Jita Park Speakers Corner

If the majority of the actual players are in highsec, then they could quite easily outvote the null sec guys so the argument that they don't care about the CSM because it is null controlled is flawed. The issue is the players not voting, not who 'controls' anything.

So that falls back on the high sec players again, not the null players. The null sec players are the most involved, committed part of the player base. They are the ones who keep Eve's 'story' alive by writing new chapters to it. Of course they are going to know about the CSM and when it comes time to vote, they are going to take the time to vote (even if they do vote with the bloc vote).

The high sec players that take the time to vote are also the most involved of that part of the community. They are the ones who care about the game and vote despite the fact that null currently out votes them. Regardless of if the CSM is dominated by Null sec, if they care enough about the game (not the CSM, the game), they will vote.

The people who don't vote are in the mindset that the CSM doesn't matter, not because it is dominated by null (except in what seems to be a minority of people who come to the forums), but because it has no power over the game, that it is a PR stunt by CCP or they simply don't know about the CSM at all. You have more than likely listened to the CZ interview of Sgurd, where he at 18 months into the game only knew what the letters in CSM stood for. That was pretty much the extent of his knowledge. That to me speaks more than any sort of "null is over-represented in the CSM" argument, because if people don't know they can't take action. To quote a cartoon, "KNOWING IS HALF THE BATTLE."

If people who actually want the game to do well honestly think that null sec is over-represented, then they need to work on informing those around them to vote accordingly, not say, "Oh don't vote because the CSM is dominated by null sec." That's not smart, and if Eve players are one thing its smart (generally). If it really made that much of an impact on them, they will vote. Not this "Oh well the CSM is all null, so I won't vote" argument. If they don't vote they have no one to blame but themselves about a Null dominated CSM.

So again I say to you, the issue is players not voting, not who 'controls' the CSM.

And why should they care about being represented in something that does not represent them?

CCP should be the first interested to get a representative CSM, but they're OK with the CSM being as is and actually are very proud that now they represent better the dwindling minority who will rather use the elections than vote with their wallet/feet.

If they voted, they'd be represented, not the other way around. As Malcanis said you need to make the effort to get something, both in Eve and in the real world.

CCP have no influence beyond giving the players the tools and working with the CSM.

Highsec forum shitlords are a tiny minority of the eve player base. They just post at each other enough on the forums that they believe they are a majority. They're not.

While your ability to simply persist in your beliefs in the face of overwhelming derision and reality is impressive this isn't really all that great a rebutttal. Attacks like this are an attempt at social marginalization which doesn't work at all when the person trying to use them doesn't have any social group they represent or can influence.

As I said, it is CCP who should be interested to get a CSM as representative as possible, if just for the investment it represents. If they're fine with how the CSM represents the playerbase, who am i to object?

Anyway, i am from a nation cynical enough to not blame it on "the people" when they ignore a unrepresentative representative system. With only one guy in 14 at the CSM that remotely looks like me, the only reason why I vote here it's because i'm a sucker for democracy, not because i think the CSM represents anyhting else but who are the cooler guys with 1% of buddies amongst the playerbase.

It is CCP who chose that, in order to have a special relationship with them, a player must build up a fan club to vote for him, a task which accidentally is way easier to some players just because they play in certain ways in a certain places, and way harder to others who play other ways in other places. It is CCP who favor the players who organize, over the ones who don't, albeit it is moot, to say the least, that the players who organize are the same ones who pay the bills or beef up the subcription numbers with fresh players.

By the way, as much as CCP lets the CSM become a popularity contest rather than a representative tool, they also choose to ignore other ways to engage the playerbase in a more systematic and professional manner, less "buddies of my buddies" style. But that would be another matter....

There are two things getting lost in this analysis:

1) For the sake of argument, let's say that there are fewer null sec players than high sec players who are involved and committed. However, the mechanics of sov null require that some of them are also in charge of tremendous numbers of people, with all the organization that implies. Then, it only takes a dozen or so involved and committed nullsec players to marshal thousands of votes. Their guys vote because they got a spiel and a one-click voting roster, and go back to running anoms; the high sec guys run L4s right through it all; if they do vote there's no coordinated voting strategy, and so the impact of each ballot is reduced relative to the one-click voters in the (organized) blocs.

2) Nobody--including CCP, as far as I can tell--knows how many high sec players are actually high sec players. In my more ornery moments I want to say that players should consider themselves to be based wherever their income source is, but that doesn't fly--if someone wants to consider themselves a null sec player because that's what they want to consider themselves, that's pretty much the end of the discussion, because that belief will inform their voting strategy.

That said, I'm especially glad that Mike made the CSM as the high sec guy, because he's a good, smart, big-picture guy, and some of the other high-sec dwellers who've thrown their hats in the ring have made me cringe.

The whole High Sec null argument is a **** as it is old.

Nearly every person I have ever come across in null has a HS alt of some description.

What ever changes are made in HS or null effects the games as a whole.

You can not be just a null sec candidate or just a high sec candidate as to say that you only care for one area of space means you are blind to the fact that changes can and will effect the entire game.

I am pretty sure if this was your attitude in the CSM that CCP would pay very little attention to you.

Sure you can go into a CSM meeting with CCP and say.. who gives a **** to HS lets do x, y and z in null, will get zero attention from CCP.

To me this reads like you're trying to make the whole thing purely CCP's problem.

Sorry buttercup, but it's not.

CCP are "happy" to speak to the people who care enough to run, and who are chosen by the people who care enough to vote. If that leads to a CSM that's mostly populated by "nullsec", why should that bother CCP, exactly? Because you don't like it? Well maybe you don't, but you don't care enough to do anything about it.

Actions speak louder than words. Whining on the forum about "popularity contests" because the people you like didnt get voted for, and using that as a reason why you didn't vote is just... it's not even dumb, It's surreal. How on earth do you expect anyone to take your complaints seriously when you show no evidence that you actually care at all? You don't even care enough to make sense.