Your 2014 Arbiter nominees

[SL33PY]

I'm saddened to see that this year was the least active year when it comes to nominations for the arbiter spot. I've let the nomination gone on long enough and here are the nominees of 2014

• Isileth
• SL33PY

Both Isileth and myself will prepare a post to pitch our ideas, after which the voting will start.

[M.Steiner]

Same :/
I'm sure there will have been others here who wanted to nominate yourself and Isi but chose not to post because the two needed nominations for each of you had already been met, thus posting to nominate each of you again would have been pointless. That could part explain why only three people posted in the nominations thread I guess, but that won't account for everyone here. It takes just seconds to cast a nomination and/or vote, it's the same time every year and has been for 10 years and we've had notices on both IRC & Facebook pointing here for it too. Rather sad that this was on our big anniversary year but I ranted about arbiter turnouts with last years actual vote as well so I'll be quiet. Hope the vote itself has a better turnout even if there's only 2 people up for the position

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One of my posts from last year:

Still 4 more days I guess but unless things change considerably between now and next tuesday this will have been the lowest turnout we've ever had.
The 17 votes for last years Arbiter poll aside, I'd like to ask where the 24 are that voted in the exiles name changing thread during that same time period last year, which were literally just days apart from one another? There were more people that voted against that proposal than what have voted here so far [edit: at the time of me posting there were 8 votes, which later went to 10], IRC even has more people than this, when it isn't pissing around for 3 days and actually lets people connect that is.. Infact the same thing happened the first time we had the name discussion looking back at the results.
I won't go on a rant but this just goes back to that post I made again. C'mon folk

Arbiter poll 2009: 18 voters
Name change poll 2009: 30 voters

Arbiter poll 2010: 18 voters
Arbiter poll 2011: 15 voters

Name change poll 2012: 24 voters
Arbiter poll 2012: 17 voters

Arbiter poll 2013: 10

Do people just not care for the position any more and don't feel like voting? or think it should be changed? Perhaps it's time we had a serious discussion on it once this years poll has ended so the same doesn't happen again next year?. I know for a fact that if I went ahead and had us revisit the naming poll again after last years split vote we'd have people coming out again in much bigger numbers than this. So what's with the arbiter election?
Better to speak up and explain why you're not voting than to just not bother doing either. Nothing can be done or changed if nobody actually says anything

[Isileth]

Bloody hell, yeah I always wait till the very end to vote and snipe in a couple of names that haven't made it, but this year it was kind of dead and the thread just didn't pop up in my unread posts and I forgot about it

I think the very fact I'm 50% of the candidates raises serious questions. Honest question though, did the Arbiter have to perform a single action last year?

[Anubis]

Bloody hell, yeah I always wait till the very end to vote and snipe in a couple of names that haven't made it, but this year it was kind of dead and the thread just didn't pop up in my unread posts and I forgot about it

I think the very fact I'm 50% of the candidates raises serious questions. Honest question though, did the Arbiter have to perform a single action last year?

The Arbiter hasn't really had anything to do for a few years now - when things are quiet, there's naturally less to arbitrate

[SL33PY]

I have not had to arbite anything in my first year as an Arbiter. I think that only few realized I was the arbiter last year.

For the coming year I would like to start some serious threads with some serious questions on how we want to move forward as a community. I am sure that Arbiting will be necessary. Standing by is no longer an option and I've had way too much good times to just let it die out the way it has.

The biggest problem with our group as I see it is that we have no in game rectuiters. Those that used to recruit stopped doing it a long time ago. Various reasons have been named for that.

To do list:

• talk with anyone that wants to listen about: change, new games to play together,...
• decide on change with those willing to voice
• when entering a new game as SSX we need to make getting a new recruiters our #1 priority
• more activity on not so "new social networks"
• secret sauce
• let magic happen

Still awaiting Isileth's entry and then the arbiter vote will go up... Unless his previous post was his "vote for me" post, in which case he'll need to let me know about it. Also soon, since I'm off to Austria for a week starting tomorrow

[Isileth]

I vote to let Sl33py continue as arbiter on the basis that I completely agree we need to have a serious discussion about the future of the group and recruiting new players. (Honestly how long ago was the last new member to join?)

The reason I don't believe I would be right to oversee that, although I would definitely want to be actively involved in the discussion, is its been many many years since I was actively involved with the SSX in game, perhaps 4-5 years ago in EVE. Thinking back I believe I may have only ever played with the ssx as a guild a few times over 10 years as a member, the other instances being Guild Wars and Anarchy Online.

While I have always been extremely active on irc, the forums and some of our side interests such as the football games we have ran over the years, I am not and have never been a big MMO player. Which looking over our history is clearly where the biggest focus and most of our members came from. Its also surely going to be the main route to expanding the group once again as they naturally suit in game cooperation and the building up of groups with both new and experienced members.

As it is we have lost our natural recruiters and also the numbers and activity levels have dropped to the point where we wouldn't passively attract new members just by being active in game as a guild. Its something that does need a concentrated and deliberate effort. This isn't a new situation, certainly its come up in past arbiter elections but also its been addressed on its own, sadly no real action was taken.

Of course the same difficulties of what makes our group so great still apply and our values aren't something that we should sacrifice. I would be very much against just going out and just trying to mass recruit for the sake of having members. We are aimed at more mature gamers and that frankly applies now more than perhaps ever. Those of us that where the youngest members a decade ago, just kids and teens at the time are now in our 20s and jobs and life have started to take hold. Those that were in their 20s, 30s and more are now very understandably often heavily preoccupied with bringing up their own newest members on top of dealing with all the things life has thrown at them.

Given that, we cant expect to be the biggest and most active group about pushing towards the latest content till 4am, that's not going to be our route back. But its clear if we want to be more active we need to make an active effort. I personally would love to see more ssx members playing together, even if its just 2 people posting in a thread to play a co-op game. Its activity and that's golden. With the glut of mmos out there as well, im sure we could get several players starting new chars at the same time and just having a bit of fun playing together even if its only once a week.


However all this is something that I do believe needs much more discussion and I really hope we do seriously look at what we can do. I don't believe I am the person to be taking the lead in that. As much as it was never the original intention the arbiter has become a position of leadership to some degree and I think right now its very important that's taken up by someone more suited to helping expand the group.

[Anubis]

Those are probably the two best and most needed "Why Me" posts in years!

[M.Steiner]

Yep, and agreed regarding the discussions
I started writing a post about this stuff just recently but I will wait until the vote is over before I stick it up!

[Padishar]

I apologize for my tardiness once again...
In response to MS inquiry last year,
Hopefully my reason for being continually absent is understandable:

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I co-own Smart Homes Smart Offices and am in the process of buying out my partner,
Which means I will soon completely own the empire ::insert ominous Star Wars music:: that I have been building these last few years.

I have grown this fledgling tech company of 5 people to nearly 30 employees & with in the last couple of months, just opened 2 new satellite branches
My work schedule for years has hovered around 12-13 hours a day, 6-7 days a week and hasn't slowed yet.
So it takes a $@^&* amount of my time still...

Though I would still like to participate here,
Even if its only conveying small nuggets of wisdom once in a while

[Anubis]

Wow, congrats on your success Pad! Glad things are going so well for you, even if that does mean more of your time being eaten up