Post Archive
Region: Refugia
Happy birthday NS. I didn't know it was so old!
Chacapoya, Cheesy Tots, Typica, Araine, Survivors Win, Tiralta, Amiyoka, Uwuguaya
While I disagree with some of your points I do agree copywrite laws such as these should not be mandatory
Junitaki-Cho, Antimai, Uwuguaya
I agree with this statement and have voted against.
Junitaki-Cho, Antimai
Which point do you disagree with, that the Disney company owns 70% of western IP or that millions of people might not have died if pharmaceutical companies couldn't claim copyright over their vaccines which prevented them from being more widely mass produced for developing nations?
Sylh Alanor, Junitaki-Cho, Amiyoka, Antimai
I just think that some copyright laws should be put in place because people deserve to get paid royalties for their efforts, i know its a really annoying capitalist concept but sadly that's the world we live in.
Uwuguaya
Any thoughts on the Historical Region Act?
Sylh Alanor, Uwuguaya
The thoughts are directly above you
Sylh Alanor, Antimai
That's about the pub'ic domain act
Chacapoya, Sylh Alanor, Tiralta, Neurodiversity, Uwuguaya
I cannot wait to manually remove all my bids for S2 cards and throw them on Refugia and our embassies' S3 cards. (I have 320 bids atm)
Chacapoya, Cheesy Tots, Typica, Araine, Liphia, Tiralta, Jazur
Typica, Tiralta, Uwuguaya
Yeah don't get me wrong I completely agree with how stupid the whole disney thing Is, I think copyright laws should be adjusted, sure just not completely abolished
Uwuguaya
Hello hello Refugia!
We here in St Leone would just like to remind people about RISDU,
the greatest union for industrial and social development within the region.
Apply today by senting a telegram to St Leone!
https://www.nationstates.net/page=dispatch/id=1793918
Chacapoya, Cheesy Tots, Liphia, Jazur, Waywards Edge, Amiyoka
Wait a minute-
I guess I'm changing my vote again.
Uwuguaya
Tiralta, the way you transformed your flag into its card-form is such a classy look. Really good use of the vertical alignment and the empty space necessary if you want to display your whole flag.
Chacapoya, Cheesy Tots, Typica, Araine, Tiralta
me omw to endotart with Refuge Isle's new endotarting program:
tackled about 100~ nations
Update: 96 left
Update: 40 left
Cheesy Tots, Typica, St Leone, Tiralta, Antimai
its making them less strict?!? that's good
It's forcing nations to recognise them. Which is bad.
Chacapoya, Junitaki-Cho, Tiralta, Antimai
You want some copyright because there is no such thing as owning non-physical property then. It might sound weird but pouring your heart into something and having it stolen (think Kimba the white lion) won't happen, while after sufficient time to make money, people can use it so no Disney bs. Also, no Disney bs in the form of bribery to extend a copyright.
Uwuguaya
Yeah the laws around intellectual property can get confusing. Basically copyright is for creative works like books, movies, paintings, etc, patents are for inventions, methods, and processes, and trademark is for brand names and slogans, basically anything that identifies a product as being manufactured by a particular company (and it seems like logos can be both trademarked and copyrighted because they can count as art as well)
Trademarks make sense in that it makes it so youre not allowed to sell something you made and claim Apple made it. Its misleading. If Im buying something because it says its made by a brand I know is reputable and its actually something completely different, thats not good. Although there is something to be said about companies trademarking common phrases and then trying to enforce it, thats just insane.
I dont like patents because I feel like if you come up with a new medication or a new way of manufacturing something, then everyone should get to make or use it to you know, improve quality of life. I mean insulin costs pennies to manufacture, they could literally charge $5 for a months supply, even a years maybe, and still make a profit due to the millions of people who need it. Theres no reason for it to be so expensive besides greed.
[spoiler=Lengthy Anecdote]
In a biology lab in college, they had us looking for antibiotic producing bacteria in soil. A lot of antibiotics are derived from other bacteria, as the ability to repel other bacteria provides more space and less competition. Infections with antibiotic resistant bacteria are on the rise, so the biology department thought it would be fun to have us grow some colonies using soil samples from our backyards and see if we find anything that produces antibiotics.
None of my bacteria produced any, but there were a couple other students who had some. Then we grew more of that bacteria and exposed it to common antibiotic resistant bacteria, like e. coli and some in the staphylococcus genus, to see if anything was able to repel it. Its basically just a clear ring around a single bacterial colony in a petri dish in which nothing is growing, and absolutely covered in the grossest yellow-brown bacterial sludge everywhere else. It means that colony is producing some sort of antibiotic and the other bacteria in the petri dish arent resistant to it.
And the results from one colony in particular were promising enough that the university decided to get an actual pharmaceutical company to look into it, with the agreement that none of us students would be credited or acknowledged in any way, even the ones who found and grew the bacteria to begin with. If it turned out the bacteria was a viable option for making new antibiotics, the company would patent it and they would be the one making money off it and deciding whether or not its affordable.
So essentially some pharmaceutical company is out there potentially profiting off the work of unpaid university students and claiming its all theirs, or will be in the future. And theyd likely charge an extreme amount for it. The students who actually discovered them have said if it actually came to anything, theyd rather it be accessible so it could actually benefit as many people as possible. They were not thrilled to have had their work commandeered like that knowing what was likely to happen. And the college said it was theirs to give away because it happened in their lab with their equipment and their professor just happened to supervise it (he didnt really do anything he was just there to make sure we didnt give everyone e. coli).
And who knows how many times thats happened? How many times has a company, taken the work of college students and patented resulting products for themselves, all while charging extortionate amounts because of research and development costs, despite basing it off the work of unpaid students who dont even work for the company?[/spoiler]
Then theres copyright. Since it only apples to creative work and not something that can directly affect the quality of someones life unlike being unable to access lifesaving drugs, I dont have as much of an issue.
If you pour your heart and soul into writing a novel or painting a painting I dont think someone else should be able to make an exact copy and then claim they made it and sell it as if they did. Public domain exists for older works and fair use is supposed to protect parodies and reviews and whatnot, but abuse of copyright is still rampant and enforcement is all over the place.
I dont find the concept itself objectionable as long as its more like hey I wrote this book, dont slap your name on it and sell it as if youre the author please, as opposed to Disney buying every character in existence and copyright claiming every youtube video they appear in even if they fall under fair use just because they can.
Araine, Liphia, Tiralta, Uwuguaya
*Nods* I completely forgot that copyright and patents are two different things. I support copyright, mainly because I'm in the process of writing a book(Although some annoying mind goblins that may-or-may-not have been created for comedic effect would say otherwise(Hey!), but I voted against(Or thought I did, I discovered that I didn't change it despite having memories of doing so) because patenting lifesaving drugs and medicines and then making them have ridiculously high prices is just wrong and immoral. Honestly, copyright really needs an overhaul so that Disney can't do what you just described. But, I do still support copyright, because I wouldn't want my life's works to be stolen- at least while I'm still alive.
Uwuguaya
Thank you for joining our region! This post is not only to welcome you, but also to give you a basic introduction to Refugia and ways to interact with the community if youre interested in doing so.
Refugia is part of a larger community, Calamity Refuge (or CalRef for short). If you want to hang out with us, check out our Discord server: https://calref.network/chat/. You can find a list of CalRef services on our Network Site: https://calref.network/. From there, you can access our forum (for RP and spam games), Wiki (to collaborate on RP and regional documents and information), a full list of our Discord bot Dot's commands, and more!
There are a lot of things you can do on NationStates and in Refugia! Become a Member State by joining the World Assembly. Once youve joined the World Assembly and have been in the region for 7 days, youll be able to get a spot on the map of Refugia, as well as vote in our regional elections and run for Council positions! You can also endorse other nations in the region easily by using our custom tool, Tart.Calref: https://tart.calref.network/ For more information, please check out this dispatch, which includes information on what the World Assembly is and why its important.
If you are visiting on a puppet nation, please disclose your main and reason for visiting to our Operations Councillor, A Million Dreams.
Finally, if theres anything else youre interested in learning about our region or NationStates, feel free to ask! Ill incorporate feedback into these welcome messages in the future, so youll be helping other people as well!
Chacapoya, Typica, Araine, Junitaki-Cho, Scandinavia And Colorado, A Million Dreams, Prodigal, Uwuguaya
3 Billion citizens lets go!!
Typica, Araine, Liphia, Tiralta, Lycanjeskai, Neurodiversity, Uwuguaya
I think it's fantastic that y'all have excellently reasoned support for individuals not getting ripped off by corporations for their creative works! However, I'd point out that this legislation does not cover what you're talking about and is both very broad and very vague and therefore subject to the same abuse we see in the real world.
Remember that in the World Assembly, legislation cannot be edited due to how the site is coded; it must be repealed and replaced which means in order to change it you've got to get two proposals through. It's much easier to defeat this one which doesn't actually do what you want and then get one much better and more specific proposal through (maybe you could even write it!)
It goes completely against the real world way of working where we like to narrow choices down and force them to be better a bit at a time, but in the World Assembly we can and should demand that really great, specific, ideal thing on the first go.
Typica, Sylh Alanor, Araine, Junitaki-Cho, Antimai, Lycanjeskai, Uwuguaya
Thank you! I was so determined to have my flag showing as intended so I really appreciate this <3
Also if anyone else wants to show their whole flag in their card in a similar way, my newest flag is in my flag factbook so you don't also spend 2 hours trying to get the dimensions right. Obviously you'll want to put in your own background colours and banner at the top, but feel free to copy the dimensions I found that worked and overall style if you like it.
Typica, Melenavenia, Araine, Junitaki-Cho, Portmanteau, Antimai, Uwuguaya
I love this!
Typica, Portmanteau, Tiralta
man i'm not even gonna try and begin to understand the complexities and ic(?) bitterness between defenders and raiders 😭. voting against on liberate moon just due to... general leanings so far
Portmanteau, Tiralta
I don't understand r/d but I do believe that the liberation was written by one of the raiders.
Portmanteau, Tiralta, Antimai, Uwuguaya
i spied that in the SC thread which then only confused me more. gotta love NS! /lh
Melenavenia, Portmanteau, Tiralta, Uwuguaya
I cant seem to join the WA for one reason or another it seems. Odd.
Greetings from our humble Kingdom of sand and mountains, I look forward to getting along and developing along side with everybody here.
Typica, Sylh Alanor, Araine, Portmanteau, Polushia, Antimai
Im never drinking a red Bull at 8 at night again only got 3 hours of sleep. Made it through work tho 😭🤚🏼
Typica, Sylh Alanor, Araine, St Leone, Antimai
lmao, I was up talking to someone on discord until 03.30 and had to wake up at 06.00 for school xD
. . very good sleep -w-
Sylh Alanor, West Remeshile
Loooollll I have to be up at 6:30. I got up at 4:00 so Ive been awake for like an hour.
St Leone
. . ive been at school now for like . . 3 and a half hours . . I have 4 hours left and i have a test in the last 2 TwT
West Remeshile
I updated my nations flag! Went with a darker purple. I really like it a lot. Any other options?
Typica, Liphia, Portmanteau, St Leone, Tiralta
Omg good luck! You can do this. I hope you pass ur test and go home and take a nice long nap😁
St Leone
It looks great!
Portmanteau
remember to update your card then ^^
(if you want it to have the new flag ofc) xD
Typica, Portmanteau, Tiralta, West Remeshile
Will do thank you!!!
Portmanteau, St Leone, Tiralta
Good luck! I have a test tmrw :(
St Leone, West Remeshile
I went afk and a Zombie invasion happened...
HOW
Btw new Refugi flag, Love it!
Typica, Melenavenia, Tiralta, Neurodiversity
You also missed that the value of trading cards was reworked and that we're getting S3 cards very soon! :D Oh, and the 20th anniversary of NationStates.
Typica, Liphia, Tiralta, Polushia, Antimai
Wow! Amazing. Thanks for telling me! But wait... does that mean we are all going to get our own cards?
Melenavenia, Tiralta, Antimai, Duerrenberg
Yours is here! https://www.nationstates.net/page=deck/card=4485680
You can still edit it for a few more days if you want it to look different.
Typica, Melenavenia, Polushia
In the new Easter egg it said something about a hidden mini game (also it shattered the 4th wall) can someone explain?
Antimai, Duerrenberg
new easter egg?
Antimai
There are several Easter eggs to find (more info here: https://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=489036). I'm not sure which of them you're talking about though.
Antimai
I'm happy to answer any questions about current events if there are any.
Tiralta, Antimai
waywardia has found 1 easter egg
Typica, Tiralta, Antimai
Waywards Edge on an alt here, made my flag like Tiralta
I think it looks cool
Typica, Portmanteau, Tiralta
card flag no.2
Tiralta
how do i leave
you can check out any time you like but you can never leave
Typica, Portmanteau, Archipelago Nine, Waywards Edge, Antimai, Mare Stellarum
The 20th anniversary one they just added to the game
Tiralta, Antimai
I'm finished endotarting (according to tart)
WOOHOO
It only took maybe an hour, i'll have to check tmr if i missed
Sylh Alanor, Araine, Antimai
Awesome job! \o/
Typica, Waywards Edge, Antimai
Help I got an 11 answers issue ( OH NO HELP )
Typica, Waywards Edge, Antimai
(real)
Antimai
Ooooooh I just got that one! I'll read it more thoroughly when I get home.
Aephony, Antimai
Woo, I am back! Almost missed a card season, wouldn't like to be stuck with a disappointing card. How was your Monday?
Sylh Alanor, Araine, Tiralta, Absols, Antimai
I cant help but feel like the card ranking system is somehow rigged? Judging by your badges you shouldve been an ultra rare or even an epic but somehow youre a rare
Sylh Alanor
new flag moment
Sylh Alanor, Tiralta
well...
from my understanding, after having peeked at the SC thread on the liberation again, moon was successfully filled by raiders and has been for some time, natives having been pushed out and defenders... not doing anything? it seems like there's a point of contention with supposed "defender" regions (saw refugia itself mentioned) not doing their self-declared defending and voting against liberation. if this is the standard affair and not just an exception in the case of this liberation then that is indeed... confusing. are liberations usually voted down regardless, or is it because this one was written by a raider themself?
sidenote:
do you already have a separate region in the WA? you also need to verify your email in order to actually join. check your spam folder!
Uwuguaya
If you're referring to Aephony, three 1% badges are entirely typical for a rare
Sylh Alanor, Tiralta
Dang, Ive seen epics with just 3 1% badges and maybe a couple easter eggs or a supporter badge, how come?
Uwuguaya
We are a defender region?
I thought we were an environmentalist H*ckposting region
Sylh Alanor, Araine, Tiralta, Antimai, Uwuguaya
They like to try and pick fights with people who are just too cool for school 😎
*skateboards away*
Typica, Tiralta
tries to pick fights with people who have an active founder be like:
(I mean, Refuge isle does have history with the blackhawks.)
Uwuguaya
We are not. From regional law:
[list]
[/list]It might already be clear why it's a bad idea to drink raider kool-aid. The resolution at vote is a propaganda attempt to give raiding orgs credit and sling mud along the way, and that includes slinging it at us because we're not supporting it.
You are correct that the region was invaded, on a long-term sleeper operation. One of the leaders of the raid decided to write the liberation as a publicity stunt to get themselves more attention. If you're not aware of how liberation resolutions work in the Security Council, they prevent a password from being applied to a region by someone other than the founder. They do not automatically return control of the region to native population. Liberations are often used to prevent the region from being population zero, and refounded. Since raiders could feasible refound the region in less time than it would take this to pass, there is entirely no utility in having it, even if it were written by them.
There are a host of reasons why defenders are not liberating the region. The first is that there are about two long-inactive puppet accounts in the region, and that is the extent of the "natives" that remain. If the situation were reversed and defenders were pushing a liberation, the discourse would be that those "natives" are not good enough to be considered, that there are only six pages of RMB posts in the last twelve years, and that it's a dead region that's hit by tag raiders time and again. I, personally, agree.
There are 153 raiders in the region and, being in control of the region, they have all day to arrive without threat or resistance. Defenders, on the other hand, would have to muster that many and more in order to reclaim the region. There is a 10-15 second window for any liberators to arrive in before they get banned for free by the twelve raider officers with border control that they have acquired during the sleeper operation. It's not particularly feasible to organise what would probably be 200 people working for weeks to save a tag target that raiders mechanically could have destroyed already. The rest is waiting for the theatrics to play out.
Typica, Sylh Alanor, Araine, Amiyoka, Antimai
Raiding / Defending used to be the way I was interested in playing a decade ago on my older nation - my original is Jinckus. Back then for me the fun in it was infiltrating a region and seeing where I could go with it. I wasn't involved in any successful ops and the region I was in was demolished by internal politics by the founder.
I think a lot of the people who get fun out of raiding regions and those who do region defending are only playfully bitter towards one another. At least, that's how it was for me anyway lmao.
Antimai, Uwuguaya
Refuge Isle has been an active defender for much, much longer than they were in raiding lol.
That being said, yeah we're not a defender region. We're in fact expressly and very vocally not aligned to either side as a region. It's just there are some people out there who have a "if you're not with me, you're against me" mentality and can't imagine people who are mostly uninterested in r/d.
Typica, Araine, Tiralta, Waywards Edge, Antimai, Wolfielandia, Uwuguaya
yeah i probably should read everything i see, not the most important parts
the [sub]small[/sub] stuff matters too!
Antimai
Hypothetical what if time!
So, if a person can ban lets say 10 accounts in 30 seconds, thats 1 account every 3 seconds. 12 x 10 = 120, so 40 accounts could get banned every 3 seconds. so you have to get around 50 accounts with WA in under 30 seconds, without nuking NS' servers. That doesn't seem feasible. 50 accounts then have 30 seconds to start regaining control before they are banned. Hypothetically, you would need on the order of 500~ accounts per minute to save a region. thats not happening.
[sub]im doing 1000 calculations per second and they're all wrong[/sub]
[sub]Source: poor math by Waywardia[/sub]
Edit:
1 account every 3 seconds times 12 would equal ~ 4 account bans per second, so hypothetically, 5 accounts would need to enter a region per second.
5 x 60 = 300~
300 accounts per minute to bypass a ban.
Antimai
A lot of reading on the issue «Easter Egg: 20 Years A-Workin». <.<
Neurodiversity
Why did i subject myself to torture for a stupid number
Torture? Math is fun most of the time
Typica, Tiralta
You can ban up to one account per second. That cooldown is collectively shared by all regional officers. There are several raiders who are able to hit 1 ban per second in their own right. But with twelve regional officers, it is guaranteed. So a minimum safe buffer is to have an volume of updates in a excess of the seconds of trigger length, and this is typically 10 to 15 seconds.
In addition to that, you will also need to have enough updaters to cover the duration it takes the region to update. For large regions that have, say 150 pilers and 165 jumpers, it could take an additional ten or fifteen seconds. Or occasionally seven minutes. You'll need enough defenders to cover all of that too.
Antimai
bruh-
Okay new numbers
1 account per second
15 second safety net
1aps - 15 seconds = x amount of accounts needed
1k accounts would probably be sufficient to save a region, given they enter at the same time, and they all endorse the same person at once
(without crashing NS)
actually lets keep my old numbers, 4 aps would be overkill, but like CMO (Command Modern Ops) it's better to overestimate than underestimate
Unrelated to anything, the board has reached page 700 which is the National Pokedex number of my favorite Pokemon! :D
Sylh Alanor, Portmanteau, Tiralta, Waywards Edge, Antimai
sylveon?
Edit: i looked it up im probably wrong lol
Sylh Alanor, Amiyoka
Spot on! I love Sylveon.
Sylh Alanor, St Leone, Amiyoka
my fav pokemon is Emolga cx
Sylh Alanor, Cadenzana, Amiyoka
Are you referring to the badges you see on the cards themselves? They only show a preview of the top 3 badges. For example, my card shows a site supporter, easter egg and 3 gold badges, but I had 14 at the time the card was created.
Sylh Alanor, Araine, Liphia, Amiyoka
OY I got an easter egg :D
time to update the card lmao
Typica, Sylh Alanor, Araine, Tiralta, Amiyoka, Antimai
Post self-deleted by Refuge Isle.
Makes sense, thank you
Tiralta, Amiyoka
ahh, that'll do it. thank you for the explanation! i do have to wonder why some of moon's raiders do regard refugia as a defender region though, assuming we've never made a stance as being one in the past before.
hey now! don't forget the pervasive endotarting ;)
Tiralta, Amiyoka
In the past, The East Pacific regarded us as a "raider meritocracy" and 10000 Islands considered us a "Do Not Defend" region for being raider. Ironically both later became embassy regions. In the current climate, regions that oppose the Brotherhood of Malice tend to get lumped in as "just another defender org/conspiracy". Best guess is either a "with us or against us" mentality or, generously, just getting something wrong because you don't understand it.
Refugia has always had a mix of raiders and defenders in the Regional Council. We have a long history of supporting resolutions that are supportive of raiders, critical of raiders, supportive of defenders, and critical of defenders in the World Assembly. We enforce a moderation policy of no military gameplay swipes in chat, and we have never carried out any raids or defences from this region or organised by its leadership.
The region's perspective is that the shallow rhetoric that military gameplay brings is caustic, unhealthy, and unproductive. And while many members of this region, including myself, do work in r/d outside of Refugia, within Refugia, people have to learn how to co-exist and talk to each other like human beings.
Cheesy Tots, Sylh Alanor, Araine, Liphia, Tiralta, Waywards Edge, Amiyoka, Ullrani, Antimai
i've endotarted everyone :)
Araine, Amiyoka, Antimai
I personally love lycanroc and will be getting the midday form ASAP on Friday
Cadenzana, Wolfielandia
what happened to the RRS modification that expired 2 days ago?
"You have no power here?"
The new Easter egg issue says something about a secret website? Does anyone here know about it? If you dont want to make it public, you can tell me privately on telegrams. Im good at keeping secrets
Araine, Wolfielandia
Sorry yes, that passed 23-2-3, full results: https://vote.calref.network/results/41
I've added it to the RRS.
Cheesy Tots, Sylh Alanor, Araine, Junitaki-Cho, Cadenzana, Tiralta, Whitanchir, Antimai
Congrats on being legendary 👏
Cheesy Tots, Sylh Alanor, Junitaki-Cho, Cadenzana, Portmanteau
Thanks for the well-wishes, I'm excited to see Sylh Alanor and Honeydewistania as S3 Refugia legends too, and start collecting my friends' cards again!
Honeydewistania, Cheesy Tots, Sylh Alanor, Melenavenia, Junitaki-Cho, Liphia, Portmanteau, Tiralta, Tidelia, Rocklin
NationStates is a rabbit hole of fun easter eggs you can find, on top of doing things like challenging other nations by comparing your stats to theirs. This can be accessed here: https://www.nationstates.net/page=challenge
Portmanteau, Tiralta
It's pretty funny that some people have begun talking about Pokémon and it's not even because Scarlet and Violet are coming out on Friday. In fact, I have a question for future Scarlet and Violet platers here: Which starter are you going to pick? I think I'll choose Fuecoco. If I do, I could name them Chili or Pepper, and both are opportunities I can't pass up.
Portmanteau, Tiralta
You guys think my card looks acceptable right now or should I move making a new one higher on my list of priorities?
Cheesy Tots, Portmanteau
I think your card is acceptable whenever you're happy with it
Cheesy Tots, Typica, Portmanteau, Tiralta
Assembled with Dot's Region Saver.
Written by Refuge Isle.