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Issue 7 - Turn 726 |
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The Galactic Information Network The Editorial Tired of the status quo?
contact the Pirate
Alliance at
pirate_alliance@ Are you a budding
Mack the Hack or Nigel
Villiers-Smythe? Writers
needed. Contact us at
thetbgtribune@ Contact us to advertise in this space. E-mail address in the Editorial Section. |
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VOTING PATTERNS For the past 125 turns, the galaxy has come under the reign of Constitution. He has held the position of Galactic President, and has had his supporters and his critics. The most notable of these critics has now left the game, but the latest sustained attempt to oust him from power has been from Rosalind and the Freedom of Information Party. We decided to ask those with the votes just who they voted for and why. The reponses that we received were very interesting. As you probably can guess, the majority of those who are eligible to be president vote for Constitution at election time. However, there does seem to be a bit of an "Old Boy" Network with both LUG'S BELT and the Fierce Prophet Mendelssohn stating that one of the reasons they supported him was because he was "a friend". However, another major factor for those voting for him is "He provides information for my [Fierce Prophet Mendelssoh] database (which he uses himself to do his duties)". A similar statement was also given in another reply. A common theme throughout the replies was "He's attentive to the needs of the elder captains while still making sure he helps out the younger captains who may need assistance." - Annushka Moya, and "I think he does a good job (such as coordinating anti-Dybuk efforts, and module production, and behaves presidential)" - Fierce Prophet Mendelssohn. There are many who support President Constitution because he does "a good job". However, very rarely do people describe what they mean by a good job. The example above given by the Fierce Prophet is very rare. However, it seems that the Presidency could swing depending on the actions of Constitution. Of all the responses that we received, the main thing that would change the votes would be if Constitution turned to the dark side and took up a life of piracy. This seems unlikely. Out of those who are eligible for the presidency, there were a couple of responses saying that they did not vote for Constitution, notably Rosalind and Borg Prime. Rosalind votes for herself, and Borg Prime allegedly votes for "None of the Above". When asked what would change either of their votes, Rosalind stated that she would support a candidate who "supported the policies of the FIP", whereas Borg Prime stated that "If the candidate could see his way clear to sharing whatever information the alien gives with a small group of people (me included), then I'd consider abandoning No One". Given that Borg Prime is an alleged member of the same alliance as the Galactic President, this is a slightly confusing statement. However, I'm sure he knows his own mind best. IS TBG IN DECLINE? by Nigel Villiers-Smythe TBG is now 726 turns old. In that time, the game has undergone many changes, and is now about twice the size of the original TBG. In the last three weeks, the server that TBG resides on broke. Should we have taken this opportunity to stop playing TBG and find other pbem games, find real life, do some useful work? Well, the answer is probably yes as we do not get paid for playing TBG, and we will need something to do if the server ever breaks again. However, there are some good things that have come out of this unplanned stoppage. A group of friends who play TBG and are very addicted to it found a new pbem to play. You may have heard of it, it's called VGA Planets. This was originally intended as a stop gap while TBG was down, but the addictions of it proved too strong, and there is now a game running parallel to TBG. The gap in TBG also saw a boom in new topics on the Sirius Space Dog saloon, at least initially, where TBG players had to think of something else to talk about. Following the many links in the signature of Chris Babcock is an education in itself, although it should be done with protective gear on. One major question does remain unanswered though and that is "Will our girlfriends let go of us again now that TBG has started?". Many players of TBG have girlfriends/wives who cannot stand TBG, who must have thought christmas had come early when TBG went down. How are they to cope now when there boyfriends/husbands suddenly get drawn back to TBG? Worse still, what about those girlfriends who appeared during the break. They do not know the pulling power of TBG. Many new relationships that should blossom may be damaged irreperably by TBG. So, should we give up on TBG? Should we give up on something that has been the staple part of most players weeks for the past two years? Should we give up on the old monolithic beast? Simply speaking - No we shouldn't. If your girlfriend/boyfriend can't understand your love of TBG, then s/he does not deserve you. TBG IS ALIVE. LONG LIVE TBG. THE EDITORIAL Welcome to yet another edition of the TBG Tribune. Happily, we do not suffer from the same problems that pbm.com suffered from recently. Unhappily, we suffer from completely different problems. However, we are trying to solve them, and with your feedback we can do so. We are still looking for more writers for the Tribune, so please do contact us at the address below. Keep the feedback coming in to thetbgtribune@yahoo.co.uk. The TBG Tribune Editorial Team |
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THE GALACTIC INFORMATION
NETWORK Ever since the fall of the Betelgeuse Empire, former Imperial Warship Wolverine has been slowly building a collection of information that he hopes will rival the Presidential information database. This collection of information is called the GIN - the Galactic Information Network. At present, there are approximately 20 players who are supplying the database with information, and we were able to contact a couple of the members of GIN and they were able to give us their views on it: Former Imperial ship Deformed Rabbit is a member, and when question on whether he thought the GIN was a good idea, he responsed "The prolific nature of such groups suggests so, don't you think?" and "a well laid out static database is of immense use to me regardless of the regularity of updates due to ships contributing to it." So far so good. It appears that he is a happy customer. Another happy member would be the Dora, who when asked about the GIN said that "alliances should be evolving into groups of players who share certain political or strategic or military(etc.) goals(IE the FSP) rather than simply being info sharing mechanisms. The GIN would be for those who don't want to join an alliance, but still want/need some info sharing capability." We also spoke to Wolverine and asked him why he had formed the GIN and what long term plans there were for it. His response was "I was talking to some of the other scripts hackers about making some easy way for people to share information." and "I wanted to help newbies get a better start since alot of them play fairly bad." GIN was originally set up at around the same time as the Betelgeuse Empire, and one of the early advantages of the GIN was that you were not taxed by the Betelgeuse Empire. However, with the fall of the BE, this advantage soon disappeared. This was probably a blessing in disguise because the BE was not universally popular, and the GIN could start afresh as a totally separate project to the BE. The future plans for the GIN are to keep it exactly as it is - information open to virtually everybody on the proviso that they don't tell anyone else about it. There are a few ships that might be denied access to the GIN, when asked about these, Wolverine's response was "It is me solely who desides who will be allowed into GIN. There is a few ships I will not allow, these being Dybuk releasers and starnet terminal purgers since they are making actions which are too alien for me. A ship attacking Wolverine would not be expelled or denied access to join GIN. Now don't take this as a encouragement :))" So, all in all, it appears that the GIN is proving to be a big success. I close off this report with some final words from Wolverine: "All in all it has been a great experience designing and running GIN. I would like to take this opportunity to tell everyone that if you are considering starting a alliance but do not have a script hacker you can contact me and I can set up the scripts for you. Of course all members would have to give me their secret urls. I have been running the FORT DB since before turn 200 and have not been a member of FORT for a very long time. There has been no cases of abuse. I actually had a nice time writing this and thinking back to the beginning of my ship and my wierd ideas to spice up the game." THE FINANCES SECTION by Nigel Villers-Smythe Below is the new information for the Finances Section.
As can be seen from the table, the average amount of engineering favour in galaxy is on the up and up. With the promise by Mighty Prophet, Flying Haddock that he will be willing to choose young ships so that they can use his favour to gain enlightenment, and the fact that his Dybuk Protection Scheme seems to be working, this is a good sign. Alpha and Flying Beak remain at large, and it can only be a matter of time before Dybuk is released again. The more ships that there are with more than 200 engineering favour the better, and this is a good sign that more ships have more favour. Also of note is the rise in the accessed starnet terminals. This is good to see given that the purging is apparently continuing. |
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