On Sat, Jun 6, 2020 at 11:12 PM Aris Merchant <
thoughtsoflifeandligh...@gmail.com> wrote:
On Sat, Jun 6, 2020 at 10:24 PM Rebecca via agora-discussion <
agora-discussion@agoranomic.org> wrote:
I also encourage everyone to vote against as many of Aris's proposals
as
possible (i.e, the non-essential ones) because Aris has submitted 10
proposals or something, most of which are minor cosmetic changes, in a
blatant attempt to get heaps of money.
Uhhhhhhhh... That isn't true at all. The only one that's actually
cosmetic is "Referenda", which results in significant increases in brevity
and comprehensibility. I think it's a big improvement, and several others
seem to agree. The closest other ones are probably "Ministerial
Reshuffling" and "Proposal Recycling Initiative". I certainly wouldn't be
particularly upset if "Proposal Recycling Initiative" doesn't pass, it just
fixes a few problems that I noticed when fiddling with other legislative
rules. "Ministerial Reshuffling" means that chambers, which currently have
to be stretched quite a bit to cover all proposals, would cover them more
comfortably. This is also a worthwhile improvement.
In general, money had relatively little to with my thinking. While I
can't say the thought of earning money isn't something I'm looking forward
to, I think I would have submitted all of my proposals even if there were
no financial reward for doing so. Now, clearly the impending economic
change is a major reason why I'm submitting all of these proposals. But
what actually happened was that while I was fixing things with the new
economic system, I saw other problems in the proposal rules. I decided to
propose ways to fix those too while pending was still free. I also
remembered a bunch of other things I didn't like in other rules, and
proposed fixes for those as well. I knew that in the future I'd be
financially punished for improving things, and so I decided to propose
improvements now rather than later.
I put significant time into these proposals (many many hours, at least
ten and probably a fair bit more than that), and I was responsive to
feedback on them. We've decided that proposal authors deserve to be
rewarded for their time and effort in coming up with good proposals, using
a financial incentive. If we didn't want people to get money for writing
good proposals, we wouldn't have come up with a financial incentive.
Likewise, we've decided as part of our current economic system that pending
should be free, and I am relying on that arraignment while it lasts, just
as many others are, including you. If it had been proposed at the drafting
stage that some of these proposals should be merged, I would have
considered it, but you didn't propose that then. As it is, these are
proposals that are intended to make the game better. I'm not saying that
everyone is required to vote for them. We have voting procedures so people
can say whether specific changes are positive or negative. But if you
think my proposals are good, I'd ask you not to vote against them just
because I'll be receiving compensation from my work.
As a final point, if people think that some of my proposals were split
up and should have been merged, I'm prepared to consider pledging to give
away some of the money. I wrote proposals that I considered logically
cohesive and sensible units for voting, but I do agree that if proposals
have been divided to the point where it's abusive and just gets extra
money, that's unfair and could be a reason to vote against the proposals. I
don't think I did that sort of abuse, but if the public disagrees with me
I'll give up some of the money to ensure that changes that I think are good
get considered on their merits. What I won't do is categorically agree to
give away compensation for the effort I put into writing proposals. I hope
people won't take my unwillingness to do that as a reason to vote down
proposals they otherwise approve of.
Okay, I feel like I need to respond to this on a level that's more
personal and not just logical argumentation and justification. I realize
it's not your fault and I realize you couldn't have known any of this, but
I'm having a *really* strong emotional reaction right now, and I feel like
I need to explain why.
I "graduated" from high school this week. It was... a hell of a time to
graduate. There was no real ceremony, just a social distanced filming of me
receiving a diploma case that didn't even contain a diploma. I didn't get
to go through any of the normal parts of graduating. Some of it I'll get to
do later. Some of it, like seeing all my friends at school again, I'll
simply never get to experience. I know life sucks for everyone right now,
but even so, things are... not great for me at the moment.
Everything I said in my previous message was true. Those were all reasons
I did what I did. But more than that, I needed an escape from real life,
because real life just kind of sucks right now. So rather than spending my
graduation week celebrating, I spent almost half of it coming up with
proposals and doing other Agora things. Like I said, I think they're all
things that make the game better. Money had nothing to do with it.
I don't expect everyone to vote for my proposals just because my personal
life is a mess right now. However, I would appreciate not being accused of
coming up with cosmetic proposals just to get rich. I realize that you
couldn't have known all of this, and for all that matter I realize that you
probably said what you said at least half as a joke or part of gameplay,
but assuming you know what someone else's motivations are is a dangerous
thing to get into (I do it too, it's very human). This is, as I said, an
overreaction, and it's in large part due to stuff that isn't really your
fault. That being said, I nearly cried, and I don't think I've ever been so
close to filing a Cantus Cygneus. I would really appreciate an apology.
-Aris
