The Rejected Times - Issue XIX

[Unibot]

Issue XIX, May 04, 2014

Editor's Note

We had some people who had got lost during our last issue. Unfortunately this issue is just as large, so here's a map for our more casual readers...



>> NEWS

Nepotism at its Finest
New Moderator Appointments suggest Nepotism
COMMENTARY | GLEN-RHODES

Last week, on Thursday, April 24, the General Assembly community was greeted with two new moderators. This did not come as a shock to anybody, because it was painfully clear that the moderation team was unbearably slow due to inactive moderators. In order to get a timely ruling, authors had to sacrifice a lamb and kill the thing they loved the most. Players called for additional mods the week prior, after Ardchoille, the lead mod, shot down the idea of World Assembly Mentors.

However, the two players the mod team chose as their newest recruits proved to be controversial. Mousebumples is a long-time member of the General Assembly community, though had not been particularly active prior to promotion. Mallorea and Riva, known in the Gameplay community as an unapologetic amoral raider, was the second choice. While many players offered their congratulations, several decried the choice as runaway nepotism and upholding the status quo in a game so many believe needs to be changed. Among the many accusations, these players suggested that Mousebumples and Mallorea and Riva were chosen to be mods because they would not threaten the status quo. Both have rarely disagreed with the mod, and both tend to defend mod decisions and the mod team in general against criticism. Who best to welcome into your ranks than some cheerleaders?

Of the two, Mallorea and Riva earned particular scorn. Most people, even supporters of the decision, admitted that the choice of Mallorea and Riva was a complete surprise. If there had been an open discussion about who should be the next General Assembly mod, Mallorea and Riva would not even make it to the first round of suggestions. Yet, he was chosen anyways by the mod team, through some secret vetting process the community will never understand. It is hard to believe that the mods received very many emails suggesting his promotion. Why would the community want somebody who has openly admitted that he cannot be trusted? [ http://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=288914&p=19617723#p19617723 ]Who is known as a proud self-proclaimed troll? His behavior is exemplary of the worst behavior in this game. Mallorea and Riva perpetuates an unfriendly and toxic culture that has been regularly recognized as a serious problem for sustaining the World Assembly as an active and vibrant part of NationStates. Yet, he was chosen to be a mod.

To veteran players, it is no mystery why Mousebumples and Mallorea and Riva were chosen. While the latter is really jumping the shark, both meet the primary qualification for joining the General Assembly mod team: be members of the Antarctic Oasis group of friends. It is no coincidence that the last three players made mods – Flibbleites, who is seemingly missing in action, and now Mousebumples and Mallorea and Riva – are all part of the Antarctic Oasis community. Ardchoille has long been friends with this group of players, yet pretends that the occasional resolution legality ruling against them is evidence that she is not impacted by the bias any other normal human being would experience. All of these mods routinely participate in Antarctic Oasis “rant threads,” where they insult and denigrate the players they’re charged with moderating. Ardchoille, Flibbleites, and Mousebumples have been participants for the past five to six years, and Mallorea and Riva has recently joined them within the last two.

Is that really the behavior we want from our mods? Palling around with the likes of Omigodtheykilledkenny (commonly knows as just “Kenny”), who in one thread said that Auralia “sucks donkey dick” and accused him of being a “homophobe bigot Tea Party Catholic asshole?” And we are supposed to believe that none of this affected Ardchoille’s decision to use a tool she said would only be used for extraordinary situations, to strike down Auralia’s resolution after it had passed? Should we also believe that reassuring Antarctic Oasis that the “No Army” rule would never change, and then striking down Auralia’s resolution – which would have put the rule into question – are two totally separate events completely irrelevant to one another?

Even if it is not blatant favoritism and corruption, mods are not super-humans. Participating in these threads undoubtedly impacts their ability to be fair, impartial and unbiased.

So why is that the mods chose two more mods from that community? They would like everybody to think that Mousebumples and Mallorea and Riva were the most qualified candidates. But this game is full of relatively smart people. I do not buy what the mods are selling. This choice was pure nepotism at its finest. It was a choice intended to bring friends into the team, friends who will not challenge the status quo or really change anything at all. But several current and former GA “regulars” fear that adding these two to the team will change things. We will see even more nonsensical rulings. Even more dismissive attitudes towards revitalizing the game. And more toxicity injected into a part of NationStates that has been dying a slow death for years because of people who behave like Mallorea and Riva.

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No Candidates Left
TNP Elections Begin – No Left-leaning Candidates in Sight
COMMENTARY | UNIBOT

With the recent announcement from Lennart that he would be withdrawing from the delegate race comes a clear absence of left-leaning candidates in The North Pacific’s latest delegate elections.

For the past few months, concerns regarding the extent of The North Pacific’s invasions and occupations have been growing in The North Pacific with senseless attacks on Transilvania, Scotland and St Abbaddon among others and growing cooperation between The North Pacific Army with imperialists and organized invader groups such as The Black Hawks and The Black Riders. With pride in the army at an all-time low, intergovernmental relations poor and citizens upset with the increasing influence of invaderism in The North Pacific, it would have appeared to have been a natural development for a new candidate to reject the status quo and promise a new, brighter future for The North Pacific.

Lennart, the relatively green politician (although a respected Security Councillor) proved to be the left’s best chance at this political about-face. He admitted he was concerned at the sheer regularity of these invasions, especially in proportion to the region’s defenses. A poll conducted by McMasterdonia found Lennart was the most popular candidate out of a varied range of potential nominees.



With Great Bights Mum and Democratic Donkeys pledged not to run, this leaves the two expected candidates to lead the race, KiwiTaicho and R3naissanc3r. KiwiTaicho stands as the clearer successor of the “McMasterdonia days”. While living under the politician’s shadow during his tenure, KiwiTaicho has proven to have everything going for him: the long history as a military leader, best buddies with McMasterdonia and strong credibility as a hard-core partisan invader with the dignified whitening of the hairline that we like to call “neutrality” in feederite politics. However, he suffers from a problem that plagues many politicians: a failure to connect on a personal level with voters like his popular, charismatic predecessor did.

Fortunately for KiwiTaicho, he is running against someone more vapid in personality and charm than the average tax accountant. The long-time imperialist, r3naissanc3r, lectures with the appearance of faux sensibility that comes with his distinguished career in electoral politics in the Eurosphere and his numerous partisan appointments in judicial and bureaucratic departments. R3naissanc3r’s failure to compensate for the appearance of his pocket protector with any sign of a robust, innovative set of policies has left his campaign just as stagnant.

With the frontrunners leading fairly weak campaigns, the alternate candidates have not stepped up to provide a more enticing vision. It is fairly traditional for a joke “I will coup TNP” candidate and Romanoffia to run for delegate – in this case, Mallorea and Riva is running on a platform to establish The North Pacific as a solely invader region and purge the region, while Romanoffia is running on a more serious campaign which involves being neither “raider” or “defender” – supporting the policies of Tyr's Hand Party like the other frontrunners, KiwiTaicho and R3naissanc3r. Given the fact that Romanoffia is trying to establish himself as a wildcard and an “alternate” choice, it is odd he has aligned himself with basically the identical ideas of the other candidates.

The Tyr's Hand Party is a political party started by Evil Wolf as a response to the growing concerns surrounding The North Pacific’s invader missions. Tyr’s Hand Party proposes a kind of “centrism”, which encourages invading helpless regions for the purposes of training and building relationships between the North Pacific Army and popular invader and imperialist groups like the Lone Wolves United, UIAF, The Black Hawks and The Black Riders. It is no coincidence that the members of the party themselves are leading invaders with a long affiliation with these organizations. The irony continues when the party’s manifesto labels “regional Independence” as one of its main tenets.

The major problem with running a campaign in The North Pacific under the orthodoxy of “Tyr’s Hand” is it is politically inflexible: extremism disguised as “centrism”. If you look at Eluvatar, McMasterdonia and Jamie Anumia, you can quickly understand what you need to be to win an election in The North Pacific: you need to be able to appeal to a very broad selection of The North Pacific. Someone who governs from either the center-left or the center-right modestly and sympathizes with the other side, someone with a twinkle in their eye and a smile. A friendly face that rules from sense and their own restrained beliefs of what is right and good for their region, not from Independentist orthodoxy or the Church of Onderkelkia. There are a lot of genuine, respectable members in The North Pacific who wonder “is all of this invading ruining the reputation of The North Pacific?” and “why can’t we defend too to train?”. You cannot get elected calling these members, “radical extremists” or “purists”, and certainly cannot lead a region mocking that half of the region.

So far we’ve got a handshake without a grip versus a policy wonk without a policy, a radical without an edge and a joke candidate without a joke. I project that the next delegate will be the first candidate to break from the mold and show sympathy to the concerns of NPA dissenters, without alienating those that want to see The North Pacific continue to invade. My money would be on KiwiTaicho or a late sign-up, but KiwiTaicho cannot remain confident that he will win the election without showing sympathy for the other side of the region’s concerns given his own backing from the pro-invaders is getting thinned out by other similar candidates, r3naissanc3r, Romanoffia and even Mallorea. KiwiTaicho was recently asked by Flemingovia whether he felt that The North Pacific Army was operating within the ideological centre and KiwiTaicho responded, "Simply put, no". That's probably the first admission from any of the frontrunners that I have heard of the subject, however there are a lot of questions that remain: does KiwiTaicho believe that this course that NPA needs to be adjusted and how would he plan to do that? In the very same thread, KiwiTaicho considered Blue Wolf or Gladio for Minister of Defense and suggested he would give them more independence to authorize missions.

Nominations end on May 6th, when voting begins. The next delegate of The North Pacific will be decided by May 11, 2014. Election debates will run on May 6 2014, 12:00 AM.

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NS++ Campaign Draws Mixed Response
COMMENTARY | GRUENBERG

Afforess, creator of the popular add-on NS++, was unrepetant after using his creation to advertise his views on the recent Repeal "Rights and Duties of WA States" (qv. RT XVIII) WA resolution. Afforess, whose wildly inaccurate misconceptions about the roleplayed nature of World Assembly discussions had led him to conflate the General Assembly and Security Council, and support repeal of Rights & Duties, had offered to assist Auralia in his repeal campaign; on seeing the campaign hijacked and subverted, he made use of the wide audience his NS++ extension affords him to make his views known.

NS++ is a free add-on to NationStates created by Afforess and emphatically neither endorsed nor prohibited by the game admins. It offers various nation and region management tools, and has been widely used: 19,000 nations have used NS++, of which 11,000 are still actively doing so. The numbers represent 7,000 unique players. NS++ users were confronted with a red (1) notifier next to the World Assembly sidebar, which directed their attention to the main World Assembly page. There, a red box outlined a message, containing some factual inaccuracy but otherwise essentially condensing the antics leading up to the repeal subterfuge, imploring them to vote for the repeal. Once viewed, the message was disabled. The message was shown to all NS++ users, regardless of whether their nation was actually a WA member or not.


What NS++ users saw on logging on

The message had no impact on the repeal vote, which failed by a huge margin behind a campaign of misinformation and deception, with Frisbeeteria continuing to lie about his original involvement, claiming on the Texas RMB that the resolution had "nothing to do" with his status as a game moderator, despite having at the time of authorship explicitly stated that he was "using" his "position as a Game Mod" to propose the resolution. The message may have had more impact on a concurrent Security Council resolution to condemn the repeal author, which ended up passing in the wake of the campaign. Afforess stated he "probably" would not repeat the tactic, but that he was not "ruling it out".


The propaganda message incorporated into NS++

The tactic drew accusations, from users such as Thafoo and Jeckland, of being "unethical", while he was defended by Strategos Prime vice delegate El Fiji Grande: "Shadow Afforess, the creator of NS++, was completely within his rights to use his browser extension to propagate his own views". Asked to rule on the matter, game admin [violet] stated that it was not a violation of game rules and that moderators had no control over NS++. Afforess himself noted that: "I get the feeling people upset are people who don't use my extension".

It is not the first time NS++ has encountered controversy. When the Dispatch feature was launched, Afforess's own Dispatch, plagiarising South Park, was immediately voted to #1; [violet] later revealed she had observed "botnet behaviour" in NS++ at the time, with the add-on causing users to unknowingly upvote Afforess's Dispatch. Afforess explained the situation as a result of test code accidentally left in a release, but his explanation left [violet] unsatisfied as to why he had not immediately declared and resolved the issue.

Nonetheless, overall satisfaction with NS++ remains high, and a Spring NS++ Survey conducted in the week following the incident saw 92% of users register as "very happy" or "happy" with the add-on. Only 8% thought that Afforess should "never" use the function to alert players to in-game events he thought "important or notable". Fully 50% of users had "no idea" of who the developer actually was.

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Osiris Elects New Pharaoh
Severisen steps up to the Plate
COMMENTARY | UNIBOT

Osiris elected a new delegate to replace Lord Ravenclaw on April 27, 2014. Their choice? Severisen, by a decisive 12-4 vote against Joshua Bluteisen. Severisen was given the nation, “Detective Figs” by Koth in January – he has now taken the delegacy and is leading under that account. Detective Figs has served as delegate now for three players: Astarial, Koth and Severisen. One may wonder whether this could be the start of a unique tradition.

Severisen is himself new to electoral politics but no stranger to NationStates. Joining the game in 2004, Severisen established himself as an invader in 2012 with The Black Hawks and The Black Riders as a Lieutenant with both organizations. Lately his talents have been recognized by Game-Created Regions with his recent appointment as the War Minister in Balder and now Pharaoh of Osiris.

His platform may be a surprise to some who have not meant Severisen but it comes across as a leader with the strength and confidence that Osiris has needed for some time. Plagued for years with leaders who had self-confidence issues or restrained by the need to pussyfoot around issues for the sake of politics, Severisen seems like a breath of fresh air. His platform sets himself out as a firm but professional leader, who surrounds around him with the “right” people and leads a bread and butter campaign: building areas of the community that had been previously neglected.

Severisen has announced his cabinet recently – with the legislature approving all of his appointments. Cormac Somerset as the Vizier of Osiris (Vice Delegate) and Scribe of Horus (Foreign Affairs), Alexander Somerset as Scribe of Isis (Integration and Citizenship), Rachel Somerset as Scribe of Ptah (Culture), Ikand as Scribe of Sekhmet (Head of the Army), Douria as Scribe of Ma'at (World Assembly), Abacathea as Scribe of Seshat (Justice) and North East Somerset as Scribe of Bastet (Intelligence and Security).

These choices, while experienced in terms of NationStates politics, will play a role in Severisen’s plan to train and naturalize new faces to Osiris.

“My priority for this term is to return to normal levels of activity and to bring in some fresh faces from the game to the government,” explains Severisen, “This might sound a bit odd as my cabinet is pretty heavily loaded with veteran players, but it is my hope that the members of the cabinet will take newer players under their wings and teach them the ropes. This is a key, in my opinion, to creating a self-sustaining system. The same players can't keep doing all the work forever: people quit, lives get busy. It's not necessarily a bad thing to pass the reigns to someone new”.

The new delegate told The Rejected Times that he was not surprised by the election per se.

“I don't know if surprised is the right word for it,” says Severisen, “I was glad to have the support of the people of Osiris. What was most surprising to me is that, despite being a player of nearly 10 years, I'm a newcomer to the GCR world. I only joined Osiris in December, at the creation of the OFO. Most of my contacts were from the Gameplay world. In terms of GCRs, I feel like I'm a relative unknown. Perhaps I'm wrong in that assessment. Still, I'd like to have a larger voter base for the elections in general”.

Cliché or not, "reaching out" is one of the primary goals of Severisen as he leads Osiris.

“I'm asking my cabinet to reach out to people on an individual level rather than using mass telegrams,” explains Severisen, “Once the userbase is up, I'd like to work on creating a vibrant culture. I firmly believe we have a great culture, or the potential for one, in Osiris, and I'm looking forward to getting more people to experience that”.

In a season of political change, this spring cleaning has proven good for Osiris. The Rejected Times wishes Severisen a productive term.

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Brute Cynicism Conquers The NationStates Community
Repeal “Commend The NationStates Community” passes.
COMMENTARY | UNIBOT


Invaders rain on the Parade.

“Repeal “Commend The NationStates Community” has been passed by a very wide margin, 9,119 votes to 889, which serves as the second attempt to repeal the ill-fated commendation. The first repeal attempt was defeated last year in November, 8,387 votes to 3,684. What changed between then and now? More political enemies with more opportunities to vote stack, one can only presume. Venico told The Rejected Times that “new GCR delegates willing to stomp for the passage” were the reason for this attempt passing versus the last attempt.

The resolution bore from a single event: 2012’s April Fools. When players were encouraged to compete to gather stocks in NationStates, one coalition between many players called “The NationStates Community” encouraged international cooperation on a massive game-wide scale. At the last moment, Earth, the caretaker of the nation planned to send her shares to NewTexas to ensure that someone would defeat Max Barry. Max Barry, however, had different plans – blocking Earth’s share transference with a single message, “I can’t let you do that”. He sent his shares to The NationStates Community and in doing so ensured that mass cooperation won that day.

Max Barry responded to the event in a rare news post, entitled “What Went Down”.

“I just want to say how much fun this was,” Max Barry told NationStates, “And the reason it was fun because of how madly you embraced it, so thank you to everyone who made it so. I've said it a million times before, but I really am in awe of this place sometimes. On the surface it just looks like a website”.

The NationStates Community was commended as a testament to that spirit of cooperation which had brought together so many players together. But its commendation has since become a target for repealers, mostly from invaders like Skyrim Diplomacy and more recently, Venico. For many of these commentators, the coalition had been led and organized by defenders like Earth and Mahaj, disguised as “international cooperation”, which served as a political victory for them. In NationStates, nothing is sacred or protected from petty political attacks.

Venico told The Rejected Times that the resolution had always bothered and he pursued his repeal draft after Douria had told him to “look smaller” for his first resolution. Looks like Douria was proven wrong.

“This resolution bugged me for two reasons,” says Venico, “One, it was a one-time commendation. I know some SC people believe that you don't NEED a pattern but I'm one of those who thinks commendations and condemnations should be more for established behavior rather than one offs”.

“Secondly, it was an April Fools event,” says Venico, “It didn't impact the world at large and it's gimmicky”.

Venico said he was not surprised by the final vote. Meanwhile, others saw this as a sad day for NationStates, abandoning its appreciation for a symbol of cooperation and optimism for the sake of scoring a political victory or worse, muddying what they perceived to be a victory for others.

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Forest Frolicking No More
[violet] tweaks with the Game Code…
COMMENTARY | UNIBOT


Fish say they will “miss the forests”.

An old quirk of NationStates has finally been resolved. For years now, any national animal could be reported as “frolicking” in the nation’s forests, regardless of whether this animal was an aquatic animal or not.

Some like Sedgistan argued that this could be explained as an ambiguity: a fish might frolicking in the rivers of a forest, for example. Others, however, were more pedantic about the subject and saw the error as a sign of poor game design.

Although in the past, [violet] has been reluctant to change this particular quirk, on May 01, 2014, [violet] implemented a tweak to the game code which ensured that the game would make an effort to automatically recognize marine animals as frolicking in oceans and air-borne animals as frolicking in the skies. This author tried the system and found his own national animal, the walrus, now “frolics freely in the nation's sparkling oceans”. Neat-O!

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>> OPINION

The Pathology of Patriotism
Part Three of a Four Part Series, “Rethinking Power in NationStates”.
EDITORIAL | UNIBOT

I made a mistake. An error. There, said it. It’s hard to imagine that this time two years ago, I had not yet created The Gameplay Alignment Test and the words, Regionalism and Cosmopolitanism were not used so casually and authoritatively as they are now. Nowadays, these concepts are taken for granted for – it’s not uncommon to see an electoral candidate declare “I am a regionalist!” proudly, or a legislator condemning their political enemy as a “dirty cosmopolitan”. Regionalism and Cosmopolitanism exist – they’re patterns of belief that you will find if you observe the political arena in NationStates. However, my mistake was to assume that people hold beliefs out of conviction and not political expediency. That is our dark secret: many of us do not hold our beliefs because we believe them, but because they suit us in our current political context. Certainly there are believers – people will strong, philosophical convictions – I’ve always identified as a cosmopolitan with a strong belief in its defense of individual liberty and freedom. However, when I had so much counter-evidence, it was very wrong indeed to assume that people would so carelessly ignore their situations and choose what they believe is right, instead of what is advantageous to them.

People are adaptable – their beliefs are as flexible and fluid as their situation. One day, someone may be a “regionalist” and another, a “cosmopolitan”. During their ideological transformation, it’s not the person that has changed, but their situation and their calculations of their political interests.

Some may have a hard time understanding this idea because they see Regionalism and Cosmopolitanism as their caricatures: “regionalists are loyal patriots, cosmopolitans are dirty region whores”. This is obviously a one-sided perspective and serves to bolster the regionalist narrative by praising some and condemning others. What really separates Regionalism and Cosmopolitanism is its architecture of power. Regionalism centralizes power around a tight circle of trusted insiders; it screens the population to produce insiders through arbitrary tests of loyalty (e.g., WA Nations, Citizenship). Cosmopolitanism decentralizes power around a wide, encompassing circle of the population with little screening between its members to produce either insiders or outsiders. Centralization and decentralization are the primary distinctions between Regionalism and Cosmopolitanism. A regionalist society is more exclusive in its power structure, while a cosmopolitan society is more inclusive.

Note: political authority and status is an excludable good – what these beliefs tell us is when to exclude. If we know then that most people, in theory, are rational and seek out these goods, their beliefs will often be informed by their situations. If X stands to gain from a regionalist structure, X will profuse regionalism; if X stands to gain from a cosmopolitanism structure, X will profuse cosmopolitanism. You would gain from regionalism if you stand a reasonable chance at passing these arbitrary tests of loyalty and becoming an insider (with which you receive even larger shares of power). However, you would suffer greatly if you failed this screening and became an outsider. Likewise, if you could pass this arbitrary test, you would have smaller share of power in a cosmopolitan scenario, because power is more distributed to other members, however you would gain greatly if you would otherwise have been considered an outsider.

The Principle of Negation, in the study of multiculturalism, finds that collective identities are stronger and clearer when more of the population is excluded by an identity (some identities are broader than other). Exclusion, thus, plays an integral part in sustaining the primary goal of Regionalism: to protect and promote the region’s identity. Meanwhile, cosmopolitanism boasts a broad, inclusive regional identity with weaker interpersonal social cohesion. It should come to no surprise to readers then that those who will be one of the accepted few with praise patriotism and regionalism, while those who will have their citizenships on the cutting block will denounce these ideas as violating minority rights.

But situations can change. In our current political context, changes are happening all of the time. Some players are being included more into the centre of power while old favorites are losing favour. The screening process that determines who is trustworthy and who is ‘identifiably’ a member of the region is of course a strategic process. What is means to be a full-fledged social member of a region changes with a region identity (which is flexible and directed by the levers of power in a region), while the screening process of trustworthiness is entirely a misnomer – many insiders cannot be trusted and they are nonetheless allowed into the elite circles because of the political value of their inclusion and the region’s private dialogue.

When players believe that the screening process, which once may have been favourable to them, will no longer be favourable to them, they will switch from pursuing regionalist measures to pursuing cosmopolitan measures. Alternatively, if players believe that the screening process, which once may have been unfavourable to them, will no longer be unfavourable to them, they will switch from pursuing cosmopolitan measures to pursuing regionalist measure. This political cycle reveals just how fluid a player’s ideological alignment can be when political turmoil lies ahead.

These personal decisions, however, have extreme consequences for the political climate in their regions: while Regionalism often downplays important issues which may bring social stigma to their group (because they see problems as collective, instead of on a more individual level), Cosmopolitanism suffers from low social cohesion. A formerly regionalist government like Osiris, for example, struggled in the past to identify and respond to important systemic issues – criticism was perceived as an attack on the community and the regional identity as a whole. Meanwhile, a formerly cosmopolitan region like Lazarus, struggled to organize collective campaigns without social cohesion. The failures of Regionalism and Cosmopolitanism accumulated and helped lead to the Osiran Civil War and the People’s Liberation. But despite the major consequences of these events, our theory suggests that these ideological patterns lie in the rationality of individual political participants.

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How should we recruit?
OPINION | JOE BOBS

Joe Bobs discusses the morality of recruitment.

The recent ‘Userite Myth’, published by the NPO, characterised recruitment as ‘coercion’ or ‘enforcement’, which many userites, myself included, may consider strong words. After all, recruitment is essential for a user-created region (UCR): after the initial group of founders, and excluding those who may have discovered the region through its embassies, all members of a region arrive via recruitment. The number of UCRs means the chances of someone happening upon your region are negligible, so a method of highlighting your region to new members is necessary.

However, how a recruiter goes about highlighting their region varies. It is generally accepted that sending recruitment telegrams to brand new regions, either by the use of stamps, scripts, or manual recruitment, is acceptable, but there are other methods, some formerly against the rules, but all now considered legal, which are still frowned upon by many. I am asking, do we think these are OK?

UCR Recruitment: In a recent case in the Global Right Alliance, the embassy with Capitalist Paradise came close to closure, after it was revealed that one member of CP had attempted to recruit nations from the GRA some time last year. Once upon a time, this would have been against game rules, but is now accepted legally, but is it accepted morally? A region is a community of people that in some manner attempt to assert its shared identity and, ideally, accepts the right of other regions to assert theirs. It’s this idea that makes some defenders take offence at imperialists and invaders who remove a region’s identity (I of course recognise not all imperialists and invaders do remove their targets’ identities, and don’t wish to paint all with the same brush). And it’s this same idea that leads many to take offence that some may recruit from another region.

Non-new GCR Recruitment: This brings me neatly onto my second point, if we agree there is something ignoble about recruiting from UCRs, why do we not take such objection to game-created region (GCR) recruitment? I would say we should, in the case of non-new members. New nations are not yet integrated members of a GCR’s community. In those first few minutes of the game, there’s as good a chance someone could end up a member of The Pacific, The Black Riders, 10,000 Islands or Europe, and the telegram they receive is likely to chime with their personality and interests for which they will select. A non-new GCR member has already made this choice, they are an integrated member of the community, and have chosen it above others. Attempting to recruit them is equal to recruiting from a UCR.

RMB Adspam: And then there’s adspam, much loathed by GCRs the world over. Many debate its usefulness as a tool, and many find it irritating as a disruption of conversation. In years gone by, many GCRs stipulated a UCR could only hold an embassy with them if they did not post adspam. So, do we find this acceptable? The very name ‘adspam’ suggests we do not. However, a recent TRR survey found only 38% of voters actually objected to it. I would argue that, following from my thesis, adspam damages a community. The regional message board is just that, a small forum for those who do not use the offsite forums, and its intention is for use by members of that community. Adspam advertises without discrimination, to both old and new members, and so has the same sour taste as the methods discussed above.

Recently, the International Democratic Union sent a recruitment telegram to an unknown number of WA nations. This was frowned upon by many, as of course it weakens the Delegacy of any regions targeted, and could remove valuable members of that region’s military. In addition, it falls foul of the values discussed above, that we should not damage another community by attempting to remove its integrated members. I for one would like us all to think about this, to think about the rich experiences we have had as members of various communities in NationStates, the friends we have made, the debates we have won, and, at the risk of sounding oh-so cheesy, the fun we have had. I suggest that we should respect other communities in the way we would wish our own to be respected, and that we all bear this in mind next time we think about our recruitment methods.

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Multi-Regional Delegates
OPINION | JOE BOBS

As much as we love NationStates, I think we all agree it needs a shot in the arm, a shake up, a little something new. If the game does not change and develop, we master it, and the challenge is gone. I believe we have reached one of those thresholds. The game needs a change, a big one. The raider-defender conflict is fast becoming stale, predictable and too easy for both sides. In the World Assembly, you can predict whether a resolution will pass or fail with ease. Mastery leads to predictability, and eventually, boredom.

I have a solution, which I believe would radically alter the game in an interesting way. Two words: Multi-regional Delegates (OK, maybe three words, depending on your opinion of the hyphen). The basic idea is this: it would be possible to be Delegate of multiple regions, with one nation. Any nation could receive endorsements from anyone, regardless of the region in which your nation physically resides. It would be possible for one person to command a vast empire, and not in the current way imperials tag a WFE and swap an embassy. Imagine the cults of personality around the great leaders of the world. Imagine the coalitions of regions, uniting together and electing a leader; perhaps they would rotate the position between member regions. Imagine the coups, where a leader could first build support in other regions, before mounting their final strike, or build support in the region before moving in.

Now think about the changes to invading and defending. Endorsements would move with you when you moved regions, so each region invaded would have the stack of the entire raider army behind it, and each defence and liberation the same. Instead of a small force of those available at update, huge armies would do battle together, in wars spanning dozens of regions. Epic battles would span the world, establishing alliances and coalitions between regions would become key to winning. We currently have coalitions formed such as the FRA or UIAF, but they are not supported by the game mechanics, only by off-site forums. This would resolve that situation.

As a limitation, and to preserve the purpose of the 'region', perhaps endorsements from outside the region in which you reside could be limited, so example, they could be worth 50% of the endorsement count. There could even be an opt-out tick box, the way you can deny a delegate access to regional controls. Here are some thoughts from others on the proposal:
 

Jarrinan: I think it's a really interesting idea, to take into account international opinions and influences. Maybe each region could have a delegate and then there could be a delegate for a group of regions who share embassies perhaps.

Lemmingtopias: It doesn't need to wreck the WA at all. The WA should still give one approval to each Delegate - not each delegacy. So if a Delegate has 10 regions, he still gets one approval. It might be best if it was only possible if two regions 'link' to one another - and that it requires a hell of a lot of influence for a delegate to agree to 'link' to another region. The regions will literally count as one region as far as the WA is concerned.

Wibblefeet: As far as taking this idea on the surface - the only way I can see this working at all would be to have a HUGE discount on endorsements not in the actual region. Or possibly a sizable discount in general, but a huge one on regions without the actual delegate in it.
Example:
Delegate Ralph is delegate over 5 regions.
Big GCR - 143 endos.
UCR - 33 endos, and Ralph in it.
Small raided UCR - 5 endos.
Tiny UCR - 2 endos.
Tiny UCR - 2 endos.

Under the "85% discount for endos not in the region" - Ralph would have effective endo counts of, say: 149, 55, 32, 29, 29. Under a plan where the endos are discounted heavily where the delegate is not in the region, the math gets uglier, but the goal of the system would be to make the delegate park himself in the region he most wanted to hold. Delegates IN a region with the delegate OUT of the region would have their votes discounted by, oh, 33-50%. Endos from outregion for a delegate who is also outregion would be discounted further, probably 90% or so. Note that raiders and defenders could play on both of these systems, but the political clout of the GCRs would be huge, simply due to the number of WAs they have available, even at discounts.

Feel free to add your thoughts to the debate at http://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=291673

[God-Emperor]

Mall for delegate!

[Westwind]

Interesting influx of nations into TRR, putting them up as 2nd largest region in the game.

[Consular]

Indeed. Where'd they all come from, I wonder?

[Unibot]

Not me. It's Parhe.

[God-Emperor]

Lazarus is sad 'bout it.

[Eli]

go Mal