally between members of the group? What I'm trying to say is that I don't think work presented as being done while part of a group is Commendable. Who's to say other members of this group aren't equally Commendable as well? Just stick their name in at the start and it would read just the same.

Also only two issues published - a lot less than other issue writers C&Cd.

Impressed by the international database managed by Trotterdammer scholars, which serves as the most comprehensive and widely used compilation of the following:

• Tangible effects resulting from a national response to a problem,
• Potential policy changes that may come indirectly as a result of said responses,
• Historical changes in world census rankings following these important decisions,

Awed by the conduct of these scholars in making this database free to use, while maintaining transparency in their methods of data collection, enabling all leaders to make more informed decisions without being misled,

Well the database is a good concrete thing they've done, but given the wooliness of the first section it does not stand up by itself as Commendable.

Finally noting the impressive world census rankings achieved by both Milostein and Trotterdam in categories such as intelligence, compassion, safety, and education, upholding a benchmark standard for other nations,

This just reads as an afterthought, a bit of filler to the draft.

Concluding that, without the contributions listed above, misinformation, errors and chaos would ensue,

Hereby Commends Trotterdam

It's a well written draft but suffers from the fact that you cannot attribute all the work they've done solely to them. A greater part of this document is spent extolling their work as part of a group, the members and numbers of which are unknown.

Sorry Noah, but at the moment this one gets a pass from me.

[Noahs Second Country]

I don't know the nation and have never been involved in GI, but I'm assuming they are not and never have been an Issues Editor? Because if they were I think this would be right out as an attempt to circumvent R1.

Okay, so assuming they're not how many nations are in this cabal? (Oh you've used cabal three times in this section - I know I'm being picky but it's a little repetitive.) Is it five, ten, twenty? Does Trotterdam do a majority of this work or is it split equally between members of the group? What I'm trying to say is that I don't think work presented as being done while part of a group is Commendable. Who's to say other members of this group aren't equally Commendable as well? Just stick their name in at the start and it would read just the same.

Also only two issues published - a lot less than other issue writers C&Cd.

They have never been an issues editor. The "cabal" is a reference to GI as a whole. Obviously, Trotterdam is not the sole contributor to GI, however, the number of contributors is not necessarily something that is easily quantified. It seems as if you've interpreted GI as a singular group project, when in reality it's a large collection of individual efforts (drafts) with others giving suggestions on how the OP can improve their efforts. Trotterdam is not necessarily your average GI poster, and as you pointed out, they only have 2 published issues. As far as I've seen, Trotterdam doesn't attempt to write issues, despite having 7000 GI posts, most of which tend to be high quality feedback. Instead, everyone on GI is aware of Trotterdam because you can almost expect high quality feedback from them on nearly every draft. Additionally, they provide interesting discussion on the stickied megathreads, these points tend to be fairly useful for editors and players alike. Hence, this is an "issues C&C", but it isn't necessarily your standard "x wrote this, this, and this issues C&C" resolution. As a result, this resolution struggles a bit more from expressing these ideas in an IC fashion.

As for your point on the repetition of "cabal," I'll make that change in the next draft, and I'm considering removing the stats clause. On top of this, I'll see how we can clarify the first few clauses a bit to highlight the individuality of Trotterdam's contributions to GI.

[All Wild Things]

I really like this proposal. Trotterdam is a good choice of candidate, and the proposal is well written.
Nice work!

[Fauxia]

First impressions are that this is a reasonably detailed draft, certainly greater than the previous two attempts at Commending this nation. However, I have some more in-depth criticism below.

Snip

Also only two issues published - a lot less than other issue writers C&Cd.

Two issues is certainly not a commendable number. Many authors, including yours truly, have authored more. However, Trott’s contributions to GI go way beyond that. He’s been a staple of it for years. His advice is thorough and very helpful. He has helped to push plenty of middling issues over the top, and many authors are indebted to him for that.

Additionally - and this might be worthy of being mentioned in the resolution - we likely would’ve spent far longer without knowing the map of issue chains if not for Trott’s contributions. There is probably no non-editor, besides maybe New South Hell, who was nonetheless in a site position for much of his career - who has contributed as much to the collection of underlying information about issues than Trotterdam. If you look through the forum thread for the list of issues, you’ll find numerous posts of Trott’s elaborating on the things not readily apparent - macros and validities, as well as simply reporting new issues. Maintaining the spoiler list is certainly commendable (see: Drasnia, Jutsa), and it’d be light years behind where it is now if not for Trott.

I agree that the proposal could use some work, but Trott absolutely deserves it.

[Jutsa]

Going to quick add that Trot's countless reports and corrections in the issues thread, along with his lists of effect lines and policy changes,
the latter of which I can not stress enough how much has helped me think up new issues and policy-changing options.
Not the best way to write an issue but it's helped me immensely brainstorm to say the least.

Plus, lets be honest, GI would be pretty darn quiet without Trot around. or aussie for that matter.

The amount of work put into figuring out how NS works is truly remarkable, I must say, and I also stand by the fact that his comments are almost never short of helpful. Full support.

[Noahs Second Country]

After some deliberation, the second draft is now up, featuring:

• The "applauding" clause to reference Trotterdam's contributions in mapping out issue chains.
• Removal of a couple uses of "cabal" in favor of a synonym.
• Rewording of the "understanding" clause in hopes of referencing GI with a bit more clarity.
• Minor wording changes

[Fauxia]

This looks much better. Well, I think it probably does. I don’t exactly have a copy of the first draft to compare to

[Ransium]

it's not really possible to actually utilize this site to boost a stat up really high

It's worth noting that Weather is an exception to this rule. Weather is coded in such a manner that an option will always increase/decrease it by the same amount, regardless of a nation's starting position, so it's possible to get very high weather purely from following the directions of the database.

No-one has actually done this, to my knowledge, but it is possible.

This is exactly how I use the database actually. I knew of the deterministic nature of weather and what’s it’s influences are before Trotterdam’s website, and I used to use a team of puppets, my knowledge, and a spreadsheet to determine which options were optimal. Trotterdam’s website makes things a whole lot easier.

[Noahs Second Country]

This looks much better. Well, I think it probably does. I don’t exactly have a copy of the first draft to compare to

Forgot to spoiler the first draft
That should now be fixed.

The Security Council,

Frightened by the prevalence and scale of national crises facing world leaders throughout the multiverse,

Aware that a cabal of nations is dedicated to presenting solutions for the aforementioned crises in a brief, clear, and occasionally amusing manner,

Understanding that this cabal plays a critical role in the stability of the international community as a whole, by hosting regular discussions on a wide variety of notable issues,

Praising scholars from Trotterdam for their participation in this cabal as some of the most prolific, tenured and consistent associates; their contributions include:

• Assisting other nations' scholars in their efforts to present solutions, checking for factual accuracy and clarity, as well as overlap with previously presented solutions to prevent potentially harmful inconsistencies,
• Bringing attention to important, yet often overlooked flaws that may arise in any documentation provided to world leaders, which could otherwise mislead them into choosing an unsuitable solution,
• Explaining any unintended consequences that may arise from policy decisions in a clear and concise manner,
• Presenting two pressing matters of their own via the satellite state of Milostein, regarding the dangers of unregulated firework use and the construction of a particle accelerator,

Impressed by the international database managed by Trotterdammer scholars, which serves as the most comprehensive and widely used compilation of the following:

• Tangible effects resulting from a national response to a problem,
• Potential policy changes that may come indirectly as a result of said responses,
• Historical changes in world census rankings following these important decisions,

Awed by the conduct of these scholars in making this database free to use, while maintaining transparency in their methods of data collection, enabling all leaders to make more informed decisions without being misled,

Finally noting the impressive world census rankings achieved by both Milostein and Trotterdam in categories such as intelligence, compassion, safety, and education, upholding a benchmark standard for other nations,

Concluding that, without the contributions listed above, misinformation, errors and chaos would ensue,

Hereby Commends Trotterdam

Co-Authored by SherpDaWerp

[SherpDaWerp]

It's worth noting that Weather is an exception to this rule. Weather is coded in such a manner that an option will always increase/decrease it by the same amount, regardless of a nation's starting position, so it's possible to get very high weather purely from following the directions of the database.

No-one has actually done this, to my knowledge, but it is possible.

This is exactly how I use the database actually. I knew of the deterministic nature of weather and what’s it’s influences are before Trotterdam’s website, and I used to use a team of puppets, my knowledge, and a spreadsheet to determine which options were optimal. Trotterdam’s website makes things a whole lot easier.

Huh. I heard about the nature of Weather from you originally, but I don't recall you saying that you had used the archive for that express purpose.

In that case, there you have it folks: the 10th best Weather belongs to someone who uses Trotterdam's archive!

[Noahs Second Country]

Last call, with submission planned for tomorrow unless any major issues come up.

[Honeydewistania]

Submitted as of 15 minutes ago

[Trotterdam]

I'm just dropping by to note that I really like the in-character language used in this proposal. Yay, I'm a nation of scholars!

Otherwise, carry on. Have fun debating for and against this proposal.

[Comfed]

The SC has seen too many commendations for essentially just writing a lot of issues. Opposed.

[Drasnia]

The SC has seen too many commendations for essentially just writing a lot of issues. Opposed.

Please show me in the proposal where it mentions issue authorship.

You can't be cause it doesn't. Trotterdam has never had an issue published, yet in my opinion they are one of the most important members of the issues community.