There has been quite a number of threads that have sprung up recently where we have players, clans and admins unhappy over placements for the NQR. There is a lot of people that are unhappy, admins and players alike. Each of these threads start off with a grievance and ends up going off topic and going nowhere. This is leading to increased frustration for everyone and general unhappiness in the commmunity.
Well what I would like to see is the following:
Can a Quakeworld steering committee be set up which is made up of people covering all aspects of the qw community. Important issues that need to be addressed regarding the future of qw and the best policies to be put forward are discussed in a proper forum with proper meeting etiquette .
Discussions should be chaired by an independent person to keep issues on topic. I think the qw community needs a bit off organized direction. Any organiztion should have some management in order to help keep some order and to help resolve issues so that there is some fairness in how issues are raised and dealt with.
I'd like to see this happen so the leagues can request assistance in recruiting coders, writers, admins etc from a committee who get together and work out a solution. Same goes for people with issues. Players etc can raise issues to the steering committee who endeavour to deal with any issue in a fair and transparent manner.
People will rubbish this idea like they do with everything. But the idea should be considered and expanded upon. I would like to see a representation from some of the old mature heads - Active and inactive and also rookies to gold players, Code developers, writers, client developers, league admins etc.
So balanced and varied views are given to any future development or issue.
Any comments on a format for a committee or on what you think about the idea ?
(I placed this here as it was buried in another thread and not really visible)
Ihalainen: Not sure where you are coming for with a 'manager-tightwallet-superstar-council' I think its missing my point and a flippant remark.
Whether "QW is free, totally and completely..." has nothing to do with it.
At the moment regardless, there are plenty of disputes being vented aimlessly on QW.nu forums and they dont get resolved and just result in more annoyance and frustration. This is leaving admins pissed off and wondering why they bother. How many admins have dropped out in the past years over these problems. On the other side we have clans going inactive because they feel they are not listened to. Can we afford to continuing losing admins and players. I think the community is too small for that.
And yet its the same issues that continuously pop up each season and each year. Would it not make sense to put a few old heads together and try and come up with a solution to all this issues when they happen than leaving it all fall on the same few people ?
I am guessing from your comment that you are afraid of some sort of elite group that drags things down in red tape. Don't worry that certainly is not what I was suggesting
All it should be is a representation from everyone right across the board who have a passion for the game and who can help get resources for projects when needed, offer advice and help mediate in disputes. All these people already do this for free anyway and are often involved in discussions. It just puts a bit more structure to it and ensures that problems people have, do actually get addressed and don't just end up an unfinished dispute on a thread that dies. Quite simple really.
I think that everyone should read the threads on qw.nu forums and on nqr11 comments sections completely and you will see just how pointless and completely off topic the arguments become. You will then understand a bit where I am coming from. There are some great points made on both sides that get lost in pure rubbish and one line snide remarks. Its a pity really and it you get dizzy reading some of it.
I for one had offered to help out as an Admin in the next EQl. Purely because they needed people. But its unlikely that I am gonna participate now unless things improve. It just ain't worth the hassle I'm afraid. There are few people as it is that are prepared to help out. Ignition, Duelmania, Ownage 1 cant get admins. And also EQL ended up with one active admin last season.
Imo this isn't the right way to goo either. Big problems often have easy solutions?
I think the biggest problem so far is communication and pre set rules. As for the NQR-dispute i first thought of recommending some "pre-season" league to get a better pictue of clans overall. And after that everyone could state their oppinion about things. There really seemed to be a lot, and I mean A LOT of whine, complaints, whatever you wanna call it, before this NQR season even started. And later on, after some games had been played, much of the complaints turned out to be ... just stupid and incorrect?
"We are gonna get raped by team X" - Isn't a valid complaint imo. "We have been totally raped by team X" - That's fact and actually worth something.
Hmm, correction: "biggest problem is Lack of pre defined rules" regarding a clans skill level and where to put them. Would like to see a better dialogue with clans and force them to back up their complaints with actual facts and not guesses.
"Imo this isn't the right way to goo either." You say no but why not. Please explain. A grouping of people to discuss things is simple. It could be created for example only to intervene in certain cases and to perhaps offer some advice or direction. It can be as simple or complicated as one wants it to be. Thats what should be discussed here. For example It could be set up for just 2 weeks to set out a fair grouping system and template for all league in the future and then disbanded once the community is agreed. You can't just say no with a vague cliched remark like "Big problems often have easy solutions"
Please at least discuss this taking in the advantages and disadvantages
"Would like to see a better dialogue with clans and force"
This is exactly what i am suggesting. Better dialogue between all concerned parties. And they way to have that is that you have a mediator that keeps people on topic and prevent people throwing in stupid un-thought out responses.
"everything that minimizes drama is bad for qw!"
The drama is going to happen anyway, don't worry Just maybe though that more people will come away feeling they have been heard and some pressure taking off the backs of Admins.
and ake_vader More are just not online right now! IM NOT IN QW HC! and they actually got very little power its mostly for discussing stuff but never putting any action in (LOL PURITY)
I make sure to solve the issues i recognise as important and interesting ones by myself. I don't think i would be that much more efficient with a "council", but maybe that's because i already have a quite decent "network" of people i cooperate with and personal skills (programming) already, i dunno. The NQR crew asked me before the season begun if i wanted to fix their website but i turned down the offer as i really didn't feel up for it and the task wasn't really interesting.
Please don't use the word council in this Its not what I am getting at all and sounds bad. What I really am putting forward is just a more disciplined way for people to discuss issues with proper meeting etiquette. So that we don't have a good discussion ruined by people with stupid one liners where they start being pedantic and ignore the real meaning of some one else's arguments. I can give countless examples in real life where this bloody helps. We are all supposed to be mature here
maybe set a player for each division in the league who has a good insight into that division, and any disputes about placement can be discussed with him. OR when a teams signs up for eql/nqr email the clan leaders when the group placments are made and they can either say YES im fine with bronze/silver/gold or NO im not.. but with a vaild reason from the clan leader as to why not, not ramdom comments in form's from radom people not effected by the decision......
It's a nice idea, here's a summary how I imagine it could work: - There will be a group of people like there already is around qw.nu - already done, just updating the list of people from time to time is necessary - There will be a well known, well defined way how to contact this group (e.g. publicly available webpage form you fill in, then they invite you somewhere to join the discussion...) - It will be known what this group offers (like you say - consulting, talking to public, using personal contacts net to get people, like coders, graphics, etc.)
What Sassa is describing is pretty much the Quakeworld.nu private channel along with some people we think are valuable assets to the scene. It only makes sense to invite people who are involved in the development of various mods etc to get sound discussions on the current topics.
I'm not sure what the difference of such a group mentioned in the main post would be though. If people won't volunteer to do some news writing/whatever after a .qw, what would make them volunteer after i, or whoever else, have talked to them?
really good post pleura, As myself being one of those topic authors I felt that already from the first replies when 2ppl hadn't get the point at all of my post it went totally off topic and to hell. with flames and anger..
Ake Vader: Okay. First off I am also a member of qw.nu private channel so I am familiar with it and its importance. In relation to my point and follow up posts is this: The qw.nu private channel is just that. Its private. Some of the members never make any visible contributions to posts on this website or any of the others, giving any leadership or guidance in disputes. If they did it would in my opinion really help. That is not to knock the invisible things they do behind the scenes. And also many of the members do indeed get involved in offering advice.
It would be good to see that grouping set out a different public forum where issues/disputes can he handled and dealt in a transparent and fair manner as I discussed in my follow up posts above. This doesnt have to change the qw.nu channel and its current function.
JohnNy_cz: What Johny is saying is exactly what I am getting at
Johnie: Thanks for your constructive input. Just on this though. As an example I helped organize the Rookie clans for the current NQR. I had a good idea as to the abilities of most of the clans and was asked for advice on them when placements were being done. However we still ended up with a situation where an unkown player ended up in a new clan and he completely lopsided the 3 games he played in. Thankfully that player opted to step down in fairness but there was debate as to whether he should have been pressurised in the first place. This situation is happening all the time in other divisions as well and is hard to predict or prevent.
It is how it is dealt with is the real issue I have though. Is their a consistent way of dealing with a situation like this ? Is their a fare way of handling complaints. Is their any leadership going forward for all leagues as to a fair system that applies to all leagues ?
Dont have time for a longer reply on this until later. Thankfully say you all
Lads, it's all about the glasnost. This community of Quake players is so flipping small that anyone who tries to carve themselves an echelon "sub rosa" is playing the ego game. A private council, however honourable its intentions may be, is unnecessarily undemocratic and outright insulting to the disenfranchised majority. It is easy to delude yourself into thinking that the "doers" are better off making executive decisions on behalf of the community, but if there is hope, it lies in the proles.
What I like about Pleura's proposal is the notion of mediated discussion. I've hardly been here a wet week and my eyebrows are singed by a raging inferno of pent up frustration and age-old grudges that gets unleashed whenever I raise my voice above a squeaky little whisper. The quality of debate around here is not particularly high. I said this before, but if you want to fairly represent the community as a whole, look to the clan leaders. These are the people who really drive the community, and they are the key to communicating with every player.
Want to make fallbunny standard? Why not get all the clan leaders to vote on behalf of their clans. I know that this has been done before, voting for fakeshaft or something? and it looks like a good fit to me. Every clan I've ever been in is relatively in harmony, and can come to a consensus on any decision. The alternative is to give a voice and a vote to every registered QW player on an open forum with a straight forward poll, that is a bit messier because you have to deal with aliasers and lamers and fake people, etc., but it has the added advantage of taking into account the duel players and free agents that are floating around the place.
Most disputes online stem from a lack of transparency. A couple of like-minded individuals make a decision among themselves that affects everyone. Their opposites are going to be pissed off. I agree that the key is improving dialogues with clans. The way I see your "steering committee", pleura, is an open forum or even mailing list with all the clan leaders and whomever else wants to join, where issues are freely debated (I know people are going to say it's already there yak yak yak). Fact is, most people are not going to get involved, and that doesn't matter, because at the end of the day, when a decision needs to be made, it will be transparent and reasonably democratic. Involving the clan leaders introduces a shared responsibility - that in itself will filter out most of the childish bullshit, and will also lead to slightly increased participation on some matters.
However, this does not fix the issue of NQR disputes or EQL disputes or Serve-me disputes or anything that is not owned by the community. Whoever runs the NQR is entitled to have a rule that says "The changes made by the NQR Crew are not open to public discussion." I think it is stupid to have a rule like this, but whatever, it's your ball. League admins are fallible and it is inevitable that some decisions will be illogical. Refusing to make public the reasons behind them is always going to rub people the wrong way.
Pleura, It is good to hash these things out occasionally, you're dead right to post your thoughts and everyone else who replied. Say what is on your mind always, and as long as you're being somewhat civil then nobody has the right to try and get you to shut up. In the end you tease out these things bit by bit until it's all unraveled. There is no need for all the stupid petty anger and childish stuff, the average age here has to be 26+, right?
In summary, the most important thing we can achieve, as some people said, is to improve dialogue between the clans. If you have a consensus or at least a majority among the clans, then this will carry a lot of influence which can be used to pressure the NQR into changing some policy, or whatever. How we execute this really depends on what kind of issues are still outstanding.
p.s., this would be better on a forum where you can use the quote function and stuff like that.
i don't like the idea at all. what could a committee of some kind achieve that's not being worked on already? i would hate to feel like there is the average quake player on one side of the fence and some high and mighty comittee on the other. from my point of view all of the good things that have happened to qw in the last couple of years came from people that felt _free_ not obliged to contribute something. be it organizing tournaments, coding for ezquake, helping with www stuff - so much more... i could be wrong and there might be a small and secret society that i'm not aware of, that is planning stuff and making the important decisions, but that's not how i think it should work and if it already does then i have to say i'm surprised and disapponted, too.
I think it's still not well explained what exactly would it be. How would the group decide? (I don't even agree with lots of developers with various development topics, can't imagine how more people would agree on topics like pleura's example of latest NQR Bronze div stuff) What other things would this group decide? Please write a new blog entry where you'll sum it up again a bit. Comment other people comments, etc.
I think we are onto the same thing dEus - people will always work on the stuff they find interesting for them, and that kind of stuff they can probably find their way to already.
Yea, also new people will join and old people will leave, that's another thing .. having a place where you could keep up-to-date list of people who are "available".
On the "resource" problem: how about implementing such a thing right here on qw.nu? Users could fill in their skills in the profile and whether they are available/want to work at the moment. A list of available resources (users) could then be generated.
The profiles could also somewhat be managed by the qw.nu crew if they know someone has gone idle etc. Untick "available" if someone hasn't been seen online for the last three months and so on.
It won't solve any problems that requires discussion, but maybe it would be easier for people to know how to contribute.
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