OiE Think Tank: Guild Activities

[Walter]

This is going to be the thread to invent and discuss activities that should help our guild going again...

[Ancalagon]

Excellent! (in a Mr Burns voice, rubbing hands with glee:))

Well, a couple of things we need to decide upon first and foremost;

1. Do we restrict membership again or continue to keep it open to all comers? Personally, I am not too concerned by age either way, so add your own thoughts. I am however keen that we drive for new members and soon (links in our sigs to the Guild as Chymaera suggested is a good starting point). I also think we should be contacting directly, every member who has not replied to Walters list and asking them of their commitment to the Guild...*nudge @ Turgon*

2. Is there value in allocating titles, or at least rewards. Should contribution by members mean they can join the debating team, start new debates, select new topics etc. or should rewards mean titles? I am not so much concerned about titles, but I would like to see us all start with a clean slate and design a new, functional structure that defines effort. How do we do this, well that is up for discussion;)

In addition, I wonder if it is worth discussing with Mike and WM a standard system whereby all Guilds have the same system running throughout, particularly if someone wants to move from one Guild to another, they can bring their status with them. I think this would work now that RPGs are out of the forum. I continually harp on about LotrPlaza (http://www.lotrplaza.com/forum/career.asp) model, but in my very humble opinion, it is absolutely the most outstanding blueprint from which to work. I do not advocate copying it directly, just that is ought to be considered for all Guilds and functions throughout the forum. Lightyears ahead of post counts.

3. We need to decide on who wants to do what within the Guild itself. Certain people are better suited to certain tasks. I, for example am dreadful at finishing what I start, but I have ideas at a rate of 30 a minute. So I guess I am not really one for seeing projects through to the end. Everyone is good at something, we need to know who has what skills and where they ought to be put to work.

Mull over this lot while more stuff comes into my head:D

[Turgon]

I'll start PMing absent members right away - no problems there.

As for titles, I think they could work really well, people like them evidently so why not create some? We could create ranks equivalent to the Tolkienologist for instance, but give them an Ost-in-Edhil slant, that would be in keeping with a wish for a uniform system. A Journeyman Tolkienologist joining the Ost-in-Edhil, would simply take up the equivalent rank in our system.

With regards specific roles within the guild - I can see that working well. A debate captain for instance to run the debating team - that would be a good idea. I'm sure there are other examples too, but that's something that springs immediately to mind.

Not too familiar with LotrPlaza - but I'll certainly check it out.

[Ithrynluin]

Not sure where to post this...I guess I'll put it here.

I would just like to encourage all the O-i-E members to visit the Guild of Scholars and participate in any threads you might find of interest. I have invited some members of the GoS to visit this guild...

The problem is that some threads get very little response, and I'm sure there are members on this forum who would want to participate in some discussions, but they just don't visit some parts of the forum and those threads go unnoticed.

Thus both our guilds will have more 'traffic' and the periods of 'silence' and 'decline' will occur rarely, if ever. I think this 'symbiotic relationship' would work well for the enrichment of both guilds.

Cheers :)

[Walter]

I don't think PM-ing members will work, they might give word, maybe partake for a while and then disappear again. Also there - formally - exists a certain member in the guild, who so far has never posted in the guild (IIRC), but whos active participation would cause me to leave the guild immediatly.

As I said in the other thread I would like to see some form of restricted membership, but I'm not sure that this should be age once again. How about letting "guild aspirants" in for a while and see how they do within the guild and then let the existing members decide if this person should become a member or not?

I don't care much about titles and I consider a testing and ranking system - like in the GoT - outright stupid (not only because I probably never would come beyond "aspirant" status were I to be "tested" ;)). But a system to measure the "frequency" and the "quality" of a members contributions, now that would be something different (recently I am pondering such a system for the Wiki too). The only problem I see, is to work out such a system, that cannot be easily cheated, postcounts and postlength are indicators, but not sufficient, IMO.

As for taking over responsiblities within the guild I'd volunteer for Tolkien-sources, mythology, Tolkien's other works and generally - what I'm usually best at - "giving a poor example"... ;)

[Turgon]

I wish you said that earlier Walter I've just PMed all the people all the membership list...:eek: I don't think it will do any harm to try though - and at the very least we have given them a heads up about the situation.

With regard to titles though, I'm not suggesting we should be testing anyone, not really my thing either. But titles could be fun if we could find a way to implement them. Not sure how we would go about that here but on the TolkienWiki, a 'rate this article' function could work well. Don't know how that would work on the software end - but it could be good for the people reading the pages. A top twenty articles page or something - would work very well I think. I know the hot-spots performs this function to some degree - but that is rather temporal with the regards to the topics it shows. Anyway I'm drifting off topic here...:)

[Walter]

np, Turgon :)

As for the rating of Wiki pages: I's a good idea, but I don't know if it can be easily implemented in the software, I need to talk with H. about this....

[Walter]

Another idea (not really new though):

What about a thread where the members post a brief introduction of themselves, their particular interest in Tolkien, etc.?

[Ithrynluin]

Originally posted by ithrynluin
Not sure where to post this...I guess I'll put it here.

I would just like to encourage all the O-i-E members to visit the Guild of Scholars and participate in any threads you might find of interest. I have invited some members of the GoS to visit this guild...

The problem is that some threads get very little response, and I'm sure there are members on this forum who would want to participate in some discussions, but they just don't visit some parts of the forum and those threads go unnoticed.

Thus both our guilds will have more 'traffic' and the periods of 'silence' and 'decline' will occur rarely, if ever. I think this 'symbiotic relationship' would work well for the enrichment of both guilds.

Cheers :)

I thought I was going to get some sort of response to the above, but never you mind...

[Ancalagon]

Ithrynluin, I am quite sure that the few members we have left within Ost-in-Edhil would be more than happy to participate in some of the discussions held in the Guild of Scholars, and if I am correct a number already have. However, as you can read from the tone of the most recent threads (including this one), Ost-in-Edhil is trying to ensure it keeps its head above water. We are currently locating our missing members, trying to plan some activities within this Guild to ensure it can once again flourish and hopefully add new members to our lists.

So I would politely ask you to be patient, allow us time to reorganise and in time, participate in other Guild discussions over and above our own. It's a big forum out there and Ost-in-Edhil is only one small part of it.

[Ithrynluin]

My eagerness and impatience was only due to the fact that the same thing is (or was) happening to the GoS - trying to keep its head above the surface...

[Chymaera]

Rest assured Young Padawan ;)

I will be visiting the Scholar's and see what there is to see.:) (I was a former member under Elberth's regime dontyerknow)

We don't want to step on other Guild's toes by poaching there members so we should compile a master list of all Guild members. So we know who is free to join us.


On the whole I think I am fond of titles as long as there is responcibility attached to it. That is part of why I took on 'Doorwarder' (also I had just finished 'Cottage of Lost Play' and it related to a desciptive thread I had started describing our Glorious Guild hall, this I will endevour to complete)

[Ithrynluin]

Thank you, Chymaera.

I was a former member under Elberth's regime dontyerknow

Oh I know. I just revived an old thread of yours - some crazy theory on Balin or other. :D

[Chymaera]

:eek: just because a theory is half-cocked doesn't mean that it is?:D