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aki

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Re: XE
« Reply #75 on: April 10, 2016, 10:36:21 pm »
Firstly, Charley, I appreciate you for taking the initiative and starting a much needed conversation about the future of XE. I realize that we have had multiple disagreements in the past, but I am truly optimistic that we can work together for the betterment of XE.

Taking into account the numerous points that were raised in the thread, we (XE staff) have come up with the following list of terms. To be transparent, below is the exact list taken straight from our forums.

Quote
(1)   George and I will extend management access to Charley and one additional person from the current XE team to oversee and coordinate the transition (White, Fercho, Riders, Nilz, Zatch, Honor, etc. – whoever would like to step up to do this, we can discuss among the current XE staff) – this is important to support the “new” XE with any legacy knowledge / infrastructure in place

(2)   George and I will likely only continue to be involved in an advisory capacity; not in day-to-day management of the server, but to participate in only the most critical decisions regarding the direction of XE and to help with this new transition

(3)   If Charley would like to suggest additional key management-ish additions to the staff, i.e. scripter, web admin, etc., this is something we can discuss

(4)   â€œNew” XE will continue to use current XE forums and any infrastructure in place (as discussed earlier)

(5)   XE staff members who are currently active will continue to hold their positions (they should not have to re-apply)

(6)   Inactive XE staff members should be removed from the staff immediately

(7)   Admin applications will be opened on XE forums (makes 0 sense for them to be on VU clan forums, if anything they would be on VC:MP forums)

We believe the above is a robust framework that we can begin with, as we collaborate going forward. Also, hopefully you can see that we have intentionally kept the above points to a minimum and made them as simple as we can, as we believe that any new changes to XE should be discussed together in the spirit of collaboration rather than negotiation. 

I would also like to highlight a few additional points, the first and third coming collectively from the staff:

(1)  The 25% system would be great in an ideal world, but is not practical as Gangstaras was first to point out. We need to be forward thinking rather than stubbornly focused on remedying past failures. Also, simplifying the reason for XE’s drop in player count to ULK politics is silly – there are a lot of reasons why XE became less popular, from the F1 mods to the sheer fact that XE management became inactive. Based on all these years running XE, I believe and many would agree that the best way to recruit staff members is through a democratic process of XE staff applications. Decisions should not be made by just you or me or anyone else, but based on public opinion (everyone’s posts and votes) and voting by the staff.

(2)  In your OP, you provide a little history of XE. I hope we can both agree that it is useless to debate the history of XE and consider the following as simply my response to your post and I would like to leave it at precisely that. If you would like to get in a public discussion about it, I am sure that both of us can write a few essays on the topic, but I believe that would not be productive to our discussion and we would only be going backwards. For the record, however, I must state that there are several holes in your version of events.  There is just one that I need to point out, which was that I was managing XE before SGB even came back to VC:MP and generously took over server hosting. Also, I am the only person to this day who has had continuous conversations with Tommis over the years – if you insist (and I would rather you not) I will drag Tommis over here to validate my role in relation to XE.

(3)  Related to the above point, you must recognize that you have no right to move forward with XE without the permission of me and the current XE staff. Now, we are more than happy to invite you to our management team and lead XE in its next phase, but as a matter of principle, this point must be acknowledged.

Please note that everything I have mentioned above is the result of numerous discussions between the current XE team. We have a 10-page thread on the matter and countless discussions between individual members on IRC and other avenues of communication. This is our collective stance on the matter and I say this because we sincerely hope that your next post is your acknowledgement of everything in this post and your intention to move forward and join the XE team as a part of its management. Again, we have tried our best to keep things simple here – the above is only a framework for us to agree on first so that we can discuss any great ideas you have for XE as part of the same team.

Finally, I would like to point out that I had a great discussion with Drake, and so has many others from the XE staff. As you and many members of the community have suggested, we believe that Drake will be an incredibly important addition to the XE team. Drake already has access to XE’s scripts and will be making progress on remaking the script (especially considering the time sensitivities that you had mentioned in your prior posts). He currently has XE dev status, but once you join, I think we can start with both you and Drake as additions to the overall management team with full access to the website, server, IRC, etc.

Thanks for reading and we look forward to working with you.
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Charley

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Re: XE
« Reply #76 on: April 11, 2016, 05:47:51 pm »
Eesh. I don't view your reply as satisfactory. I think your lack of apology after not replying for 11 days is rude, I think you've ignored most of what myself and others put forward in this thread, and I think that bringing Drake in to your current team without discussing it publicly here is a sly, cynical move. I paused development so that we could discuss this, and then you started it again but under your command, without discussing it here. That kind of move makes me sick, it's utterly disrespectful and shows that you had undisclosed intentions behind demanding that we pause development.

I don't know if I can be fucked with replying properly, because what you've posted does not contribute to a dialogue, it is an attempt to dictate the direction of this without acknowledging some of the fundamental points that have been made in the last few pages. I don't wish to sit here and repeat myself, repeat what I and others have already written.

Congratulations Aki, you may have pissed me off enough that I no longer wish to do this.
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aki

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Re: XE
« Reply #77 on: April 11, 2016, 06:06:51 pm »
Eesh. I don't view your reply as satisfactory. I think your lack of apology after not replying for 11 days is rude, I think you've ignored most of what myself and others put forward in this thread, and I think that bringing Drake in to your current team without discussing it publicly here is a sly, cynical move. I paused development so that we could discuss this, and then you started it again but under your command, without discussing it here. That kind of move makes me sick, it's utterly disrespectful and shows that you had undisclosed intentions behind demanding that we pause development.

I don't know if I can be fucked with replying properly, because what you've posted does not contribute to a dialogue, it is an attempt to dictate the direction of this without acknowledging some of the fundamental points that have been made in the last few pages. I don't wish to sit here and repeat myself, repeat what I and others have already written.

Congratulations Aki, you may have pissed me off enough that I no longer wish to do this.

Umm, not the response that I was expecting. Believe there is a misunderstanding here. Could you please re-read my post, think about it for a day, then respond? I  thought my post was very reasonable, as it is the product of multiple days (or weeks) of collective thought and discussion among the XE staff. I actually took the time to write a post that I thought you would appreciate and agree with. Please do me a favor here and try to digest what I have posted before viewing everything from the wrong angle.

Also, I don't know if you have skipping over my posts, but I have been intermittently apologizing for the delays throughout this thread - in fact, I think my "apologies for delays" make up half the posts here.

Finally, I think it makes complete sense for the current XE team to speak with and get to know Drake. If you re-read my last paragraph, he has not been officially added to the team; we were hoping that we could do that when you would join. I really only even included the last paragraph to show that we agree with and welcome your idea to add Drake to the scripting team.
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Charley

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Re: XE
« Reply #78 on: April 11, 2016, 06:53:59 pm »
If you re-read my last paragraph, he has not been officially added to the team

Drake already has access to XE’s scripts and will be making progress on remaking the script

...

He currently has XE dev status

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aki

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Re: XE
« Reply #79 on: April 11, 2016, 07:23:48 pm »
For the record, Drake reached out to me, not the other way around. XE dev is a placeholder status on the forum - he does not have XE staff or management access yet. All he has access to is a copy of the script (given to him yesterday) so he can begin familiarizing himself with it, especially given the urgency. George and I have both made it clear to Drake that we will not be granting him official staff / management access until we have finalized our discussion with you. Please feel free to ask Drake yourself.

Again, I strongly suggest that you re-read my post and take some time to think about what I have posted.
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GangstaRas

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Re: XE
« Reply #80 on: April 11, 2016, 08:23:11 pm »
Well if I may add, perhaps there is some misunderstanding, as such, I'll express my understanding of things and maybe you guys can clarify.

From what I got from aki's post is that:

Charley will be granted management position along with a current XE staff member of your admin's list alongside him to coordinate the transition --- a step in the right direction to me

George and aki will dictate what is good and what is bad in the best interest of XE's development to prevent any form of ill-fates in serious management situations --- an understandable role

The XE forums currently as is will now become a scaffold for molding the long & overdue renovations needed --- a step in the right direction to me

All inactive members are kicked immediately but the current staff remains in place --- no problem to me; personally I never saw why they felt threatened. Though I question what is being done behind the scenes to contribute as "activity" to a dead server, if XE deems them honestly active then not one of the active members should be kicked, it's only fair after all

All the proposed admins by Charley must go through XE --- understandable but I think something has been off here from day one. As someone who "applied" to Charley's admin setup, I never expected to walk in as an admin into XE just like that, XE's admin application board has a nice reputation (at least how I remember it back in 2010), a walk in was definitely impossible for those who applied based on such thoughts. The way I viewed it from the get-go was that it was a recommendation of whom Charley sees very fit for the role he has given each individual. With Charley to supposedly become manager, this list of "recommendations" comes along with him and would be discussed per application. So none of that VU forums XE has legal rights bullshit

That's my understanding of things, and if something is misunderstood on my part, please clarify but this would be how I think it ought to be
« Last Edit: April 12, 2016, 01:10:24 am by GangstaRas »
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aki

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Re: XE
« Reply #81 on: April 11, 2016, 08:35:33 pm »
Well if I may add, perhaps there is some misunderstanding, as such, I'll express my understanding of things and maybe you guys can clarify.

From what I got from aki's post is that:

Charley will be granted management position along with a current XE staff member of your admin's list alongside him to coordinate the transition --- a step in the right direction to me

George and aki will dictate what is good and what is bad in the best interest of XE's development to prevent any form of ill-fates in serious management situations --- an understandable role

The XE forums currently as is will now become a scaffold for molding the long & overdue renovations needed --- a step in the right direction to me

All inactive members are kicked immediately but the current staff remains in place --- no problem to me; personally I never saw why they felt threatened. Though I question what is being done behind the scenes to contribute as "activity" to a dead server, if XE deems them honestly active then not one of the active members should be kicked, it's only fair after all

All the proposed admins by Charley must go through XE --- understandable but I think something has been off here from day one. As someone who "applied" to Charley's admin setup, I never expected to walk in as an admin into XE just like that, XE's admin application board has a nice reputation (at least how I remember it back in 2010), a walk in was definitely impossible for those who applied based on such thoughts. The way I viewed it from the get-go was that it was a recommendation of whom Charley sees very fit for the role he has given each individual. With Charley to supposedly become manager, this list of "recommendations" comes along with him and would be discussed per application. So none of that VU forums XE has legal rights bullshit

That's my understanding of things, and if something is misunderstood on my part, please clarify but this then would be how I think it ought to be

Gangstaras, your understanding is exactly correct.
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hotdogcat

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Re: XE
« Reply #82 on: April 11, 2016, 09:10:41 pm »
Charley in my opinion you should talk with aki in irc, he's almost ever connected.
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honor

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Re: XE
« Reply #83 on: April 11, 2016, 09:33:40 pm »
Firstly,this post is not an insult to you.But for something I personally try to understand.

Just interesting how you came up here Charley.You discussed alot here for anything related to XE.You asked sometimes and got your replies respectfully.So the discussion went on

So how come you never wanted to ask about this case for much details under a mature post?We have been in here friendly with no doubt to make sure both you and us have no question marks in our minds before making a collabration.

I just have to ask even if it's damn risky to do.Because everything should be asked here before an healthy agreement:Is there anything else that you didnt expect to see?There is no obvious reason to be that strict.As I said,its not an insult.

Not only you running out of wishing,But people around here,Drake and we are getting uncomfortable by hearing those kind of negative and rude posts.

Still,we are looking forward to being able to work with you.Im ignoring the last post you've sent.Make sure you have a reasonable explaination for the decision in the very end of it.
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Charley

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Re: XE
« Reply #84 on: April 11, 2016, 10:09:32 pm »
Okay, here's my response, but I won't repeat it (numbers not related to the numbers on Aki's post).

1) At the very core of what I suggested was that the old management structure, or 'legacy infrastructure' as you've put it, Aki, should be abandoned. Ownership over XE, including the forums, the server and the brand should be transferred to the community. No more 'advisors', 'managers', 'head admins', levels 3, 5, 6, 7 etc. No more behind-closed-doors decisions, and no one, single person who has ultimate control over the whole thing simply by virtue of their hosting and having administrative control over the forum. What XE needs is a balanced, fluid system that can hold its members to account, and not be dictated by any one member of staff.

What you have offered me is a place in the current overly hierarchical system wherein you remain unaccountable and in ultimate control. Oh, and I can bring along a few friends. It completely disregards the whole thrust of what I have put forward.

2) 'Drake came to me first', that's like saying 'yeah, well he started it!'. As an apparently responsible party to this issue, you should have suggested he wait, and to see how the discussion here developed, just as I did. You exercised a double standard, demanding that I wait for you, but then not waiting for me. It is utterly astounding how you use the argument of 'urgency' in this case, when this is something that you have been speaking against since you first posted here, and you have taken 11 days to give one contribution to our so-called 'conversation'.

3) If you had listed these terms of yours soon after I agreed to pause development for you, it would have been a good first step in negotiation. Instead, you waited this long and posted a list of proposals that, in my opinion, are self-evidently problematic. I would have liked to work through the problems with you, but honestly, if it's taken you this long to post these, and they're in the form they are, then I don't think I have the patience. If I had just ignored you and rolled with my original plans, I could have XE open and running right now. I've taken a look at the process of converting the script, it would take no more than 6 hours. I could have opened up a new forum, had a bunch of new staff, and we would all be playing XE right now. I put this all on pause after realising that such an action would be disrespectful, that I should engage in conversation with you and the 'current' XE staff. But this 'conversation' has driven me to my wit's end, dude. This isn't fun anymore, it's just a slow, boring, frustrating mess.
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aXXo

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Re: XE
« Reply #85 on: April 12, 2016, 12:00:38 am »
Charley, could you elaborate the head of the leadership structure that you suggested?

My understanding is that there is always a de facto owner of every community. That is the person who pays for stuff and has the root access to the host. How do you plan to dissolve this position?
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Drake

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Re: XE
« Reply #86 on: April 12, 2016, 12:57:40 am »
Quote
1) At the very core of what I suggested was that the old management structure, or 'legacy infrastructure' as you've put it, Aki, should be abandoned. Ownership over XE, including the forums, the server and the brand should be transferred to the community. No more 'advisors', 'managers', 'head admins', levels 3, 5, 6, 7 etc. No more behind-closed-doors decisions, and no one, single person who has ultimate control over the whole thing simply by virtue of their hosting and having administrative control over the forum. What XE needs is a balanced, fluid system that can hold its members to account, and not be dictated by any one member of staff.
I totally disagree about this point and I have told you the same while we were discussing in IRC too.
What do you exactly mean by 'transferring to the community'? Whatever the case, there is always one person to do all these stuffs.
No more ranks? You exactly said, 'Server Coordinator', 'Managing Admins', 'Admins' and 'Moderators'. Aren't these ranks?
I believe that making decisions privately is not very appropriate but that's how it works out everytime, everywhere.
As you are saying, 'single person who has ultimate control', there is no one having ultimate control actually. There are 4 ranks currently, 'Developing Managers', 'Managers', 'Admins' and 'Moderators', but Developing Managers and Managers have just one single difference and that is being involved in the development of the server, that's really it. Both are almost same ranks. Nobody is having ultimate control over the system, as you said, if the staff decides to remove someone, it would be done, either me, aki or you.
If you think that aki having control over hosting and forums would have the ultimate control, that isn't the case, if the staff decides he should be removed but he having control over the server wouldn't let that happen, the whole staff should just abandon him and start everything new, there is always an option.
I believe that you want to give everyone a chance in the staff but you better know that all people want is 'higher ranks' and that's it. If you think you would give a chance to people who haven't even contributed for the server, how can we trust them to contribute later on?
I said already and I would say again, this isn't the best option.

Quote
What you have offered me is a place in the current overly hierarchical system wherein you remain unaccountable and in ultimate control. Oh, and I can bring along a few friends. It completely disregards the whole thrust of what I have put forward.
I believe it looks as if aki has ultimate control but trust me, you are wrong. I have already said that aki doesn't have the ultimate control just because he is involved in hosting stuffs. You and I have been offered to be as 'Developing Manager', the same position as aki which doesn't mean that 'Developing Managers' are superior than 'Managers', if that's what you mean.

Quote
2) 'Drake came to me first', that's like saying 'yeah, well he started it!'. As an apparently responsible party to this issue, you should have suggested he wait, and to see how the discussion here developed, just as I did. You exercised a double standard, demanding that I wait for you, but then not waiting for me. It is utterly astounding how you use the argument of 'urgency' in this case, when this is something that you have been speaking against since you first posted here, and you have taken 11 days to give one contribution to our so-called 'conversation'.
I just wanted to fast up the process, because I have said already, I would have less time after my school reopens and I see that's what is going to happen. But yes, I was the one to PM aki about my situation and he isn't to be blamed for it, please. I thought that you(Charley) wouldn't mind about this, but I guess I was wrong. If you remember, I asked you to join IRC as I wanted to discuss about this but you said you were busy and I wasn't able to tell you everything about this with just a forum PM.
Please, don't think aki is upto something else, because that's not the case at all. He really wants to collaborate with you and me and I trust him when he says that he works the whole day and even on weekends which obviously would take sometime to reply here. Even you said you are busy the whole day working and just get sometime during night.

Quote
3) If you had listed these terms of yours soon after I agreed to pause development for you, it would have been a good first step in negotiation. Instead, you waited this long and posted a list of proposals that, in my opinion, are self-evidently problematic. I would have liked to work through the problems with you, but honestly, if it's taken you this long to post these, and they're in the form they are, then I don't think I have the patience. If I had just ignored you and rolled with my original plans, I could have XE open and running right now. I've taken a look at the process of converting the script, it would take no more than 6 hours. I could have opened up a new forum, had a bunch of new staff, and we would all be playing XE right now. I put this all on pause after realising that such an action would be disrespectful, that I should engage in conversation with you and the 'current' XE staff. But this 'conversation' has driven me to my wit's end, dude. This isn't fun anymore, it's just a slow, boring, frustrating mess.
As I said, believe him when he says that he is busy IRL, just more than you.
Lastly, Charley please don't get pissed off, let's just proceed already dude. It's already been a while since this discussion started and don't forget, this is just a game.

That's all I wanted to say, and I think we really should have a live discussion about this matter in the IRC, things will get alot easier to understand. I would really suggest Charley and aki to have a live conversation about this in IRC and take it as a request from my side.

Thank you.

EDIT: As per Charley wants me to stop the development of the script, I have stopped it until this discussion comes to an agreement.
« Last Edit: April 12, 2016, 01:37:37 am by Drake »
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GangstaRas

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Re: XE
« Reply #87 on: April 12, 2016, 01:29:22 pm »
Charley, could you elaborate the head of the leadership structure that you suggested?

My understanding is that there is always a de facto owner of every community. That is the person who pays for stuff and has the root access to the host. How do you plan to dissolve this position?
This

The way how I registered what Charley wants reminded me of how Open Source software works. The community literally builds and contributes to the software's code, design, almost everything and makes it better. But there still is and have to be some executive body behind it all that accepts/denies what's coming in so its hard for me to picture
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honor

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Re: XE
« Reply #88 on: April 12, 2016, 07:37:01 pm »
By the way,One thing needs to be adressed

Quote
I think your lack of apology after not replying for 11 days is rude, I think you've ignored most of what myself and others put forward in this thread

But

Quote
Actually I wasn't aware that Aki is still active, I thought he had essentially abandoned VC:MP and XE.
...
This does change things

So you were going to do things in your way without asking any of us(xe staff).Untill the point you said this,you didnt mind aki responding to this.I think this is quite obvious what Im pointing out here.

And I think only one point summerize why you dont wish to do it:Things didnt process as you expected.So no.Inputs of people around here has no relation to aki.He has to wait to say on behalf of us.
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Fercho

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Re: XE
« Reply #89 on: April 13, 2016, 12:45:54 am »
After your latest post I have obtained a different concept about your general point about reviving XE, and to be frank I'm pretty disappointed to see your reaction to the post that you "demanded" in such a hurry. Basically we (xe existing staff) actually want to collaborate with you, or don't you realize that we literally offered to give you and Drake full access? Same position that Akiharu and George hold.

Moreover, in aki's post people from our xe current team and so some of your applicants agreed. In fact, both sides inclined to agree at most with our suggestions including Drake. Now, the community you're talking of in your "proposed system" has agreed, so I do not understand what is your goal now, it seems now that you want to set up your own system, your own rules and your own decisions. You're the one who speaks of democracy, and with your opinions you show a contradictory image about yourself.

This sounds like total control by one person to me, a fact you can't hide just by calling yourself  "server coordinator."
Still we hope you to think clear, accurate and meaningful ideas to make a succesful collaboration.
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