Secret Evil Plans

[Kaiser Hasan I]

Well Scott, I wonder if you'd ever thought you'd see the day I'd be here. To be honest, like history tells us, Secret forums sound alot more interesting than they are. In a show of good faith I'm going to speak to Babkha about an intelligence sharing option but it'll take some effort since I was being relied on to maintain activity there and left.

Like all of the old nations, none of the Admin have time to plot like we used to. I noticed over time that Shireroth has a reactive intelligence function as opposed to an operational intelligence function. Would there be any interest in changing that?

[Scott of Hyperborea]

There's some more interesting stuff in the archives, if you've got access to those. And by SHINE policy, the really interesting stuff never gets posted at all. Why tell more people than need to know?

But no, I'm not a big fan of active intelligence gathering. It tends to lead to stuff like the Ocia situation. Not that we'd be as stupid as they were about it, but the possibility's always there. If there was a really good reason, I'd support it. As it is, we don't have any enemies or any way that any enemies we did have could hurt us. Have I ever told you how much I love isolationism?

[Kaiser Hasan I]

*Looks at icy island north-east of shireroth where the people don't speak much and the doors are usually locked.

Isolationist? You? Bah!


Hey, the Ocia situation was an excellent operation, worked nearly perfectly, for Babkha.


And yes, I know Shireroth well enough that I figured the "don't write anything in a secret forum that you actually WANT TO BE KEPT A SECRET" rule applied. I'll have a look through the archives, sounds interesting.

[Gman Russell]

No one will ever know some of the things SHINE did...

[Kaiser Hasan I]

Meh,
Not to many people care to know. Spying is sort of a dead sport in this hobby now.

[Gman Russell]

Very true.

[Erik Mortis]

Wait.. you still have access?

[Gman Russell]

Access? I'm a moderator.

[Ari Rahikkala]

We want Greg to have access, don't we?

[Kaiser Hasan I]

Once I got access, its a true sign that this place is not what it once was, (and the cover charge is ridiculous). :P

[Erik Mortis]

I just forgot he was able to get in here is all.

[Scott of Hyperborea]

Hey, I got a question Hesam probably knows the answer to. Why was Graius fired from MNN?

[Kaiser Hasan I]

Ben was fired from the MN.net for a lot of reasons. I believe Scott felt that Ben was not being objective as an Admin and was using his admin privileges to pick on Ocia. I know Ben and Scott, so I tried to moderate the dispute a bit by telling Scott that Ben has never given any privileged information to Babkha (which is true) and that this could likely be solved by giving Ben a stern warning instead of revoking his admin. Ben is a decent enough micronationalist, but he has some tragic flaws which were the basics of why he was ejected:

- He was rude and condescending which alienated a lot of people from MN.net.

- He'll start a project for his own gains and never complete the work he started.

And on the other hand, Scott has some tragic flaws in that he is uncompromising on professionalism and that he expects any admin or mod at MN.net to be a responsible employee. While admirable, (more things would get done) its not practical since this is a hobby with a huge range in age groups and ability.

Something to keep an eye on: As a result of all of this, Ben has been trying to get some leverage to start a rival ISO/GSO. I've tried to dissuade him from it, but he's intent now. Its obvious what his motives are, but the end result will just mean Babkha becomes isolated and eventually dead.

Currently Troy has been doing a lot of interesting work for it including original migration patterns of what he considers the core ethnicities of our sector (Shireroth, Babkha, Attera, Apollo). He postulated that our sector was inhabited according to the Earth theory of Indo-European expansion. He and I have also been working on an Eckert projection which could be more easily used for ship movements, locations and distances. On the other side of the house, I looked at the ISO proposals run by Scott and Ryan. The proposals are brilliant. It's some of the best work I've ever seen and it brings the level of mapping and community relations to a new higher standard. I proposed the idea, but don't have enough time to work on it otherwise I'd be all over it. But I digress.

Ben losing his admin at MN.net, along with the fact that he is no longer a GSO board member has caused a bit of a smoldering upset in MN.net. I can see the GSO falling apart in a few months time if this trend continues. Coupled with the fact that Scott has insinuated to me many times that he will be closing MN.net in the fall, I'd say there is a good chance that the realistic simulation side of our community will be gone soon.

this is only my opinion and may not necessarily reflect the actual events.

[Scott of Hyperborea]

Wow, guess I've been out of the loop. I definitely didn't know Liam was planning on closing down MNN. Is it really his decision now, and not Iain and Lachlan's?

It was kind of obvious that the GSO is having some problems, but I didn't know the backstory. I don't know what the ISO is (is that the "consistent simulation" side of the GSO?) However, I might as well mention that I was tossing around ideas with Yvain to create a new mapping organization based on Micras now that the basics are copyright free. I'm still upset that they won't upgrade map quality, and Yvain was helping me make some graphics for a potential successor map for a while. But now that I'm in 'Nam and Yvain's computer's down, that's kind of been put on hold.

You might want to bring that up to Ryan or Troy. I'm not willing to work on any map that isn't based on Micras geography, but as long as they're within that paradigm, I'm game (though the resources of my little cabal will be low so long as I'm travelling and Yvain's not around)

[Kaiser Hasan I]

I don't know what Lachlan and Iains opinion on closing down mn.net is, but I imagine if Liam goes, the site would likely loose a lot of influence.

I know Troy is interested, but I'm not certain how he would feel about using Micras as the map. I spoke to him briefly about it, and his opinion is that since he's done so much work, he might as well find a vessel to actualization.

My opinion of any map is that I don't care who runs it so long as its professionally run and universally used. I would very much agree to use the micras geography (since its our historic map) but I am not sure how the folks at the MCS would take it. this would be a third map for our small sector so I think if we went ahead with this, we'd have to be VERY thorough with getting support.

Troy is working on a clickable political map, a realistic land representation and a detailed resource map as well as the projection issue I brought up.

Scott, as long as you think you can manage this with everything else you're doing, go ahead but I don't want everyone to get invested in it and have it flop. I'll mention it to Ryan when I see him as well.

[Scott of Hyperborea]

I definitely CAN'T manage it now. But in August or so, when I'm back in the States and Yvain hopefully has his computer working, I will be very interested, and I think I can bring a lot to the project.

Tell Troy and Ryan that I might be interested in whatever they've made, and that if they send it to scott.siskind[at]gmail.com, I promise not to make it public or claim it's my own or do anything stupid like that.

This is an example of some of the stuff Yvain was doing for me before he left. Don't show it to Ryan until he promises not to make it public, and don't show it to Troy period...I trust him more now, but still not 100%

http://www.raikoth.net/Stuff/brycedphysical.jpg
http://www.raikoth.net/Stuff/topo2.gif
http://www.raikoth.net/Stuff/mcsnew.jpg

[Kaiser Hasan I]

That is some excellent work. Personally, I'm rather keen on applying a proper grid reference system to the map, but figuring out a way to show the grid OVER the land on a political map would be difficult for editing purposes.

I won't contact Ryan about this at all. In fact, I'm a bit hesitant to approach him at all due to the historical troubles of the MCS, but we'll see. Troys on board, I didn't show him anything yet, but he'll likely have his own agenda anyways. Out of interest, what has he done to make you mistrust him? Remember, I was away for a few years and I'm still catching up. (its sort of neat seeing the progress after leaving for a while, didn't expect the result to be honest).


And I have another issue. While I support Andreas researching the FIoJ, I'm concerned that he is going to try and mimic the concept of FIoJ for his own nation. While I would support a new Apollo initiative started by any of the people who were actually there, I don't know about someone using the "brand" so to speak, for their own interests.

[Erik Mortis]

Wait.. What's going on? Is the MCS threatened by things going on?

[Scott of Hyperborea]

I am pretty sure Andreas knows what he's doing and can be trusted not to mess anything up.

If MN.net folds, I think a joint Babkhan-Shirerithian effort to replace it would be a good idea. In fact, I would love to wait until the GSO folds, and then launch a new, improved version of the MCS using Yvain's maps and a slightly revised charter that makes the GSO folks think their opinions have been taken into consideration. If Babkha and Shireroth pushed it, we could probably convince most of the rest of the MCS folks to come along. In fact, a joint MN.net replacement/mapping organization under the aegis of a Babkha-Shireroth commonwealth would be pretty unstoppable.

...of course, all of this is moot as long as I'm on LOA in Southeast Asia and Yvain doesn't have a computer. But if Liam's not leaving until the fall, maybe by then we'll have had time to throw something together.

[Erik Mortis]

I won't abandon the MCS.

[Kaiser Hasan I]

Looks like Ben went ahead and tried to propose change anyways. I don't know why considering there isn't actually anything serious to propose beyond complaints. Ultimately I'd like to see everyone moved back to one map. So I think that could be a project?

[Erik Mortis]

I would be pleased to see people return to the MCS.. which is kinda like the Catholic church in this.. with the GSO being the Eastern Orthodox church? We must heal the Schism! And reform the mother church.

[Kaiser Hasan I]

Well, a benevolent dictatorship is preferable to a corrupt or unwieldy democracy. I don't really like the current format of the MCS. But if say you were to become chair, I am certain we could bring everyone back in "full communion" of the MCS.

[Erik Mortis]

HA! No one would want me to have an active role there. Not even me.

Honestly, I have no real issues with the format of the MCS these days. It seems to have the ability to keep on going. I haven't heard of anything to outrageous being done..so, I'm not sure what the issue is.