A new sign-up. Two post. Go check him out in the citizen registry thread. I ask CT to check him ip with Beburbista and Mark Phispher please.

Check IP how? Sure she can find the IP addresses, but what good does that do? And isn't Burebista the poster you had an argument with the other day about your managerial skills?

Reguardless of the arguement, the point is whether he is a spy. And if he is, we'll need to review his status in this game.

@ eyrei. Here is my reasoning.

Mark Phispher started out with 1 post and it was in the Citizen registry. A thread was started about him, and he was gone. Soon after, Buberbista signed up. Go look at what he says when he signed up. " I hope this doesn't turn into spy paranoia again"-paraphrased. How would he have known about that on his first post? Then, we see Buberbista complaining about not being able to see the secret forum. Then Buberbista disappears, and Seves shows up. That is my reasoning for wanting to know if their ip's matched. So, please check them eyrei to help out this review.

Goonie, you are WAY too paranoid.

Goonie, people are going to join and leave this game. That does not make them DLs of the same person or spies. I checked those, and none of the IPs are the same. That is the last time I do so unless you have a very good reason for your accusations.

Anyway, I am deleting this thread in a few hours to avoid possibly offending any of those accused.

None of the accused can see this. It is in our constitution to have new members put under Judicial review. I do not like being bashed by all of you for doing what is in our constitution.

Originally posted by Goonie
None of the accused can see this. It is in our constitution to have new members put under Judicial review. I do not like being bashed by all of you for doing what is in our constitution.

That is simply unworkable. All we can check for are DLs, not if they are spies from another site. So you have no information with which to make a decision about whether a poster is a spy or not, so I suggest you work to remove that clause from your constitution, or simply don't follow it, because witch hunts are not going to be tolerated.

Further, they will be able to see this once they are given access, which will be next time Thunderfall updates the registry.

Well, we will have to see how the Judicial runs this. It is not my job.

You are team captain or something of that nature, are you not? Your judiciary doesn't have a thread yet...

I am team captain yes, but this is a Judicial Review.

I am not asking you to make the ruling on this review. What I am asking you to do is to get that part of the constitution that requires this review removed.

I guess I have to do that too.

@eyrei. I cannot get it removed. It was voted in by the people for the people. This is a democracy.

Originally posted by Goonie
@eyrei. I cannot get it removed. It was voted in by the people for the people. This is a democracy.

Subject to the rules of CFC. Besides, I suspect that final consitution is being approved because people just want to get one into place. Do you really want a part of your constitution to be impossible to uphold?

Originally posted by Cyc
I guess I have to do that too.

If you are saying you will do whatever it is needs to be done to get this removed, please do. It would be much appreciated.

@eyrei

Thunderfall was the one who suggested that this forum be used to talk about new citizens who were "suspicious". If Thunderfall says we can do it, why do you say we cant? If you have noticed, we dont do it about all new members. Go see the secured access roster thread. I added two users yesterday.

Goonie, you have to provide evidence, not just start accusing every new citizen that joins.

I am not accusing! Is it hard to understand that I am bringing forth a new poster/citizen for review by the Judiciary. I am sorry for abiding by our constitution.

Originally posted by eyrei


If you are saying you will do whatever it is needs to be done to get this removed, please do. It would be much appreciated.

No, I meant I guess I'll have to open the Judicial Branch thread, also. Unless Vander opens it tonight, I will.

Actually wouldn't I open the Judiciary thread since Public Defender is higher on the CoC than Judge Advocate?

Originally posted by Goonie
I am not accusing! Is it hard to understand that I am bringing forth a new poster/citizen for review by the Judiciary. I am sorry for abiding by our constitution.

But, how are you going to tell if it's a spy or not? The only thing mods can do is to keep a list of IP addresses - even that's not going to say if they're a spy. Thunderfall can search for all IP adresses. Besides, it's very easy to fake an IP. Just go to any local library, and log on there. Different IP (usually).

Seriously, Goonie, this constitution has a serious flaw. I have tried to be nice about this, but this needs to be removed, now, because it will simply not work. If you have evidence that someone is a spy, by all means bring it to one of the mods privately, and ask that they try to check it out.

You do not have any means of rooting out spies, so stop acting like you do!

Originally posted by Goonie
@ eyrei. Here is my reasoning.
Go look at what he says when he signed up. " I hope this doesn't turn into spy paranoia again"-paraphrased. How would he have known about that on his first post?

I can agree to that. But linking him to Marc Phischer is unprovable. But I think that "spy paranoia again" is a little to telepathic to go unnoticed.

That said, we should not be accusing, simply investigating the matter.

Unless that person signed up at the old forums at CDG or where-ever it was. That could explain a heap.

Originally posted by Gingerbread Man


That said, we should not be accusing, simply investigating the matter.

I am sorry. I really don't mean to be offensive, but:

You do not have the means to investigate the matter!

OK, as Judge Advocate, I am going to make an official statement here, as it is my duty to see that the laws of our Nation are carried out. I am going to try and distance myself from the issue and speak of it just as I have read it. First off, our Constitution:

Article F: The Judicial Branch will be formed of three leaders, one who is tasked with upholding the laws (Judge Advocate), one who is tasked with defending the citizenry (Public Defender) and headed by the Chief Justice. It shall be the main responsibility of the Judiciary to admit citizens into the game who shall have joined after February 16, 2003.
______________________________________________

This Article F is taken from the Re-vamp version, put together by our President, Octavian X, modifying the original version by donsig. The Re-vamped version was up for a while and discussed at length and Article F was never brought up, because I suppose, everyone thought it was a good idea, including Mods as they never raised an eyebrow to it. Next, our proposed "Final Constitution":

Article F: The Judicial Branch will be formed of three leaders, one who is tasked with upholding the laws (Judge Advocate), one who is tasked with defending the citizenry (Public Defender) and headed by the Chief Justice. It shall be the main responsibility of the Judiciary to admit citizens into the game who shall have joined after February 16, 2003.
________________________________________________

As you can see, on our final draft of the Constitution, Article F is untouched and remains with the same sense of security that it had in the original draft. This is because, I believe, as most people here are unsure about the actual procedures of the game, this Article brings a feeling of safety or security. And I agree.

This Article F was introduced by donsig on Feb 11th, and has been on the table for half of the days this sub-forum has been open. The general idea of the Article was discussed before that. No one has ever had a problem with it. One of the reasons for this is because we are not the Police or the FBI. We are gamers and we new this all along. We knew we didn't have the investigatory means to track down successfully prosecute spies. What we wanted was some means of protecting ourselves from knowledgeable people (or tricky ones) from other sites. And that's what Article F gave us.

In regards to this thread, Goonie was simply trying to protect the public from being scoped out by another site. He was actually just following procedure based on the Constitution (all of them). This is not paranoia. This is a responsible citizen. CT has claimed that Goonie is claiming EVERY new citizen is a spy, when it is obvious that the last two were accepted uncontested. eyrei, who seems to me to be on the virge of trolling Goonie, has claimed that there is NO way to prove a spy. Well that may be true, but Goonie didn't ask CT to prove SeVeS a spy. He asked her to compare IPs. This is something that CT and eyrei both have stated they can do (unless in their shyness they have neglected to say that user names are not listed next to the IP's). It was a simple request in an investigatory manner. It could even be looked at like it was 007ish or Sherlock Holmesish. He asked for a favor not a denounciation. I think everyone may be going a little overboard on this issue.

To back up Article F, here is Article A of the Final Constitution:

Article A: All Civfanatics Forum users who register in the Citizen Registry are citizens of Fanatikou, subject to the approval of the Judiciary. Citizens have the right to assemble, the right to free movement, the right to free speech, the right to a fair trial, the right to representation, the right to demand satisfaction and the right to vote.
__________________________________________________ _

Obviously, the very first line of the very first Article states that each new citizen of Fanatikou is subject to the approval of the Judiciary. According to our Constitution, Goonie has done nothing wrong. Pure and simple. In fact, the arguements or reasonings he has brought up in this thread are quite interesting.

And now, finally, from our Constitution again:

Article K: The constitution, laws and standards of Fanatikou can never be contrary to the rules and regulations of the Civfanatics forums. Moderators may veto any such constitutional amendments, laws or standards.
________________________________________________

This Article, which seems to be a standard in all DG Constitutions, is a very good one. We don't want to bite the hand that feeds us. I would suggest that the easiest way for this problem to be solved, although maybe not the best, is for the Mods who are denying Goonie his investigation to physically prove (by posting here), that this kind of play investigating is contrary to the rules and regulations of the Civfanatics forums. Then they can just veto the parts of the Constitution that support this kind of thing. Other than that, we will have to wait until this Constitutional Poll is over, re-write the document (which we would have to do if vetoes slashed out the parts about this issue), and repoll it. Which both in my opinion require equal amounts of work as the Constitution in it present form seems just fine to the people of Fanatikou. As Goonie has stated, TF has also looked upon this sub-forum as private and encouraged us to keep it that way.

So, as Judge Advocate, in this official statement, I say that the Constitution does not HAVE to be changed, but if the Mods can prove that the writings of several Articles are contrary to the rules and regulations of the CFC Forums, then they can Veto those Articles.

As a side note, in the eyes of the Judge Advocate, Goonie has done nothing wrong by initiating this thread.


OK, I'm done.

Originally posted by Cyc

In regards to this thread, Goonie was simply trying to protect the public from being scoped out by another site. He was actually just following procedure based on the Constitution (all of them). This is not paranoia. This is a responsible citizen. CT has claimed that Goonie is claiming EVERY new citizen is a spy, when it is obvious that the last two were accepted uncontested. eyrei, who seems to me to be on the virge of trolling Goonie, has claimed that there is NO way to prove a spy. Well that may be true, but Goonie didn't ask CT to prove SeVeS a spy. He asked her to compare IPs. This is something that CT and eyrei both have stated they can do. It was a simple request in an investigatory manner. It could even be looked at like it was 007ish or Sherlock Holmesish. He asked for a favor not a denounciation. I think everyone may be going a little overboard on this issue.



I have made it very clear from the beginning that there is no real way to find spies. Unfortunately, noone seemed to listen, so now we have a clause in this constitution that is impossible and inflammatory to enforce. I am asking that it be removed ASAP to avoid further problems.

And Cyc, I am not trolling Goonie. He seems to be resisting my efforts to correct this situation, so I am getting somewhat frustrated. I did check the IPs to humor these laws, but, as I have been trying to tell people from the beginning, it proved nothing at all.

I see, eyrei. If you check the paragraph that you quoted above, I've edited it. When rereading it, I noticed I left an important part out. But I've put it in now and will help confirm your statement. I understand how frustrating these issues can be, but they are our laws, voted on by the citizenry. We must not approach this in a slashing manner (from the Judiciary), the Mods on the other hand have a back door as stated in my conclusion above (which you posted before I finished). Talk with the Mods and come up with a contridiction of CFC rules and regulations, clarify which parts of which Articles you're vetoing, and be done with it. Other wise it is going to be a very long process for everyone else to come to a conclusion.

Ok. There is a forum rule against starting threads that target other posters.

Originally posted by eyrei


I am sorry. I really don't mean to be offensive, but:

You do not have the means to investigate the matter!

Notice how I said we should investigate the matter. We meaning us as a country, not me.

And sorry, that was offensive. No need to yell. I was trying to be apolitical. I was just saying how each side of the argument has its points.

And my post immediately after this:

Originally posted by me
Unless that person signed up at the old forums at CDG or where-ever it was. That could explain a heap.

But it seems that you are right in saying that there is no way to catch spies, without breaking the forum rules. Since there aren't allowed to be threads directed at anyone, howabout we ban PIs. Because a PI is all this really is. We are making sure that the person in question really is innocent.

I wont accuse this person, or any person, of being a spy until they are proven it.

All that would be needed to end this is to see if Beburbista really meant what he said would be to see if it was referring to the old forum.

OR

maybe this guy really wants to be on our team, but is always scared away when we PI him.

I'm trying to be apolitical. (after seeing American politics on the news, I decided I should be apolitical forever:) .) But people seem to be missing that.

And now lets prove that we are the best CivIII community by showing that we can win this game, with or without spies watching us the whole way.

Sorry Gingerbread Man. I wasn't 'yelling' at you in particular, but at everyone. Apparently I wasn't heard the first time I tried to get this point across, so I am making sure everyone hears and understands it this time. No offense to anyone, but this really must be understood.

I am fairly certain I have said this before too...if you suspect a new member is a spy, contact one of the moderator's with your evidence privately. I doubt we will be able to figure anything else out, because we are privy to only a little more information than everyone else. It is however, far preferable to starting a thread to discuss someone's guilt or innocence that they cannot even post in to defend themself.

Stop worrying about spies and start worrying about winning this game.

Why then did Thunderfall tell us to talk about new members in this forum eyrei? This was his idea.

Wow, a debate at 0'dark 30. Anyway, here's a snippet from the forum rules:

What can't you post?
You agree, through your use of this service, that you will not use this forum to post any material which is knowingly false and/or defamatory, inaccurate, abusive, vulgar, hateful, harassing, obscene, profane, sexually oriented, threatening, invasive of a person's privacy, or otherwise violative of any law. You agree not to post any copyrighted material unless the copyright is owned by you or by this forum.

These are what applies:

innacurate - What if the person is accused of being a spy, when they're not? That's an innacurate assumption.

hateful - While it may not start out that way, what if the player is let in and sees this? It's certainly going to be a troll. What are they going to think of CFC?

harassing - denying someone access to this thread (especially with all the new citizens) could be taken this way if it takes days for each 'PI' to pass.

invasive of a person's personal privacy - You're pretty much asking, if not yourselves, the mods to do extra work by performing 'background checks' so to speak. Emailing them about what sites they go to, what emails they use, etc. gets pretty invasive. Checking a person may require a list of IPs to scan for DLs, or accounts on other forums. That alone is invasive if the list is required to be posted publically. IP addresses on the forums are usually something only mods and the admin should see.

This also means we'd have to scan the IPs of every user on every site. This would have to be done by the admins. A user doesn't have to be a membr of a MSDG to give out secrets, though, much less a forum. They could converse by email. What you're ultimately asking for is a list of IPs addresses, and that can't be done due to security issues. (hackers and that sort of thing) Not everyone wants to have their IP address passed around.

Originally posted by Goonie
Why then did Thunderfall tell us to talk about new members in this forum eyrei? This was his idea.

Ones that seem suspiscious, not every single member. Would checking the 27,000+ members of CFC be enough?

Well I'm at least as paranoid as Goonie, but i don't know how we can check the new people.

I remember myself starting to post in the demogame and became governor quite fast. Then when India attacked us I was accused of being an Indian agent :P

Originally posted by Cheetah
Well I'm at least as paranoid as Goonie, but i don't know how we can check the new people.

I remember myself starting to post in the demogame and became governor quite fast. Then when India attacked us I was accused of being an Indian agent :P

:lol:

Ones that seem suspiscious, not every single member. Would checking the 27,000+ members of CFC be enough?

CT, you are right! We cannot check every member, and we HAVEN'T! Seves is the first. If you look in the roster thread, I have already added two members without judicial review.

So, what's the purpose of this then? Especially if someone signs on as a new user, and doesn't even have an account here yet?

The purpose of this process is to let the Judiciary(elected by the people) decide whether or not they believe a certain user should be allowed citizenship. Does the United States or Germany accept all applicants?

As Chief Justice,

So far, the accused has done nothing wrong. We have no evidence of him spying (Do we have spys?) nor that he has registered before. Now perhaps the moderator can cofirm that, but we'll jump that hurdle when we get there. But again, as of now, the accused is innocent.


Some other issues:
1. Isn't this thread enough for discussion of at least this case? I'll make a Judicial thread just to be safe.
2. Sorry I was out for all this discussion. I had to go to sleep for class today.

Ok, we need the verdict of the other two members of the Judiciary.

I will post a verdict later tonight or tomorrow morning.

Let me say that before I was really POed, but now I can agree that any suspicions go to the Mods, and any evidence goes in the forums.

That way there will be no witch hunts, just witch burnings. ;)

And I say that a new signup or a low post count is not evidence, so this PI really should have gone to the Mod first, then the mod could display any evidence he finds if there is a spy. (excluding the actual personal details e.g. the IP address. they would just say "IPs matched)
Normal PIs would follow.

So in other words, only mods can start PIs about spies, but we could PM them our suspicions. Would that work?

Originally posted by Vander
As Chief Justice,

So far, the accused has done nothing wrong. We have no evidence of him spying (Do we have spys?) nor that he has registered before. Now perhaps the moderator can cofirm that, but we'll jump that hurdle when we get there. But again, as of now, the accused is innocent.




There is no accused here. That is what I am trying to get across.

As Judge Advocate, I will say that I can find nothing wrong with the forum use or patterns shown by SeVeS. If the Judicial Review request seeks an answer to the question "Should SeVeS be approved for citizenship in the MSDG?", then I say yes. He seems to spend most of his time reading and conversing in General Discussions. I think I would rather use the term "approved" rather than "innocent".

Ok, with two out three approving seves, I will add him to the roster.


And GbM, this system is going to continue as long as it is in our constitution.

Originally posted by Goonie

And GbM, this system is going to continue as long as it is in our constitution.

Since noone has made any move to change this, I guess I will have to do it myself. These threads 'investigating' other posters will end now. They are against forum rules. If you wish to continue discussion on this issue, start a thread devoted to it. This one is closed with the hope that it sinks to the bottom before these new members see the paranoia surrounding this game.