The PPC Posting Board - Latest posts

Always nice to get new members. Here, have a copy of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - surreal and artistic in spades.

I personally feel like they should be treated like the US Congress treats them. They do not factor into an actual vote. That's how you can have the Senate unanimously confirm a nomination with 92 votes instead of the actual unanimous 100. So for our purposes it is 17-13 in favor of a ban.

As for board moderators it would be 15-6 against moderators.

Please don't mind the huge gory mess down below, by the way. It's a thankfully rare occurrence around here and we're normally a lot more cordial and friendly bunch than... well... we as a community were a few days ago. -_-' Thank goodness it's dying down, though, I believe.

Also, glad to see another Steven Universe fan! Have one of my own shed feathers and a plush toy of Lion!

...a vigilante.

Crime through the roof? Unemployment rising? Poverty going up?

If you're not careful, you'll start seeing vigilantes spring up, and where one vigilante rises, five more soon follow. And then you've got a mess with them starting to be labeled superheros, or at least working unofficially with the police...and, well. You can't have that.

My suggestion as Super-Analyst? Cut police funding. Encourage super-villains--better yet, encourage *smart* super-villains. Import them from other places, if need be--increase immigration but don't increase funding to support immigrants. And raise the cost of living. As conditions turn harder, comic books suggest that super-villains will rise. (Varieties include the "I will make my city better and squash all vigilantes trying to stop me"--you may eventually be assassinated by one of them, of course, but that seems to be your goal, no? It can't hurt!)

As for the squatters...if you wish to increase super-villainy rates (do you? Of course you do!) my super-analysis is that evicting the squatters will provide more angry people to become super-villains' minions! Wins all around. Well, sort of. The super-villains win, I guess.

((hopefully it's okay to join the advice giving two years in? If not, feel free to go 'who is this what are you doing here' in character or something, or else just let me know OOC. Couldn't resist, though :D))

~Zing

Still not king.

Oh, I admit it's been a good year:



We've crushed the legal system. We've destroyed our intelligence community. We've ended foreign aid and prohibited alcohol - those were our first actions this year. We've swung the employer-worker balance entirely over to employers - we've even permitted child labour!

And we have a black market. We have tax evaders. We have class warfare and riots.

But we don't. Have. The hate.



Our number one haters are the Liberals and Socialists, but there are still too many reasons for them to like us. Look at these plots!




We're halfway through our term. If we don't shape up, we're going to be voted out - an ignominious end indeed! I'd much rather be killed.




Solve it.

hS FC

Oh, and there's some people we need to deal with. Let me know.

This is our final meeting. In four quarters, we will find out the result.

PM hS

Housekeeping first: the Minister for Surprisingly Important Things has taken a leave of absence. I'm sure the lack of his counsel will be noticed.

Folks, I've gotta tell you, we were able to do everything we agreed on. Bank bonuses? Limited. Alcohol tax? Raised. Drugs? Legalised and taxed. Cuts? Made, mostly in road building (which will cut car use, and improve our environment).

Now, some of you may have heard the damning news reports back in the first quarter - the ones that ignored the strike we'd just put an end to, and focussed on the way our credit rating had just been downgraded yet again. And yes, it's true that our policies led to a brain drain on our country, and rampant drug addiction. But we've been countering those!

We've reduced the luxury goods tax to half the brain drain. We've boosted the health system to counter the drug issue. We've helped out the environment with a recycling initiative, and we've even found the funds to increase police presence. Heck, this last quarter, we won a major aerospace contract! Check out these beauties:










Yes, you read that right: we are on course to win this election! Keep it up, folks, we're doing great.

Now, I admit, there are still problems. The brain drain has killed our economy back off:



(Though our technological backwater status is about to go away, helping with that.)

And the capitalist terrorists named after cake are coming for us:



But our policies are working! Our people like us... slightly more than average! Stay the course, loyal ministers.




PM hS

((Democracy 3! The game for anyone who ever looked at their workday and thought "needs more spreadsheets!".))

Borg jokes aside, welcome to the PPC! I'm Jay, call me AC.

For your newbie gift, I give you a Portable Awesomeness Dispenser. Guaranteed to instantly make you temporarily more awesome with one squirt.

One last word: have fun!

I have a pretty big variety of things I'm into, but my top four would be Steven Universe, Superjail!, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Mega Man, Steven Universe in particular. Peridotisbestgemshesperfect

I think it was the original series that got me into this in the first place; I am a sucker for lampoons with a dash of professionality. (I should probably start talking like a normal person, but normal is boring.)

Hello there. Have a pile of colourful pens.

Come on in, grab a seat by the fire, and leave your sanity at the door! Do be sure to leave it on the coat rack, though, it gets terribly dusty on the floor in here.

So, since I seem to be the first one to welcome you, much I ask if you have any particular fandoms? Useful talking point, that. Helps us get to know you. I should also point you to the links to the Constitution and the Original Series, conveniently located at the top of the page, if you haven't already read them.

I also present to you my traditional Newbie gift, a Replica Holocron, perfect for storing all manner of arcane knowledge. You can also have a Steampunk walking stick, complete with fancy brass compass and such. Just in case you're not a Star Wars fan.

Well, that's everything I can think of, welcome to the PPC!

Sure, some very serious mistakes were made with the July situation, but I'm not as convinced as you are that this is a pervasive issue.

However, you have a valid point there. That is, I agree we need to be a lot more careful about not using the Discord to pre-frame a discussion before it comes up on the Board. There's probably a better wording for the rule that will catch that sort of thing while permitting the significantly more frequent conversation that goes

A: [does something that's a bit uncool, like swearing or starting to veer into getting snipy at someone]
B: You shouldn't do the thing/edit your post/...
A: Sorry. [if possible, fixes the thing]

which I'm firmly convinced is not a Board-level issue

It's been a week, and we've seen 31 people vote, which is a large enough sample of the community to be representative (last few times I tried to count, the PPC had about 40 to 50 members). We also haven't seen "too many" abstains or calls to wait a bit, so that's not a validity issue either.

I personally feel that permabans need at least 2/3rds vote to stick. However, this was a vote on a temporary ban, so it's a lot less clear what the vote threshold should be. Then again, PPC votes are to a consensus, not a majority, and it's best to err on the side of caution with the sanctioning. So, I'm going to decide that there was no clear consensus on my ban, but that there was a very clear trend in favor of it that can't be ignored.

Despite this uncertainty, I think I need to be banned for a bit, and there's no reason I can't be harsher on myself than the community is. I made a terrible mistake that caused serious harm to July. There need to be consequences for that, and I personally don't feel punished enough by the apologies and the resignation.

Therefore, I'm announcing my ban from the PPC for 2-3 months. That is, until some point between May 23 and June 23 (I expect it'll be in early June) I won't be:
- Posting on the Board
- Present in the Discord
- Editing the wiki

I considered just muting myself on the Discord, but that felt like it would soften one of the parts of getting banned that feels bad, so I won't be doing that.

One exception: if I come up in the grievances thread next month, or if there is any voting, I'll be participating in those discussions. (well, also, I'll finish the discussion(s) I'm currently involved in if they get continued, but not drag them out)

I'll stay available by email (clickable above) and by Discord PM (I'm Tomash#8833) if anyone wants to keep in touch.

If the T-Board or archives have problems, please do contact me. I'll still be available to fix them.

As to the moderator vote, I'm going to propose a result, which everyone should feel free to ignore. Of the 21 people who voted, 70% of them (15 / 21 is about 0.7) are opposed to mods, which is a strong indicator that the community as a whole isn't particularly keen on the idea. That means that the result is no mods.

In a thread below, Maslab and Delta Juliette appear to have been elected Discord mods by 11 votes and no objections. Since that's not a sanction, and it looks like everyone either supports this or doesn't care enough to object, I think we can declare that election concluded.

On the mutes, I don't think we have enough participation to impose that sanction. However, I think that the people whose mutes are being called for should consider voluntarily muting themselves for a while.

So, yeah, bye guys. Sorry for my part in all this mess.

"We're still just discussing what should be done to about July. Once we've come to some conclusions - gotten past the knee-jerk stage of things, reached a starting point for the proper debate - then we'll take it to the Board."

Remind me again how good the Discord's judgement is of what's appropriate?

hS

So I've been lurking about on the forums for a while, and I decided to make myself known. I'm Garrulous, and I'm a guy whose into all things surreal and artistic. Nice meeting y'all.

I think you're being a tiny bit too absolutist here. For example, those "negative decisions" often serve as a useful reality check to keep knee-jerk reactions off the Board.

However, I certainly support Rule N: "Substantive discussion about the PPC community or canon should be kept on the Board."

Hey, at least you get two votes, right? :-,

Yeah, I'm gonna go edit that for recordkeeping purposes.

I am very unclear how anyone can view the Discord - which you can access just by clicking a link, and which is infinitely searchable apparently - as any more private than the Board. But for some reason, people did think that.

hS

We agree with our esteemed colleagues on the alcohol tax. We also agree that cuts must be made, but we do not know to what areas.

Distressing Statistics might be correct on tax breaks for foreign investors, but I would like to wait another year to see how our agreed upon measures do, before we move on this.

We also support the SIT proposal to legalize and tax certain drugs.

We would also like to vote in favor of limiting banking bonuses. It will likely cause that money to be reinvested in the business (hiring more workers, perhaps) or invested elsewhere in the economy.

-Phobos, MoSH

Not that it changes the tally, but I definitely did not vote for a ban.

I think there's a difference between doxxing classically (spreading someone's identifying details publicly, with an intent to harass/get them attacked) and not editing someone's real name out of a screenshot in a place you thought was private, only to realize it wasn't private.

For that reason, I don't consider what Tomash did consistent with punishing someone for "doxxing".

If the gain in revenue from new business would outweigh the direct tax losses, do it. Otherwise, don't.

Alcohol is out. The legal system is out. Guns are in. Foreign aid is out. Any nonsense which provides 'rights' for 'workers' is out, smashed, and gone. The Socialists and the Liberals will be lining up to take us out.

Good! Your hate has made you... powerful!

hS FC

It looks like DisStat, ICAff, and SuImThi are all in favour of raising the alcohol tax, and using the money to fund our efforts. There's also a 2:1 agreement that we need to make cuts, though not in our areas of interest; I'll see if there's anything unpopular that we can slash.

Distressing Statistics has proposed giving tax breaks to foreign investors. Surprisingly Important Things suggests legalising and taxing some drugs.

Unfortunately there is no agreement yet on the banking bonuses; unless someone else can comment, I'll have to make the decision myself.

PM hS

((About three hours to go))

And take your time, I don't mind.