EVE General Discussion

Yeah, I'm one of em, but I do all these things solo, including PVP, without needing what you're talking about. I have one already, but we're all in different time zones and I only see them for about two hours of an evening. The rest of the day, I'm on my own, and do just fine. But all that aside, what's the difference between a 'blue community' and just joining a corp/alliance that does and lets you do what you want?

Capitalism is a necessary balancing factor to socialism, as socialism is to capitalism. When you have one without the other, you open the doors much wider to corruption and chaos. If you're against one or the other, it's for ideological reasons, not academic ones, which means you haven't got the ability to form a relevant, educated objection to either in the first place.

I know chopper. I don't know you. And 'daring to dream' is not a convincing qualifier when it comes to experience with EVE Online and its socioeconomic dynamics. Try again.

And those are fair points, you've made your case, but it all comes back to what I said before: This is EVE, you do what you want and what you have the power to accomplish. In order to accomplish what this thread is looking for, then you need to understand that the players you want to get involved in this are also going to do what they want and what they have the power to accomplish. You need to figure out what that is for each individual that you want to convince to join you, so that you can cater to their needs. Government isn't as easy as you seem to think, and whether you like it or not, every leader, dictator or not, needs his keys.

its called the csm, you're not relevant enough

People are more complex than that. Napoleon Bonaparte said that once he'd experienced command he could never take orders again. Nobody argues that he was either a bad leader, an idiot or flawed somehow. His actions changed the genetic makeup of a continent, for a long time he was the archetypal historic 'great man' that drives history and now when people hear his name they think of cognac.
Eve mechanics are simpler and more forgiving than life, what with resources spawning forever and nobody ever dying.
Great thing about Eve is tinpot little dictator types can be quite useful in generating action, while good, smart men get used as stooges for the players behind coups. I'm looking at you BNI 2015.

OP, people set up all sorts of arrangements but the game's limits remain. Democracy requires more of the individual and the organisation than most spaecships pilots are willing to commit.

That link from Remiel is gold, it collapses big important things down into sentences.

Ill answer your points now.

It is a governments responsibility to look at the state of affairs on different issues and then take some sort of action that will result in the issue being resolved.

So lets say the OP set up some sort of government and pledged to do something about ganking and made lots of people aware of his intentions. I think the onus would be on the general Eve populace to decide if they want to sign up to the op's government and help do something about ganking. I accept that some people may not be affected by ganking so there would be no real incentive for them to get involved, but what about the little guy who is affected by ganking? Will he just accept being repeatedly ganked or will he stand up and be counted and join something that could help?

If the OP has to convince people to join then they probably wont. I think it is better to publicise the core ideals of this government and what issues they can resolve and then see how many people are interested in joining.

If I could focus on you for a sec Remiel, It appears that you think this isn't possible because Chopper said its not possible, not because you've tried it for yourself and come to your own conclusion.

When I did my first Invitation to 0.0 thread lots of people said what I suggested wasn't possible I proved them wrong by inviting 6 new guys into npc null and teaching them everything I knew about survival and guerrilla warfare. It worked very well we were able to earn lots of isk and we fought back and got lots of kills on the larger enemy we were fighting. Most of the guys listened to me intently and I was very impressed.

The New Order of Highsec is the nearest thing you'll find to a government within the game.

It stands independent of player Corp and Alliance affiliations. Its members cover all the professions available in Highsec (yes, even mining!), and it is itself governed by a set of guidelines which are flexible enough to allow for individual interpretation, but clear enough to be understood by the citizens of Highsec.

James 315 heads up the Government and the New Order, by popular agreement, and for the simple reason that no one else has proven capable of managing such a diverse population and Staff.

Much as I love them, I want you to forget about the CODE. Alliance, for the moment - don't worry, they're sufficiently elite to take it on the chin.

There are hundreds of us non-allied folks toiling away in Highsec, on behalf of our Government, an administration which has been established for more than 4 years - a very long unbroken line in EVE Online, where stuff changes routinely.

Many people come to the Forums to pour scorn on us, but I've a simple challenge for them:

Alone and unaided, devise and implement a scheme in Highsec which will (over time) attract more than a trillion Isk in investment, provide entertainment and 'content' for thousands of players (willingly or otherwise), be instantly recognisable for anyone visiting Highsec, have a dedicated long-running well-written and popular blog, produce its own art and media work, light up any EVE Online sub-forum where it appears - and get right under the skin of a certain type of EVE player, without fail.

I'm not a betting person, but I am willing to lay what used to be called a 'Sportsman's Bet' (sadly no longer able to be so used - see 'Football') that not a single one of you will be able to approach what James has achieved - whether you agree with our methods and justifications or not.

The challenge stands. Do it alone, or get your pals together to help you. If you don't like us, organise a popular revolt - I've heard that's a way to bring down governments...

Governments do exist in Eve - I believe goonswarm has already been mentioned. They are not a democracy by any means, more akin to a socialist autocracy. They have a dictator and a directorate comprised of very capable people (call it a cabinet of ministers if you like) for all kinds of things. Finances, infrastructure, internal and external affairs, secret service, military and so on. They collect taxes, have state-run resource mining and processing facilities and infrastructure and use the funds gained through that to take care of their own by providing ship reimbursement, jump bridges, staging and production structures, subsidies, military defense, yadayada. They have a set of laws on what people may and may not do within their sphere of influence and ways to enforce it.

So, Governments do exist in the game, and they work. However, I don't see the same thing being possible for democracy. There is one major problem with democracy, not only in Eve: Democracy is the rule of the people, and most people don't make good rulers. Most people lack the insight necessary to make the right decisions for the whole group. With Eve being a spaceship game on the internets, this is even more of a problem, as we are all anonymous, unless we choose to not be, and it's even more difficult to figure out the true intentions of a political figure in Eve than it is in the real world. It's relatively easy to rile up a bunch of people and get them to follow your alleged cause, but those people will never know what you are really after. On top of the support of its people, a democratic government will need funds and the ability to access and use them. Eve players are way too good at acting to make this work. It is very easy to just fabricate a new identity once they've burnt theirs, have run your little government into the ground, taken all the funds and assets they could get and vanished into the darkness of space.