Frattlegacy III: a Non-Campaign

[frattastan]

Hi. As we all know, the circumstances of this election are very unfortunate. For some it's fatigue, or unlucky timing, or they're put off by the permanently tense debates of recent weeks, or they haven't matured enough as players to engage more deeply in this campaign.

The priority for the new administration should be to restore an atmosphere where people feel comfortable with contributing to the region. I have spoken before about many of the concepts here but the central idea is that restoration of the region to a somewhat healthy state is largely a matter of incremental improvements thanks to small efforts of many people. "Contribution" is a fairly loose concept - a contributor can be someone who is a good-natured regular #spam or the RMB, or who votes on WA resolutions, or who attends a cultural event, or who provides an endorsement, etc. In particular, however, organic contribution that arises due to interest in a department grows its staff and the typical pipelines to Officership and Delegate develop.

This doesn't address wider cultural or circumstantial issues that have troubled us in recent times, which merit a wider discussion. The government's job, however, isn't to wait for a single fix but to break the loop of drama and restore some sense of normalcy. It's obvious that we are performing below our potential even right now, and that we could have a fast turnaround when it comes to interest and activity. I am also confident that Catalyse was on the path to achieve that had her Delegacy not ended so soon.

I think I can achieve this. I consider myself a level-headed person. I am a good at teamwork, even with people who have disparate views or can be difficult to work with.¹ I have the ability to personally tackle many government tasks if help isn't forthcoming. I am good at handling high-pressure situations that could be frustrating or demotivating to others.

As you probably know, a new set of Officers will be elected in less than a month, so some of the ideas below are very general or provisional. While an important part of Officer work is to enforce the Delegate's goals I will also make sure to communicate with them and make them accountable for any personal goal they may have.

Foreign Affairs

Despite the recent drama with Europeia and its regrettable outcome, I would argue that our FA is among the strongest, principled and consistent in NS, more so if compared with our limited resources. We have an especially diversified set of allies and partners (including, e.g., Osiris or non-gameplayers in Forest). While some treaties are outdated by now, most can serve us well in areas as different as security, culture, our defender principles, and GCR security. As usual, one of the main aspects of "day-to-day" FA is awareness of world events, and I will make sure to stay on top of that and hold regular consultations with friendly regions on issues of interest.

The most important open matter: we need to hold conversations with certain regions involved in the Europeia talks with a view to re-examining our bilateral relations and our expected level of engagement with them. This was part of the outgoing government's plans, and I will take care of it immediately after my election.

Culture

Anarchisticstan has been doing a fine job but she (or whoever her successor) is should aim for greater diversification of events. The overall theme should still to leverage casual events with low barriers to involvement. This includes using them for interregional engagement, as Cat planned to do with TNP on a regular basis. In terms of diversification: Popmaster and Werewolf are highly successful, but there is no harm in trying new things, especially if they can appeal to slightly different crowds. Hoff's CYOA was a good thing. I would also like to bring back movie nights for special occasions (e.g., before N-Day, on Halloween, and so on).

Outreach/Integration

It's a department felt aimless more often than not. However, in principle it's also the area that is best suited to have a wide toolbox with the common goal of engaging outsiders with government. Giang should be focused on something more practical than RMB watch. Many ideas have been tried once and then forgotten, even if they would work well to keep people engaged. Opinion polls should be brought back, as previously suggested. This doesn't have to be an overwhelming effort - the idea is to find productive ways to keep oneself busy. I can help Giang with it, and she can find volunteers to delegate the simpler tasks to.

I am supportive of Cat's plan for RO elections and will continue them.

Shoot your most difficult questions, I am not afraid.

---

1. "The person or persons I am talking about know who they are".

[Vis]

1) I noticed you haven't mentioned anything about WA. Do you believe that it's not an important portfolio, or just that at the current time TRR can't or shouldn't expand resources and energies on it?

2) You haven't discussed about recruitment which I find peculiar, especially with the number of active and involved citizens dwindling. Do you have no ideas to that effect, or believe the situation is okay/will fix itself?

3) When I run for officer 2 years ago movie nights didn't have a lot of success, part of it a result of timezones, and other parts were the "menu" of movies offered. How do you plan to deal with this?

4) With discord adding activities to VCs, how would you utilise them to increase Reject engagement?

5) Who would be your ideal people to run for officer next election, and what portfolios would you assign to them?

[frattastan]

1) I noticed you haven't mentioned anything about WA. Do you believe that it's not an important portfolio, or just that at the current time TRR can't or shouldn't expand resources and energies on it?

WA platforms are often overambitious, and their success depends heavily on the availability of a WA-focused Officer (e.g., a known GA author). Recommendations could be issued for resolutions that are particularly relevant to us, but in general I don't believe that regular recommendations or collective authorship or advocacy should be a priority at this stage. The focus will be on ensuring more basic WA-related tasks, like attention to the queue, early voting, forum consultation. That satisfies the needs to the large majority of the region.

2) You haven't discussed about recruitment which I find peculiar, especially with the number of active and involved citizens dwindling. Do you have no ideas to that effect, or believe the situation is okay/will fix itself?

Yes, I know that recruitment is a big talking point for you.

I am very confident that decline in involvement is due to an offputting overall vibe and a lack of inspiring activity in the various departments. Activity is a recurring issue for most regions, and typically it's tied to known cycles in broader NS membership, or to breakdowns in specific pipelines (e.g., gameside -> offsite, citizens -> government). In spite of this, TRR isn't faring especially poorly on activity metrics, especially when compared to the other sinkers. Also, historically we have been able to have periods of high activity, or the ability to attract new members from other regions, even in absence of recruitment. This raises the question of how necessary recruitment truly is.

Recruitment can be useful even if not necessary, but there are issues with how practical it is to implement. I previously tested API recruitment while Delegate, and found that it had very low return rates. Manual recruitment can be effective, and some of the largest UCRs set up elaborate reward schemes to try and keep it going. However, anyone who has done manual recruitment knows that it very easily leads to burnout, so it could be a poor decision in terms of resource allocation (if you end up exhausting your best recruiters when they could have focused on government initiatives that are more 'efficient' even if the total possible yield is lower).

I would rather have Outreach (and the Gameside Officer) go for more modest "internal recruitment". e.g., starting conversations with active residents (who answer issues, vote in the WA, send endorsements, or post on the RMB) trying to figure out if there are aspects of the offsite governance that they would be interested in. This would be low-volume but can work to integrate new members as citizens. I believe that I said as much before in some discussion we had so it's not very peculiar, isn't it?

3) When I run for officer 2 years ago movie nights didn't have a lot of success, part of it a result of timezones, and other parts were the "menu" of movies offered. How do you plan to deal with this?

Packaging with larger events. In theory one could succeed at building a dedicated movie club with showings on regular basis, but I think it's easier to hold it as a rare occurrence; go for 'iconic' movies; and have it just before or after some other events to benefit from people sticking around.

Our Christmas Rejectmas showing of Die Hard changed Altasund's life, tyvm.

4) With discord adding activities to VCs, how would you utilise them to increase Reject engagement?

Ideally, I wouldn't. Activities are the same across all servers, so they aren't as useful in making TRR especially distinctive or attractive. They can be used for some casual fun but they are too cookie-cutter to be a pillar of cultural engagement. This doesn't mean that our cultural ideas should be unique and never heard of before; but they should be something that our members can't easily have elsewhere. That's the gist of most successful Culture departments.

5) Who would be your ideal people to run for officer next election, and what portfolios would you assign to them?

I don't like patronage!!! I will be happy with the incumbents running again, of course. It's inconvenient that Hoff and Giang have some overlap in the understanding of their portfolios, but I think that both of them and Anarchi have room for further growth as government officials.

[Vis]

Yes, I know that recruitment is a big talking point for you.

I am very confident that decline in involvement is due to an offputting overall vibe and a lack of inspiring activity in the various departments. Activity is a recurring issue for most regions, and typically it's tied to known cycles in broader NS membership, or to breakdowns in specific pipelines (e.g., gameside -> offsite, citizens -> government). In spite of this, TRR isn't faring especially poorly on activity metrics, especially when compared to the other sinkers. Also, historically we have been able to have periods of high activity, or the ability to attract new members from other regions, even in absence of recruitment. This raises the question of how necessary recruitment truly is.

Recruitment can be useful even if not necessary, but there are issues with how practical it is to implement. I previously tested API recruitment while Delegate, and found that it had very low return rates. Manual recruitment can be effective, and some of the largest UCRs set up elaborate reward schemes to try and keep it going. However, anyone who has done manual recruitment knows that it very easily leads to burnout, so it could be a poor decision in terms of resource allocation (if you end up exhausting your best recruiters when they could have focused on government initiatives that are more 'efficient' even if the total possible yield is lower).

I would rather have Outreach (and the Gameside Officer) go for more modest "internal recruitment". e.g., starting conversations with active residents (who answer issues, vote in the WA, send endorsements, or post on the RMB) trying to figure out if there are aspects of the offsite governance that they would be interested in. This would be low-volume but can work to integrate new members as citizens. I believe that I said as much before in some discussion we had so it's not very peculiar, isn't it?

Recruitment isn't only from other regions
It's more likely to get active RMBers, but alas most of them are just north of being considered fascists or transphobes. Would you have the integration teams comb through the RMB to find suitable nations for recruitment (by recruitment I mean bringing over to the discord and forums and getting them to stick)

Ideally, I wouldn't. Activities are the same across all servers, so they aren't as useful in making TRR especially distinctive or attractive. They can be used for some casual fun but they are too cookie-cutter to be a pillar of cultural engagement. This doesn't mean that our cultural ideas should be unique and never heard of before; but they should be something that our members can't easily have elsewhere. That's the gist of most successful Culture departments.

You can turn your nose up on "common" entertainment, but they're the easiest to organise and when mixed with VC can be pretty fun. They're also fairly varied, so you can move from one activity to the next without the need of getting people to change website/game/whatever.

I don't like patronage!!! I will be happy with the incumbents running again, of course. It's inconvenient that Hoff and Giang have some overlap in the understanding of their portfolios, but I think that both of them and Anarchi have room for further growth as government officials.

Smh avoiding the question!!

[frattastan]

It's more likely to get active RMBers, but alas most of them are just north of being considered fascists or transphobes. Would you have the integration teams comb through the RMB to find suitable nations for recruitment (by recruitment I mean bringing over to the discord and forums and getting them to stick)

"Combing over" would be applied to the Activity page, especially for nations who may be active but are unfamiliar with offsite communities in NS. RMB regulars are a smaller pool, which I believe can be noticed through normal interaction (and contacted afterwards).

Also, "integration teams". I fully expect it will be just me or me with Giang and Hoff to start with.

You can turn your nose up on "common" entertainment, but they're the easiest to organise and when mixed with VC can be pretty fun. They're also fairly varied, so you can move from one activity to the next without the need of getting people to change website/game/whatever.

Everything is fun with friends, obviously.

To be clear, I wouldn't stop a Culture Officer who tells me that they want to add them to their palette. I am just saying that, to me, there are clear reasons why they can't be a mainstay of any region's culture, and "elitism" isn't one of them.

[Anarchisticstan]

I really appreciate the feedback. I didn't host a movie night or anything yet because of technical reasons, but I could try working around that.
In addition, if my earphones work, I could go with a popmaster. I'm also going to host a trivia (as you can see from #announcements) and that's definitely a change of pace from usual game events.

As for your campaign, I'm supporting it. I'd love to hear feedback on culture if you get elected (but my term may finish by then).

[Vis]

"Combing over" would be applied to the Activity page, especially for nations who may be active but are unfamiliar with offsite communities in NS. RMB regulars are a smaller pool, which I believe can be noticed through normal interaction (and contacted afterwards).

Also, "integration teams". I fully expect it will be just me or me with Giang and Hoff to start with.

Yeah, this is part of the issue. How do you plan to get citizens to be invested in the region to contribute to its well being without being in a position in the government? Or do you believe that only government members should be putting time and effort into the region.

[frattastan]

The onus is on the Delegate and the Officers to start putting time and effort into the region. Involvement from citizens usually stems from interest in the government's various initiatives, and is made easier when there are tested 'templates' for involvement: the barrier to contribution is lower, and volunteers can also feel as if they have something specific to do, rather than being left without direction. You organised Diplomacy games before because at some point in the past Culture had organised those games, they had caught your attention, and you found that setting up one was easy enough.

Messaging newcomers is either untested or long-neglected ground, and at present faces notions that most will inevitably be fascists or transphobes or cause problems. Some people will help anyway for selfless reasons but one shouldn't expect a load of volunteers. If it is successful then hopefully that can change. If it doesn't change that's not necessarily a major issue in this specific case because it's a task that can be reasonably tackled by few people. Internal rewards (badges, ranks, gifted cards) can help but imho they depend on the prior existence a large department and organisational culture within it, so I don't find them applicable all the time.

Involvement will generally fluctuate. If it drops then the ultimate responsibility for coming up with something falls back onto the Cabinet.

Aside from a proactive government the only other aspect that is relevant to encouraging citizen involvement is vibe. If someone's involvement is met with negativity* or is a cause for controversy then they're unlikely to even attempt it. I am hopeful that this can improve, though.

* Unless the negativity comes from me, because as Delegate I will know better than everyone else what is a bad idea and what isn't.

[Vis]

True, I found out about Diplomacy games from TRR, but I didn't organise them because culture did- I did that to play with friends, much in the same way I organise Raft. The idea is to play with friends, not replicate something that was done before.

[frattastan]

True, I found out about Diplomacy games from TRR, but I didn't organise them because culture did- I did that to play with friends, much in the same way I organise Raft. The idea is to play with friends, not replicate something that was done before.

The point is that had Diplomacy games never been introduced to TRR at some point, you would have never organised them as part of a regional event - even when you couldn't personally take part.

Popmaster is often hosted independently. It is hosted because people want to have a good time. Originally, though, it was introduced to the region as a government initiative. In part that's what I mean when I say that interest in a government's initiatives can cause a rise in contributions to the region.

[Warzone Codger]

Is electing you an admission that self government has failed and that we needed turn back to a parent to clean up the mess?

[Harmoneia]

Is electing you an admission that self government has failed and that we needed turn back to a parent to clean up the mess?

Second this

[frattastan]

Is electing you an admission that self government has failed and that we needed turn back to a parent to clean up the mess?

Just giving people some breathing room while we get back to the basics. The world isn't over yet.