Welcome to Gaia! ::

This thread will be used for input on the guild revamping project. A list of what we're trying to do can be found below. Everything that has a strike out through it has been done, and items in bold are currently being worked on.

Subforums

• Spam - I know some people want to keep the spammish threads around the guild so a subforum set aside would be a good way to compromise with those who want to see some on-topic discussion going on. Maybe we could also have a bump sticky in there for people who just like to bump and earn gold that way. A lot of people are into the spam aspect of things, so maybe we could attract people with the Spam subforum and then they'll check out the other guild features. I think it would help control spam in other areas of the guild as well because it gives the spammers a place to themselves.
  
• Crew Only - This one I'm pretty much going to do anyway because I think it would be very useful to us in the long run. We could set up a specific list of crew dos and donts so people aren't getting mixed up with how to use their powers. Also, it would be good for crew-only chatter that is meant for the entire crew but not the rest of the guild. As opposed to PMs, it would be more effective. I'd like to have an area for the crew members to report what they're doing with the guild and why, as well, because it would help us all stay on the same page.
  
• Shop/Quest - I don't really know if we should combine these two or separate them, but I was thinking for the time being it would save space and money to just combine all the item-related stuff into one subforum. So, anything that has to do with a shop of any king, selling items without setting up a shop, looking to buy items or anything else, or questing should be kept in there. The shop subforum especially has been a big idea floating around lately.
  
• Contest/Games - For anyone who wants to set up some sort of avatar contest or something, including giveaways. It would also be the place to hold guild-hosted contests and giveaway events. I'm not so sure about this because I don't know how popular it would be, but we could give it a try once we get more people. I think this idea should be saved for a little while though, as in get all the other, more popular ideas going first.
  
• Roleplaying - We should definitely bring this back. It will be popular once we get enough people. I was thinking we could make a master character list, too.
  
• Newspaper/Events - Going along with the newspaper that I believe Kite suggested earlier on, instead of just making a single thread, let's make an entire subforum for it. This is my idea: The newest edition is posted as a locked announcement, and the older issues are just regular locked topics. Then, we can have like... a sticky for suggestions, sign ups for different jobs, submitting stories, etc. I really want this one to come about.

New Features

• Suggestion Thread - A sticky for suggestions having to do with the guild. Ex: new subforums, a specific feature, a different layout, etc. Anything, really. Except moderator nominations and junk. >_>
  
• Donation Thread - Just a sticky or something to recognize the people who donate directly to the mule account. Donations made to the guild itself aren't listed there because they're listed in the memberlist.
  
• Invite List - A sticky where you can suggest people to be invited to the guild. Everyone in the crew will be in charge of invitations, but when they invite people, they should edit the post and strike out the people invited so we can all stay on the same page.
  
• Birthday List - An official list of everyone birthday in the guild. :D
  
• Link Library - Kind of like the old linklist.
  
• New Introduce Yourself Thread - The other one is pretty old.
  
• Guild House - We should bring the old Koto~House back!! And maybe even set up a house in Gaia Towns? Ooo~
  
• RP Profile List - I mentioned this before. We could have a profile list in the RP subforum for all the characters and stuff.
  
• 'Of The Day' Thread - Jokes of the day, questions of the day, words of the day, news of the day, 'on this day in history' etc. I think it would be neat. Maybe it would be more of a newspaper thing, but I kinda want it to be daily so I dunno how we could pop out a new issue every day. o_o Maybe it could be just a little mini-article along with some other simple stuff for a sticky updated daily in the newspaper subforum.
  
• Avatar Spotlight - This could be decided a number of ways, but I think it would be cool to have an avatar spotlight thing on the home page of the guild.
  
• Koto~Quilt - A patchwork quilt made from pictures of all the members. :D Yay.
  
• Crew List - Bios of the crew and stuff so the members know who to PM about certain stuff and can just get to know their crew members a little better. This would include stuff like time in the guild, what their jobs are, etc.
  
• Guild Advertising - A thread set up in the Chatterbox to get us some more publicity. I think we can also set one up in the Guilds forum because there's a section in there somewhere where you can advertise.
  
• Advice Column - This is for the newspaper. I think it would be a cool idea. (:
  
• Random Conversation Topic - A single topic in the main forum where random conversation (not spam, just off-topic talk) is held. They seem to be popular in some other guilds I've been to.
  
• Guild Quest Thread - Guild quests for like, housing items to put into our guild house for Towns or to dress the mule. Sometimes even stuff for contests and giveaways. We could merge it with the donation thread, actually. That would save space and clutter and actually make sense. x3
  
• Giveaway - This would be a good first guild quest. In order to get some attention for the guild, we could host a giveaway!
  
• Member Quest Thread - A list of all the quests of guild members, in case people are feeling generous and want to go bump their threads or donate to them.
  
• Donations Link - Just a link on the homepage to make donating straight to the mule account easier. It would take them right to the "start a trade with" thing.
  
• Affiliates Thread - A list of other guilds, quests, charities, giveaways, etc. that are affiliated with the guild.
  
• Traveler's Class Membership - A type of membership for those who don't spend much time in the guild but would still like to be a part of it. Travelers get rooms in the Koto~Inn, which will be like the Koto~House but... an inn. They also can't be given guild jobs, and you can switch between traveler and resident status whenever you want. This was explained in more detail on page 5.

Rules

• TOS/Gaia Rules - Of course
  
• Respect everyone in the guild, especially crew members and captains - Self-explanatory.
  
• No begging - Including in giveaways and stuff. We never really had much of a problem with this but still.
  
• No advertising - I consider this stuff like, making a whole thread geared to get you to join another guild. If you want to link a site or something because it has to do with the conversation, then that's fine, or even if like... there's a topic about dogs and you want to suggest a guild for them to look at about dogs, that's fine. So are signatures. I really hope you guys know what I'm getting at as far as the difference goes.
  
• Post Minimum of 10 - Basically, you should reach a post minimum of ten posts by the time you've been in the guild for two weeks. It's not that hard and it's to ensure at least a little bit of activity.
  
• No Spam/Bumps - Unless it's in the appropriate forum/thread. Veering a little off topic is okay but if things get too crazy, the thread will be locked. No one will be punished unless it's the same people detouring the thread in the first place.
  
• No Drama/Fighting - Goes with the respect thing.
  
• No Pagestretching/Overquoting - Meaning, not a ton of quote boxes and no pagestretching.
  
• No Bumpleting - This is bumping and then deleting posts.
  
• Relevant Titles - Topic titles should be related to the topic of the thread. Everyone is usually pretty good about that.
  
• Don't bring up old topics - We don't have this problem right now because of the lack of topics in the guild, but if a topic moves off of the first page, don't bring it back up unless it's your own topic that you're bringing back for a reason. Just make a new thread if you want to discuss something that's already been done but is on the second, third, etc. page.
  
• No Repeat Topics - Meaning don't repost a topic that's already been done and is on the first page. If it's off of the first page, then it's fine.

Specific Forum Ideas/Rules

• For Contest/Games - The crew can and will delete and discontinue any contests that are unfit for the guild. Contests should contain clear and fair rules, and can be for profit or free but again, they must be fair. Don't duplicate contests unless they are dead. Also, you are responsible for your contest. You are in charge of maintaining the peace and keeping rules in order. And please try not to disturb the game with a bunch of spam and extra chatter unless it can be done without disturbing others in the game. Only post if you want to be involved.
  
• For Roleplaying - Keep the out of character chat to a minimum and have it marked clearly. (ex: [out of character] in character) Cybering is not allowed, and either is inviting people to 'take it to PMs'. Make your own rules as far as 1337, grammar, gameplay, OOC chat, etc. goes. Perfect characters, along with godmodding, are no fun and are highly frowned upon. If we receive excessive complaints about you doing this then you will be given a warning and maybe even a banning from the guild.

Hiring a good Graphics Artist could do wonders. I'm not saying our old theme is outdated, but maybe you might want to buy some more banners? Domo did a great job on these, however, so it's just a small suggestion.

Maybe we could turn that storage into a shop section. We have artists and comic strip artists just floating around, maybe changing it into a shop section of sort might boost member join-age.

Also, we have a lot of threads that just go OFF TOPIC so much, the only way I remember the initial topic is by looking at the topic and first post. The rest is just random google. Maybe making two 'Blah' Chatterbox threads, and the rest of the threads could be required to have a point or topic to talk about, and if it gets off topic, to close it and delete it.

More journal! We need someone to post News that affects us, the common man. Write articles that could affect us: Teenagers, Texans, Gays, Straights, and then place them into a Sticky Thread. A Newspost of some sort.

Since RP Didn't work, I'll leave that one out. Although, we still have that RP that's just sitting there in the subforum. Maybe revive it after we get more members?

And one last idea, do some scouting. Just send someone out there with a thread in guilds marked "Active Members Needed", and recruit some good people. People that share our interests.

These are just initial ideas, but maybe they could inspire you to better ideas.

I'm not opposed to more members coming in, howerver, I will say that it does take me a lot of time for me to get comfortable with them and treat them as family, like I do with all of you. I won't be mean to them or anything (unless they make me mad), it'll just be a smidge uncomfortable for a bit.

And as for the "off-topics", I like it. Yeah, we have a bunch of threads, but how often do our threads really CONTAIN a topic we need to stay on? So, I'm none too big on having a "Blah" chatterbox thread. I like it the way it is.

A news thread would be good, though. I do like that idea. Aegis will get all political, I just know it. xD

I also agree with the new grapic arts stuff; but I don't know what a "theme" should be. I mean, what is it we really stand for? I've got nothing against gay/straight/bi, but I get so much of it in real life, so let's not have that be the theme, please.

Well, a lot of the topics I raised were actually given good feedback, so we might want to not only do some of these, but maybe tweak them to better suit the guild, and maybe branch other ideas off of it. We need Aegis, wherever that pop-tart is. XP

On Koto-Thing, there's about 1.5k at the moment.

When do you think we should get this ball rolling? And what should we start with?

I was thinking we could go through all the threads and junk like I suggested... Clean them out. How many of you guys have AIM or MSN or something? Hopefully we could get a chat going and discuss what threads go where during the process, if you guys would like that better than me just sorta doing it.

In the meantime, we can come up with a purpose for the guild, and the marked members will be done away with. Then we can look into a banner idea or something.

After all that, we're open for business again and can start the recruiting process. I still say a Koto~Thing sponsored giveaway would do a world of good. >_>

Once we start to get members, we add the spiffy features that we're planning.

By the way, I was thinking that instead of having an Announcements thread, we could move that to storage and just post new topics when we have new announcements... I think it would be more affective.

Please stay on topic for the announcements, guys. Just a general reminder.

No no, your reply was fine. xD

Thanks Kite. (: I'm questing but I'm willing to chip in what I can, or what we need.

Do you want to be in charge of finding a good graphics person? You seem to know more about this stuff than I do, so you'd probably be best for it... If you can, see if you can scout around and get a couple names. We'll have like, a guild vote or something on what we want done and who by out of the artists you pick and we'll go from there with the price.

MSN/AIM/YIM ANYONE?