Cyril

The moment you realize the new upgrade came with GIPHY.

Hello. I wanted to say a few things.

(1) Based on the community meeting, I will be taking a more active role on the OOC side of the forum. That primarily means I'll be more involved with OOC discipline.

(2) I've removed the telegram link to the Main Chat from the front page. While I'll still keep our admin powers, at least for now, on the chat, the fact is, on the front page it meant the chat represented the site and thus me as owner of the site. I wasn't comfortable with some of the content of the chat representing the site, and thus me as the owner, and thus the chat will no longer be on the main page.

We were going to split the chat but the feedback we got from the community meeting suggested you guys didn't like the idea. Thus we are keeping the chat whole.

I have given 2 points to @MrAnderson for some comments that violated the "Don't Be A Dick" rule on Telegram. This is a reminder to the community that what you do on telegram can have consequences on this forum. We ask that you be civil and respectful of other people on the chat. We are all very passionate about our politics and even if you disagree with someone, it's no excuse to insult them.

I like MrAnderson and I think he's a good person. But he blatantly crossed a line. The rules apply to everyone, even to the admin members who had helped establish the game. We are very thankful to them, of course, but we expect them to follow the same rules as other members of the community.

I have received a telegram message from the now banned user @Shiggy on telegram.

I honestly was not implying anything of the sort. I was referencing a song by Gwen (who played AGS) who was making reference to actual conversations in AGS.

I am actually horrified that it was taken taht literally because it was not at all how I intended it.....in fact I intended no ill will towards vandy or any of the other administrators.

I sincerely apologize for the quote and any sordid insinuation. It was not my intention and I am truly sorry.

I am not asking to be unbanned. All I ask, is that you post this apology. I honestly did not mean for this to turn into a battle with the AB or insinuating anything so sinister.

I have decided to post this apology as he asked since I believe everyone has the right to apologize for any offense given.

@Ollie had set up the VGS Main Chat as CA. This meant he was the only one who could remove admins and while he gave us the ability to add admins, it basically meant we couldn't ensure the VGS admins are the ones on the AB. As Owner, I have set up a new main chat that we will be using. This way no matter who is CA, I or the current CA can remove/add admins at will.

You can find the new chat by following the pinned link in the old chat, by clicking the link on the front page, or by clicking the link at the bottom of this post.

https://t.me/joinchat/BDsV7VHPwcqIc6XIP86NSw

@Vandy is the new Chief Administrator. All hail your new overlord.

I don't know if any of you have noticed but with @Ollie having real life commitments keeping him from the game, I do think it's time I hire a new Chief Administrator.

So here is where I'm at: I think the game hit the ground running, we were doing well during election season, but as it always happens during the legislative part of the game, activity dies down. It seems players simply aren't interested in participating in House/Senate debates enough to keep the game going. Not only that but the AB is being presented with real life that means they haven't been as active as they'd like.

So how do we solve this without shutting the game down? I'm going to use the "r" word: I don't think a reset will fix any issues. I think we'll all get excited, people will sign in, people will run for office, and then during the break between elections, we'll be seeing the same issue. We saw it time and time again in VUSA and I don't want VGS to start that cycle. I also feel like activity is too dependent on the AB. We need an active AB but it should be players, not the AB, that generate activity.

We need a new Chief Administrator that will hopefully be able to step in, shape an AB to address activity issues, AND figure out a way to get people engaged in governing when they don't seem interested in doing that....or becoming WAY more focused on elections. Problem is we don't have THAT many members so....forming a new AB is going to be tough. I don't have the time, the will, or the energy to be that CA. Nobody in the AB is that person either, they've made that clear.

So I'm going to the player base. If you want to be CA and you think you can address the challenges of this reset, I welcome you to apply. But I'm going to be very clear: I don't think it's time for a reset. If we can't make THIS reset work, this early, we won't make ANY reset work. You will be able to change the calendar, make all the gameplay adjustments you want, but a reset is off the table.

I also encourage all of you to stop doing nothing. Start doing PRs. Start participating in debates. Start doing stuff. Start actually playing and stop worrying about whether or not the AB will write about it. If we can't make this reset work, the game won't work. And we can't make the reset work if players just wait for a reset or they wait for the AB to act. Play the game, have fun, and give feedback.

Dioxyribosenucleicacid was accidentally given universal mod powers which he instantly abused, deleting content he didn't like and hiding other content.

I am permanently banning him. The GOP is advised to seek the AB to see about deleted content.

I have made a small change in the way the Contact Us button works. It used to send an e-mail straight to my inbox but since some people might use the button that the AB is better suited to answer, it will now create a support ticket.

I have requested an update to the latest version of the software. This is mostly fixing bugs but there may be some light downtime during the update.

I've been asked by Invision to update our DNS name servers as they make some changes to the back-end. Hopefully nobody should notice on the front-end but during the next 48 hours if there's any issues, that's why. I apologize for the inconvenience.

America was sadly super homophobic in 1998.

We do welcome LGBT members to join the forum and our community though!

17 minutes ago, Wilder said:

So I attempted to send a PM, only to be told that I am allowed to send 0 messages per minute? I'm not really sure what to do

Try now. 

@Ollie or the rest of the AB might change your PM limits and settings later but for now they should let you PM people.

These aren't GAME announcements but rather community or forum announcements. As such I am dedicating this thread to announcements from me. For the most part, you can ignore this thread but it's my way of keeping you guys informed with what I'm doing. And of boring you.

[*] Long quotes will now be shortened to 5 lines. There will be a "read more" button added at the bottom.

[*] I've installed a currency mod. It will be up to the AB if, when, and how it's used.

[*] My posts are now SPECIAL in they have a special background. Pretty cool, right? No? Well too bad. I like it.

[*] Members can now set up 2-factor authentication to better protect their account. Any member with access to the AdminCP MUST use 2-factor authentication.

[*] There is now a Guidelines link at the top menu (under Miscellaneous) that takes you to the Terms of Service.

Also:

[*] If you know how to effectively use Facebook ads, please contact me. I'm not saying I'm going to run Facebook ads but I'm also not saying I won't.

Can I just say I'm extremely pleased with the work @Ollie and @Kemal Bora and @Baudin and @MrAnderson and @Avner and @Ben are doing right now? They set up not just the game but most of the forum from scratch with very little assistance from me so this is all on them. One of them even did the logo! All I did was set up the domain, set up the forum on server software, and installed a couple mods. So a big round of applause to them for getting this game off it's feet.

I hope your all as excited as I am for VGS to really kick off.