Assembly Hall

Tonight I listened to Eve Radio where the CSM spoke about The Mittani Scandal and then The Mittani and Nyphur talked about the consequences and fallout of associating real life name with overly sensationalist terms. The conversation was much less dramatic than I expected and I'm very thankful that Nyphur was so willing to work with The Mittani. Eventually they even made up and almost e-hugged. How cute.

However, there's an important take away to be had here: what could have been a story about a drunk mostly anonymous ******* making an exceptionally stupid comment at Fanfest became so much more because of the use of a real name. The news elements fed off of each other with all making various untrue allegations towards not The Mittani - but the player behind The Mittani. And really, this is hardly the first time that someone's real life name has come up in terms of their actions on the CSM - for instance there are several people who have been accused (but not "convicted") of breaking the NDA and now their real life is similarly affected. So effectively: the use of a real name takes things to the next level. And this is going to be true any time someone's real life name is used - whether that person is The Mittani, Jade Constantine, Liang Nuren, or yours.

At any rate, at the end of the show, someone posted The Mittani's real life address and someone else said they were headed that way to **** The Mittani's wife. This isn't the first time I've seen something like this said, but I've learned a lot about the way CCP handles it since the last time I saw it so directly. And just to be clear: CCP takes these threats very seriously and I wouldn't be surprised if someone's received a visit from their local law enforcement tonight.

So with all of this in mind, I believe that the CSM white paper should be amended in such a way that the CSM candidates (and eventual CSM members) real names and countries of origin are not given to the player base as a whole - but strictly to CCP. The real life information of current CSM members is already available, but that's no reason for future members to potentially be put in similar real life situations.

We as a player community have proven that we are not responsible enough, not mature enough, and not sane enough to be trusted with this information and this proposal is meant to help our upcoming CSM candidates - those whose real names aren't known yet. Maybe even people like you.

-Liang

I generally agree with the need for caution, but I do have one issue with this, and it might even be the reason why CCP chose to publish names in the first place, I dunno.

If the real names off applicants are removed from the process, doesn't that increase the chance of a player with a poor reputation using an alt to run for the CSM?

There may be players who would not vote for a certain candidate because of a past action (say The Mittani) or because of a poltical association (a certain alliance etc) but who would vote for his publicly unknown alt that is 'untainted' by a colourful past.

While revealing a real world identity could be abused, it also helps to identify individual players from largely anonymous character identities that can be legitimately bought or sold.

If real names were removed from the process, there should be another means of identifying players beyond the character name they choose to compete with.

Posting of The Mittani's real life address is harassment (invitation to mischief) beyond anything he said or did at Fanfest.

Threat to his wife is no joke. Can never tell who is a sick joker and who is truly deranged, but that's not for CCP or any of us to sort out. That's for the police to investigate.

But just as in RL, if you want to run for any kind of office, it's not unreasonable to require that you give up some of your expectation of privacy and that you accept greater responsibility for all your words and actions.

You are going to speak for us, be one of our public faces. We should know and be able to verify who you are, not your in-game persona. Your in-game self may be a villain; your real-life self honorable. But it might also be the other way around.

Many good reasons not to want that kind of scrutiny. Some bad. Either case, don't stand for office.

You know the risks of losing the anonymity shield going in.

In my opinion, anonymity for CSM candidates won't work.

At the end of the day, toons are pixels on a screen. The people on the CSM are the players, the people behind the toons. Since those people are representing the players as a whole to CCP, the players need to know who the people behind the toons are, because (in most cases) those people are very different from the toons they play.

Not signed.

I don't support this. If someone wants to be among the few representing the entire player-base, and have such perks as an all-expense paid trip to Iceland, they can do us the courtesy of revealing such basic information as their name and country of residence. For me, it is more the principle here. I could maybe get behind striking their country, but not their name. I think running for CSM should involve opening up to the playerbase enough to share their real name.