Join the new world

I wasn't sure how to start this article, I've thought about it and have mulled over a few ideas. I'm going to talk about who I am, why I came back to eRepublik, and my goals for this run of the game. The last 24hrs has seen a blub of activity that has surfaced. At this point, when I'm all of a sudden super busy in Real Life, so here I am at work. I appreciate you taking the time to read the article, and I hope there is strong engagement. Be aware, that I represent myself. Not any party or military unit. My thoughts and goals are my own, not the current party I may be with. I'm hoping I don't run out of typing runway for this article. Grab your drinks, tasty treats, take a nice big puff, and let's dive in!

Who Am I
I'm literally a nobody. I enjoy the simple life, and taking it easy in life. Life is too short to get upset, to be angry, or to hold on to grudges. I'm 45 as of this writing, I have a decent career in finance, and have an amazing life. I enjoy playing games of various kinds from FPS's to factory games. Just no sport games, I'd rather play those in RL for some exercise. I've been playing games since I was around 5 years old. My first computer was a hand me down from my brother (Commodore 64). I've literally been playing for decades and I've seen a lot. I enjoy engaging with the community of people who play the same game that I am. In everything that I do, I walk in Acceptance, Respect, and Integrity. Words have meaning and are important, and even more so when there are actions behind those words. I live my eRepublik life very similar to my RL, it's just in here you can literally do and achieve goals in a different way. I'm here to be an active proponent to the community and to we welcoming of all regardless of what the historical meta may be. I believe that we all deserve freedom to choose what we choose and to live life how we want.

Why Am I Here?
One thing I've noticed while coming back. Is just how people are playing this game? I've tried to get some engagement and responses from the community of people who are playing this game. Typically in a game, I'll test the community to see what the toxicity levels are, who is engaging with the community, and in general I try and get a sense of what's going on. Because I had a blast playing this game back in 2009/10, I'm just trying to hop in here and have some fun before I completely excise this game from my memory. I may play this game long term, but it all depends on you, the community of active people who hopefully still enjoy this game and the interactions you come across. I don't care about what the meta was before I came back. I've come across terms like "sniping", "training wars", "hot air balloon program". There are subsets of rules within a game world with mechanics. Ultimately those rules are meaningless if you aren't welcoming people into your community or engaging. From my current perspective of a Citizen, the game mechanics are simple enough to get a quick grasp on everything without any real explanations. The nut I want to crack is the ePolitics of eRepublik. It was hard to crack into before, and it is one of my major goals for returning. This might have some historical meta, and as of this moment that all doesn't exist as there really isn't much to dig up. I've used a search engine to dig up anything and found a rabbit hole of eRepublik being acquired in 2017 by a game holding company which have some decent revenues. Their stock price sucks, but that's fine. There are also a set of dead forums that seem unused recently. You can see why I'm confused about the whole ePolitics and what has been happening on any of that level if there is no transparency of it. Are there private groups running eCanada? You'd think the parties would at least have a party newspaper which is actively used to drive public opinion or to recruit so that everything can be actively moving forward. eRepublik will live or die based on the community, as is the case with every game/group that exists. Which this now nicely rolls into why I came back, do jump in the deep end, get some activity going, do my clickity clickity and then think about the next article to write. To persue my eRepublik goals and to create some great experiences to take into the future. Maybe meet a bunch of wonderful people, and some bad, in the process. It's all part of acceptance and understanding that we are all individuals and thus we should be diverse and different.

My Goals
1. To learn about the ePolitics of eRepublik.
2. To unite eCanada into a new and bright stage of eRepublik.
3. To be accepting of new and old so that we can have an active group together.
4. To maintain a eCanada with it's RL territories, and to then push out from there.

eRepublik Political Meta
I've been trying to do some research on the political meta, and it's been really frustrating and challenging. In 2009/10 it wasn't that difficult, but now all I find is old and stale content. I even cruised the old newspaper articles, but in reality they were all old and thus aren't relevant from my perspective. The somewhat active one is The Hill Times and it's only really managing a strange program? All you can read is their registration article, but I just find it weird to follow a subset of rules within game mechanics. Then it's heavy handed on using the word "punished". As soon as I started to see that word being thrown around, I knew the program wasn't for me. This is where my searching gets frustrating, is trying to navigate the series of articles to try and come across those islands of activity. You have to do a bunch of clicks and reading through a bunch of old stuff to try and find the new. So I am reliant on the community to be open and accepting. That is why I feel it's the obligation of those who administer eCanada to be transparent and upfront of what they are doing. I'm open to correcting my thinking if the right set of information comes across my eyeballs. I appreciate TemujinBC for reaching out and looking past the party affiliation to include me on the congressional message group. Know that I don't see a history, it's just from the point I'm added moving forward.

This is where I come to political parties. I joined the party that was the most active and accepting of newcomers. My current affiliation is one that has come from active interaction and I felt an acceptance to the people who I have reached out directly. This is why I chose similar affiliations with Foxfire and Rylde due to them being accepting and open. There are other parties higher up in the leaderboards, but I was disappointed to see no newspaper articles that are recent from these parties. Maybe I don't know where to look? Maybe I could have reached out? Foxfire gave me a bunch of food, ammunition, etc. without any provocation. I respect this, and so I reciprocate the respect back by joining up with the same military unit as Foxfire, and as such the same political party. It's eRepublik's way of having a group of active people with similar goals to be able to achieve anything.

To add to my perspective, I've cruised through all the screens that I can. Such as the Leaderboards to try and get a sense of activity. To be honest, it's all real low. I've tried to click through and see if there is anything more than just looking at the various screens and seeing who is in what party, etc. It became very difficult to keep following along if you aren't taking notes along the way. I don't see the public presence from any of the top parties in the leaderboard.

Cash Shop
I'm not sure how many of you out there drop your credit card on any cash shop purchases. I appreciate you if you do, because you are part of what is keeping this game alive with the holding company. For me funds are limited, and so I rely on those with more means to send gifts my way if you are so inclined. This isn't required or necessary. The only thing about this, is you can't have entitlement if you've dumped a large quantity of RL funds on this game, as in it's current state, it's designed to extract your funds.

Conclusion
I feel that I have shaken the proverbial tree in eRepulik here. I wanted to see who from the community of the game would reach out and jump into my articles. I know a few have, due to having 7 subscribers as of this writing. The votes on the articles are there, and there are even endorsements? Not sure what those are for, but I guess it used to mean something at some point. The point of what I'm doing is being accomplished and at the end of the day, I'm yearning and wondering about this damn game. It's permeated into my RL and has affected it in a good way. I hope there are the silent many of you who maybe want to feel some emotions and maybe mix up the status quo in the spirit of fun.

I used the newspaper as a clarion call to those of you still playing this game in a mechanical manner who come back to click, but are silent and go with the status quo. I'm a disruptor. I go into a space and push the limits of emotions to create activity and movement as long as it is honest, fair, accepting, and in the spirit of good wholesome fun. I don't agree with any sort of discrimination, ad hominins, racism. Let's keep it clean and fun. People can be passionate and words can be said, as long at the end of the day it's in a positive manner.

Thanks for reading and have a wonderful eRepublik day in eCanada!