Hurf Blurf & Dealing with CCP

If elected to CSM 6, this is the expansion I will push for.

An interesting pair of questions that allowed me to expand a bit on how I think CSM 6 will operate.

Out of curiosity, how will you deal with the possibility of - should you get elected - select other CSM members confusing the concept of accountability with hurf blurf, emo or fists on a table (you know what I mean). Accountability is one thing, the other stuff has made CCP run away consistantly as well a caused much kneejerking over the years. It usually only ends up in social engineering, which at best gives no results (look at Mazziliu and Elvenlord) and at worst makes CCP throw their company values even harder out of the window.

I can't predict how I'll deal with that possibility because each situation is going to require a response based on the facts of the moment. It's very important that the people elected to CSM 6 understand that the bullshit grandstanding and ME ME ME politics and attention whoring that have been demonstrated by some previous delegates isn't going to work anymore. I've seen this process from both sides of the fence and I have a good idea of what CCP thinks of certain types of CSM members that don't seem to care about the fact that they are on a COUNCIL and not there to promote just their one favored version of game play in EVE.

For months, I have been speaking with both past and present CSM members and soliciting their feedback as much as possible. I believe that many of the the CSM 6 candidates know how important it is now to be informed and are doing the same kind of homework. They are looking very hard at the past CSMs and will base their approach on what seems to have worked and what has obviously failed. If I am elected I am going to work with other like-minded CSM members to ensure that we take our predecessors' hard earned lessons about dealing with CCP to heart.

And as a second question, how would you deal with repeat occurances of CCP running for the hills the moment CSM does not agree with them (like they did with Incarna) and isolates the CSM while still feeding it all to the media. The only instruments you have there are those that Hilmar emphasised (transparancy, communication), but that means keeping all occurances within the public view, which is not liked by some parts of CCP. It's a tough thing to approach.

When I look at the list of candidates running this time around, I think there is a good chance that CSM 6 is going to comport itself much differently than past councils in terms of establishing communications amongst ourselves. When you get people who are long-time alliance leaders or real life professional managers (or both) on a council like this, we're going to play CSM much the same as we play EVE. There will be organized Skype / TS meetings, analysis of enemy fortifications, plans of attack and then execution.

If it sounds much like the CSM is going to war... well, perhaps it's an apt analogy. If you look at some of the other campaign threads in this forum, you'll see at least one common theme among several - that of forming a proper united front.

So when CCP moves to 'isolate' the CSM, it becomes the responsibility of the elected members of the CSM to do everything in their power and use all of their experience to bring the concerns of the people we represent to light. My former status as a Dev and the working relationships I had with people who are still there will count for something when there is a situation like that. If CCP chooses to run for the hills, as a member of the CSM I will call them out on it, keep the community informed about it and track it so that those trends can be demonstrated in no uncertain terms. I will work with the other CSM members together to be relentless in pushing for communication with the players on key issues even if there is no response.

At the end of the day, no one can force anyone in CCP to communicate with CSM, but I will certainly make sure there is a record of our attempts to try. Preferably, CCP will choose productive engagement with CSM 6. There's no reason to make this process unnecessarily difficult.