Proposed Amendment to the Constitution - Citizen Discussion Thread

This amendment to the Constitution includes various elements that have been discussed and received popular support. I've been collecting them for one submission instead of having a Cabinet Poll for each item individually. These have all been passed through polls or heavily discussed already but I wanted to put the whole package up for comments and possible refinement before I call for a Council Vote. Please post any questions/arguments on any section of this ammendment.

Description of changes and additions

Game Time - Changed the advance notice requirement from 24 hours to a fixed schedule.

Chat turn instruction thread - Added instruction to use a dedicated thread for turn instructions.

Absentee officials - Clarified when a Leader is considered absent.

Deputy Leader powers - Clarified that a Deputy acts with the power of the department when the Leader is absent.

Chat Representatives - Clarified that Chat Reps have departmental decision making powers in the chat turn only and can vote in Spot Council Votes. Clarified Chat Rep appointments.

Jurisdiction conflicts - Clarified that jurisdiction conflicts are resolved according to the Chain of Command.

At-Large Councilor titles - Removed "Junior" from the second Councilor's title.

Council Votes - Added clarifier that Council Votes override any other authority. Edited clause on poll duration to allow early finish when a measure has received enough YES or NO votes that further votes will not influence the outcome.

Actual changes and additions
Additions are in blue, changes are in black.

Section A: Game Dynamics

Article 4: The President will post a fixed schedule of game times (example - 23:00 GMT on Saturdays, Mondays and Wednesdays). This schedule may be updated each Sunday for the next week's turn chats. If not updated, the existing schedule carries over week to week.

Article 11: There will be a separate instruction thread for each chat turn. This thread should be set up as soon as the chat turn is scheduled. All instructions to be played out in that chat turn should be placed in this thread. Any instructions that are not posted to this thread before the start of the chat turn are not considered official.

Article 12: An official is considered absent from the Forum when they have not replied to an inquiry (Council Vote, request in their Department Thread) in 36 hours. An official is considered absent from a turn chat when they are not there at the beginning of the turn chat.

Section B: Government

Article 2: Below the department heads are the deputy leaders. They are the voice of their department in chat turns and the forum when the Leader is absent. They are responsible for carrying out the plans of the departmental leader and may make departmental decisions that haven't been addressed by the leader. Deputies may vote in Council Votes when the departmental Leader is absent.

Article 5: When more than one official has jurisdiction over a particular activity the conflict will be decided according to the Chain of Command.

Article 6: Below the deputy leaders are the appointed chat representatives. They are the voice of their department in chat turns when the Leader and Deputy are both absent. They are responsible for carrying out the plans of the departmental leader and may make departmental decisions that haven't been addressed by the leader.

Section I: Elections

Article 5: There are two polls for the At-Large positions, one for the Senior Council Member At-Large position and one for the Council Member At-Large position. These polls share the same candidate pool.

Article 15: Each Department Leader may also appoint a Chat Representative. The primary responsibility of a Chat Representative is to attend the turn chats and represent his/her department during the absence of the Department Leader and Deputy.

Section K: Chain of Command

Article 1: The Chain of Command defines rank and precedence for Playing Rights, Naming Rights and Jurisdiction Conflicts.

Article 2: COC

• President
• Vice President
• Domestic Leader
• Military Leader
• Foreign Minister
• Science Leader
• Cultural Leader
• Trade Leader
• Senior Council Member At-Large
• Council Member At-Large
• Domestic Deputy
• Military Deputy
• Foreign Deputy
• Science Deputy
• Cultural Deputy
• Trade Deputy
• Remaining Elected Officials (example - Governors)
• Appointed Officials (example - Designated Chat Representatives)

Article 4: A Council Vote is considered the highest rank of the Chain of Command, when applicable.

Section L: Council Votes

Article 2: Polled council votes will last a minimum of 48 hours or until all council members have responded or until a plurality of all council members have carried or passed the measure. Spot votes (in the Turn Chat) will be tallied and carried immediately.

Article 13: An official is considered absent when they have not replied to a Forum inquiry (vote, request, etc) in 36 hours or are not present at the beginning of a turn chat.

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I do not see how we can define these together. A forum absence means that instructions were not posted, while a turn chat absence simply means the official could not be there during that time. There are many times when I can post up until about the time the turn chat starts, but cannot attend. This should not be considered the same sort of absence. There is no need for the deputy to take full control of the department in this instance.

Originally posted by eyrei


I do not see how we can define these together. A forum absence means that instructions were not posted, while a turn chat absence simply means the official could not be there during that time. There are many times when I can post up until about the time the turn chat starts, but cannot attend. This should not be considered the same sort of absence. There is no need for the deputy to take full control of the department in this instance.

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Are you interpreting it that if a Leader misses the chat then the Deputy is in charge until the Leader posts on the Forum again? I'll edit it for clarity.

Originally posted by Shaitan

Are you interpreting it that if a Leader misses the chat then the Deputy is in charge until the Leader posts on the Forum again? I'll edit it for clarity.

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Basically, which completely eliminates the control of any leader that misses a turn chat. It implies full control of the department for that time. I do not consider missing a turn chat an absence if the instruction thread has been posted in. That clause gives too much power to those who attend the turn chat. The influence of those who attend a turn chat is already considerable because it is human nature to head those who are right in front of you more than those who have spoken in the past.

Originally posted by eyrei


Basically, which completely eliminates the control of any leader that misses a turn chat. It implies full control of the department for that time. I do not consider missing a turn chat an absence if the instruction thread has been posted in. That clause gives too much power to those who attend the turn chat. The influence of those who attend a turn chat is already considerable because it is human nature to head those who are right in front of you more than those who have spoken in the past.

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Section B ensures that the Leader's plans will be used. The Constitution only gives power to Deputies when the Leader is absent. We have to consider a Leader absent if they're not at the turn chat or the Deputies have no power at all.

Originally posted by Shaitan

Section B ensures that the Leader's plans will be used. The Constitution only gives power to Deputies when the Leader is absent. We have to consider a Leader absent if they're not at the turn chat or the Deputies have no power at all.

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The deputies are supposed to take over for the leader if he/she is not posting and has not in a while. Not if they are absent from the forum during the turn chat. If instructions have been posted, the deputy or chat rep's only responsibility is to make sure the person playing the game knows what those instructions are. They can be changed in an emergency, but otherwise should be interpreted very literally.

would it be against the constitution to voice ALL citizens in the turn-chat until they misbehave or speak up?

the rule for the chat would be:
all are voiced. but citizens should be quiete until asked by the player or another official for comments/polls.
if someone misbehaves or the situation becomes too confusing, he/she/all citizens is/are devoiced

I am 100% in favour of dis' proposal. Remove the barriers between govt and citizens. I don't recall the citizens agreeing to be de-voiced. Some chat rules and rights ought to be in the constitution, since it is an integral part of our game.

Originally posted by chiefpaco
I am 100% in favour of dis' proposal. Remove the barriers between govt and citizens. I don't recall the citizens agreeing to be de-voiced. Some chat rules and rights ought to be in the constitution, since it is an integral part of our game.

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That sounds good to me if there is not too much noise. Having played a couple of turns at the beginning, I can say from experience that too many people talking can be very distracting, and relevant points may be overlooked in the mess.

Originally posted by chiefpaco
I am 100% in favour of dis' proposal. Remove the barriers between govt and citizens. I don't recall the citizens agreeing to be de-voiced. Some chat rules and rights ought to be in the constitution, since it is an integral part of our game.

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They did agree, Chiefpaco. In this poll.

Disorganizer and Chiefpaco - This section of the amendment is ratifying the rules we're currently using, based on the polls. If either of you would like to revisit the issue I'd be happy to help.

EDIT: I must be sleepier than I thought. We are revisiting it right now.

Discussion please, people. Any other proposals, arguments for or against?

i think a 12 vote poll is not the right thing... and we learned since then... we learned why ppl leave the game...
another point is:
chat voicing is not handled by the constitution. in fact, the chat is not handled at all. it could also be a phone-conference.

in the chat today, some ppl made me as the chat-op decide to give it a try. maybe this will bust our next turn-chat, but i will take the risk (and gf also) in favor of having more citizens included.

Should chat reps have full Leader powers while performing their appointed duties?
This poll is closed.
Yes - In the chat turn only. 12 60.00%
Yes - In the chat turn and Forum. 2 10.00%
No 6 30.00%
Other (explain below) 0 0%
Abstain 0 0%
Total: 20 votes 100%

[Edit Poll (moderators only)]

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May 09, 2002 05:12 AM

Shaitan
Paternica Exhaustica

Registered: Dec 2001
Location: Atlanta, GA

Chat rep powers
Should appointed chat room representatives hold the entire power of their department in the chat room? Specifically, should a chat representative have the right to vote in spot Council polls if they are the representative of their department in the chat room? Should this extend to the Forum if the Leader and Deputy are absent?

The YES choices will be aggregated for the overall YES/NO decision.




I'm a bit confused here. Does "Specifically, should a chat representative have the right to vote in spot Council polls if they are the representative of their department in the chat room?" mean what it appears to mean or were the options for this poll change for a third time and i'm not aware of it. If this poll is valid, wouldn't it be in contradiction to Section B, Article 6?

Thank you, Cyc for catching that. I apparently suffered from a massive cranial flatulence. I had edited the amendment when the poll was running the other way and totally forgot to edit it with the final results. I'll correct it ASAP. For the record, Section B Article 6 originally contained "Chat reps cannot vote in spot Council Votes."

Regarding the voice rights portion:
I think it would be wiser at this time to remove this from the Amendment when it is presented for the Council Vote. As Disorganizer mentioned, the turnout for that poll was quite low and as we can see there is a lot of push against this rule. However, I'm actually hesitant to do this as I fear it will bite me on the butt as a "Leader disregarding a poll" issue.

Thank you Shaitan. Just trying to be helpful here. As far as your last statement, I believe your right about the biting. (Not that it would be my teeth!)

Now please change the descriptions of changes and additions, please.

Thank you Shaitan.

chat-voicing can be discussed here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=22569

POWER TO THE PEOPLE!

As the turn-chat is not covered by the constitution till now, we were able to change this very fast to hold our citizens with us.
It was an emergency issue since many citizens flock away from our game.

Originally posted by Cyc
Now please change the descriptions of changes and additions, please.

Click to expand...

Got it. Thanks again.

The Amendment has been passed to the Council for a vote of approval. I have removed the section regarding voicing in the chat thread. It is my firm belief that the interests of Phoenatica are best served by allowing the current debate on this item to conclude before passing it into law based on the item's previous poll. I accept full responsibility for this decision. It is mine and mine alone and no other official was a party to it.

I propose A11 be read like this:

Article 11: Each department will have one representative in the chat turn.

I don't think any more is needed and chat rules be removed from the constitution for now, as you stated.

Also, for A13, I think the Leader should be given a break, if a post is not reasonably visible or is, in fact, reasonable. I think the post should read something like:

Article 13: An official is considered absent from the Forum when they have not replied to a reasonable inquiry (vote, request, etc) in 36 hours. An official is considered absent from a turn chat when they are not there at the beginning of the turn chat.

It adds vagueness to the Article, especially what does "reasonable" mean. However, that is something the leader will have to defend to account for their absence. I suggest the leader's defense contain something to do with the post not being the main point of a citizen thread or not mentioned in the official's governmental thread.

I took A-11 out of the submitted amendment all together for now. We'll have to get into it when we have more info and some real life experience from the chat turns.

I've clarified A-13 by defining the inquiries. Good catch there!

The voting proposal (Council Vote) can be found here.

The proposal at the top of this page has been syncronized to the actual Amendment being voted on by the Council. Some changes had been made between the original proposal posted here and the end product, based on citizen feedback (which was the reason for this thread in the first place ). The changes from the original include:

Section A, Article 12 was originally:
An official is considered absent from the Forum when they have not replied to an inquiry (vote, request, etc) in 36 hours. An official is considered absent from a turn chat when they are not there at the beginning of the turn chat.

Section A had the following article which has been removed:
Each department will have one representative in the chat turn. Should more than one member of a department attend the chat they may communicate between themselves through a private room, PM, etc, but only the senior member will have voice in the chat.