AS,

This post is the basis for a poll open to all DS.
The goal of the poll is to find out which percentage of DS members active on the website (roughly about 2/3rd of DS) supports my proposal on how to approach DS management in the period November 2009 - July 2010.

Consequences of the poll
Consequences of the poll can be as follows:
Scenario 1. If less than 25 people vote within 2 weeks time (before Saturday November 7th), I will step down as Community manager at the 8th of November. In this scenerio I conclude too few DS members care sufficiently about the course of DS as a community, so any proposal on this field can only fail. The number of 25 votes is what -on average in DS polls- can be seen as relatively high: as we should be able to expect in a matter of this importance.
Scenario 2. If a majority of 70% or more supports the proposal, I will communicate to DS' division leaders a request of staying Community manager till the annual DS party in June/July, during which I will make sure that execution of the proposal takes place successfully.
Scenario 3. If less than 70% supports the proposal, I will step down as Community manager at the 8th of November. In this scenario it is up to DS to find a new leader.
Needless to say, I draw my conclusions based on behaviour of DS as a group; I will not hold individual people responsible.

The management proposal for period November 2009 - July 2010
In order for me to remain Community manager, several matters should be agreed upon, which are necessary for me to feel that being Community manager of DS actually has a purpose.
It concerns 3 elements of concrete change in DS:
1. DS respects itself as a community and its members.
2. Divisions actively seek connection to the community.
3. Division leaders/officers actively represent the community.
It concerns 3 concrete missions for the period November 2009 - July 2010.
1. Each division leader makes concrete agreements with each individual officer of the division it concerns about their behaviour towards other DS members. These agreements are aimed at concrete actions with the goal to take DS as a community seriously to the extent that increasing connection between the division and the community can take place. The exact contents of agreements are left up to division leaders and officers to decide on: assistance of the Community managers is available when requested.
2. Each division leader, assisted by the officers of the division it concerns, makes a concrete plan about how to create more connection between the division and DS as a community. This plan involves concrete actions and places responsibility in the hands of specific people assigned to work on executing the plan. The exact contents of the plan are left up to division leaders and officers: assistance of the Community managers is available when requested.
3. Division leaders and officers put serious effort into becoming active representatives of the DS community by:
- introducing DS mentorship (in its current form) into the division,
- introducing Officer training (in a form yet to be determined by the Community manager and division leaders).

Explanation of the elements of change
DS has 1 major problem: lack of connection between divisions and community. I explained my view on this matter in this post, in part 'Challenges that are left'.
Hence my proposal is a suggestion concerning how to deal with this problem. The approach I think is best, based on 8 years of DS leadership and management experience outside DS, is based on three elements of change that are necessary for survival of DS. Should these changes not take place soon, I estimate that within one year or at most two years DS will cease to exist.

Part 1. DS respects itself as a community and its members
Changing a way of thinking can happen step by step through adjusting to new situations: as you can read in my earlier post, this didn't work when it concerned divisions' vision on DS as a community. It was usually saying yes and doing no.
The other way is to take a specific moment in time at which the concrete decision is made to from then on treat a situation differently. This is what part 1 of my proposal relates to.
DS as a community must take itself seriously: being socially involved with other people -also when it concerns online contact- is not 'only' a game.
The fact that DS as a community takes place online usually does not make the people that you meet in DS less real: they are still people who appreciate it that you live after agreements, that you listen to them when they want to tell you something, that you take them seriously. DS lacks awareness of this fact, because it is all too easy to not take people seriously when there's two pc's and a long distance internet connection in between: to say something just to shut someone up, to remain passive, to not take advice of others into serious consideration, and so forth.
But being 'serious' in a social context is not the equivalent of being 'boring', it is the equivalent of being 'respectful'. Hence I write this long post not to do something extremely boring, I write this because I take DS seriously and respect its members. And without respect for one another DS as a community cannot survive.
Things mentioned above relate to a change of mindset. Under the current circumstances it is not something that can be taught, advised, or urged. It is something that people must either accept or reject to then stick to the decision made. And when decided upon, dare to confront each other when others are falling back into a pattern of disrespectfulness.

For example: it just cannot be that officers of DS divisions state right in your face that they don't care much about DS as a community. This is completely disrespectful towards DS in the worst way possible.
Currently however, such statements have been incorporated as rather normal hence not worth paying special attention to from the it's only a game perspective.
This type of situations should be entirely wiped out in DS. If you don't take DS seriously, you essentially don't respect the people in it, thus you shouldn't be in DS.

Part 2. Divisions actively seek connection to the community
Although there are goals, a mission and a strategy for DS as a community, I noticed practically none of the divisions have used this information to position themselves in the game it concerns. This needs to change.
In my opinion, division leaders and officers should be made aware of the options that the community offers. These will defer per game and the experience level of the leaders/officers it concerns, hence there need to be meetings organised specifically aimed at determining how the community can help its divisions becoming connected to DS.
'DS has no added value' is no valid outcome of these meetings: DS divisions are in DS, thus part of DS, meaning connection to DS is a given fact.
The leading argument and most important goal for áll divisions of DS at áll times is remaining connected to DS as a community, because it is the community that determines divisions' uniqueness.

For example: pressure from unwilling members, who care about nothing usually than their own gear/dps/level/status/etcetera, does not mean distance is taken from DS, but means the recruitment method is changed. A fundamental change of mindset from what divisions are currently doing: currently divisions are lead by their members, who (ironically, but very logical from the average selfish point of view) lead divisions ever further away from DS as a community, as they're never taught to care about DS.

Part 3. Division leaders/officers actively represent the community
Currently, representing the community is a problem for all DS divisions. Division leaders and officers lack time, willpower, experience, or a combination of those three to profile their division by using the uniqueness of DS as a community: because new members are are difficult to motivate, because leaders and officers were never properly introduced to DS themselves so can't pass on much knowledge, because in daily life of divisions 'surviving today' is a main goal in itself which leaves no time for any concerns about something distant like the DS community. This must change, if DS as a community wants to survive.
For this situation to change two concrete actions are needed. One long term related action, and one short term related action.

1. DS mentorship (long term): mentorship of new members by introducing them to DS as a community is an absolute must when wanting to create stability for the community in the long run.
The whole structure for this to work is already present, only the mindset in divisions needs to change. Divisions will have to realise that without properly introducing members to the DS community it just cannot ever happen that divisions arive at a point at which its leaders can truly rest assured of their division's survival. Like I mentioned before: recruiting people for any DS division but not properly introducing them to DS as a community is trying to grow a tree but constantly cutting off its roots.

2. Officer training (short term): division leaders and officers need to have a minimal understanding of how DS as a community works. What can be found where, what behaviour can be expected from members, how to deal with overactivity and resistance among people. In short: they need to be made aware of the fact that being leader/officer is about more than teamplay with some people in-game. Namely, also about making DS members part of the DS community, which is one of the main purposes of being leader/officer of a DS division. This understanding is the key element of transferring sense of community membership onto other members of DS, without which DS mentorship would be pointless. Officer training makes leaders/officers not only sources of information about the community, but also representatives of the community that form an example to others.
Currently there is an officer training available. However, the rate with which leaders and officers changed over time makes it better in my opinion to re-discuss which contents the training should have.

For example: currently divisions are overfocused on surviving the well known incident of officers stepping down. This results in having to find new officers, which is usually tough because there are only few people in each division sufficiently equiped to become officer, which means new officers are practically always less experienced than old officers, which shortens the duration of DS officership altogether because stress levels are higher for new officers who -in order to uphold the division's status- are forced to perform at the same level as old officers, which results in a constantly lower standard 'quality of membership' for DS officers. The only short term solution being, as seen widely throughout DS: dropping the most time consuming task of officers, namely remaining connected to the DS community. 'Most time consuming' for the simple reason that the newer the officer the lower the level of involvement in DS. Because once they need to become officer there just never is any time to introduce them to DS as a community. And so also among officers connection to DS as a community gets ever less.
The solution of creating an officer pool and training these people, so that new, trained officers are always available was been settled in DS from the practical perspective earlier this year, but already proved to be very hard from the perspective of changing mindset in divisions: in my opinion officer training is a necessity nonetheless, both for the community and for the individual divisions. Because without officer training the cycle of burning out officers will continue to last and thus forms both an ever greater danger to the stability of DS as a whole, and a major source of demotivation for the individual officers. Founder of Daoine Sidhe,
Founder of Moíra,
Founder of the Travian division,
Founder of the Travians division,
Founder of the Perfect World division.

Rayendir Sidhe I'm saying Ray go for it!! Members of the Secret Society of Pointheads:
-The Wicked
-Gekrulez
As a member of DS I see things running smoothly, so I totally support your idea of staying as Community Manager.

And btw thank you for all the good job it has been done along with division leaders and officers. “There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle; you can live as if everything is a miracle.” Albert Einstein

I choose the second... u? I will have to agree with Kouk here Ray.

Moreover, I have to admit that the fact that you are willing to devote your free time on making such a detailed plan on how DS should function, looks to me like you are the man for the job.

In other words, keep up the good work. "Matters of great concern should be treated lightly.
Matters of small concern should be treated seriously."
Yamamoto Tsunetomo AS Kouklien and Brollthul,

Thank you

I am glad to hear that the both of you experience no trouble in DS, as it points out rightfully that it's definitely not the case that 'all is bad' in DS. That was neither the intention of my post above.

There is however the organisatory level in DS leadership/management (that the average member is not bothered with usually) at which things do not go as smoothly as they should. Especially in the long run these things will cause trouble if left undealt with: we know this based on past experience with DS and its divisions.
And like I mentioned, as Community manager I feel it is my task to set course for dealing with these situations. Otherwise I would be a useless leader.
I hope you can imagine how your daily activities in DS (although I noticed you quit playing WOW just recently, you will be missed) take place on a whole different level than the organisatory things I speak of; hence that you will give my words in the previous post some serious thoughts and choose wisely.
I have no doubt that you will. Founder of Daoine Sidhe,
Founder of Moíra,
Founder of the Travian division,
Founder of the Travians division,
Founder of the Perfect World division.

Rayendir Sidhe I want to say, Keep alive on the site and give us some fun Maybe you come with even better ideas like MSN groups

GReetz Gek Members of the Secret Society of Pointheads:
-The Wicked
-Gekrulez
Thank you both for your kind words!

Both Kouk and I, like the fact that all the people we 've met here so far, are open minded and helpfull. That quality, in my book constitutes for a very strong community.
Because of that, the "details" that Ray is reffering to, are things that we can always solve I think! "Matters of great concern should be treated lightly.
Matters of small concern should be treated seriously."
Yamamoto Tsunetomo First of all, I hope no one takes any offense from what I'm about to write, I simply want to talk about whats on my mind.

So first of all Ray, I do feel you have alot of commitment and good intentions from the spirit of your sayings.
I am, however having a hard time understanding what does this proposal mean.
Therefore I am going to assume you are talking in this article about your intentions to create a connection between the WoW division members to members of other divisions in DS (and please correct me if I am mistaken).

I have been in DS WOW division for a few good months now, and I like the people here alot, and feel happy to call it my guild.
However, since I cannot attend DS parties and do not see other divisions posts as they do not appear in our forum traker, I have rarely talked with anyone outside our division and do not feel an urgent need to do so.

I am currently in this guild thx to the people in it, and wether I leave or stay depends only on my connectinos with them and not on any other person in DS.

So, as for the poll, I'm afraid I will refrain from voting since I'm not inclined this way or the other and am not really sure I even understand its meaning correctly.

Once again, hope I didn't hurt anyone, this is just my personal way of seeing things This is exactly what he means with most of his post, you don't feel the need for being part of the bigger whole of DS, because you just care about the game you are in and the ppl you play with in there. I can understand this, i was like this for the first 6-8 months in DS aswell, but I learned to like the community part of DS aswell. You don't have to be at a DS party to feel connected. The people all are all here on this forum aswell and many others

And talking about the forums, the tracker is really not the way you should be using the forums. It gives only a narrow view of the recent posts, but you might have missed something that is no longer in the tracker.

And as for getting to know the other divisions, try reading the newsletter ppl work so hard to make every month. SC2:
Uno
WOW:
Quit
EVE:
Quit indeed I'm happy as member of DS I'm like the spamking here, but that's because I like DS as DS

GReetz Gek

And Ray I'm proud to have a king like youMembers of the Secret Society of Pointheads:
-The Wicked
-Gekrulez

On 24 Oct 2009 @ 22:56 Racan wrote:
First of all, I hope no one takes any offense from what I'm about to write, I simply want to talk about whats on my mind.

So first of all Ray, I do feel you have alot of commitment and good intentions from the spirit of your sayings.
I am, however having a hard time understanding what does this proposal mean.
Therefore I am going to assume you are talking in this article about your intentions to create a connection between the WoW division members to members of other divisions in DS (and please correct me if I am mistaken).

I have been in DS WOW division for a few good months now, and I like the people here alot, and feel happy to call it my guild.
However, since I cannot attend DS parties and do not see other divisions posts as they do not appear in our forum traker, I have rarely talked with anyone outside our division and do not feel an urgent need to do so.

I am currently in this guild thx to the people in it, and wether I leave or stay depends only on my connectinos with them and not on any other person in DS.

So, as for the poll, I'm afraid I will refrain from voting since I'm not inclined this way or the other and am not really sure I even understand its meaning correctly.

Once again, hope I didn't hurt anyone, this is just my personal way of seeing things

In order to not promote my own opinion too much whereas the whole thread is meant to ask other people's opinion, I will only respond to this by clearing up the choices the way I think they can be made.

Some people in DS will reason like you, Racan, and conclude they are in DS for a small group of other people that are in DS too. It is a choice that leads to a highly unstable community: because people essentially don't care about the community, but care only about a small group of other people.
The logical effect of this, and you can see that in all kinds of occasions accross divisions, is that once 1 person leaves a chain effect starts up. Because his/her friends leave too, and their friends leave too, and so forth. Most of these people do not leave because something is wrong with the community per se, they leave because other people leave.
I, in the role of Community manager, do not want to lead DS if its members have this attitude. Because it would mean I lead a community with members that don't want to be part of the community really. And secondly because it would mean I lead a community that is practically uncontrollable.

Other people in DS will reason that if you're part of a division in DS you're also part of the community DS. These people will feel a certain level of responsibility for- or need to participate in the community.
These are the people for whom there is a Community manager in DS, who can manage community related affairs DS wide. This involves assisting the newsletter team (which is now fairly self providing), the member involvement team (which arranges recruitment matters), and other taskforces; but also supporting division leaders or officers in DS who need advice. Not to mention the organisation of the other line of DS bussiness: RL parties.
This type of work is what the Community manager is for, and it requires members of DS make the choice that participation in the community is a necessity: because without people there cannot be a community, and without the DS community there cannot be DS divisions in the end (I compared with trying to grow a tree while at the same time cutting off the roots). As Community manager I want to know whether there are sufficient people in DS currently who support this vision. Founder of Daoine Sidhe,
Founder of Moíra,
Founder of the Travian division,
Founder of the Travians division,
Founder of the Perfect World division.

Rayendir Sidhe I'm all for you staying as Community Manager. Even just from being in the Community not even a week I've been drawn in and engaged with others, however i feel that maybe there could be the need for a shared forum. (Please alert me if there already is one)

-Saban- Patience and perseverance have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish. shared forum is that there are more forums for every1, called the tavern and the drunk nasty!!

GReetz Gek Members of the Secret Society of Pointheads:
-The Wicked
-Gekrulez

On 30 Oct 2009 @ 15:17 [DS]Saban[DS] wrote:
I'm all for you staying as Community Manager. Even just from being in the Community not even a week I've been drawn in and engaged with others, however i feel that maybe there could be the need for a shared forum. (Please alert me if there already is one)

-Saban-

What Gek's trying to say is that the 'Tavern' and 'DrunkNasty' forums are both shared, aiming to increase interaction between members of seperate divisions If it was just as simple as forums.. but indeed it helps. Racan has a point when he says that he can't see forum posts of other divisions.

All divisions have a number of forums for their members. Logically every division has an officer forum with access only for a limited number of members (namely the officers and CC). However, where the forums of the WoW division are open to all members to read (and if I am correct post), most other divisions seem to have division member only, so closed, forums.
I understand that some games need the secrecy of closed forums, the question remains, should these closed forums also be closed for DS members from other divisions, or only for outsiders. Healing the MT through ICC.
http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Kor
%27gall&cn=Treetrunk

Tanking since 2007
http://eu.wowarmory.com/character-sheet.xml?r=Kor
%27gall&cn=Treatrunk Rayek,

This is because the infromation that is given on that forums, would be useable for other players of the same game, like tactics how you're gonna get some1 else, that's why they are hidden, and only for members of the division

Greetz Gek Members of the Secret Society of Pointheads:
-The Wicked
-Gekrulez
TBH i think non-EVE members have no use about reading our EVE related topics in the Dead space forum. Most topics would look wierd without the knowledge of the game. SC2:
Uno
WOW:
Quit
EVE:
Quit AS,

The forum issue (degree to which they are shared, or not shared) is nothing more than a symptom of the real problem really. Because in the past we already turned the situation around towards more public forums after which happened exactly what is mentioned in previous posts: people don't feel like reading everything because they don't know the members of other divisions than their own, and ask themselves why they read the forum anyway because it's about a game they don't play, and thirdly conclude reading forums throughout DS is hardly doable if your intention is (like with most DS members) to spend your online time primarily on gaming.

The problem is: divisions are not sufficiently aimed at being part of the community currently, and there is nothing one can do about that on the level of facilitating community related matters: we can go change forums, ranks, rewards, website access, sitemaps, etcetera, but as long as divisions do not activate their members on the field of becoming a serious part of the community it will never be truly successful.

It takes realisation especially among division leaders and their officers that proper mentorship (introduce new members to the community) and officer training (creating leaders able to look further than everyday's incidents; towards long term connection between divisions and the community). And realisation among DS' current members they need to accept the fact that they are the community: the community is not something that comes dropping from the sky being completely managed by someone else.

Hence I started this thread: I would very much like to stay as Community manager, but only if that means I manage a community that makes the clear choice it does indeed want to be a community and not some lose set of divisions all acting on their own and focusing purely on short term solutions.
Otherwise the 'community' exists only in the heads of a few old time members. Founder of Daoine Sidhe,
Founder of Moíra,
Founder of the Travian division,
Founder of the Travians division,
Founder of the Perfect World division.

Rayendir Sidhe racans point is very simple... who are we as wow ds memebers going to be talking to in game and most of the time... WOW members... In an exagerated way it is like taking your whole year in high school and trying to make them talk... although how good an intention it may be (and obviously alot of work has gone into it) it really is not viable... especially if u have nearly 40% of the guild voting no... Just because this poll is passed does not necassarily mean that people will co-operate ie they think it is a bad thing for DS...

I think this is a simple case of why fix what is not broken... i am happy in this guild and as part of a community and i also think that just because i am more familiar with people in one game does not mean i am not part of this community... Eg if my home town has a rugby team and a football team even thoiugh i know people on the rugby team better does this mean that i am not part of the home town community... i hope you see my point in this post as i can see alot more complications if this motion is passed... and from what i have read so far the future problems have not even been considered properly yet...


Thanks you

Wudy (voice of the average Joe DS member WoW division) Pelicans are about as useful as a handbrake in a canoe. AS DSwudy,

There is however a large number of people in DS unwilling to take the path that you choose.
Like moving to Ireland and learning Irish because it happens to be the language that the people speak; or moving to Ireland and refusing to learn Irish because it takes too much time.
Unfortunately there are too many people of the second category in DS, who need support for becoming part of the community.

This poll deals with that on a management level: it asks of f.e. officers and division leaders to spend attention to this, so that the community can grow without losing its health.
And it starts with themselves, because 'recent' trouble in DS (over the course of 2 years) all have one important factor in common: officers leaving DS because they didn't feel sufficiently connected to the community.
Happened in each case that a division collapsed throughout recent years; in the Eve division, in the Travian division, and in the GW division.

But that's hard to accept for divisions, because daily affairs and gaming are usually focused on and long term management (let alone officer training) is taken for 'costing too much time' and/or 'no fun'.
Even though f.e. the contents of officer training aren't clear yet: showing how much this really is a matter of mindset, rather than a matter of whether it is 'impossible' or not.

And that is why I connect my leadership to this; it is pointless trying to lead a community in which too many people don't want to make the necessary investment to keep the community healthy.
I did lots of things throughout the past years that made things better, but this core friction between community and divisions remains: and it is high time someone takes responsibility for it. Founder of Daoine Sidhe,
Founder of Moíra,
Founder of the Travian division,
Founder of the Travians division,
Founder of the Perfect World division.

Rayendir Sidhe The wall of text..

I have been part of another community (and still am) where we have no "leaders" as such, but just a group of people that enjoy gaming and come together whenever for a laugh - wether it be games like Counterstrike, Eve or Wow. This Community has been online mmm for a good ten years I think.

(I don't know how long tbh, but I have been part of it for 7 years and I know they were online atleast 3 years before I joined)

My point being, there is no talk of problems (as there aren't any) and there is no talk of future problems.. Why fix something that isn't broken ey?

I feel each time you mention officers that failed that I am part of that equation, as I have been both GM and officer in the time span you are reffering to. Ok, so I don't have time for the commitment required here in DS, but it doesn't mean I don't care or don't want to make this as best a community as possible. I just think there is a lot of effort being put into managing DS, when DS seems to manage itself just fine..

Ah.. I don't know.. Just know that to me DS seems still just fine.. Well, I have to say one thing that I am troubled with on this post Ray.

I can understand the willingness to make divisions communicate together and make all the members be a big happy family.
But I honestly think you are giving into this too much attention.


I think that whoever wants to be a part of the larger concept of DS is more than welcome to do so, and by even asking for help on how to do that, he will get help from most of members here.
When Kouk and I started the msn thingy, we never thought that we must find a way to bind all of the members together, we only wanted to open the door to all that want to join. That turned out quite well cause we ended up with a community of friendly people that are there to chat with, when we see each other online

My point to this is one.
I will have to respect Racan's choice not feeling the need to participate to other divisions, but I will have also to respect the choice of any other member that wants to do the opposite than Racan.

There is no need to force things to cross interact. Just let the doors open for everyone that wants to join to do so "Matters of great concern should be treated lightly.
Matters of small concern should be treated seriously."
Yamamoto Tsunetomo Hmmm yes and no Broll. You cannot force anyone, on the other hand if no initiatives are taken to stimulate inter division communication all divisions will become little islands and 'DS' itself is just a name, but no real community. All the world is not, of course, a stage, but the crucial ways in which it isn't, are not easy to specify. Thats my point exactly Dorus!

Its good to see people who care and want things to work out. This is one of the reasons that I support Ray as leader.

But its another thing to try to figure out ways to stimulate connection and another to claim that if you do not do so, you will kill the community


I am 100% agreed to binding DS together! Just not forcing them to do so... "Matters of great concern should be treated lightly.
Matters of small concern should be treated seriously."
Yamamoto Tsunetomo Where does it say something would be forced? Founder of Daoine Sidhe,
Founder of Moíra,
Founder of the Travian division,
Founder of the Travians division,
Founder of the Perfect World division.

Rayendir Sidhe

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