DIS: Re: BUS: Registration

[Kerim Aydin]

On Sun, 14 May 2017, Gaelan Steele wrote:
> Let’s see if I can make a CFJ out of this.
> 
> Gaelan

As Arbitor, I'm saying this is unclear in "specifying a statement
to be enquired into" - is it the whole sentence, or the term 'this'?
or maybe Gaelan is making a 'statement', referred to by 'this', which 
is the act of sending the email (in the sense that works of art can
be considered 'statements')?

Feel free to take the obvious next step.

Re: DIS: proto: stopping timing scams

[Publius Scribonius Scholasticus]

I think it should be limited.

Publius Scribonius Scholasticus


On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 1:06 AM, Aris Merchant
 wrote:
> On Sun, May 14, 2017 at 10:33 PM, Kerim Aydin  wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> Many voting scams in the past have end up in a race condition,
>> dependent on voting on the last minute.  Here's a proto to address
>> that in general (and maybe even make it an interesting endgame).
>>
>> Just phrased generally to get feedback, need to figure out which rules
>> it needs to overrule, etc.
>>
>
> Fabulous idea! I'd maybe broaden the restriction to include all
> actions affecting the tally, just so that someone doesn't try using
> cards on people or something like that. It would be illegal, but
> someone might do it anyway.
>
> -Aris

DIS: Re: OFF: Proposal Pool

[Publius Scribonius Scholasticus]

I have pended mine.

Publius Scribonius Scholasticus


On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 1:09 AM, Aris Merchant
 wrote:
> [Just a polite reminder: these will be removed from the pool in one week,
> unless you pend them or ask for an extension.]
>
> The proposal pool currently contains the following proposals:
>
> ID Author(s)AI   Title
> ---
> pp1P.S.S.[1]3.0  Agoran Education Rethink v3
> pp2nichdel  1.0  Pending List Price Adjustment
> pp3nichdel, Aris, o, G. 1.0  Granular Paydays (v3)
>
>
> Legend: * : Proposal is pending.
>
> [1] Publius Scribonius Scholasticus
>
>
> The Pending List Price (PLP) is 6 shinies. The Pending Minimum Price (PMP)
> is 5 shinies.
>
>
> The full text of the aforementioned proposals is included below.
>
> //
> ID: pp1
> Title: Agoran Education Rethink v3
> Adoption index: 3.0
> Author: Publius Scribonius Scholasticus
> Co-author(s): ais523
>
>
> Change Rule 1367 to read in full:
>
>   Certain patent titles are known as degrees.  The degrees are
>
>   - Associate of Nomic (A.N.)
>   - Bachelor of Nomic  (B.N.)
>   - Master of Nomic(M.N.)
>   - Doctor of Nomic History(D.N.Hist.)
>   - Doctor of Nomic Science(D.N.Sci.)
>   - Doctor of Nomic Philosophy (D.N.Phil.)
>
>   Degrees are ranked in the order they appear in this rule, with degrees
>   listed later being ranked higher.  A specific degree CANNOT be awarded
>   to any person more than once.
>
>   A specified degree CAN be awarded with 2 Agoran Consent, and SHOULD
>   only be awarded for the publication of an original thesis of scholarly
>   worth (including responses to peer-review), published with explicit
>   intent to qualify for a degree. Persons wanting a degree MUST request
>   a mentor from the Herald before having made substantial progress on
>   eir thesis. The Herald SHOULD coordinate the finding of a mentor for
>   any person requesting one. The mentor SHOULD answer questions of the
>   mentee and assist in the writing of eir thesis. The mentor SHOULD
>   coordinate the peer-review process for the thesis.
>
> //
> ID: pp2
> Title: Pending List Price Adjustment
> Adoption Index: 1.0
> Author: nichdel
> Co-author(s):
>
> Amend Rule 2445 by replacing the second, thirdand fourth paragraphs with:
>
>   Pending List Price is an integer switch, tracked by the Promotor,
>   whose default value is 5. At the beginning of every month, the
>   Pending List Price is set to nine-tenths of the mean of the price
>   paid for each proposal pended in the previous month, rounded
>   down. If less than 2 proposals were pended in the previous month,
>   the Pending List Price is set to its default.
>
>   Any player CAN pay Agora a specified amount, which is no less
>   than the Pending List Price, to flip a proposal's imminence to
>   "pending" by announcement. If the specified amount is less than
>   the Pending List Price, then the attempt to pay is  INEFFECTIVE,
>   and the proposal's imminence is not flipped.
>
> [Basically just combines Pending Minimum and Pending List. The simpler
> math also means that the price tends to end up a tiny bit higher than
> the previous scheme.]
>
> //
> ID: pp3
> Title: Granular Paydays (v3)
> Adoption Index: 1.0
> Author: nichdel
> Co-author(s): Aris, o, G.
>
> [v3: added the clarification of 'duty-fulfilling' reports]
>
> [v2: Changed the switches to be natural, fixed not specifying what
> offices are paid, and deleted a typo that suggested the report was paid
> instead of the player.]
>
> Flip the Payrate of every office to 2.
>
> Amend 2484 (Payday) to read, in full:
>
>   Payrate is a natural office switch, tracked by the ADoP, with a
>   default value of 2. Report Rate is a natural office switch,
>   tracked by the ADoP, with a default value of 2.
>
> [Add in Report Rate, which can be adjusted by-office.]
>
>   At the start of each month, if Agora's Balance is not 0 or less,
>   Agora SHALL pay each player 10 shinies.
>
> [Nothing changed here.]
>
>   Immediately afterward, for each duty-fulfilling report published
>   last month (in chronological order of publication), Agora SHALL
>   pay the publisher of the report the Report Rate for the office
>   the report is associated with unless paying would leave Agora's
>   balance at a negative value.
>
> [Pay out for published reports before offices, in a way similar to how
> offices are paid. It's very important to note that, if Report Rates
> were not equal, it'd be possible to pay the 1st and 3rd reports but not
> the 2nd, if the 2nd would make Agora's balance neg

DIS: Re: BUS: Registration

[Publius Scribonius Scholasticus]

That conditional would most likely be invalid.

Publius Scribonius Scholasticus


On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 4:27 AM, Quazie  wrote:
> If there is any doubt that Gaelan Steele is a player, then I give them 1
> Shiny just to exacerbate the doubt.
>
> On Sun, May 14, 2017 at 23:33 Gaelan Steele  wrote:
>>
>> Let’s see if I can make a CFJ out of this.
>>
>> Gaelan

DIS: Re: BUS: Re: OFF: [Promotor] Distribution of Proposals 7850-7851

[Nic Evans]

Final vote counts are coming shortly, but Quazie's vote remained and
became a PRESENT. Conditional votes are interpreted at the end of the
voting period, so it wasn't a FOR at any point.


On 05/14/17 18:09, Alex Smith wrote:
> On Sun, 2017-05-07 at 15:56 -0700, qoid.us (Agora's list server) wrote:
>> Received: (qmail 13401 invoked from network); 7 May 2017 22:56:48 -
>> Received: from localhost (HELO vps.qoid.us) (127.0.0.1)
>>   by vps.qoid.us with SMTP; 7 May 2017 22:56:48 -
>>> Return-Path: 
>> Delivered-To: agn-agora-offic...@agoranomic.org
>> Received: (qmail 13377 invoked from network); 7 May 2017 22:56:46 -
>> Received: from mail-yw0-f172.google.com (209.85.161.172)
>>  by vps.qoid.us with SMTP; 7 May 2017 22:56:46 -
> In other words, the "voting period has started" message didn't actually
> arrive at the lists until 22:56:46.
>
>> Received: (qmail 11287 invoked from network); 14 May 2017 22:56:19 -
>> Received: from localhost (HELO vps.qoid.us) (127.0.0.1)
>>   by vps.qoid.us with SMTP; 14 May 2017 22:56:19 -
>>> Return-Path: 
>> Delivered-To: agn-agora-offic...@agoranomic.org
>> Received: (qmail 11237 invoked from network); 14 May 2017 22:56:17 -
>> Received: from sun61.bham.ac.uk (147.188.128.150)
>>  by vps.qoid.us with SMTP; 14 May 2017 22:56:17 -
> Here's part of the headers from the scam message to agora-official. As
> we can see, it was definitely received inside the voting period.
>
> This is the latest of the four attempted scam messages (by me and
> Aris). As such, I believe the correct vote tally on proposal 7850 is
> most likely 1 FOR, 0 AGAINST, 0 PRESENT. (It's possible that Aris'
> attempt to withdraw ballots on 7850 failed to withdraw Quazie's, which
> was cast as "endorse ais523" not "FOR", which would make it 2 FOR, 2
> AGAINST, 0 PRESENT.)
>




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DIS: Re: BUS: Votes

[Nic Evans]

I'm interpreting this as a conditional vote on 7849-7851, meaning it's a
Present on 7849. If this had been written as "In all agoran decisions,
currently up for vote, written by ais523:" then there'd be no vote on 7849.

(I'm clarifying my decisions because I'm expecting CoEs all over.)


On 05/09/17 22:38, Quazie wrote:
> In all agoran decisions currently up for vote:
>If that decision is about a proposal written by ais523:
>   I endorse ais523 on that agoran decision.




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Re: DIS: Confused

[Alex Smith]

On Sun, 2017-05-14 at 22:13 -0700, Kerim Aydin wrote:
> Unfortunately, he gave a little too much time window, and Aris
> noticed, and managed (maybe) to withdraw ais523's votes.

I'm pretty sure Aris figured it out independently. Aris sent a
"testing" message some time before my messages, which strongly
indicated that e was checking to see how long an email would take to
reach the lists (or alternatively, checking to see that a cronjob was
working). Either's a fairly clear sign that a timing scam was planned.

-- 
ais523

Re: BUS: Re: DIS: Sort-of random question

[Josh T]

Thank you for your pledge/ I don't think it's something quite bothersome
enough to make a proposal about, but I would like to express to all
individuals that I would prefer to be referred to by my nickname.

天火狐

On 15 May 2017 at 11:27, Nic Evans  wrote:

> I don't think there exists any formal way.
>
> I pledge to not refer to 天火狐 as Josh or Josh T.
>
>
> On 05/15/17 00:54, Josh T wrote:
> > Random question: Is there a way to formalize the fact that I do not
> > want my name (as opposed to y nickname) to be an acceptable way to
> > refer to me?
> >
> > 天火狐
>
>
>

DIS: Re: BUS: Re: OFF: [Assessor] Resolution of Proposal(s) 7850 (Attempt 1)

[Nic Evans]

On 05/15/17 11:46, Alex Smith wrote:
>> I would make this a Cantus Cygneus, but I'm not even sure we have a 
>> registrar,
>> or an ADOP to make a registrar, and I'm sure that taking on necessary
>> duties as these it not actually what's on the Junta's mind.  Enjoy
>> your badges - maybe an officer will publish them in a report some day.
> Despite what I said earlier, if the Registrar is missing, that's one of
> the easiest jobs in Agora and I wouldn't mind taking it on. Do we have
> an ADoP at the moment? Part of the reason why people haven't been
> taking on offices may be just down to not knowing which offices are
> empty.
>
PSS is Registrar via deputization atm. I sent a message a while back
offering to take it if they didn't want it, or allow em to keep it (IMO
more officers is good).

I'll gladly take ADoP and, as penance for causing more peturbation than
expected, I'll try to handle some form of the SLR in the meantime.

I do want to make it clear that the *only* reasons I allowed a junta was
1) ais523 is a long-term player in very good standing, and 2) the junta
doesn't bestow any real power besides the ability to stall the game
indefinitely (and even then I can think of ways to overcome it).

I've never made an attempt to win, or even seize any power, before today
and don't particularly intend to again. I just though it'd be fun, tbh.




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Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Re: OFF: [Assessor] Resolution of Proposal(s) 7850 (Attempt 1)

[Alex Smith]

On Mon, 2017-05-15 at 11:55 -0500, Nic Evans wrote:
> I do want to make it clear that the *only* reasons I allowed a junta
> was 1) ais523 is a long-term player in very good standing, and 2) the junta
> doesn't bestow any real power besides the ability to stall the game
> indefinitely (and even then I can think of ways to overcome it).

It's not even indefinite, there's a way to pend proposals via waiting
21 days. I took care that the scam proposal didn't give me any sort of
dictatorship at all.

Passing dictatorships is fun, but I really needed at least one of the
Promotor and Assessor to be strongly on board to make that work, and
probably both. Just getting a win is much less disruptive and much less
exploitable, also meaning that people are more likely to cooperate with
it.

(I also miss being able to win economically; the lack of economic
victories is basically forcing people who want to win to do so via
scam, whereas when we had a strong economy, it used to be about 50:50
which way I'd win. I've had some thoughts on the economy recently, but
decided to leave them aside until the scam was resolved in case people
thought they were connected to the scam. Right now, I'm not sure how
many shinies I have, but perhaps I'll submit the proposals without
pending them and see if anyone likes them.)

-- 
ais523

Re: DIS: Confused

[Publius Scribonius Scholasticus]

I also figured it out independently, but knew that others also knew it
and would work against the scam.

Publius Scribonius Scholasticus


On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 11:25 AM, Alex Smith  wrote:
> On Sun, 2017-05-14 at 22:13 -0700, Kerim Aydin wrote:
>> Unfortunately, he gave a little too much time window, and Aris
>> noticed, and managed (maybe) to withdraw ais523's votes.
>
> I'm pretty sure Aris figured it out independently. Aris sent a
> "testing" message some time before my messages, which strongly
> indicated that e was checking to see how long an email would take to
> reach the lists (or alternatively, checking to see that a cronjob was
> working). Either's a fairly clear sign that a timing scam was planned.
>
> --
> ais523

DIS: Re: BUS: Time to close the loopholes

[Publius Scribonius Scholasticus]

Thank you, oh powerful and benevolent dictator.

Publius Scribonius Scholasticus


On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 12:28 PM, Alex Smith  wrote:
> I transfer 10 Shinies to Agora. (The victory from this scam seems like
> enough of a reward without trying to cheat on pending costs at the same
> time.)
>
> I submit the following proposal, "Close Recent Loopholes", AI 3:
> 
> Amend rule 683, by replacing the last paragraph with:
> {{{
>   A valid ballot is a ballot, correctly submitted, that has not
>   been withdrawn. During the voting period of an Agoran decision,
>   a player CAN by announcement withdraw (syn. retract) a ballot
>   that e submitted on that decision. To "change" one's vote is to
>   retract eir previous ballot (if any), then submit a new one.
> }}}
>
> Amend rule 2445 so that it has the following text:
> {{{
>   Imminence is a switch, tracked by the Promotor, possessed by
>   proposals in the Proposal Pool, whose value is either "pending"
>   or "not pending" (default).
>
>   Pending List Price is an integer switch, tracked by the Promotor,
>   whose default value is 5. At the beginning of every month, the
>   Pending List Price is set to the mean of the price paid for each
>   proposal pended in the previous month, rounded down. If less
>   than 2 proposals were pended in the previous month, the Pending
>   List Price is set to its default.
>
>   Any player CAN pay Agora a specified amount, which is no less
>   than the Pending List Price, to flip a proposal's imminence
>   to "pending" by announcement. If the specified amount is less
>   than the Pending List Price, then the attempt to pay is
>   INEFFECTIVE, and the proposal's imminence is not flipped.
> }}}
>
> Amend the rule created during the resolution of proposal 7850 by
> deleting all paragraphs that contain the word "imminence", and then
> inserting the following paragraphs at the end:
> {{{
>   ais523 CAN cause a specified player to earn a Black Ribbon by
>   announcement.
>
>   ais523 CAN cause this rule to repeal itself by announcement.
> }}}
> [I already have my Black Ribbon, so I forgot that I might potentially
> need to award them to co-conspirators. Also, give me a way to clean up
> the rule when I'm done giving out rewards. As a reminder to people who
> aren't used to the Ribbon system, the idea of Black Ribbons is that
> they can only be gained via proposal or via scam, and it's standard to
> give a Black Ribbon to all the participants in a scam if it's capable
> of altering the gamestate enough to give Ribbons.]
>
> Then retitle that rule to "Scam Reward".
> 
>
> I submit the following proposal, "Close Ancient Loopholes", AI 3:
> 
> Amend rule 879 so that it has the following text:
> {{{
>   Each Agoran Decision has a quorum. This is a number set when the
>   decision is created, and thereafter cannot be changed. When a
>   person initiates an Agoran Decision, that person SHALL state the
>   quorum of that decision. However, incorrectly stating the quorum
>   of a decision does not invalidate the initiation, nor does it
>   actually change the quorum of the decision.
>
>   The quorum that an Agoran Decision gains as it is created can be
>   defined by other rules of power 2 or greater. If no other rule
>   defines the quorum of an Agoran Decision, the quorum for that
>   decision is equal to the number of players who voted on the
>   Agoran Decision to adopt a proposal that had been most recently
>   resolved at the time of that decision's initiation, minus 2.
>
>   As an exception to the previous paragraph, the quorum of an
>   Agoran Decision can never be less than 2. If the rules would
>   attempt to set the quorum of an Agoran Decision to less than 2,
>   it is set to 2 instead.
> }}}
>
> Amend rule 955 by replacing the text:
> {{{
>   - If there is more than one option, and the number of valid
> ballots is less than quorum, the outcome is instead FAILED
> QUORUM.
> }}}
> with:
> {{{
>   - If there is more than one option, and the number of valid
> ballots is less than the quorum of that decision, the outcome
> is instead FAILED QUORUM.
> }}}
> 
>
> I pend these two proposals using the mechanism in the rule "Reward and
> Delay".
>
> --
> ais523

DIS: Re: BUS: Re: OFF: [Assessor] Resolution of Proposal(s) 7850 (Attempt 1)

[Publius Scribonius Scholasticus]

I am currently registrar I believe.

Publius Scribonius Scholasticus


On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 12:29 PM, Kerim Aydin  wrote:
>
>
> On Mon, 15 May 2017, Nic Evans wrote:
>> While we have the efficiency of authoritarianism we might as well clean
>> up a couple things.
>
> I find, to my surprise, that this is too much like real life right now,
> and I don't want the stress, nor to be the reluctant officer trying to
> clean up.
>
> I thought I wouldn't mind being the quiet officer with rulekeepor and
> Arbitor, not really minding what actual play was happening, but it's
> taking too much time for this crap.
>
> I deregister.
>
> I would invite ais523 to consider being an Officer at some point.
>
> I would make this a Cantus Cygneus, but I'm not even sure we have a registrar,
> or an ADOP to make a registrar, and I'm sure that taking on necessary
> duties as these it not actually what's on the Junta's mind.  Enjoy
> your badges - maybe an officer will publish them in a report some day.
>
>
>
>

DIS: Re: BUS: Re: OFF: [Assessor] Resolution of Proposal(s) 7850 (Attempt 1)

[Publius Scribonius Scholasticus]

The idea is that Agora would pay for it, but I see your issue and will
submit a revision soon, if others don't beat me to it.

Publius Scribonius Scholasticus


On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 12:38 PM, Alex Smith  wrote:
> On Mon, 2017-05-15 at 11:22 -0500, Nic Evans wrote:
>> On 05/15/17 10:57, Alex Smith wrote:
>> > >   ais523 CAN Declare an Amendment by announcement, specifying a proposal.
>> > >   Upon doing so, that proposal's imminence flips to "pending".
>> >
>> > So as not to stall the game, I'll use this mechanism for people on
>> > request, so long as the proposal being pended is not a scam. However, I
>> > request that a small donation of 5 Shinies be made to Agora in return
>> > for this service, so as not to disrupt the economy.
>>
>> While we have the efficiency of authoritarianism we might as well clean
>> up a couple things. PSS attempted to pend a proposal titled Agora's
>> To-Do List. The Secretary counted the payment but the Promotor didn't
>> add it to the pool or distribute it. I submit the following proposal and
>> request that it be pended:
>>
>> {{{
>> Title: Agora's To-Do List
>> Adoption index: 1.0
>> Author: Publius Scribonius Scholasticus
>>
>> Enact a rule titled, "To-Do List", reading: "Any player MAY with 1
>> support add an item to the to-do list with a specified number of
>> Shinies associated with it. Any to-do list item must have a clear set
>> of requirements for completion. The to-do list shall be maintained by
>> the Lister. Any person MAY complete an item on the to-do list and
>> claim the specified number of Shinies associated with it by notifying
>> the Lister of their completion of the task. If the Lister agrees with
>> the claimee, the Lister shall pay the claimee the specified number of
>> Shinies from Agora. Any disagreement regarding completion shall be
>> resolved via a CFJ. After an item has been completed, the Lister shall
>> remove it from the to-do list."
>>
>> Enact a rule titled, "The Office of the Lister", reading: "The Lister
>> is an office; its holder is responsible for maintaining the to-do of
>> Agora.
>>
>> The Lister's Weekly report includes the current state of the Agoran
>> to-do list and any recent events thereof."
>> }}}
> Part of the pending mechanism is intended to catch problems with
> proposals before they're distributed. There's a fairly clear problem
> with this one (the Lister plus a confederate could scam arbitrarily
> many shinies from Agora via adding a large number of trivial tasks). I
> recommend you retract that proposal and submit one without that issue
> (e.g. via basing the requirements to add things to the to-do list on
> objections rather than support). As this proposal clearly shouldn't
> pass in its current form, pending it seems like a bad idea, although
> I'll gladly give you a free pend for the replacement.
>
> Alternatively, you could charge players Shinies to add items to the
> list, and then give those Shinies to the person who fulfils the task.
> This doesn't even need a rule to implement; you could do it as an
> Organization.
>
>> Additionally, I attempted to pend Granular Paydays (v3) but it wasn't in
>> the most recent Promotor's report, and now I suspect that, regardless of
>> the results of my CoE, it can't be pended that way. So I'd appreciate if
>> that was pended as well, and I'll submit another payment if the
>> Secretary doesn't accept the payment I already made to pend it.
>
> Fair enough. I pend "Granular Paydays (v3)" via the mechanism in the
> rule "Reward and Delay".
>
> --
> ais523

DIS: Re: BUS: Re: OFF: [Assessor] Resolution of Proposal(s) 7850 (Attempt 1)

[Publius Scribonius Scholasticus]

I would be happy to take on some more offices as I have the time to do
so. I am also sad to see a player leaving and I hope they will return
when they are able. As to the problem in general, the problem could be
solved possibly via real-life rewards and/or contract it out via
AI/Computer or Mechanical Turk, which I may be interested in helping
with.

Publius Scribonius Scholasticus


On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 12:46 PM, Alex Smith  wrote:
> On Mon, 2017-05-15 at 09:29 -0700, Kerim Aydin wrote:
>> On Mon, 15 May 2017, Nic Evans wrote:
>> > While we have the efficiency of authoritarianism we might as well clean
>> > up a couple things.
>>
>> I find, to my surprise, that this is too much like real life right now,
>> and I don't want the stress, nor to be the reluctant officer trying to
>> clean up.
> There shouldn't actually be much cleanup required here. Most of it's
> just closing the scam, which is something that should have happened
> anyway, and is anyway done via proposal.
>
> (Also note that I don't actually have a dictatorship. The scam was
> powerful enough to gain one, but I chose not to, in order to disrupt
> gameplay as little as possible.)
>
>> I thought I wouldn't mind being the quiet officer with rulekeepor and
>> Arbitor, not really minding what actual play was happening, but it's
>> taking too much time for this crap.
>>
>> I deregister.
>>
>> I would invite ais523 to consider being an Officer at some point.
>
> This is one of the biggest issues with Agora at the moment: we keep
> proposing things that require Officers to track, but nobody has time to
> actually track them. Part of the reason I'm mostly sitting on the
> sidelines, fixing problems when I notice them and scamming wins in the
> process when I can get away with it, is that I don't have large blocks
> of time to continuously devote to Agora like I used to.
>
> Are you implying that the scam is connected to an increased Rulekeepor
> and Arbitor workload, though? That would surprise me; most of the work
> made for those two offices recently seems to have been caused by events
> other than the scam.
>
>> I would make this a Cantus Cygneus, but I'm not even sure we have a 
>> registrar,
>> or an ADOP to make a registrar, and I'm sure that taking on necessary
>> duties as these it not actually what's on the Junta's mind.  Enjoy
>> your badges - maybe an officer will publish them in a report some day.
>
> Despite what I said earlier, if the Registrar is missing, that's one of
> the easiest jobs in Agora and I wouldn't mind taking it on. Do we have
> an ADoP at the moment? Part of the reason why people haven't been
> taking on offices may be just down to not knowing which offices are
> empty.
>
> --
> ais523

DIS: Re: BUS: Super Election Season

[Kerim Aydin]

On Mon, 15 May 2017, Nic Evans wrote:
> 1) Right now and until the first election begins, I would appreciate if
> every player submitted eir opinions on the most difficult and the most
> important offices.

I still intend to catch up the online CFJs to fill in 2014-2015, as I got 
interested in using these in a thesis once those are complete.  Am likely
to keep things relatively current in the mean time.

If anyone is interested in setting-up Arbitor-as-Agency while I'm maintaining
the site and tools, let me know.

DIS: Re: BUS: Super Election Season

[Aris Merchant]

On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 2:19 PM, Nic Evans  wrote:
> I intend to deputize for ADoP to publish eir report.
>
> Once I'm ADoP (assuming Gumball doesn't step in to stop me) I intend to
> begin elections for each office, and would like to go through the
> following process:
>
> 1) Right now and until the first election begins, I would appreciate if
> every player submitted eir opinions on the most difficult and the most
> important offices.
>
> 2) Once I can I will start elections, a few at a time, beginning with
> the most important offices.
>
> 3) When an election is happening for a given office, I would appreciate
> if every player submitted eir opinion on what we can do to make that
> offices' duties easier to fulfill, and what would be an appropriate
> payrate for that office.
>
> 4) If we all agree something needs to be done to ease a certain office's
> burdens, someone should volunteer to draft a proposal to do so.
>
> 5) Once all the elections are over, I will make a proposal to flip all
> the payrates to reasonable numbers based on the discussion (I may use my
> own discretion and/or prefer the opinions of previous and current
> officeholders instead of a direct mean).
>
> I also recommend that we pause all other proposals, except for those
> already pending and those intended only to fix or simplify gameplay,
> until this process is complete.
>
>
Aye Associate Director. I'll have opinions on the offices out in a
little bit. announce my candidacy for Promotor and Arbitor (not that
I'm very interested in the second one, and I'll be more than happy to
step aside if anyone is. Just trying to do my part in picking up the
pieces.) I'm considering an administrative delay of the current batch
of proposals until I'm confident that there will be a Rulekeepor on
the other end to receive them. Comments appreciated.

-Aris

DIS: Re: BUS: Super Election Season

[Alex Smith]

On Mon, 2017-05-15 at 16:19 -0500, Nic Evans wrote:
> I intend to deputize for ADoP to publish eir report.
> 
> Once I'm ADoP (assuming Gumball doesn't step in to stop me) I intend to
> begin elections for each office, and would like to go through the
> following process:
> 
> 1) Right now and until the first election begins, I would appreciate if
> every player submitted eir opinions on the most difficult and the most
> important offices.

Speaker: Imposed, so isn't relevant here. Also doesn't do a whole lot
right now.

Prime Minister: Mostly just here as something for people to fight over.
Easy, and also unimportant (especially as the Prime Minister's "job" is
something that people typically do anyway). Its main positive role,
other than giving political power, is in fighting invasions and in
perpetrating scams.

Promotor, Assessor: Seem to be being run ably at the moment, but these
are vital to more or less all Agoran gameplay (it says something that
these offices have persisted more or less unchanged for years and
years); we don't have much to do other than proposals at the moment.
Promotor is the easier role (because trying to track down votes is
normally harder than trying to track down proposals/pends), and they're
both pretty much equally important, for obvious reasons.

Arbitor: Someone needs to track and assign CFJs, although our current
implementation of the office isn't great. I'd say this is fairly
important. The historical tracking part of the job and the judge
assignment part of the job are conceptually independent, with the
former being more difficult and the latter typically having more
immediate urgency. Historically, this role's rarely changed hands,
tending to stay in one person's control for years at a time, as that
makes recordkeeping easier.

Referee: I don't think the current version of the office has ever been
used. It's easier than the old version, at least (which was
nightmarish). Arguably, the fact that the office hasn't been used is
responsible for the lax state of our offices.

Rulekeepor: Highly important, and some people will find this easier
than others. Like Arbitor, tends to stay in the same hands for years at
a time.

Reportor: Should probably be replaced by the gig economy. We've had
something like this on many occasions, and I don't think it ever
produced reports in a timely manner for more than a few weeks at a
time. (Strangely, something like this did end up producing useful
reports for a long time, but it was purely unofficial back then.)

ADoP: Very important (given that it's hard to fix office vacancies
without one), also fairly easy.

Registrar: Less important than it might seem; a player who isn't doing
anything typically doesn't create any major gamestate differences from
a nonplayer. Also fairly easy as offices go. Nonetheless, failing to
track players for a long period of time would likely lead to trouble.

Secretary: One of the more difficult offices. (It's the spiritual
successor of Notary, which I held for a long time and was rather time-
consuming). However, having offices like this tends to end up vital if
we want open-ended gameplay (which we typically do; an economy tends
not to function without it). Incidentally, the agora-notary wiki, which
was previously used to help simplify this sort of role still seems to
be functional; if the Secretary role ends up getting out of hand, we
might want to look into using it again.

Superintendent: Could end up difficult if we end up with a lot of
Agencies, but is probably fairly easy right now. Importance will depend
a lot on how important Agencies become for gameplay; I don't expect
them to be all that relevant, but who knows.

Herald, Tailor: Fairly low impact; it's important to have someone
tracking things like Ribbons and Patent Titles long-term, but it
doesn't matter if this office is vacant for a while. Merging these
would make sense, as they're very similar offices.

-- 
ais523

DIS: Re: BUS: Registration

[Owen Jacobson]

> On May 13, 2017, at 3:01 AM, Quazie  wrote:
> 
> 
> On Sat, May 13, 2017 at 09:57 tmanthe2nd .  > wrote:
> I register as a player.
> 
> I give tmanthe2nd 1 Shiney if e tells us how e found agora and what compelled 
> em to join.

Is this sort of triggered action effective? If so, when should I conclude that 
Quazie has actually performed it?

-o



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DIS: [Draft] Deregistration and Assets

[Owen Jacobson]

> In the interest of uniformity, couldn't we just add the Organizations thing 
> in until that separate rule is written? I'd prefer not to have that loophole 
> siting around, but you're the resident economics mastermind at the moment :) 
> (at the very least, you're secretary, which gives you unique perspective). 
> I'd also add that at some point, probably after contracts, I'm likely to try 
> to (re)introduce wills, and then we'll really have probate courts. Wills are 
> really just binding contacts between the testator and the executor, anyway.

I’d rather get the rule fixed. Here’s my draft:

Proposal: Deregistration and Assets
Adoption index: 2
Authors: o
Co-authors: Aris

Amend rule 2485, "You can't take it with you", by changing its title to
"You Can't Take It With You", then by changing the text to read, in
full:

"Heir" is a person switch, tracked by the Registrar, whose value is
either Agora (the default value), or a player other than emself, or
an Organization. A player may flip eir Heir by announcement.

When a player is deregistered, e automatically pays all of eir
Shinies and transfers all of eir Estates to eir Heir, immediately
before deregistration.

Amend rule 2461 ("Death and Birth of Organizations") by changing its
power to 2, then by adding the following paragraph between the
paragraph beginning "If an Organization's Income is ever lower [...]"
and the paragraph beginning "If a player's Expenditure is at most
[...]":

Immediately before an Organization is destroyed, it automatically
pays all of its Shinies to Agora, and transfers all of its Estates
to Agora.




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Re: DIS: proto: stopping timing scams

[Owen Jacobson]

I like the bones of this, and it effectively puts a stop to the race to get 
scam votes in at the end of the voting period. Given that that’s been behind 
two dictatorship scams in a row, I think something in this vein is probably 
merited.

On May 15, 2017, at 1:33 AM, Kerim Aydin  wrote:

> [Implication; if you vote at the very end of a decision period, it
> extends 30min, but you can't do any more voting (or further extend
> it).

I don’t think 30 minutes is long enough.

Provided each player can go into Timeout at most once, and stops being able to 
affect the tally thereafter (and the point about cards is an important one, 
here), a vote close to the end of the voting period should probably push the 
voting deadline out to 12-24 hours after the action causing the extension 
occurs, to give people who are, often literally, asleep a chance to notice.

-o



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Re: DIS: Sort-of random question

[Owen Jacobson]

On May 15, 2017, at 1:54 AM, Josh T  wrote:

> Random question: Is there a way to formalize the fact that I do not want my 
> name (as opposed to y nickname) to be an acceptable way to refer to me?

I don’t believe so. There’s a fairly long tradition of allowing any 
recognizable name - look at the series of CFJs on alternate ways of referring 
to omd, for example.

However, the only recognizable name you have right now is 天火狐, since that’s the 
only one you’ve ever used. If you object to someone who has the temerity to 
call you “Josh” or “draconicdarkness”, I suspect it won’t happen a second time. 
The right to choose one’s own name is fairly well recognized here.

-o




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DIS: Re: BUS: [Proposal] Machine-Readable Reports

[Owen Jacobson]

On May 15, 2017, at 3:06 AM, Gaelan Steele  wrote:

> I create the following proposal:
> 
> Title: Machine-Readable Reports
> AI: 1
> 
> Append the following text to Rule 2143:
> In addition, officers SHOULD provide their reports in a machine-readable 
> format. This machine-readable report SHOULD be available on the World Wide 
> Web, and officers SHOULD publish the address of the machine-readable copy 
> along with their published reports.
> 
> [Commentary] Hopefully this will make automating reports a bit easier. I’m 
> keeping it at SHOULD for now; maybe it should (no pun intended) become a 
> stronger requirement at some point.

I’m of extremely mixed opinion about this.

On the one hand, making more data about the game accessible in a 
parser-friendly format provides some good opportunities for analysis and study. 
On the other hand, one of the things about Agora that differentiates it from 
BlogNomic and a few others is that the game state is, in large part, defined by 
prose. Reports with exceptions in them are, if not a regular occurrence, then 
at least an unsurprising one. I’d hate to lose that.

Is there a weaker form of SHOULD? Should this perhaps be an organization of 
interested curators and officers, instead of a rule?

-o



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Re: DIS: Re: OFF: Proposal Pool

[Owen Jacobson]

I can find no such message. What am I missing?

-o

> On May 15, 2017, at 6:12 AM, Publius Scribonius Scholasticus 
>  wrote:
> 
> I have pended mine.





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DIS: Re: BUS: Super Election Season

[Owen Jacobson]

There’s a related question: which offices have outlived their utility, and 
could be either eliminated or replaced with a lighter system?

> On May 15, 2017, at 5:19 PM, Nic Evans  wrote:
> 
> I intend to deputize for ADoP to publish eir report.
> 
> Once I'm ADoP (assuming Gumball doesn't step in to stop me) I intend to
> begin elections for each office, and would like to go through the
> following process:
> 
> 1) Right now and until the first election begins, I would appreciate if
> every player submitted eir opinions on the most difficult and the most
> important offices.

My sense is that the top three most important offices, in descending order:

1. The Distributor,
2. The Assessor, and
3. The Rulekeepor.

These three offices, working in concert, make it possible to reason about the 
rules of Agora at any point in time. If any of the three should fall idle, the 
game is effectively on hold until someone deputizes for the office and gets 
things moving again. The game can function without most other offices, but if 
proposals can no longer be turned into rules, or if the only way to understand 
the rules is through a full reckoning of all past proposal actions, then the 
game is unplayable.

I would estimate that the top three most difficult offices, again in descending 
order, would be

1. The Rulekeepor,
2. The Assessor, and
3. The Referee.

These are the offices most exposed to complicated player actions, either 
through proposals (which are difficult instruments at the best of times), 
through complicated voting decisions, or through needing a comprehensive 
understanding of the rules and being able to spot not only breaches by action, 
but also breaches by inaction.

> I also recommend that we pause all other proposals, except for those
> already pending and those intended only to fix or simplify gameplay,
> until this process is complete.

Seconded.


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DIS: Re: BUS: Re: OFF: [Assessor] Resolution of Proposal(s) 7850 (Attempt 1)

[Gaelan Steele]

I’ve been watching Agora off and on for a few years now, and I too am saddened 
to see you go.

Before you go, G., would you mind publishing the XML ruleset you mentioned that 
you had? I imagine it would make life much easier for whoever followed you.
> On May 15, 2017, at 9:29 AM, Kerim Aydin  wrote:
> 
> 
> 
> On Mon, 15 May 2017, Nic Evans wrote:
>> While we have the efficiency of authoritarianism we might as well clean
>> up a couple things.
> 
> I find, to my surprise, that this is too much like real life right now,
> and I don't want the stress, nor to be the reluctant officer trying to
> clean up.
> 
> I thought I wouldn't mind being the quiet officer with rulekeepor and
> Arbitor, not really minding what actual play was happening, but it's
> taking too much time for this crap.
> 
> I deregister.
> 
> I would invite ais523 to consider being an Officer at some point.
> 
> I would make this a Cantus Cygneus, but I'm not even sure we have a registrar,
> or an ADOP to make a registrar, and I'm sure that taking on necessary
> duties as these it not actually what's on the Junta's mind.  Enjoy
> your badges - maybe an officer will publish them in a report some day.
> 
> 
> 
> 

Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Super Election Season

[Owen Jacobson]

> On May 15, 2017, at 6:04 PM, Alex Smith  wrote:
> 
> Less important than it might seem; a player who isn't doing
> anything typically doesn't create any major gamestate differences from
> a nonplayer.

An idle player has, at least, a few meaningful effects:

* An idle player draws a salary on months when Agora has Shinies with which to 
pay one,

* An idle player can be a member of an Organization, and can keep a moribund 
organization from being destroyed.

> Secretary: One of the more difficult offices.

I’ve alluded to this before, but to make it explicit: the Organization-tracking 
parts of this office - budgets, lockouts, charters, and so on - are fairly 
straightforward. I don’t find them to be much of a burden at all, although that 
could change if we start making more extensive use of Organizations at some 
point. My biggest burden on that front is keeping the ACU balances up to date - 
a job I’m planning to abandon at some point in the next couple of weeks, as 
Shinies have subsumed what interest I had in that Organization.

If someone wants to take over keeping books for the ACU, please, be my guest.

However, the economic elements that office has accumulated _are_ more 
complicated. The Secretary, right now, effectively needs to read every 
-business, -official, or backup-list message, just in case it contains 
something that could be construed as a Shiny transaction or a change in Heir. 
(The need to track Heirs will attach to the Surveyor, as well.) This is 
considerably more work than making sure nobody’s Expenditure exceeds 100 and 
that the charters go out once a month.

I’m loathe to suggest yet more offices, but i’d be strongly in favour of moving 
the economic aspects out of the Secretary’s office and combining them with the 
Surveyor’s office in some way. We’ve had a Bankor, a Treasuror, and probably 
other names for that office before; no reason we can’t have them again.

-o



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Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Registration

[Alex Smith]

On Mon, 2017-05-15 at 22:10 -0400, Owen Jacobson wrote:
> > On May 13, 2017, at 3:01 AM, Quazie  wrote:
> > 
> > 
> > On Sat, May 13, 2017 at 09:57 tmanthe2nd .  > > wrote:
> > I register as a player.
> > 
> > I give tmanthe2nd 1 Shiney if e tells us how e found agora and what
> > compelled em to join.
> 
> Is this sort of triggered action effective? If so, when should I
> conclude that Quazie has actually performed it?

Except when voting, conditionals in actions have to be evaluated at the
time the action is made. Conditionals talking about events in the
future therefore are always too ambiguous to succeed.

-- 
ais523

Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Registration

[Owen Jacobson]

On May 16, 2017, at 12:16 AM, Alex Smith  wrote:
> On Mon, 2017-05-15 at 22:10 -0400, Owen Jacobson wrote:
>>> On May 13, 2017, at 3:01 AM, Quazie  wrote:
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Sat, May 13, 2017 at 09:57 tmanthe2nd . >> > wrote:
>>> I register as a player.
>>> 
>>> I give tmanthe2nd 1 Shiney if e tells us how e found agora and what
>>> compelled em to join.
>> 
>> Is this sort of triggered action effective? If so, when should I
>> conclude that Quazie has actually performed it?
> 
> Except when voting, conditionals in actions have to be evaluated at the
> time the action is made. Conditionals talking about events in the
> future therefore are always too ambiguous to succeed.

Thanks.

-o



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DIS: [Proto] Economic Victory

[Owen Jacobson]

If we’d like to have some victory mode besides scams, and the rules toy of the 
season is Shinies, then that seems like a solvable thing. How’s this:

* Any player may claim victory as the Miser of Agora by paying Agora some large 
percentage (70%? 80%?) of the Supply Level in a single payment, by announcement.

* Any player may claim victory as the Mogul of Agora by having a balance no 
greater than eir total salary on three consecutive Paydays.

* Any player may claim victory as the Grand Duke of Agora by transferring all 
extant Estates to Agora in a single message, by announcement.

I hate to incentivize hoarding, and both of these do exactly that, but I 
figured I’d at least try to move the discussion forward a bit.

-o



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Re: DIS: Officer Tech Chat

[Nicholas Evans]

I should add: I have labels for all office-related messages. I use filters
to catch most of them, and I manually move things that the filters don't
catch when I see them.

The keywords I use for Registrar are: registrar, register, deregister, 869,
registration, deregistration

The keywords I use for Assessor are: for, present, vote, endorse, present

These both pick up a lot of excess, but they rarely miss anything so it
probably halves or quarters the amount of potential work involved in
finding relevant messages.

On Fri, May 12, 2017 at 12:12 AM, Nic Evans  wrote:

> Just curious: what's everyone using to manage eir various duties? It
> comes up in pockets of discussion, but I'm not sure I've seen them all
> layed out before.
>
> -For Registrar I used a python script that formatted the table and added
> annotations.
>
> -For knowing when to assess, I use a service called zapier to add a
> to-do job to my calendar when the promotor distributes.
>
> -For assessing, I have a Python script that reads a csv and creates the
> table. Then I manually add annotations.
>
> -All I have for Reportor is a template with the categories.
>
> I think both my scripts are buried somewhere in the wiki's repository. I
> should update them some and add wiki pages explaining them for my
> successors.
>
>
>

Re: DIS: Re: OFF: Proposal Pool

[Aris Merchant]

Neither can I. P.S.S, could you please point me to the message?

-Aris

On Mon, May 15, 2017 at 8:35 PM, Owen Jacobson  wrote:
> I can find no such message. What am I missing?
>
> -o
>
>> On May 15, 2017, at 6:12 AM, Publius Scribonius Scholasticus 
>>  wrote:
>>
>> I have pended mine.
>
>
>