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Having said my peace about the first proposal for Citizenship, I'm ready to move on. This is not one single proposal with a lot of components like the previous one, but many smaller proposals that are independent of each other that I think would still have an impact on some of the problems I tried to solve in that one.

Create a Mentor Program
While it wouldn't be tied to a particular status anymore, we could still assign a mentor to first-time Citizens for their first 3 months in Wintreath. The way I envision it, the mentor would regularly check in on them, gauge how they're feeling about Wintreath and whether they need help with anything, and otherwise just be a friend and a link between them and the rest of the community. When possible, mentors would be assigned based on what the new Citizen wants to get involved with in Wintreath...for example, someone interested in RP would get a mentor that's in Rollspelskra. We could still informally track what new Citizens are doing in the community through things like the seasonal records, but it would no longer be tied to anything in particular.

Create Pathways to Success
Speaking of a new Citizens' interest, we could also create pathways that defined what success means in those areas. For example, if a new Citizen was interested in Werewolf a basic success might be playing a game from beginning to end without dropping out, while an advanced success might be hosting their own Werewolf game. Then we can create guides, resources, and mentoring that can help them along that path. In this way doing works for the community becomes more of a plan than a requirement for anything, but there's still some guide to see how they're getting along.

Give the Joint Moderation Group More Ambiguous Authority to Remove Disruptive Members
There's already some precedent for this, when we banned Anthony from the Discord for a year for consistent immature behavior over time. In the original proposal, we could gauge someone's behavior while they were an initiate and determine whether they had the maturity to be part of our community. In the absence of that, I propose simply expanding the JMG's existing authorities to allow for removal of disruptive members as needed.

Change NS Nation Option for Maintaining Citizenship to Require WA Membership
There was a lot of discomfort around adding an activity requirement on the NS side, so I'm proposing at least requiring them to be in the WA and to endorse our delegate, so they're contributing something to that end. While the WA isn't a major focus for most people in Wintreath, having a delegate with more endorsements does give us more weight and thus more attention in the WA, especially when it's on a delegate who has been as active in the WA as Michi. It's not an activity requirement, but at least it's contributing in some way. I think it would still resolve the zombie Citizen issue as well.

The Website
This isn't my own suggestion, but after I'd put my notes for this together I read Melehan's suggestion about putting information on the website that would be helpful. I have somewhere on my to-do list to build a proper website for Wintreath...I don't know when I'll get to it, but I think that's a fine suggestion for when I am able to do that. At the very least, I had already planned to have dedicated pages for everything that we do (RP, Werewolf, community governance, etc).

I have a personal burning hatred for mandatory mentorship programs, long cultivated from both sides. I have had throughly unsatisfying experiences with every mentor ever assigned to me (mainly due to communication and boundary issues), and while I have successfully mentored multiple folks in various other situations, I've had the best success with mentees who chose me rather than were assigned me.

All of that is to say, I believe the mentorship program should be opt-in on both ends rather than mandatory. Those willing to mentor can volunteer, and those looking for mentorship can apply and indicate who they would like to mentor them based on their own goals and preferences in the community.

I like the Pathways to Success proposal, so long as it is also opt-in. Having clear goalposts is always a good thing, imo.

I also am in favor of strengthening community moderation powers and policies.

No objections to requiring WA membership and Delegate endorsement as part of the NS Citizenship requirement. It's very reasonable and doable.

If you need help with the website, I have full stack development experience, with most of it on the front end, and would be happy to help.

Okay so just a few clarifying questions and comments:

Mentor Program

As a concept, I like the idea. Particularly the tailored when possible bit. I would like to sort out what we can do to ensure people are being mentored well (What happens if they receive one message with no follow up? What if they and their mentor REALLY don’t mesh well? What happens if their mentor becomes busy?) I think it’d be cool if maybe we had members of the community who were interested in being mentors have to fill out a little profile somewhere so new members can shop for their mentors. (Also yes please, opt-in. Some people benefit from this and some don’t.)

Pathways
Toeing the line to a positive opinion here, positive-neutral until this was more fleshed out.

JMG
I don’t have the clearest image as to how things are run now but just… yes please. Full support here.

WA Nation
To clarify, the other routes of maintaining citizenship would still be in place? If so, full support.

The Website
Support- I’m not a new member by any means and sometimes I have a hard time finding certain things on the forums. That said, it could be something as simple as a pinned index or something somewhere rather than a full website. Not against the website though if that’s something y’all want to pursue.

Mentor Program
I don't really have all the details on the mentor program at that point. I imagine it would be a guild of the Civil Service like the Hearthkeepers or the Dungeon Masters, open to members that have been involved for the community at least maybe 6 months or so, so they have the knowledge to be a good mentor. I would personally like at least initially for every new Citizen to receive a mentor, if only because it's easier to look at the data and decide that certain groups don't need a mentor than to start opt-in and then try to figure out of groups that are opting out actually would benefit from having one. For reasons like that, I imagine the mentor end would start out as a pilot program...do things a certain way for three or six months and then figure out what needs to be changed.

If the concept of a mentor program is alright in general, this is probably an area we can have a dedicated topic for, but I'll wait for more responses before going forward with it.

Pathways
There's really nothing to opt-in or opt-out of on this one...the Citizenship app would be updated to ask people to choose the thing they most want to get involved in (like choosing a major in college, I guess), but otherwise it's just a guide that defines what we consider to be a successful integration. Going back to our Werewolf example, if a new Citizen got through a game without dropping out and indicated they had a good experience, it's probably likely that they'll join up for another game and we can consider them successfully integrated in that area. If they didn't after 3 months, it may be a sign that something went wrong. Did they ever join a game? Did they join one but got overwhelmed? Did just they lose interest in Werewolf? If so, is there some other part of Wintreath they may be most interested in? It at least lets us know that something happened there.

It's really more a guide for us to judge whether they may need further help and assistance in getting into the community, it's not an actual requirement for anything.

JMG
Right now the way things are ran when it comes to behaviour that doesn't actually break rules is a lot of hang-wrangling, and honestly that's probably because of me. I think we should have very high standards when it comes to banning Citizens period, but I'm also weary because when you can't point to anything other than "immaturity" it's easy to start a slippery slope that would be inappropriate for an open community of second chances. On the other hand, this general issue has come up repeatedly over the last few years over different individuals to the point that I do believe it's disruptive to the community.

This doesn't require anything other than me to order that it's so, but I listed it because I wanted to get a feel for the community's reaction to the idea, especially after the pushback on the original proposal.

WA Nation
To speak to Chanku's point on Discord about disadvantaging people who are active in other regions...I made the change to this part of the proposal because people didn't like that the original proposal disadvantaged people who couldn't be active. If someone isn't active in Wintreath but is elsewhere in NS, then it's not that they couldn't be active, it's that they've chosen to be inactive in Wintreath in favour of other regions. Again, our activity requirements are very low, and it wouldn't take more than a few minutes a month to meet them. If they're not active here but are elsewhere in NS, that speaks more to their preferences and choices rather than their ability to be active.

The Website
The coding wouldn't really be too difficult...it would just require me to take a day and play around with what I'd like the format to look like. I suppose one way people could help, especially Thanes and Jarls over aspects of Wintreath, would be to put together information that would be helpful to new Citizens and to people checking out Wintreath for the first time. Some notes I've written down for when I put together these pages:

1) What do they (the people viewing the pages) want and why do they want it? Go a couple layers deeper, what emotion are they going after (or away from)?
2) How are we going to give it to them?
3) How do we make this more relevant (to the person viewing the page)?

My problems are just two fold. Mentorship programs never ever work. There's never enough intrest from enough people to be mentors. Also requiring prospective members to be mentored will inevitably turn people off to the community and this people could be quality members of our community. The quantity vs quality thing doesn't really make sense to me any system will always have people who fall off long term members will disappear. Pillars in the community will take breaks. People who go through the programs will cease to participate. Quality can't be cultivated it happens naturally. We've had plenty of quality members break through without a system in place that will remove a certain group of people from the community. I don't mind the removal of inactive citizens but I don't think massive changes are necessary to create more quality and I find it hard to believe it will work. 

I really hate requiring WA membership. I don't use NS to maintain my citizenship anymore but I find the WA morally and ethically repugnant and I avoid it on principle and being forced to join it in order to continue to maintain my citizenship if that were still how I were doing so would cause me to find a region where I'm not forced to participate in something I despise. However as I don't use this and there are other pathways to citizenship this isn't something I'd fight to hard on.

To update based on a Discord discussion last night, the idea is now to not have WA membership as a requirement to become a Citizen, but to have it as one to maintain Citizenship. It would also count if you're using your WA as delegate of a vassal region, to cover taulover's unique situation of being Delegate of New Hyperion.

@Neon Abigail: I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on quality. I acknowledge that even quality members come and go, and people do have different levels of ability and experience starting out, but I think with help and education we can help new Citizens get a new start. Again, I've noticed in the past that people who have been in other regions and then come to Wintreath are more likely to stick around and become contributing members, which I would guess is because they already have knowledge and experience.

To update based on a Discord discussion last night, the idea is now to not have WA membership as a requirement to become a Citizen, but to have it as one to maintain Citizenship. It would also count if you're using your WA as delegate of a vassal region, to cover taulover's unique situation of being Delegate of New Hyperion.

@Neon Abigail: I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree on quality. I acknowledge that even quality members come and go, and people do have different levels of ability and experience starting out, but I think with help and education we can help new Citizens get a new start. Again, I've noticed in the past that people who have been in other regions and then come to Wintreath are more likely to stick around and become contributing members, which I would guess is because they already have knowledge and experience.

I do have a slight concern with the last data point because there might be a confounding variable: The people who come from other regions and then come here are also likely to continue playing NationStates and thus stick around. Where-as people who come here directly may not be that likely. Something to consider at least.

Others have spoken about mentorship systems, and I have already previously also, so I'll just agree that they should be opt-in. And that we already know from past experience in this region that running mentorship systems is hard and underappreciated, which leads to disillusionment and inactivity.

As we discussed on Discord, I think that barriers to entry should be reduced as much as is feasible for attaining citizenship. So at the very least, there should be no WA requirement for gaining citizenship; i.e. a nation in the region should suffice. Then, after already becoming invested in the region, citizens are more likely to be inclined to either join the WA and endorse, or already are active enough to meet post requirements. As a compromise, I also would not be opposed to adding an additional RMB post option (maybe 10 posts?).

I don't like creating an exception for myself specifically. If we do go with such a WA requirement, perhaps a better option would to also allow endorsement of delegates of vassal regions to count for the WA requirement.

I disagree with the premise that dual citizenship implies a necessary choice to prioritize one region over another. Many of our greatest citizens have and continue to be dual citizens. Their commitments may shift over time between regions, and many often disappear for months at a time, perhaps due to being RL busy, but continue to make important contributions to the region (eg Wuufu). It also would not be unexpected for people's WA commitments to be in other regions, because Wintreath does so little with WA. Having a WA requirement may disincentivize valuable members of our community from staying or coming back. (I am aware that there are technically provisions in place to keep citizenship for people who need to take a leave of absence, but they are never used. It is probably also embarrassing and stressful to ask for such a stay, and might feel like a trial of one's worth in front of all the citizens of Wintreath, considering that it is now a vote before the Landsraad. This may not be something people want to deal with if they have things going on in their life.) Overall, I think that it is better to err on the side of openness. Other regions may have more restrictions, but we should remain welcoming in spite of that, so that valuable members don't feel punished for any other commitments they may have, and instead feel at home and want to stay.

We can agree to disagree but making it harder for people to join is not going to fix these problems it is simply going to hurt citizenship instead and when you have a smaller pool by your own design you have far less chances to get another Svip or TGN or Stigya. Or me, because I simply wouldn't have joined if I saw these requirements when I came here. I looked through a lot of regions before settling here. 

Nobody is strapped for options in NationStates the more barriers to entry the less likely they come. I think removing inactive citizens is fine but making it harder to join won't fix the regions problems. It won't produce more quality it will just produce less options. 

I ran some quick figures for new and returning Citizens over the last year.

In the past year, we've had 45 new Citizens to Wintreath. Of those, 23 still retain Citizenship and 15 remain active in some way (done something on the forums, Discord, or NS in the last week), or 33%. One thing that stood to me is that every member of WARPP who became Citizens in the past year has remained active, or 7 people (almost half of the 15 active people) by my count. That may speak to their requirements for joining WARPP. To join WARPP, prospective members must satisfy at least two of these conditions: have at least 250 million people on their NationStates nation, been a resident of Wintreath for a month, or become a Citizen. Prospective members are then interviewed by the Co-Directors, who then grant final approval.

Of course I'm not suggesting we adopt those requirements as our own, but it shows that it is possible to cultivate active, contributing members and have an impact. In a coincidental way, WARPP has become an effective integration clearinghouse between the RMB community and Wintreath proper.

I also took a look at how many people might be in a mentorship program, assuming that everybody was assigned a mentor. Based on the number of new Citizens joining us each month, I estimate that there would be around 11 people on average in a program that lasted 3 months and 7 on average in one that lasted 2. I'm not married to the 3 months period...I would be fine with making it 2 months to reduce the workload on mentors.

Not related, but we also had 12 returning Citizens in the past year, 75% of whom have remained with us and are active. Of those that didn't, at least some of those made an active decision to leave (such as tatte), but overall when people come back to Wintreath, they seem to come to stay.

@Neon Abigail: I don't see how we're raising any barriers to entry at this point...the WA requirement would be one option in a variety of options, and we came to that because it was argued that a RMB post requirement would disadvantage people who couldn't be active. Otherwise the requirements are the same as they were when you joined as far as I remember...

@taulover: Conceivably, we could have other vassal regions in the future and somebody has to be delegate...I understand circumstances where somebody legitimately can't contribute their WA and also can't be active (which excludes R/D, which by its nature requires one to be active), but I imagine those circumstances are going to be few and far between. I mean, how likely is it that you're ever going to need to depend on the nation requirement to retain Citizenship? It's not impossible of course, but judging from history it's unlikely.

I've said my piece I look forward to seeing what this does to fix the regions problems. 

We can agree to disagree but making it harder for people to join is not going to fix these problems it is simply going to hurt citizenship instead and when you have a smaller pool by your own design you have far less chances to get another Svip or TGN or Stigya. Or me, because I simply wouldn't have joined if I saw these requirements when I came here. I looked through a lot of regions before settling here.

Nobody is strapped for options in NationStates the more barriers to entry the less likely they come. I think removing inactive citizens is fine but making it harder to join won't fix the regions problems. It won't produce more quality it will just produce less options.

Moot has already said that he would be fine keeping the initial application requirements the same, so in that case the initial barrier to entry would be the same as it already is. I think there might be an argument to be made that activity requirements that kick in later on may still deter people, especially if they take more than one month to open up out of their shell, though.

I ran some quick figures for new and returning Citizens over the last year.

In the past year, we've had 45 new Citizens to Wintreath. Of those, 23 still retain Citizenship and 15 remain active in some way (done something on the forums, Discord, or NS in the last week), or 33%. One thing that stood to me is that every member of WARPP who became Citizens in the past year has remained active, or 7 people (almost half of the 15 active people) by my count. That may speak to their requirements for joining WARPP. To join WARPP, prospective members must satisfy at least two of these conditions: have at least 250 million people on their NationStates nation, been a resident of Wintreath for a month, or become a Citizen. Prospective members are then interviewed by the Co-Directors, who then grant final approval.

Of course I'm not suggesting we adopt those requirements as our own, but it shows that it is possible to cultivate active, contributing members and have an impact. In a coincidental way, WARPP has become an effective integration clearinghouse between the RMB community and Wintreath proper.

I'm not too familiar with RMB RP organization, but from what I understand, WARPP operated/operates as a combination of an IC military alliance and OOC RP governing body. Therefore, I would imagine that people join WARPP to get more deeply involved in the RP process. It's a specific activity that attracts people to the organization, and the kinds of people who become so deeply involved are more likely to be the kinds of people who stay.

I think that the success of WARPP illustrates two main things. First, having activities and positions which bridge the gap between the RMB and the forums may help create a more successful pipeline with greater retention. In that sense, the current situation, where the RMB is indeed being used as the main recruiting grounds for forum RP, might be the point to focus on and cultivate for internal recruitment and integration. We might also envision similar focus on bringing people from the RPK into the rest of the Wintreath community, or similarly from the Werewolf community, by focusing on greater community building so that people are naturally welcomed into and want to take part in other activities and chats in Wintreath. This must be done with an awareness that there is no one-size-fits-all integration approach for everyone. After all, although WARPP has potentially been very effective at retaining citizens, it is still responsible for bringing in at most less than half of the active citizens who joined this past year. I think that having a variety of activities, with positions of responsibility and commitment available throughout, might be a good approach. This may involve beefing up our various institutions so that there are things to do, titles to be had, and fulfilling work to be done. All of this must be voluntary, of course - we want new citizens to join because they want to participate, and stay because they want to keep doing the things they find fulfilling. With the Storting long-gone, it is perhaps unexpected that WARPP/RPK have been filling much of that need.

Second, and perhaps more importantly, WARPP is a great example of how ordinary Wintreans without any official position of power are able to come together and do great things, with no mandates or incentivization from above. People saw a need for more organization in RP and did it themselves without oversight from the Wintrean government. Likewise, the move to the forums was entirely organic and driven by the same need for more organized and formal RP. Developing top-down policy to encourage grassroots movements like these is obviously hard. But I think we can try to emphasize to newcomers that this is a place that anyone can do anything, even on day one, and try to actively encourage new ideas and initiatives proposed by newer members of the community. It's easy to shut new people down because what they're proposing is different (I know I myself have been guilty of this), but what we need is to work with them to see how their dreams and ideas can fit into Wintreath.

I also took a look at how many people might be in a mentorship program, assuming that everybody was assigned a mentor. Based on the number of new Citizens joining us each month, I estimate that there would be around 11 people on average in a program that lasted 3 months and 7 on average in one that lasted 2. I'm not married to the 3 months period...I would be fine with making it 2 months to reduce the workload on mentors.

How does this compare to numbers (and results) in the past when we had an opt-in mentorship program?

Not related, but we also had 12 returning Citizens in the past year, 75% of whom have remained with us and are active. Of those that didn't, at least some of those made an active decision to leave (such as tatte), but overall when people come back to Wintreath, they seem to come to stay.

@Neon Abigail: I don't see how we're raising any barriers to entry at this point...the WA requirement would be one option in a variety of options, and we came to that because it was argued that a RMB post requirement would disadvantage people who couldn't be active. Otherwise the requirements are the same as they were when you joined as far as I remember...

@taulover: Conceivably, we could have other vassal regions in the future and somebody has to be delegate...I understand circumstances where somebody legitimately can't contribute their WA and also can't be active (which excludes R/D, which by its nature requires one to be active), but I imagine those circumstances are going to be few and far between. I mean, how likely is it that you're ever going to need to depend on the nation requirement to retain Citizenship? It's not impossible of course, but judging from history it's unlikely.

I'm not concerned about myself, moreso about the sorts of people who still regularly show up fairly often but not enough to hit the activity requirement. Many of them continue to be pillars of our community; one or two even still hold pretty high positions in Wintreath. Of course this is a small group of people, and it doesn't really matter too much, but I think it's neat that those sorts of people are allowed to remain citizens so that coming back is always as easy and welcoming as possible.

I'm good with all of this. With regards to increasing moderation powers, I would actually like to see some sort of either appeal process or pseudo-judicial process for citizens getting banned (non-citizens haven't earned the privilege), especially if mods get more powers. Ever since the Schism, I always feel a bit off when I see a citizen banned. I know there is discussion that goes on among the joint mod group in private, but it still feels very jarring to me.

I would then propose that before a citizen gets banned (or at least afterwards as an appeal) that they - along with a chosen or appointed representative - can put forth an argument against the decision. The representative would need to be someone who had been a citizen for a long time (perhaps at least a year), has a proven record of being civil, and has no conflict of interest in the case. Perhaps a civil service group of such people who volunteer in these circumstances could be created to draw from. These people could perhaps also be open to being reached out to if a citizen feels they are being unjustly aggrieved by the mod team even before a ban to advocate on their behalf. I for one would certainly be happy to offer myself to help clear up misunderstandings or give the opportunity to show signs of contrition on the part of citizens who have or appear to have done something so wrong.


If not this, then at least a new policy should be created so that when the discussion of banning a citizen comes up among the joint mod group and the decision is essentially unanimous, someone on the jmg should have to act in good faith as a devil's advocate (pardon the term) to argue against the banning to be absolutely sure the decision is the right thing to do. I would prefer the previous option to this, but I think this is the very least that should be done. 

I don't doubt that the most serious consideration goes into each decision to ban someone, but I think it's always the best thing to steelman such an important argument, especially with the past we have as a community and against someone who many likely consider a friend. Either way, it shouldn't rest solely on Wintermoot's shoulders to argue both sides as well as make the final decision. In some cases in which there are real life legal issues, I can definitely understand that these processes are waived, but if it's more along the lines of immaturity, flaming, insubordination, or even alleged conspiracy or sedition (e.g. a situation like during the Schism), I think this process is very much necessary. 

I know that the Fundamental Laws say that the Administration has final say on the matters of bans, but I think a rule that takes into account citizens' Declaration of Rights is a worthy one to consider implementing. 

I am active on the RMB, but cannot make my Wintreath nation a member of the WA because I need to be in the WA elsewhere to gain citizenship there.

Would being active only on the RMB still be an option to maintain citizenship even without being a member of the WA? Because if not, I'm afraid I won't be able to remain a citizen.

Well, personally I think that all this is somewhat fine. Here is my opinion:

1. The mentoring thing, according to fellow Wintreans, seems like it would be effective for a bit, then completely ignored. Sure, some people might stick with it, but most likely, the new citizen will either ignore them, or completely drop Wintreath.

2. This could work. Could. Not much to say, some people might use it, some might ignore it. Still, it could work.

3. I'm conflicted. I think that after a number of warnings, a Citizen should go on, (not joking), trial. I know it sounds stupid, because it is. However if the mods just formed a whole trial system for disruptives, maybe it could work out?? Of course, there is a million holes in this idea.  Like, Mod Judges could abuse their power and sentence people for the tiniest crime. I don't know, just skip this probably.

4. Alright. Recently I ran as Thane for World Assembly yada yada yada. (I lost). I went under a campaign stating that I'd try and get WA endorsements. However, I thought about what your proposing, and there is a real big issue. Alts. Picture this: For some reason, you want to register an Alt for citizenship. But, you can't be in the WA, cause its an alt. What about that?
Anyway, thats my opinion.
Most people are gonna hate it.