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Sounds like you have a lot of great ideas, they just need to be implemented.

The Ministry of Integration has been vacant for some time now...interested in leading it?

Spoiler

4) As a member of the Underhusen, what would you do to promote interest in the Storting and legislative activity?

More people on the forums = more people interested in regional politics on the forums. It doesn't really get much simpler than that.

Quite a few people don't particularly care for Wintrean regional politics, and stay mostly for the cultural activities. This has progressed to the point where some prominent and active members of our forum community have, at one point, voluntarily become ex-citizens.

Do you see this as an issue, and if so, do you have any ideas on promoting our regional legislature?

(This question goes out to all other candidates as well.)

I believe IRC is an incredibly powerful tool that is currently inadequately used for the induction of new players in the community. I would not have joined the forums and would not be running for UH had I not joined IRC first. IRC would play a key role in the overhaul of the introduction system I believe is necessary for new people.

...

Personally, I am here because in all my life, online and off, I have never found a more fun bunch of people to talk to. Perhaps that is the reason for my bias toward IRC, but I would definitely like to talk to people and find out their reasons.

Although I agree that IRC should definitely be promoted more for new members, I think it's important to recognize that different people will interact with the community differently. For instance, I'm personally not on IRC very often, but I still enjoy having conversations with everyone here, if not in real time.

So I ask, how do you propose to integrate IRC more into a new introduction system?

I do not see the fact people's interests drift away from politics as an issue, or rather, I do not see it as an issue that takes priority right now. I think it is important to realise that no matter how many people drift away from politics, if others are joining, they can take over and the region can evolve to better reflect what people want. surveys and questionnaires as well as the mentor system could be a good way to find out what people want in the region and I think it is important Wintreath not stand still but rather listen to people and try to improve on itself.

I agree certain people are not on IRC all that much, I would like to point out I had not read your message at the time I used you as an example of a person who would probably be good to help people on the forums, but I do understand that. At this point in time, I would like more data on these things. to see what people would like.

IRC is very daunting for a person that does not know the system. It took me a good while to get used to the idea of it, so using the mentor system might be a good way to teach people about it. In addition, I would like to advertise it more. I might even go so far as to ask Wintermoot if he could think of a way to add it to the news feed (there's a spare space for it, I'm just not sure how easy or hard it would be to do). even if it turns out to be too difficult, I would still like to advertise it with links to the mibbit chat on the "While you wait" page, possibly the Region page and maybe some other places too.

I would extrapolate on all of this, but at this point, this is becoming more of a suggestions thread and I would like to know other people's opinions before I put this forward as something we should be doing.

If you take anything from my campaign, it should be that I want to listen to people. A lot.
I do think Wintermoot listens a lot right now, but I think it may be time to help him out and actually ask people outright how we can do things better, giving them very specific questions for realistic changes and actual progress.

Sounds like you have a lot of great ideas, they just need to be implemented.

The Ministry of Integration has been vacant for some time now...interested in leading it?

That is definitely something I would be interested in, thank you.

I think a lot of this is going to be about data collection and an active and informed Unterhusen could really transform the dynamics of the region.

I think the very first step would be a survey of existing members (entirely voluntary, of course) to see what they enjoy most about the forums, IRC, the RMB and the community in general.

This has been attempted to some degree with trader's census. I do think it probably is time for a new census though, possibly looking for different things about us Wintreans. (I had been working on one for a bit, but I'm more interested in demographic info.)

Secondly, I believe it might be useful to create a small advertising flyer (probably in text format) to post in the region description on the Nationstates page, advertising the aspects people in the region like and perhaps quoting them too.

You mean the dispatch currently pinned to our WFE? Yeah, I think including quotes from established members might be a nice idea.

Thirdly, I believe it might be useful to automatically assign a volunteer mentor to new members (chosen based on the interests the new member has [from a questionnaire] and how many of them are shared with the mentor). When Krone is implemented, I might even suggest a small sum to be payed to the mentors in return for their help.

Fourthly, I believe we should be utilising the greatest asset the region has (its people) in the addition of new members. This is not entirely figured out in my head, but I think it would be good to make sure that at every stage of the joining process, people talk to people. A fill-in-the-blanks form is very good, can process many people and be very good for the purposes of understanding whether or not a person will be interested in joining the UH in the future, it doesn't allow much room for people to jump in to stuff. Imagine how much less daunting the process of joining would be for a person who had just been on IRC, met Hugsim, Tatte, Moot and anyone else there, got Taulover to guide them through the application and then suggest fun stuff based on his own favourite threads, because he is similar in his interests to the new member.

There already is a Mentorship system in place, though as Wintermoot said, with Point Breeze's long hiatus from Wintreath, the entire Integration Ministry is basically nonexistent now. The system that was existing certainly could use quite a bit more work and improvement; the issue of course if having motivated people work on it.

As for your idea about a questionaire, what's really interesting is that this used to be part of the citizenship application and was used by mentors exactly as you described. This was later changed in an attempt to make the citizenship application more streamlined. I'm not sure if that has really worked though, and kinda seems counterproductive considering that we also have a post requirement in place for citizenship.

Fifthly, I would like to simplify the laws of Wintreath.
I appreciate Moot has done a good job of both collecting the important ones together and posting them on the voting app. It is an excellent feature and it makes it much easier for someone who has not yet read all of them to understand more or less how everything works. I think we can still improve on it by effectively creating a "Wintreath for dummies" handbook for new members.
Every region I have been in has had massive texts, often for the sake of having massive texts. It is fun, especially if you're into that type of thing, but nobody is going to read them. They can be simplified, summarised and handed out to new members in a much more digestible format.

Wintermoot has written this really handy guide on the government and fundamental laws of Wintreath. The issue is that it's tucked away in the "NationStates Guides" section of the forum, in the top menu. It certainly could use some more visibility.

I'm really glad so little of this stuff is new. It will certainly make implementation easier. New or old, I think these ideas can be very useful.

Adding quotes to the dispatch was part of the plan, but I was thinking of perhaps writing some stuff in a similar way for recruitment TGs and  things like that?...

Thank you very much for all the info. I think it's great all this exists and it really underlines my point about how difficult it is for a new member to stay up to date on it all. I am going to do my best to look in to all of this. It certainly looks like it will be very useful for the things I have in mind.

The census looks very interesting, though I think you are correct in saying we need a new one especially if we want to base any policy decisions off of it. The mentoring system I shall look into further, though I think some changes may be necessary there too.

Wintermoot's guide is certainly useful and I do very much like it, but I feel like all new laws should be made very, very simply understandable too.

For instance:

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1. Title
   1.1 This act shall be cited as the Citizenship and Demonym Act.

2. Citizenship Act
   2.1 Citizens who do not keep a nation in Wintreath shall have their citizenship revoked. A monthly sweep shall be conducted to ensure citizens are in compliance.
   2.2 The Monarch of Wintreath shall have the authority to revoke citizenship from any person, so long as the Monarch makes a public announcement regarding the revocation.
   2.3 The Monarch of Wintreath shall have the authority to declare any person as persona non grata. Any person declared persona non grata will be denied citizenship, ambassadorship, or any other privileges by the government of Wintreath.
   2.4 The Monarch, or any subordinate official appointed by the Monarch, shall have the authority to grant or deny citizenship to any person who applies.
   
3. Demonym Act
   3.1 The official demonym of Wintreath shall be Wintrean.

4. Compliance with Previous Law
   4.1 Upon passage of the legislation, and in accordance with Decree 001: Section 6, Decree 001 shall be considered Void

could be summarised as(for instance);

Any person who desires a forum account must have a nation in the region. This shall be checked every month. The monarch and any people appointed by him may remove or deny and person who owns or applies for an account.

The official demonym for Wintreath is Wintrean.

It is a very simple idea, basically I imagine it as if a lawyer is explaining to his clients what a law means. The original text is nice for the lawyer, the judge and any Law text fan, but for most people the TL;DR will suffice.

PS. I realise the law I used in my example is outdated, but I just wanted an example

That is definitely something I would be interested in, thank you.

I think a lot of this is going to be about data collection and an active and informed Unterhusen could really transform the dynamics of the region.

And done! See, great things happen when people become active and talk about things.

1) Why are you running for Underhusen? What do you plan on doing if you are elected?

I always run for UH.

2) What have you attempted to accomplish in the region over the past several months? Do you feel you were successful in accomplishing what you set out to do?

Some change in the Judiciary and Legal systems

3a) If you have been a member of government over the last several months, do you feel that you've put the time and effort into your position that it warrants? Why or why not?

For the UH, yes...for my Ministry position, no. Not really.

4) As a member of the Underhusen, what would you do to promote interest in the Storting and legislative activity?

Make more laws and try and pass them.

5) As you may know, the Underhusen has not been all that active for quite awhile now. What are your ideas to change this?

Make more laws and try and pass them...and maybe build a wall...or give people free healthcare or something, I dunno.

6) Just in general, where do you want to see the region go in the next several months?

Well I wouldn't mind expanding it and keeping it more in it's NS roots.
I do apologize for the lateness of this, however again I was sick...