Building a Community

[Zoid]

I should have mentioned this long ago, but in the interest of encouraging/rewarding contributions in certain areas, new threads in the science subforums of Rec Commons are worth double EC, triple in Planet Tales, and quadruple in Chiron News Network, where you have a thread autoposted when you post something in Downloads - just changed that last.

Eventually, we're going to find more goodies to spend those EC on in the Shop...

 

[Buster's Uncle]

I love that I see stuff like this all the time lately.  We not only CAN do it, we ARE doing it!

[Flygon]

Oh, come on, I'm active too! D:

[Buster's Uncle]

Yes you are; you posted something just today.

-I love seeing this, too.

[Green1]

Do not forget your lurkers. I would say most of the traffic to sites like this lurk, hoping to learn something or download something.

Oh.. and read our rumblings and such.

There are many forums I never post at but love to read, as is probably the case with a lot of folks.

[Buster's Uncle]

And God bless the lurkers -they bring up our hits for SEO and ad rates- but they'd have more fun if they joined the conversation.

[testdummy653]

And God bless the lurkers -they bring up our hits for SEO and ad rates- but they'd have more fun if they joined the conversation.

 

[sisko]

Here's a little thing you can to do to help grow our community: http://alphacentauri2.info/index.php?topic=2972.0
Your help will be appreciated!

[Buster's Uncle]

My friends, ete is working like a mad dog on our SMAC(X) wiki - he could use your help and encouragement.  enter the IRC channel -he and I are in there right now, for the second afternoon in a row- and talk to him about whatever your particular focus is.  This wiki is a thing worth doing.  How's about pitching in?

[Buster's Uncle]

I know a guy - he's bright, fun and funny, a fine artist and one HECK of a tech modder.  Easy to like, and he's been a major asset to the SMAC(X) community in the past.

The trouble is, in private, he's a hater.  Hasn't a kind word to say about anyone behind their back.  It gets very hard to take very quickly, even when he's right about their shortcomings- which isn't more than half the time.  I do not want to constantly hear about the failings of my friends -people who have stood by me- especially when they don't make those failings my problem, especially from someone who makes his self-centered hatefulness my problem and by his failure to have my back when I needed it, has made it clear that he is not my friend.  That takes more sheer brazen hypocritical gall than I'm prepared to tolerate.

It's a shame and a huge waste, and it's just sad.

You know what the trouble is with being that guy?  Purely from a selfish perspective, consider this:  I always assumed Hater-Lad gave ME the same treatment behind MY back.  (As it happens, few in this community are any good at keeping their mouth shut, and I know it for sure, as if that made a difference.)  If you spend too much time badmouthing, anyone with at least half a brain is going to figure the same thing. 

It's not an indicated long-term strategy towards keeping friends and being happy.  Loyalty pays.

...

So what does this mean to our community?  Well, it's a common enough type of innerwebs nerd I'm talking about, and I want to say this:  we haven't had trouble with this kind of person at AC2, and we're not going to.  If you lack the wit and guts to find a diplomatic way to speak your piece in public, don't be a weasel who does it bluntly in secret through back-channels.  We don't want you here if your bile is that hard to control - AC2 is a community of adults, and we're going to act like adults. 

This is a brand of the poison PMs problem I talked about before, whatever the actual back-channel in question.  Don't be that trouble-maker; for your own sake, if not everyone's.  It won't stay secret and you won't get away with it for long.  I've seen it in action, and it's cost the community some very talented people - the perpetrators, largely. 

We've put that kid-stuff behind us, and it isn't welcome back.

Be positive and diplomatic, for your own sake, if not everyone's.  Remember Matthew 7:3, and try not to make your hang-ups my problem - you can expect the same in return.  That's what adults do.  It's what makes healthy communities, where they hold a consensus against back-biting; that's us.

[Buster's Uncle]

...I'd like to point out that, as I complained in the OP and since, it gets quiet around here in my evenings - surely not everyone only posts from work or is a European and asleep?

Get back online and entertain me!

[Buster's Uncle]

You cannot have failed to notice that we've got some .exe coders running around AC2, and we've given them their own forum.

I should mention that I'm no techie - just been trying to notice quirks in the game while I play, make some screenies, post some saves, and I've managed to report a number of things that are new to scient (and the other two .exe modders we have active, kyrub and Yitzi.)  Yitzi is mostly focused on modding for game balance, BTW, kyrub on improving the AI - scient, as you probably know, on fixing bugs/exploits.  The Bug/Patch Discussion forum is quite active of late, but the dialogue could always use more testers, reporters, and participants in the discussion.

And this from scient:

No coding required. 

If you're interested in testing the patch please let me know. I put any changes I make through heavy testing but there are a few experimental patches that would be nice to test their effects on AI. I prob won't release them as part of patch unless they've been vetted properly. If you're interested, send me a PM on AC2 and I'll share current release class.  Looking for some help updating the French and German files. The installer that I made for patch will be able to handle different languages. It's only English for now until I can get help updating other languages.

The same goes for any language - at a minimum, we'd like to cover all the languages SMAC(X) was released in -French, German, Italian, Spanish and Russian, to my knowledge- but any language under the sun would be welcome.  If you know Esperanto and English and want to, we'd like your help; just as well boost AC and build the community by making it accessible to as many people worldwide as possible.

...

Activity is up this month - this is just one of the ways you can contribute to making AC2 fun and interesting.  Get postin' on your area of special interest, whatever it is!

[Unorthodox]

Um...

Maybe I'm blind and just haven't noticed, but I suddenly seem to have some limited mod powers in the OT forum.  (lock/unlock topics, but not edit/delete individual posts). 

[Buster's Uncle]

This is news to me --- but y'know what?  Keep 'em, if you'll act responsibly and with restraint.

[Unorthodox]

Hmm...responsibly and restrained....


I was more concerned maybe something got flipped on the 'user' mask and maybe everyone suddenly had them.