Public OOC Discussion of Non-Active Nations.

[Vocenae]

OOC: Only gone in the sense that I don't park my nation here anymore. I visit the forum and RMB quite frequently. After all, I didn't put years of keeping the lights on just to entirely walk away. And just in case anyone was wondering, my nation uses soft Cs, not hard. As such, you pronounce the full name as: vOH Sin Nay, and the capital city as: vOH See Ah. Otherwise, on Discord or as the name I go by most everywhere else "Voc", that's a hard sound, like saying the word "Voke".

Anyway,  I'd rather do this in a OOC thread, but as there is none, well, gonna do it here. Sorry.

For the record, I authorized the use of mentioning Vocenae while visiting the Europa Discord, but I did not, however, authorize full use of it, or characters, named or otherwise, within it. This is a very clear use of another player's IP without permission, and while the scenario surrounding it is different, the problem behind it is no different than is I or any other player decided to go "And a group of corrupt Andallan politicians and soldiers had reached out for supporters of a coup". It's taking control of another player's assets, no matter if they're 'here' or gone entirely and it's not acceptable.

Sorry if this comes off as harsh. I've had more than a few people steal things from me and my nation over the years and it's left me more than a little defensive when people take liberties with my stuff.

Again, for the record, here is the amount of content that I gave permission for:

Quote

This was the "Northern Route", one of the most heavily-traveled air routes during the late 1940's to the mid-1960's. It ran from Andalla to Central Europa or @Orioni, with stops at @Iverica, @Prymont (Ostport), @Vocenae, and finally to wherever in Europa the passenger was destined for. It remained that way until 1964, when the trans-Oriental SK-3-200 jet airliner entered service and the airport at Burkini opened, allowing medium-haul aircraft to cross the Oriental Ocean via Burkini instead.

This was the extent in which I was led to believe you would be mentioning my nation, which again, I gave permission for.

I did NOT, however, give permission for use of anything else involving my nation. As such, I'm going to have to ask you to remove all references to my nation, beyond the above, from your post. Again, sorry if this sounds harsh, blunt or mean-spirited. It is not intended that way, but I will defend my IP. And as a basic creative rule, always, ALWAYS try to get permission from another player or if that player no longer exists, use a NPC nation. Don't ever use someone else's property without permission.

And if anyone EVER needs to contact me concerning the usage of my nation in an RP, or just RP ideas in general, I am always a simple Telegram, PM or Discord Message away. PLEASE contact me as get my permission before using my nation again in the future. Thank you.

Edited July 7, 2018 by Vocenae (see edit history)

[Adaptus]

OOC: I’m sorry Voc, but we’ve just had a situation like this with another nation RPing here without having their nations actually here or being active. And our stance on that was you need to be in Europa, and actively participating, and not just dropping in and out when you feel like it and making demands of your nation. 

And im not going to accept a position where it’s one rule for one, and one rule for another. So I’d level the same criticism towards you also. How can you make demands of your nation, when you don’t participate here? 

[Prymont]

I'll chip in on this too. @Vocenae, I don't think you're being wholly fair on @Andalla. While he could've been better in his attempts to contact you and agree upon a plan of action, you're long gone from actively participating in the region. As much as it's fair and respectful to honour the legacies that the 'elders' have left behind, you've done just that - left Europa behind. You're not here anymore. Andalla has gone through the effort of planning an aerial route, and has started a good roleplay about it. It'd be hard to avoid your nation in this route. The situation has to be tackled, and he's done what I think is fair in your absence.

To add some further context, I've been writing a thread since late December called 'Project Canamo'. It involves my complete takeover of a neighbouring country, who left some weeks before the thread started. Take into consideration that they weren't very active while here, rarely participated in group roleplays, and left without notice. I doubt they're coming back, but by your standards, my entire thread and expansion is completely invalidated. If you do hang about here regularly as you say, you'll surely have noticed my thread and seen what's going on. I'm taking over The Hellenic Rus without any permission from them. Nobody in the region is against this, including you. I've made plans to allow them to take full control of their land if they return, but that's unlikely. However, it begs the question; if you so strongly disagree with people using the IP of others without consent, why didn't you mention this to me?

Making demands like this when you're no longer a part of the region is unfair. Andalla isn't completely changing the history of your nation and creating an RP mess. He's doing his best in your absence, and that has to be appreciated. If you want to argue with his use of Vocenae, feel free to rejoin the region and build a stronger case.

Edited July 7, 2018 by Prymont (see edit history)

[Andalla]

Uh... Can some admin move this all elsewhere, please? No need to be spraying more graffiti. Or we can get Fleur and Vocenae to get back on the Europa Discord to continue it there. 😅

(Please delete this message when you do, thanks)

Edited July 7, 2018 by Andalla (see edit history)

[Adaptus]

@Fleur de Lys @Vocenae

I'm going to come out with this. 

How on earth do you expect to be taken, when you spend little to no time here, have no active nations here, except for a barely active puppet, then come around once in a blue-moon, and thunder demands left right and centre. 

I was inactive for a long time. My nation was removed. I came, back, I accepted, and I moved on, and built up elsewhere. You two should also both accept the consequences of your lack of activity. If you wish to remain about, then there is nothing stopping you dropping in a message to a member of the admin team saying "apologies, I am inactive, things are busy at the minute I will be back soon". Nothing wrong with that. 

But if you both expect to go AWOL for extended periods of time with little to no mention of it, and then to add to that, actively remove your nations from the region, and move them to other regions, as in, not CTE. How else do you expect to be taken? Upping and leaving the region by choice, without explanation, is, in any logical sense, your ceasing or role here in Europa. Especially for such a prolonged period of time. 

If you do wish to come back, then accept that you have lost the time, like I did, and move on. You absolutely can not come back here out of the blue and begin bullying other members of the community because you weren't here to take an active role in the regions proceedings. 

[Sunset Sea Islands]

As some of you might have noticed, @Prymont and I had some arguments with @Fleur de Lys. In the charter for the ISTC we agreed on the treaty being a pretty exclusive club, consisting of only the four original nations. However, the only active nations in Europa were Pry-guy and me. Since FdL left and Mag is afk, we invited new nations to the treaty. FdL was gone from both the Discord and the region, so why should we have sought his consent? He now argues that him having a puppet in the region makes touching anything he's ever participated in invalid, which I cannot understand. I side with @Andalla, Pry-guy and @Adaptus on this one.

EDIT: if @Magnaeus would be unhappy with the choices Pry and I made, that would be completely understandable. But as Dadaptus pointed out above, FdL has no right to do so in my eyes.

[Vocenae]

I'm pressed for time and data on my phone, so I've just skimmed the posts and for now you get a TLDR response. It doesn't matter if I'm here or not, given that it's my stuff. It shouldn't be used without my permission. It's metagaming, and more importantly,  IP theft otherwise.

Now, had I given permission and said "Sure Andalla, do whatever you want", then there would be no problem. But I did not give him permission. He received permission to mention my nation, not create political situations or named and unnamed characters that are corrupt. That is creating history in MY nation without my consent. That's the problem.

This is not bullying, this is not me "showing up once in a blue moon and throwing around demands, this is me protecting my things. That's it. I could have been a lot more terse about it instead of trying to explain WHY this is bad in a polite manner. If this was the official NS forums, this would be a warnable offense if reported to moderation, with ALL the offending content (which is most of the post) being deleted by a moderator upon being reported. Without any notice given to Andalla.

So all in all, my polite request and explanation is much kinder a service than Andalla would have received on the official forums. All he has to do now is replace all mentions of my nation with a NPC state (or someone else, if they volunteer or otherwise choose to participate in the RP) and literally nothing changes.

Given that there's a lack of RP rules  (we had them, once) I've suggested to Orioni via Discord that perhaps adoption/adaptation of the NS forum rules would be really beneficial for everyone.

The new guys don't know, but you, Adaptus, might remember this. Once upon a time there was a player by the name of Xheng. What did he do? He metagamed and used, without permission, other people's nations, and made quite a few people very upset in the process. What happened to this player? He was removed from the region because of those violations and several refusals to obey both moderator and admin commands to cease doing that.

As for "your opinion doesn't matter you're not here anymore you shouldn't even be on the map", let it be known I was keeping the lights on both here and in the actual region when all other admins, pretty much everyone was gone, including Orioni, Tagmatium, and even you, Adaptus.

And if you check the last page or so of the previous map discussion thread, you'll see that because of that service (and the one I still provide to Europa), I was allowed to retain my position on the map.

Edited July 7, 2018 by Vocenae
Additional comments added. (see edit history)

[Orioni]

@Vocenae I understand your arguments. I recommend that @Andalla excludes you in the RP to avoid metagaming. That's something easy to do. No need to blow this out of proportions. This topic is about airlines and which countries serve as a hub and characters that may or may not be involved. There are plenty of other places to pick and choose from.

[Prymont]

I don't think that's fair. Sure, Vocenae was here a long time ago, was an influential player, and has a legacy to be honoured, but he's long left the region now. I don't see why he can throw his weight about to disrupt a perfectly fine RP. It's not like Andalla was severely altering Vocenae's history or anything. As far as intellectual property goes, it's not as if this is the next big product that'll change the lives of billions and will make the creator a trillionaire. We're roleplaying countries, for goodness sake. It's for fun. Demanding that writing be removed on the grounds of violating intellectual property is childish.

[Andalla]

This whole thing was supposed to end with the solution of the problem and the standardization of general aviation regulations among most nations... Not in any way to harm Vocenae. And either way, this is more or less the same thing that's being debated in the other thread. I think you guys should also check that discussion.

Edited July 8, 2018 by Andalla (see edit history)

[Vocenae]

Posting this so that we're all brought up to speed, here (including myself). Intellectual property rights ARE a thing. They are not some nebulous construct pulled from the aether, regardless of how much worth or 'difference' that one user may find that the do or do not have. It is something that exists within real world law. Infringing on it is violating that law, again regardless of an individual's personal belief of the value and worth of said IP. There is no 'weight' being thrown around, it is simply me protecting my property, which it is. Continued usage of my nation without my expressed consent is in violation of Intellectual Property Law.

For the benefit of everyone in Europa, I will now list content concerning Intellectual Copyright Law, along with excerpts from The Community Rules of Europa and The Roleplay Rules of Europa.

• Taken from HG.Org (a legal resource site) is the following on what Intellectual Property Law is (bolded emphasis mine):

• Quote

  • What is Intellectual Property Law? 
    
    Intellectual property law deals with the rules for securing and enforcing legal rights to inventions, designs, and artistic works. Just as the law protects ownership of personal property and real estate, so too does it protect the exclusive control of intangible assets. The purpose of these laws is to give an incentive for people to develop creative works that benefit society, by ensuring they can profit from their works without fear of misappropriation by others. 
    
    Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution gives Congress express authority to grant authors and inventors exclusive rights to their creations. Section 8 also gives Congress the power to regulate interstate and foreign commerce, providing further support for its right to legislate in this area. Intellectual property laws passed by Congress are administered by two government agencies, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and the U.S. Copyright Office. 
    
    Patents give inventors the right to use their product in the marketplace, or to profit by transferring that right to someone else. Depending on the type of invention, patent rights are valid for up to 20 years. Qualifying items include new machines, technological improvements, and manufactured goods, including the "look" of a product. Patent protection will be denied if an invention is found to be obvious in design, not useful, or morally offensive. 
    
    Trademarks protect symbols, names, and slogans used to identify goods and services. The purpose is to avoid confusion, deter misleading advertising, and help consumers distinguish one brand from another. Since the goal is to distinguish, generic or purely descriptive marks may not qualify. Rights can potentially last forever, and they are obtained by simply using a mark. While not required, owners can register their marks for additional protection. 
    
    Copyrights apply to writings, music, motion pictures, architecture, and other original intellectual and artistic expressions. Protection is not available for theories or ideas, or anything that has not been captured in a fixed medium. The act of creation itself produces a copyright and unpublished works are still protected. Use of a copyright symbol and date is common, but not mandatory. Most copyrights are valid for the creator's lifetime, plus 70 years. 

• https://www.hg.org/intell.html
•  
• And as found In The Community Rules of Europa, specifically section §3 Your Content; Article 5. (Bolded emphasis mine)

• Quote

  • §3 Your Content
  • Above all else, respect others. If you see disrespectful behavior, report it, rather than further inflaming the situation. 
  • Before you write, seed, or comment, ask yourself if your contribution increases the strength and virtue of the community. 
  • Although we feel that full internationalization is important, please keep all posts and replies in English.
  • You may not post, upload, link to, or email any content that contains, promotes, gives instruction about, or provides prohibited content. As a member of this board you are asked not to post any prohibited content. Prohibited content includes any content that breaks any local, state, county, national or international law. 
  • Prohibited content also includes any of the following: 
  • Content that infringes any rights. 
  • Racist, abusive, threatening, or harmful material. 
  • Viruses, hack tools, or other harmful or malicious software. 
  • Gambling. 
  • Illegal Drugs. 
  • Terrorism. 
  • Torrents, cracks, Warez, CD-Keys, Serials Numbers, etc. 
  • Pornography, nudity, or sexual content of any kind. 
  • Excessive profanity. 
  • Any personal information without consent of the individual or invasion of privacy. 
  • Posting of this nature will be removed by Moderators and persistent posting of prohibited content will result in warning and possible banning. If we find that a user continuously makes inappropriate or unneeded posts, the user will be put under Moderator review for as long as deemed necessary.
  • Please remember that we are not responsible for any messages posted. We do not vouch for or warrant the accuracy or completeness/usefulness of any message, and are not responsible for the contents of any message. The messages express the views of the author of the message, not necessarily the views of this forum. Any user who feels that a posted message is objectionable is encouraged to contact a member of the Staff. We have the ability to remove objectionable messages and we will make every effort to do so within a reasonable time frame if we determine that removal is necessary. You agree, through your use of this forum, that you will not use this forum to post any material which is knowingly false and/or defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, sexually oriented, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, or otherwise in violation of any law.

•  
• And in The Roleplay Rules of Europa, specifically section §5 In Character rules; Article 1 and 2. (Boled emphasis mine)

• Quote

  • §5 In Character rules
  • Metagaming. Taking OOC knowledge IC in order to gain or improve upon yourself. This includes hearing people talking about planning troop movements on Discord and suddenly you know about it IC. This is poor sportsmanship and will not be tolerated, no questions asked.
  • Powergaming. Forcing an action upon your opponent without their permission or consultation. This would be me firing a missile at an Orioni warship and having it hit and destroy it in the same post. This prevents Orioni from being able to do anything to prevent this. If we talked about it on Discord and planned that post to condense things, that's fine. Otherwise, it's not allowed.
  • Puppeting. A player cannot use a puppet nation to supplement the nation they roleplay as, either militarily, economically or by adding their populations together. Players are encouraged to role-play with their main nation.
  • Godmod. Doing things that aren't realistic, basically? Don't. Submitting unrealistic losses and can be on-par with Powergaming. i.e. Adaptus nukes a city of mine and nobody dies because I invented the machine that sucks away explosions and radiation like a cheap hooker. Strictly not allowed and will certainly be punished with a strike (see below).
  • Voiding roleplay. A scenario may only be voided if the main parties (not people who come in after it begins) agree to it. This is to prevent people from backing out when they stray into hot water and bring an actual sense of consequences to their IC actions. People will ask why this rule exists in particular. It's to force a feeling of consequences and gravity to the actions of everybody in the region, including yourself. 
  • Ignore-canon (mixed IC/OOC). Angry with somebody? Want to ignore their existence in your canon? Too bad! Your canon is Europan canon, and what is and what is not canon is only decided by the staff. Basically: DWI or restart elsewhere. If you have a complaint about a nation, take it up with the staff.

•  

Hopefully this post was information for everyone, and not just myself.

Thank you for your time.

Edited July 8, 2018 by Vocenae (see edit history)

[Mauridiviah]

I don't really want to jump into the middle of all this, but @Vocenae, your entire argument regarding intellectual property only applies if you have in fact copyrighted a work that uses your nation and its capital name in it. If you don't, then it's not legally speaking your intellectual property. Even if you have copyrighted such a work, Andalla is not making a profit from any of this, so this is fair use. Which is why you wouldn't be able to go to a court with any of this in any case. It's not like we usually prosecute people who write Harry Potter fan fiction.

Just trying to clarify, I understand etiquette and law are two different things, but in this case you are using legal terminology and have even cited an explanation of intellectual property law, so just wanted to clear that part up.

[Vocenae]

To which I will direct you to the Berne Convention.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berne_Convention

Specifically,

Quote

The Berne Convention formally mandated several aspects of modern copyright law; it introduced the concept that a copyright exists the moment a work is "fixed", rather than requiring registration. It also enforces a requirement that countries recognize copyrights held by the citizens of all other parties to the convention.

And Rowling could go after those fanfiction writers, if she wanted. George R. R. Martin, author of the  A Song of Ice and Fire universe (the books upon which Games of Thrones is based) does.

 

To be clear I am NOT threatening legal action. All I'm asking for here is that we abide by both our community rules, which clearly state 

 

Quote

Prohibited content also includes any of the following: 

Content that infringes any rights. 

And our Roleplaying rules:

Quote

Metagaming. Taking OOC knowledge IC in order to gain or improve upon yourself. This includes hearing people talking about planning troop movements on Discord and suddenly you know about it IC. This is poor sportsmanship and will not be tolerated, no questions asked.

Powergaming. Forcing an action upon your opponent without their permission or consultation. This would be me firing a missile at an Orioni warship and having it hit and destroy it in the same post. This prevents Orioni from being able to do anything to prevent this. If we talked about it on Discord and planned that post to condense things, that's fine. Otherwise, it's not allowed.

 

Edited July 8, 2018 by Vocenae (see edit history)

[Seylos]

Since this is labeled as a public discussion about these non-active nations I'd just like to throw in this rule here that does at least mention what "should" be done in situations like this. (Also for the record I don't really have any stake in any of this just pointing something out.)

Quote

Expansion is always a hot topic. The same goes for removing nations. Be sure to read 

4.1 Reduction

Shrinking a nation happens when it ceases to exist. Usually, you are granted a grace period some weeks to return.

After a long absence, your nation will be reduced to the area around your capital. Your nation will be considered to be in crisis.

An exception can be granted for nations with a considerable contribution to RP.

This is from the Map Applications & Release thread.

www.europans.com/topic/4305-map-v4-applications-releases/

I know other people have mentioned it's rarely been used but I mean it was created for a purpose at some point, and if it isn't something people like then another more concrete rule should be made.

Edited July 8, 2018 by Seylos (see edit history)

[Vocenae]

This is the second time posting this. Abusing your moderation powers is not how you run a community, guys. You have a responsibility, regardless of how you feel about individual players, to uphold the rules without bias.

___________

Just for clarification regarding my nation in response to the above post (bolded emphasis mine):

Quote

With this latest update, I have some questions regarding former nations. I know we have had this question before, but still I am unsure how to proceed. Between the previous update and today, we saw the disappearance of (in alphabetical order):

* Adaptus

* Ide Jima

* Jilderen

* Vetok

 

In the past, what we did with former nations, was: if their contribution to our RP canon was considerable, they were allowed to remain on the map. However, their footprint was reduced to the single plot that contained their capital city. (Vocenae being an exception here, retaining all lands.)

 

Since I expect all for of the above nations to re-appear, I am reluctant to reduce their footprint. What would be an adequate grace period?

 

[Variota]

Please note: At the current time and after asking around and investigating, there is no indication that anything has happened to any post by Vocenae within this thread be it malignantly or with reason. I, as a moderator and as a person, regret that Vocenae has felt the need to accuse the moderation team of abuse. Each member of this community is free to think what they want about the moderation team or individual members of said team, however empty accusations are not a way through which we are able to foster a beneficial, fun, fair and friendly community, which is something that I feel that all of us on the Discord and here on the forums are out to do and in fact do. It is neither the way through which one effectively battles any perceived, be it imaginary or existing, abuse.

As in the other thread, I will state this to Vocenae before closing this thread: Keep in mind that the general situation as you created it yourself by your actions, speech, tone of speech, intended and or perceived actions and more both here and in other threads is a complicated one. At the moment, the moderation team is coming together to reach a consensus on what should be done in order to end up with a beneficial situation. Not only for the community as a whole at this moment but also for the future. As such, I would request that you simply wait and refrain from further accusations until a beneficial solution has been produced.

For members wondering why I have locked this: As stated, moderation is currently working together to reach a consensus to provide a beneficial solution for the community as a whole now and in the future. We, as moderators but also as players, are all about fostering a creative, fun community that will grow over the years. Looking at the Discord, looking at the forums, I think I can safely say that at this moment, with the members we have, that IS what we are doing. Like a good family or a good group of friends, we have our spats but in the end, the community is one of positive energy. The solution that the moderation team is seeking is one that will allow us to continue fostering that, growing that without issues. At the moment, finding that solution is taking some time as we want to be absolutely sure that this solution is a major one, one that removes all major issues. Rest assured that the moderation team IS working for you, one of the unique players and minds that make our community as it is, a great one. But like all good things, this takes some time.