It would be interesting to see some of these experiments. You could actually do it in a very organized way through the RoG in a very simple, non-complicated way. Once these ideas have been proposed and implemented on various parts of the site, have a thread posted in the RoG listing all these 'alpha' experiments with their names, descriptions and locations. Then have a person register for them. "I want in X because of Y. I agree to adhere to the terms of the experiment that I am doing this for." Then just have the moderator come in, reiterate what they said for the sake of clarity and stick it in a subforum in the RoG that can be used as a filing system.

Easy.

Instead of having big swaths of change on the website, it is a really provocative idea to start investing in micro change and seeing how receptive we are to it. Um, instead of repeating the same thing over and over again I'd like to suggest a couple of ideas and refine some of those that were already mentioned for these Alphas. I do so love lists, don't you?

1) A section of the forum cordoned off for people where Althanas rules don't necessarily apply to allow more free-writing and creativity. A simple set of rules and terms would be developed to govern them, but that's pretty much it.

2) A rolling experiment with characters who aren't under the regulation of the RoG to experiment with personal growth versus character regulation. Different from free writing in the sense that these characters are identified and populate Althanas, but they have much more lax restrictions from the RoG. During the experiment, they are identified and adhere to special conditions that allow them this liberty. Over time, it would be interesting to see how a sample of characters would develop and advance without regulation or limited regulation as opposed to what we already have.

At the end, once the characters have been observed long enough, the experiment can end and they can always go back to the RoG and re-register under the rules of 3.0.

3) An experiment using accounts as placeholders. Meaning that the accounts of the users aren't necessarily tied to only one character that has been registered. They can submit work from any perspective, style, etc. and the rewards are applied to the account instead of the character itself. To see what it would be like to give people the ability to just write something and submit it to the website for criticism. They then could apply for gear, items, etc. that they could perhaps use in future writings.. maybe. Idea is still fuzzy, but the concept is there.


The first one is Letho's idea. I kept it simple to retain what he's said without really putting words into his mouth, the other ones are ideas I came up with. One is based on an old argument about RoG regulation and the other is just something to experiment with to see how it works. But anyway, I agree with many who have spoken here. Its time to adapt and change with the times. We have new blood starting to come in, but Althanas should start looking on how to change with the times in order to keep building our member base and fix some of the fundamental flaws in the system.

Alpha experiments are a great way to do this with little risk to the overall site itself and allowing anybody to participate in them gives you an opportunity for comprehensive feedback while offering many new things for members to try for the site's benefit.