An idea started at a post here.

I'm bringing it here mainly because a Mod seemed to think replying to the majority of the OP as off topic.

So I brought it here so it could be discussed without being called off topic (pun not intended). So, assuming this stays open what do people think of the plan? Agree? Disagree? Ideas and thoughts?

I remember how active Oldguild was, and I'd be glad to offer whatever I can do to help restore the site and its community to its former glory.

We seem to be getting an awful lot of new members lately. Perhaps encouraging them to hang around and get involved with the community outside of just the RP forums would be a good starting point?

In theory I do agree that's a good idea, and it honestly does have potential to work.

But then there's also part of me that's afraid it will have the reverse effect.
Mainly because what I've noticed in both OT and Spam is people will pick those who they like the best and then began interacting with them off-site a ton (Steam, Skype etc.).
Which is great at first, people communicate more, know each other better etc. But it seems to have a side effect that eventually they find that they're are perfectly fine talking through said program, and don't even need the Guild anymore.

That or they decide that they dislike either a few members, or a general community on the Guild opposed to said friends. So they in a sense migrate off simply to not deal with the 'unwanted' people.

Now, obviously we can't do anything such as say "Not allowed to talk with Guild friends off site", nor should we do that.
Like I said earlier, it is infact a sound idea and it could work. But we would want to make sure it's not done in a way to encourage small groups/cliches to pop up and eventually cause separation/division as a result.

Plus, generally for such chats to work we need a generally active site/community to begin with.
I mean, if the site itself has a lacking community who is going to think the skype group is any better?
I will note though we do have an IRC currently, that does kind of function for the purpose you describe.
But those generally have the issue of still being Guild Moderated, even if not the forums directly so it has far less of the "Let's get to know each other off site" feeling.

+Speaking personally, last time I was in IRC one of their Mods (They were in and out too quick to even grab a name) banned me over a small joke simply because (Their words) 'They were too busy with Gay Porn to be interrupted by IRC stuff'.

Now, personal thoughts on that aside (I'd rather not turn this thread into a "X Mod is a prick!" sort of thread) it does still address the issue of it's not exactly an off-site conversation place if there are people sitting around who could ban you, may it be for personal reasons, or Guild regulation reasons. So yea, we do somewhat have your idea already. But it could be better.

So basically:

-Need an active site first, to encourage people to use off site chats
-Said off site chats need to help encourage community and involvement, not cliches and divisions
-They would need to be unconnected to Guild Moderation, or it defeats the purpose by simply becoming a Guild extension.

In the original topic I had already proposed trying to get the Admins to get around to making the contest topic that was promised.
We had several groups of people (One of which mind you, I think is gone. Seeing the complete lack of activity it's members have shown this past month) who were planning/working on said contests to help boost activity.
But needed their own section for it, because simply squeezing it into others has normally caused it to be unnoticed, cause people don't think to look for it, and therefore it misses the eyes of most the community.

Speaking on behalf of the Guild’s Internet Relay Chat operators (chat moderators), I have a few points -- don’t worry, I’ll expand on all of them. It doesn’t address the entirety of your post or suggestions, mostly the parts that involve us.

1. Your third suggestion literally already exists.


2. Your second suggestion is not necessarily achievable.


3. Your permanent ban from #roleplayerguild was justified and recorded.

To begin, let me provide a rundown of the IRC’s existence. The Roleplayerguild.com Internet Relay Chat is an off-topic community run specifically by members of Roleplayerguild.com who do not have moderator powers on the Guild. It’s actually a rule, you can’t be an operator/admin on the IRC if you already have Guildside powers.

They would need to be unconnected to Guild Moderation, or it defeats the purpose by simply becoming a Guild extension.

OK. Check.

Said off site chats need to help encourage community and involvement, not cliches and divisions

What the operators have interpreted this suggestion to mean is “we would like a roleplaying-based offsite chat, or at least one where we can discuss RP.”

TBH, the IRC primarily exists as an off-topic chat for people who enjoy roleplaying, but don’t want to discuss it 24/7. We do have conversations that revolve around roleplaying, and we don’t discourage chatting about roleplaying (though we frown upon people using the channel for interest checks, because god those can be annoying). It’s not our raison d’etre, nor would we want it to be. So the first half of that works out as existing.

By suggesting that you need to have a chat that’s all RP all the time, you’re essentially dictating a conversation you won’t always be a part of, with the expectation that someone will always be able to pick up the thread and run with it, so to speak.

For anyone who frequents a chatroom, you would understand why this is unrealistic to manage: People talk about so much ridiculous nonsense a majority of the time that it’s impossible to actually steer a conversation any which way.

And, bonus: The #roleplayerguild chat has a roleplaying-specific side channel, #rpgchat, that we provide to members looking for roleplaying space in chat format. Nobody uses it, because nobody asks.

Now, regarding your ban.

You, Gwazi, were personally banned from the IRC for completely and flagrantly disregarding the rules that every single member of the chat is provided upon entry. You not only entered as three different people (verifiable by IP address), you tossed around racial slurs without appropriate context and deliberately ignored other chat members who warned you about having multiple nicks (connections) in the channel.

Also, for whatever reason, you decided to aggressively argue with yourself about a topic you’d been peacefully debating with another chat member at the time.

We don’t publicize why people are banned if they are based on user reports, nor do we needlessly ban individuals from our chat without clear violation of our rules. Even if the ban had not been justifiable (it was), there are procedures in place that will allow members to contest the ban. As a member of Oldguild, and someone who has visited IRC in the past, you should have known better.

You want to foster community on RPG. That’s an admirable goal, and it is to the benefit of everyone who hangs out on the website or in IRC that it succeed. However, if you want to throw shade at any part of this community, check your facts. And if you want to play this “banned over a small joke” card, you’d best remember that there is an operator or chat admin online, if not available, about 99% of the time.

And we keep logs.

Regards,
The #Roleplayerguild operators

Ok, there seems to have been a few misunderstanding here.

Gia said you can’t be an operator/admin on the IRC if you already have Guildside powers.OK. Check.

I didn't mean "We can't have the same admins/mods here be incharge there".
I meant it needs to strictly be a community, that any strong presence of moderation could very easily lead to more bannings or controlling than anything else.
I've seen many conversations on the Guild stifled because either an Admin or Mod didn't like it, or because someone else didn't and then asked an Admin or Mod to close it on everyone else.

And every community I've seen do this has lost activity over time as a result, because people were to afraid to talk fully openly, or about certain topics.
But in communities where admins and mods didn't tend to do that, activity would flourish because we felt more bonded and close as an open and honest community.
Not one where people need to watch what they say or they'd get in trouble.

Gia said By suggesting that you need to have a chat that’s all RP all the time, you’re essentially dictating a conversation you won’t always be a part of, with the expectation that someone will always be able to pick up the thread and run with it, so to speak.

When I said "Encourage community and involvement", I meant encouraging the site community to interact and get along with more of each other.
I did not mean that it should all be focused on roleplaying.

+I wasn't trying to suggest there should be hard rules to enforce it either (in fact I specifically spoke against that).
What I was suggesting was we should try to nudge people in one direction, try to persuade people to making a closer community rather than a cliche. Not to outright force them.

Gia said Now, regarding your ban.

I should have elaborated.

When I said "I'd rather not turn this thread into a "X Mod is a prick!" I should have said "I'd rather we stay on topic, and not derail this about one banning".
I brought the case up as an example to show what I was detailing above, where such things can happen, community get's stiffled.
+I even said "May it be for personal reasons or Guld Regulation reasons". So I never even argued that it may not have been justified.

But, incase you do insist on arguing this I'm doing to start work on a longer/more detailed reply of this now through PM.
So as to not derail/lose focus on this thread. May I be in the wrong or not, it wasn't meant to be the main topic of this thread.
And I've been on OT long enough to know if this debate get's it's wheels turning in this thread, it's original point will be lost.

Edit: So, in the PM thing i was given a link to the logs of the case itself here.
Note, I'm not posting this to get a debate going. I'm posting it just incase people see moving it to PM as trying to dodge the bullet.
With this link, you can look at it yourself, make your own opinion and decide if I was in the wrong or not. Once again don't make this a 'debate this ban' thread.
This is just so you people aren't left in the dark of what's being referenced as a result of me taking it to PM.

Given how the site runs right now I don't think it needs to be more active. We'll just crash it more and it'll die again.

No, what needs to be worried about first is getting Mahz to stabilize this. THEN you can do a marketing campaign.

Dinh AaronMk said
Given how the site runs right now I don't think it needs to be more active. We'll just crash it more and it'll die again.No, what needs to be worried about first is getting Mahz to stabilize this. THEN you can do a marketing campaign.

Good point.
The site has been crashing a lot lately.
And if we do want an active community, the site should be able to survive said activity.

I'm just going to throw out there that an obscenely large portion of RPG's population is on several other RP sites -- one in particular. What's even more interesting is that a bunch of them seem to have the same starting dates. Go figure.

Anyway, things are probably slow here because a lot of the biggest drawing roleplays have already moved elsewhere. With activity much better on some other forums, it should be no surprise that our population is finding their fix elsewhere.

What would RPG need to succeed? An identity. It's old history is gone and it hasn't built up the image of a place where the team is actively working toward advancement. You are more apt to see an Admin/Mod's name when something bad is happening than you are for a great announcement. Turn that around, update the digs (just for a fresh start), and you'll start to attract some attention again. Moreover, offer something unique, even if it's just a gimmick, just to let users justify coming back. It's really obvious the Guild still has love since those groups, on other forums, have collected with one another. Give them a real reason to come back, even if it is bringing back easier BBcoding, because what's going on right now is clearly not working.

Lo Pellegrino said What would RPG need to succeed? An identity. It's old history is gone and it hasn't built up the image of a place where the team is actively working toward advancement.

I would agree. A new Identity or unique thing would probably help bring in new people.
Though, I don't frequent other RP sites. So I have no idea what others sites are missing that the Guild might pick up.

Lo Pellegrino said You are more apt to see an Admin/Mod's name when something bad is happening than you are for a great announcement.

Yea... :/
Outside of spam and roleplay discussion I only ever see a Mod or Admin if someone cried out to them to act as a shield, or if they came in on their own judgement in order to settle a perceived conflict or argument. Hell half the time they don't even say anything, they just close the thread and leave people going "WTH? Why did it close?".

And having been on other sites and communities (though not RP ones) with active Mods/Admins, and them having many close friendships and general popularity as a result... It's something this site could try to work on.

Not to suggest the Mods and Admins here are currently bad or anything, they aren't. A low tolerance for people disagreeing with one another? Sure. But they hardly let their power of authority get to their heads, and start abusing it against people like I've seen so many other people do. If they were I would have left the site many years ago rather than stick around to the point of being one of the oldest members by now.

Dinh AaronMk said
Given how the site runs right now I don't think it needs to be more active. We'll just crash it more and it'll die again.No, what needs to be worried about first is getting Mahz to stabilize this. THEN you can do a marketing campaign.

^ This.

More People=Crashes

The reason why the Guild died was due to the last crash and everyone rushed over to Iwaku and/or to other sites. Unless Mazh gets his ass to fix the issues and bugs that drives people away from this site, people would avoid this site and go to Iwaku.

I went to Iwaku and I now have an account and tested a few thing around. I love the Guild such; but, the crashes happen more often to me after the site was back up and I am tried of it.

Do I think that this site will ever get the numbers it had on the oldguild? No, the crash caused many people to move to Iwaku and if something would happen to it, nobody isn't going to return to the Guild.

So in short, fix the site and then you can spread the news that the Guild finally has an update.

Stabilisation and word of mouth though current members.

Simple.

Whether both of these things happen or not is another story.
I have faith that Mahz will stablise the site, and then I'll begin sharing it in various RPing groups I know.
Might be an idea for Mahz to find more coders he trusts to help with the site?