Obviously, for anyone that's read my blog for any length of time, I've had my issues with Ripard. I'm not issue-free with him. I still think he's entirely full of himself. Ripard is never wrong, and when he is it's always with twenty caveats. And his notion that he's done more to change the game through his blog, than any CSM representative has done on the council, is laughable.
That's just his personality. He's one of those rules lawyer guys. If any of you have pen-and-paper roleplayed, you know they type of dude I'm talking about. They're not very fun to be around, but it can never be argued that they aren't steeped in a broad-base of knowledge. These guys get to know mechanics and rules inside and out, because it's in their personality to do so. They need to be an authority on everything, so they need to familiarize themselves with everything. That's certainly a good trait to have if you're going to be on the CSM, because CSM representatives, the ones who are willing to put forth an effort, end up having to wear many different hats.[2]
Do you want a faction warfare and a mercenary representative who have never lived in nullsec, who have never done heavy industry, weighing in with their opinions on nullsec issues, such as mineral compression? Probably not. It's not a hat that fits them well. You don't want a CSM representative to be learning on the job, and then weighing in with opinions on something they still don't fully comprehend.[3] Ripard has a broad base of knowledge. He's involved himself in a great many areas of the game, because he's wants that knowledge and the practical experience.
Ripard ran for CSM6. He lost. By about a dozen votes to Darius III. Nobody likes losing. Nobody likes losing to Darius III. Ripard, I believe, did not run for CSM7 because he feared another loss. And that's kind of understandable. Though, I think he puts too much stock into his CSM6 loss.
When he first ran, nobody really knew who the hell he was. He started his blog as a platform for his election. That's really the first anybody knew of him. He did not have the recognition at that time to pull in thousands of votes. CSM7 would have been a different story. CSM8 should be an even different story.
He's the most widely read EVE blogger. He has recognition out the wazoo. I don't see how he couldn't win a seat. Top seven is a realistic expectation, but the bottom seven should be a lock. Of course, he might see bottom seven as a failure, and that would be unfortunate. The hardest workers on CSM7 happen to be bottom seven candidates. They might not get to go to Iceland[4], but that doesn't mean you get shut out of the proceedings. He can build upon a CSM8 win for CSM9 re-election.
Communication. This is where I'm most curious about Ripard as a CSM rep. We are all familiar with the amount of blog posting he does; the level of communication output he puts forth into the community. I believe he will find ways to be as communicative, without breaking NDA. I do not believe he would let the CSM hat affect his blogging hat negatively. There's always the danger that he could go dark, as happens to most CSM representatives; their big promises for communicating often and frequently, transparency will be their hallmark, then they get elected and you only hear from them every three months in two week bursts.
Ripard's weakness with communication seems to be with discussion and dialogue. He abstains from using Twitter. He's only made two EVE forum posts since April. He's great at putting forth his thoughts and ideas, he seems weak on actually holding discussions and dialogues with people on those thoughts and ideas. He prefers heavily-moderated environments in which to communicate. Twitter and the EVE forums are the exact opposite of heavily-moderated, which is probably why he has avoided them. Which could be Ripard's achilles heel. Criticism. This is mainly why every CSM tends to vanish from the public eye. They cannot handle criticism. Ripard would do himself many favours if he started exposing himself to criticism as much as possible. Learn how to accept it. Learn when to listen to it. When to ignore it. Learn to recognize the valid criticism from the trolls. Learn how to be graceful in the face of criticism[5].
Conversely, he has no problem criticising others. Which is fine. Criticism is a necessary component of transparency. And I do believe he could bring a proper level of CSM transparency to the playerbase.
Ripard has his positives and negatives. The negatives are assumptions, based on his current habits and conduct, and could very well be wrong once he's in a position to prove them wrong.
Positive CSM representative quality #1: Ripard has an exceptionally broad base of knowledge of the game. I'm not saying all his ideas are great, but he does put a lot of thought into his ideas. He can effectively wear many hats.So, yeah, I think Ripard should run for CSM8. And I don't think it would negatively affect what he says or has been saying. He might have to keep certain CCP developments under wraps, but I think Ripard is clever enough to talk around the NDA without giving up any "secrets", while still having something useful to say to his constituents.
Positive CSM representative quality #2: He's reasonably well-respected around the community. He has good karma going into the job.
Positive CSM representative quality #3: He loves of communicate. He communicates often.
Negative CSM representative quality #1: He may not give up on his own ideas and prejudices easily, even when shown they are not feasible.
Negative CSM representative quality #2: He may not appreciate criticism and trolling. By avoiding venues where this occurs, effective communication avenues are passed over.
I'll be disappointed if I don't see Ripard's name on the ballot in 2013. And barring any fabulous faction warfare candidates on the ballot, I'll toss him my three votes. I gotta say, I'm curious what he'd bring to the CSM table. And how he would prove to be different than every other CSM candidate who became a disappointment once they were voted to represent. I think he'd end up doing fine and doing things differently.
[1] Unless Pinky Feldman, Rina Kondur or Almity decide to run, there's really nobody in faction warfare I'd give my votes to next year. So, if there's nobody in faction warfare that I'm interested in, then I have to look outside lowsec for a candidate.
[2] Fourteen CSM representatives are elected, yet by mid-term only five or six ever seem to be doing anything. The rest have checked-out of the process. This has been a constant every CSM.
[3] This is why I won't run for the CSM anytime soon. I've only recently begun learning about the game in any serious fashion. And still, my breadth of knowledge is very narrow, and not particularly deep. I would be that guy who was learning on the job. I would make a piss-poor representative. Certainly, I've blogged ideas about areas of the game I have little experience with, but I look at it as a learning process. I look forward not to the "You're dumb and your idea is dumb" posts, but rather the "Your idea is dumb, and here is why: [expnalation follows]" posts.
[4] Kelduum Revaan, a top seven representative, is forgoing his trip to Iceland this winter, Hans Jagerblitzen, a bottom seven representative, is taking his place.
[5] Learn how to be the exact opposite of Alekseyev Karrde, for instance. That dude does not know how to take criticism, and has no idea how to be graceful when faced with it.
Problem with Jester being on the CSM would be that he would almost certainly have to post a lot less. Partly because it would eat up time, partly because he'd be aware of NDA-bound information that would make many of the kind of posts he does now pointless. He couldn't for instance speculate on what CCP may be about to do.
ReplyDeleteIt's his call, he's very capable. But there are other capable people out there whose election would not cost us Eve's best blogger.
He doesn't post all that much on CCP development direction. He mostly posts on what's happening now, what's been announced, etc. He doesn't engage in prognostication all that often.
DeleteHis output would barely be affected.
I'm sure Ripard doesn't have an unlimited amount of time to spend on Eve. Any time doing CSM things is less time for other Eve activities, like blogging.
DeleteEven if the CSM took up say half of the time he currently uses for blogging, that would still leave him with a good two posts a week, or more than 95% of other Eve bloggers.
DeleteOf course that might make Poe the most frequent Eve blogger... Suddenly the whole suggestion makes sense!
You forgot to add the disclaimer: "This advertisement is brought to you by Ripard Teg for CSM(tm) and in no way endorses this blogs personal views.
ReplyDeleteI kid, I kid. I'd gladly sling a few votes Jesters way if he ran for CSM for a simple reason. He demonstrates wisdom in his opinions. A flexible mind, so to speak.
Can't snipe from the cheap seats anymore if you are ineffective on the CSM :allears: I'll entertain this.
ReplyDeleteKnowing Ripard In game and on comms, he is very quick to see a appropriate solution to something, or change his views not better deal with a situation. He manages to be approachable and intelligent.
ReplyDeleteThis ad was paid for by Ripard Teg.
There's a subtle difference between "doesn't really want the job" and "really doesn't want the job".
ReplyDeleteWhile I agree he'd make a worthy CSM member, far more than all those people whom I never even hear about at least, I also get the impression it's the latter with him rather than the former.
He's never been that forthright about the position. He's always been careful to not write himself out. I think he would enjoy the position.
DeleteEasy to tell. If it's "really doesn't", he'll avoid responding to your post in any way or acknowledging it even existed, no matter how many reddit arrows or comments or whatever markers of popularity it accumulates. If it's "doesn't really", he'll wait for up to about a week and write a post mentioning you and your statement, which most likely will also criticise CSM once again.
DeleteYou're right that I've never said never, because I almost never say never. ;-)
DeleteBut the big reasons for me not to run still remain: how much control would CCP try to exert over what I posted, particularly when I'm posting stuff about CCP's business?
The other problem: in order to do the job, I'd really have to devote a lot of time to it. How much of an impact would THAT have on the blog?
It's also not escaped me how many ex-CSMers completely burn out on EVE as soon as their term ends.
"How much control would CCP try to exert over what I posted?"
DeleteI would suspect only in areas where you are in the know about expansion development, until they make it public via devblogs. So, not much different than what's happening now with your writing.
The CSM will take as much time as you want it to take. If CCP is doing new development on POSes and corporate UI, and you could give a shit about the corporate UI, then don't waste any of your time on the corporate UI.
The problem with Hans and Aleks, likely, is that they want to stick their noses into every little thing CCP is doing, thus a huge portion of their time is taken up with stuff they don't really need to bother with.
Basically, it's a year of your game life. If it turns out to be really that crappy, you can always resign and talk about why it was so crappy and why it needs reform (though, you could stay and make a case for reform.)
How many CSMers burn out? Nearly all the ones from CSM5 and CSM6 are still playing and active. The few that are not were probably burning out before they got on the CSM.
You want to make a real impact upon EVE. I can guarantee you that your blog doesn't have the impact you think it does (this coming from CSM and CCP people alike.) So why not put yourself in a position where you can have an impact.
No point complaining about what the job MIGHT be like until you actually experience it.
Ok, you win, that counts as "doesn't really". :) Good thing I didn't offer a bet.
DeleteIf I chose to serve, I'd serve out the term. Resigning from a commitment I make is not in my nature. That's why I'm slow to commit on this.
Deletere: burn-out: I was thinking of TeaDaze and Mynxee (and Trebor), three CSM members that would probably be the models for how I'd serve. It remains to be seen if Trebor stays in EVE in 2013 if he still continues with his stated intent to retire this year. And TeaDaze is back, which is nice.
For the rest: fair enough. In particular, that second to last para is something I've heard echoed from a prominent CSM member, which I thought was kind of interesting. It's probably time for me to investigate that a bit more.
"Guarantee"?? Not cool, Poetic.
DeleteI keep up with 40 different EVE blogs and I approach them all with an open mind. Your post here though stinks like rotten fish. Regardless of your personal feelings toward Jester (jealousy and envy much?) and whether your statement is truly accurate or not, you've crossed a line there. The fact that you don't see it doesn't bode well for you.
Not sure what Jester did this time to piss you off. Maybe you should just stop reading his blog?
@Roman I've crossed a line? What? And what am I jealous of? I get pretty good readership. There's nothing I can do to Jester than will boost my readership. It's not like, if he were to get hit by a bus, I would just magically inherit all his readers. That's not how readership works.
DeleteI honestly think he has the game smarts to make a good CSM. And I'm really curious to read what he has to say while he's CSM. I've no doubt he'd remain communicative during his term. To go dark is not his style or inclination.
IMO your 'guarantee' statement was unkind and unnecessary, Poetic. The fact that I had to tell you that isn't good.
DeleteYou do have pretty good readership. So, why would you go out of your way to try and push Jester into something he's stated he's not interested in?
You said you have your issues with Jester; that he's full of himself, etc. That makes me wonder about your true motive, which IMO is not for the betterment of EVE or even that Jester will make a good CSM member.
It seems to me you want him up there so maybe he can be taken down a peg or two, as you see it.
P.S. I apologize if I'm completely out of line. This is your blog, not mine. I'm usually loathe to post critical crap.
Unkind? It's truth though. It's something I was curious about, and have asked CSM and CCP alike. He's read. But nothing he has written affects design decisions or release schedules at CCP. Those things are in Rip's head alone.
DeleteAs for my motives. I'm curious, mainly. If he ends up doing everything he thinks that CSM6 should be doing, then he'll end up being an awesome CSM representative. And I think he has it in him to hold himself to campaign promises/proposals.
If he doesn't, then he will get taken down a notch or three. But that's not due to me, but to his own effort (or lack thereof.)
Take his post about lessening the effect of technetium on the on the economy. I'm no expert, but from my non-expert chair, that seems an very good idea. As a blog post, it will have zero effect on how CCP decides to manage technetium going forward. So, in the end, it's just a bunch of well-written words with no effect on the game.
Now, if Ripard were CSM, he could present that to people, and a discussion could evolve. Ans both sides would come to new realizations and things would learned, and in the end, whatever CCP decided for technetium would be coloured by those discussions. Ripard would end up have an actual impact upon the game.
Roman, I think you're seeing things where there's nothing.
DeleteAs someone who likes reading both Jester and Poetic and don't see anything wrong here, Poetic is only trying to be objective, which is not easy, and not done enough.
Great, now I can rad about what Ripard wants without even having to read his blog
ReplyDeleteA major reason why the CSM doesn't sound appealing to a lot of people who would make ideal candidates is because the CSM itself is a flawed concept that doesn't mesh with the realities of the development process and the real life time constraints of players.
ReplyDeleteI don't mean that comment to be anti-CSM, rather in my opinion its a pragmatic viewpoint on the multi-faceted issues that the CSM must face as an intermediary between the players and CCP, which really negates a lot of it's own ability to facilitate, since it runs into a situation where it attempts to represent the players while also being CCP's mouthpiece, two completely different sides where speaking loudly for one tends to undermine position opinion for the other.
While my above comments might be construed as anti-CSM, i'm really just trying to point out the realities of the CSM as i've observed, not take jabs at CSM members themselves. Its extremely time-consuming to do properly, and the good CSMers will definitely downplay the amount of time that they've put in, when I would go further to say that its life-consuming. There are some CSM members who get away with doing much less and scoff at the time that others put in, but thats just a classic case of people not really understanding who or why certain successes happen around them.
Regarding Hands and Alek, I feel like your criticism of the time they spend doing certain things is less their own fault than the byproduct of the bigger flaws and faults of the CSM as a whole. One of the biggest problems with the CSM has and always will be reflected in the two following questions.
"Who do you know who would make a better CSM members than someone currently on the council?"
"Would they actually be interested in running and serving as CSM for a year?"
This is an excellent comment tbh. Pinky 'gets it' in a way that few others seem to.
DeleteI am a big fan of Jester's blog, but I wouldn't vote for him and I hope he doesn't run. Listening to all the podcasts and reading a lot of CSM blogs, they are, and have to be, incredibly vague about CCP and game details. That would pretty much kill Jester's style, I think. He doesn't need to be on the CSM to have an effect. Like you said, he's known in Eve and he's certainly known by CCP. He can let the cat out of the bag by theorizing, but he couldn't do it if he were muzzled.
ReplyDeleteI think he stays away from theEve forums and Twitter because of the amount of white noise that they generate. Too many communication modes these days, so you have to be selective about which ones provide the most value. I don't use twitter because I find it difficult to say anything constructive in 140 characters, and the Eve forums are just an absolute mess.
I would vote for Jester too, but if I did and he got in, I am completely certain he wouldn't be able to do what he does now, so for that reason I wouldn't vote for him,and I hope he doesn't run. I don't think he HAS to run.
You nailed it on why I choose the communications mediums I do, with one additional note: EVE players have a tendency to go negative by their nature.
DeleteCombined with Twitter, this results in arguments that get overly emotional and out of control quickly because there's no room for nuance in 140 characters. It's too easy to be misunderstood.
Combined with most forums, this results in taking the Penny Arcade "Internet + anonymity = dickwad" theory to the nth degree. I get spammed pretty hard by anonymous Goon commenters on my blog as it is. It just results in a really low signal to noise ratio, particularly on the EVE-O forums.
So I lurk on both of these communications mediums (specifically: FHC, Kugu, EVE-O forums, #tweetfleet, #eveonline) but I only rarely participate in them.
But the most important reason of all: there's only so many hours in a day, even for me. ;-) I have to pick and choose how I spend my time. I'll have more to say on this topic on my blog this week sometime.
It would be interesting to know if the CSMs being vague on everything is due to NDA, or because they don't want to try.
DeleteBut if it's really because they can't, then yes, I don't want Jester to run for CSM8.
It's because they feel their job is to be conciliatory. They could speak up about features once they're released as devblogs, but they refrain, because they fear hurting the feelings of their new pals by being critical of any feature they might not like.
DeleteThey'll complain privately. And they feel it is not our right to know what they're complaining about. Public complaints are a no-no with this CSM.
I don't really care much about CCP's ~feelings~ but I do care about keeping things moving forward without unnecessary fireworks. Some of it is due to the NDA. Some of it is because we don't feel the need to bang the war drums unless things really start going to shit. We've been keeping a timeline of certain events over the past few months which I suspect will see the light of day after the December summit, regardless of how the summit goes. I think once people see what's been going on, our behavior will make a bit more sense. Or maybe folks will carry on and say grass is blue still. v0v :)
DeleteTLDR - Be careful what you wish for, Poe.
If Jester runs for CSM, he will have my vote.
ReplyDeleteAs I was quite good with predictions in the last election, I want to make one again: he will win the chair if he runs. I am rather sure about that.
He should not run.
ReplyDeleteHe is doing a far better job in keeping the CSM and CCP at check then he would as a CSM Member.
I've made a scornful remark over his last blog post... It has not appeared since morning, so yeah: Jester only adds those comment that he himself can control / considers useful... :(
ReplyDeletePity, such a pity.
He shouldn't run and I wouldn't vote for him. Jester's doing pretty good with the tools he currently has at his disposal. Eve would be better served if he just kept at it.
ReplyDeleteSo, yeah, a few things:
ReplyDelete1.) I'd love for Jester to be on the CSM. Not only do I think he's do a pretty good job, it would be very interesting to see how his perspective of CCP, his fellow CSMers and the EVE community might change / evolve.
2.) His blogging habits, frequency and the content of his blog, would almost certainly be affected, and not necessarily because of JUST restrictions due to the NDA.
3.) I would say that CSM 7 has probably done much more ~day to day~ communication, and certainly more regular high level management communication with CCP than any previous CSM. That level of interaction, sadly, comes with a price as it relates to what we can report on sometimes. It's extremely frustrating and something I intend to resolve after the summit.
4.) If you love playing EVE a lot, or if you have a lot going on in the big MMO of Real Life, being on the CSM is a major time vampire, at least among those of us on CSM 7 that have chosen to take the time to actually serve during our term.
Personally, I think Jester is pretty smart to sit out the elections and all the entanglements of being a space politician as it relates to posting his true opinions on things. But I wouldn't mind seeing him run again and possibly serve for a year to get a bit more perspective on the whole process.
Thanks for all the comments, Seleene. Good reading. Gives a few more small insights into the process. It is appreciated, you stopping by.
ReplyDelete