Subject: Welcome,

From: Gallivanting Tripper <s3036845@s...>
Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2000 17:57:07 +1000

Welcome, O 5th Player of this young if intense little Nomic.

As a result of your arrival:

- Proposals now require 3 votes against to be defeated, but still only 3
votes for to be approved, which makes defeating proposals rather a tough
ask at this stage.

- You are in the interesting position of being a Player but not a Person.
I commend you to make your coming-out Post to the DML, and take up the
position of Debutante, with the Social Standing and perks that implies.

- As a new Player, you would be in a position to receive a grant from the
State, but as it's still new and the Players have been stingy with their
Taxes, it doesn't wish to share its solitary Point with you.

- You're eligible to vote on Proposals 30, 51, 55, 58, 60, and 62-8 For an
early Point Scam, I recommend voting Against proposal 55 and then Adopting
it, which will give you 13 brand-new Points which can, of course, be used
to buy Hard (if flat) Currency

- I hope that you've been able to elucidate the latest version of our
Ruleset from the Archives, if not, TopHeavy's Administration proposal
should make things a bit more User-friendly.

See you at the next Party

Cheers

(G)T

---

From: "Doctroid " <hrholmes@m...>
Date: Fri, 21 Jul 2000 14:58:08 -0000

--- In [email-masked], Gallivanting Tripper
> position of Debutante, with the Social Standing and perks that
implies.

I find myself in the rather embarrassing situation of having misplaced
the letter of introduction written for me by my Great-Uncle General
Sir Walter Hyatt Regency-O'Hare. I remain hopeful that I shall
uncover it while unpacking my portmanteau; in the meantime, I can only
say I am pleased to make your acquaintance, and can anyone recommend a
hotel for my lodgings until I can locate a suitable property for
purchase?

> - You're eligible to vote on Proposals 30, 51, 55, 58, 60, and 62-8

Rule 58 seems to have been Defeated already. As for rule 60 I find it
in the VML but not the AML. This would seem to be a violation of Rule
2.

> For an

Perhaps I shall. I have in fact already lodged a vote Against. 

- D

---

From: "Doctroid " <hrholmes@m...>
Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2000 19:42:46 -0000

> - You're eligible to vote on Proposals 30, 51, 55, 58, 60, and 62-8

Right then.

30: The proposal allows for unregulated (i.e. un-voted-on) subgames
with virtually no restrictions. Badly rooted. 

51 - Hilbert: The Hilbert's behavior is confusing and not in the least
entertaining. Also, the proposal is rooted in its failure to specify
what happens to a dead Hilbert's lines.

55: (Voted against and adopted).

58: (Already defeated).

60 - Injunctions: Oomny. A valuable weapon in the unmoderated
arsenal.

62 - My Jewels!: Rooted, as previously discussed.

63 - Partners, Please: Very oomny. Lots of potential here for sexual
intrigue and scandal. C.f. the well known Nomic "Dangerous Liaisons".

64 - Rock Voting: Mildly rooted. Surely there are better ways to
"call the question".

65 - Redundancy Issues: Quite oomnily rooted. Oloros wrote:

> I thought that one of the points of 
> designating certain messages to the AML was so that a Player could 
> subscribe to the AML (having it delivered) and keep appraised of 
> game actions.

I would argue that, first, one could accomplish the same by
subscribing to VML and applying a mail filter. Yes, you'd have to
download more messages, but the bandwidth requirement is negligibly
larger. In fact, I would argue for the same reason that only one or
two lists instead of four is feasible and preferable. The annoyance
of juggling posts to and reading from four separate lists is one of
the more unfortunate features of this Nomic.

But let's leave that aside. Let's assume it's useful to have separate
AML and VML. Let's grant that you'd want to get the AML delivered but
not the VML, with its boring old votes. 

What purpose, then, is served by posting proposals -- or accusations
-- to the VML?

I'd argue the redundancy addressed by Prop. 65 is indeed silly, and
ought to be eliminated -- and so should the parallel redundancies
regarding Accusations, Adoptions, and Defeats -- but that it should be
eliminated by having Proposals and Accusations go to the AML only, not
to the VML only. Ditto the Adoptions and Defeats. The VML would then
be used only for collecting votes.

66 - Money Laundering: Rooted in a perverse accounting that gives
equal weights to coins of all denominations, and a perverse sociology
that recognizes only one Pauper, fails to specify how to break ties
for CEO and Pauper, and equates Rebelliousness with coinlessness.

67 - Effective Money: Rooted in contingency on a rooted proposal.

68 - Concise Summary: Oomny. I'd welcome an equally oomny addition to
the List of Tasks that would provide for periodic posting of a
"Socialnomic News" with concise summaries of non-Rule activity --
Proposals, Accusations, etc.

- D

---

From: Gallivanting Tripper <s3036845@s...>
Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2000 16:55:50 +1000 (EST)

>with virtually no restrictions. Badly rooted.

Asieoniezi, so to speak. The effect of this proposal was functionally
replaced by the passage of the Laudable Institutions Proposal, but requires
you and Oloros to give it the coup de grace. (Or, indeed, Xylen to Erase it)

>what happens to a dead Hilbert's lines.

I'd say that a more asieonezi problem is the fact that lines are not
specified in the ruleset. And I also disagree with such wanton destruction
of hard-earned coins.

>60 - Injunctions: Oomny. A valuable weapon in the unmoderated

Since no-one else had commented on this one, I'll give it a plug. Of
course I think it's Laudable - I posted it - but it arose after thinking
over the revised judgement laws. Although illegal posts are defined to not
affect the game, a post can only be finally declared illegal after perhaps
a lengthy Accusation process, during which time its status is unclear. An
Injunction makes a contested post Illegal until proved legal, with a
penalty for improper Injunctions.

>62 - My Jewels!: Rooted, as previously discussed.

But it goes so well with #63!

>65 - Redundancy Issues: Quite oomnily rooted.

<analysis snipped.
I must admit to bias because I use email filters to put each mailing list
into a separate mailbox on my hard disk.

[Historical digression]
For the purposes of online archiving, separate mailing lists for rules and
votes are essential (although I once argued that a minimalist
UnmoderatedNomic could have its ruleset implied from the Votes list only).
Furhtermore, it is extremely user-friendly for Proposals to be posted to
the votes list and the votes posted as replies. Similarly, it is wise to
keep other game-affecting actions away from general discussion. The way
the mechanics are set up, it's possible to read most of the VML and AML
just by looking at the table of contents, and reading the messages for the
latest gamedata or proposal text.
[End historical digression]

Anyway I think that mail-subscribing to the VML and auto-deleting all
messages with FOR or AGAINST in the title would be a perfectly good
substitute to posting Announcements to the AML as well. So I thought 65
was laudable

>for CEO and Pauper, and equates Rebelliousness with coinlessness.

Good point about the tie-breaking thing. In fact I thought a few bits
were ambiguous, but since I seem to be the taxman by default, I was looking
forward to the interpretation..... And the Rebel appears to be an attempt
to use a cashless society - since a Rebel isn't taxed, e can laudably
accumulate an indefinite number of points. Of course, all the laudable
bits are attached in P67, which might be either cautious proposing or a
point grab ;-)

All for now,
'
GT

---

From: topheavy@s...
Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2000 21:10:25 -0000

> the more unfortunate features of this Nomic.

True, reading 4 lists can be annoying, but i think that the real 
reason for separating them is clarity of purpose. The VML tracks 
anything that requires a vote, the RML shows all the effective rules, 
and the AML tracks all game information that isn't related to 
voting. The DML is just a place to discuss the effects of the other 
three lists. 

I think originally the notification to the AML was added because it 
wasn't certain how the game would play, and i think that at this 
phase the duplication is unneccesary. Everyone (all five of us now) 
seem to know when a proposal hits because we read/recieve the VML, 
not because of the notification email sent to the AML. Is this true?

I also think that we know when something is Adopted/Defeated by the 
message posted to the VML (or the addition/revision of a Rule on the 
RML), which would mean that the AML message is redundant.. EXCEPT for 
the listing of points. I see the Adoption/Defeat messages not as 
notifications, but rather as a Point/Coin/Status update. I wouldn't 
want to comb through both the AML and the VML to get the most recent 
point totals.

On another note entirely, How do we feel about adding more 'stuff' 
to the game? I am interested in drafting a proposal that would 
create more people (non-player people) which could tied to the 
players as vassals/etc. We could then use these people to populate 
parties, protest institutions, wage war, etc. etc. However, this 
would add another level of bookeeping to the game, and we all know 
that bookkeeping is the bane of an unmoderated nomic... 
are other players intrigued by my idea? should i draft a proposal?

does anyone have suggestions on how to implement effective 
tracking/bookkeeping in our game?

-topheavy

---

From: "Oloros the Blue" <oloros@l...>
Date: Wed, 26 Jul 2000 15:07:55 -0000

Aside: hey, it's one of the few english words with three consecutive 
doubled letters!

> [TopHeavy]
Bookkeeping is a problem. However, I would welcome a general rule on 
the provenance of Entities. Although examination may find it only 
marginally different from Rule 26 (Institutions).

-Oloros