Jita Park Speakers Corner

'What are the minutes for' is a pretty huge question.

The minutes are the only documents we get through the year where the player-elected player representatives of the CSM, flown by CCP at great expense, interact with CCP in Reykjavik with the intention of the betterment of the game on our behalf. There are other places where we may get glimpses of similar interactions - twitter, in-game channels, Eve-O forums, etc - but no one place where we see CCP sit down and interact with the CSM over an extended period of time discussing the game.

But what do the minutes actually give us? As well as documenting the interactions, they also give us a non-NDAed insight into the general direction of Eve Online development, normally starting with the next expansion. Indeed, the following expansion is normally the main topic of discussion in any summit for obvious reasons - most of CCP are working on that during the summit. These are the first set of minutes (as far as I'm aware) to not be released before the next expansion being discussed during the summit.

The other reason why minutes are required to be timely is that these CSM members need to be accountable and we as the people who voted them in, need to be able to talk to them about issues we feel are present in the game currently, potential upcoming concerns and their performance so far. The Summer Summit last year happened less than 2 months into CSM8's tenure. We didn't get the minutes until over 7 months into their tenure (with them having less than 5 months to go).

If CCP want the player base to buy-in to the CSM as a process, timely minutes showing how the people we are voting for are representing us are essential. Minutes should never take priority over the development of the game but if CSM and CCP don't get the minutes out in a timely fashion, how can you expect players to take the whole process seriously?

No, CSM members are elected and the voters have a right to know what their reps are doing. They have NO such right in regards to specific Devs though I understand that they would like to know what the COMPANY they give good money (or isk) to is doing.

Who 'hired' us is the main difference in how open we need to be in the minutes.

m

My position on all of this:

* The first draft of the minutes should be written by CSM, both for practical reasons (we have more time) and for institutional reasons (they are *our* report to the community; CCP has devblogs to present their report).

* CSM comments in the minutes should not be anonymous. The community deserves to know how each of us stands.

* CCP comments should not be anonymous. While I am sympathetic to concerns about people getting witch-hunted, any statement by a dev that is controversial can quite easily be labeled as being either a personal opinion or that of a group. All they have to do is ask for that clarification when they review the minutes. And bluntly, if the opinion is given anonymously, some idiots will immediately assume that it was said by CCP DevTheyThinkSucks and burn him/her in effigy anyway.

* One structural issue that has arisen because of the much-enhanced working relationship between CCP and CSM is that there is often a lot that is discussed in summit sessions that would clearly be NDA if the minutes were released shortly after the summit. Reread the current minutes with that in mind and consider how much would have been redacted if they had come out in October. My personal opinion is that a reasonable solution for this issue is to produce short summaries of each session for release shortly after the summit, followed by complete minutes (in the current style) for the session when the features discussed in the session are publicly disclosed (for example, accompanying the devblog).

also it would be nice if CCP had regular summits or at least regular recorded meetings say every month .. so we could get too know the CSM as people and their personalities and to get a better idea of where EVE is going in the future instead of only getting .......
dev blogs and information only when patches come out and 5 month delayed heavily edited CSM meetings where it is very hard to gleam anything useful either about what CCP is planning for the future of eve or any kind of feeling as to who are CSM actually are/ and are doing in general.

you mean like these?

http://teadaze.net/csmDB/index.php?csmsession=4

m

well who knew there was any such records??? ... we can't mind read you know .. we get all these community spotlight on corps and betting sites but nothing actually useful like CSM meeting records or useful information/eve news sites..

I agree completely on these points. There shouldn't be anonymous or otherwise unattributed comments in a formal "minutes".....ever.

If people can't be adults (or at the very least abide by ToS/EULA/Forum rules) in player to player and player to dev interactions then it ought to be standard procedure to "banish and vanish" that player account(s) on those grounds.

I have applied a sticky substance to this thread. Keep it up guys, there is a lot of good feedback and points here.

I said I would not post again in this thread, but the above comment made me change my mind.

A question to Jessica Danikov.

Have you ever been involved with running an association, club or other organisation? From your post it would appear not.

To say that the reason for the minutes is to act as an aide-memoir for CCP and the CSM is laughable.

They were there in body if not in mind and should therefore remember what was said and decided.

We were not, and if the CSM is to have any utility other than acting as a mouthpiece for CCP or alternatively as a fire-blanket, then the minutes must be timely and accurate. How can we trust anything else?

As for your last part in the above quote, we are involved parties, we are the paymasters, no subscriptions, plex or GTC, no EVE. It's that simple.

EVE is not a democracy but it does have a duty towards it's stakeholders, and to do as you suggest removes a vital part of the enterprise. Can you imagine the likes of Microsoft or Apple withholding reports of the decisions of the board to its shareholders. There would rightly be an uproar.

You can't take people's money and not tell them what you propose to do with it.

Not unless you are a government of course.

Oh, I think you must mean censorship, not censure. That is due when things appear late or not at all.

Therefor the CSM was present at the meeting. They presumably had a quorum and could thus make decisions and later communicated the proceedings of the meetings to the non-attendees.

Judging from reports of the antics at various Fanfests they may not have been compos mentis but that is another topic entirely.