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A place to discuss topics/games with other webDiplomacy players.
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brainbomb (295 D)
01 Jul 17 UTC
Is the voter fraud investigation a distraction?
Is it Republican Data mining? Beating a dead horse? Or all of the above. It feels like its designed to help Republicans gain shitloads of unsolicited free information about voters. Why else would they need such data? Why not trust the states - many of which are Red states to uphold fair elections.
36 replies
Open
Valis2501 (2850 D(G))
29 Jun 17 UTC
Claiming To Represent Flynn, GOPer Sought Clinton Emails From Hackers
https://www.wsj.com/articles/gop-operative-sought-clinton-emails-from-hackers-implied-a-connection-to-flynn-1498770851
3 replies
Open
Manwe Sulimo (419 D)
09 Jun 17 UTC
300 Point Game
Anybody down to play a 5 min phase anonymous gunboat? I'll need to give final approval for all participants, but if you'd like to express interest, do so in this thread. I'm thinking 07/01/2017 at 5pm EST.
21 replies
Open
leon1122 (190 D)
27 Jun 17 UTC
CNN Exposed In Undercover Sting - Producer Admits Russia Story Fake News
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-06-27/cnn-exposed-undercover-sting-producer-admits-russia-story-fake-news-pushed-ratings
34 replies
Open
Dorian (246 D)
01 Jul 17 UTC
Non-random picks
Is it possible to have non-random picks for custom games and tournament play?
2 replies
Open
Deeply_Dippy (458 D)
29 Jun 17 UTC
(+3)
RIP Jim-Bob Burgess
Yesterday, Doug Kent of Diplomacy World announced the passing of Jim Burgess - one of the Hobby's most consistent and valued publishers.
3 replies
Open
mfontecilla (301 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
New Player Registering Error
Hi guys, hope you're doing well. A friend of mine is having issues opening an account, however the validation keeps saying "Mailer error: SMTP Error: Could not authenticate." Does anyone knows how to solve this?
9 replies
Open
SuperMario0727 (204 D)
26 Jun 17 UTC
(+1)
Diplomacy Strategy: Sphere Theory
First and foremost, this "theory" is based on articles written by other members of the Diplomacy community. This thread is simply an elaboration of those ideas.

This "theory" attempts to craft a general strategy for the game that can be used as a guideline for players.
40 replies
Open
cb6000 (100 D(S))
29 Jun 17 UTC
New fleets only game
Game where players build only fleets. Rule change results in non standard openings. gameID=201181. Pw = boats4
5 replies
Open
orathaic (1009 D(B))
30 Jun 17 UTC
(+1)
Status, wealth, racism, and maybe some socialism.
So at the moment US republicans are trying to make sure access to healthcare is dependent on wealth. But discrimination based on status goes a long way back...
3 replies
Open
The_Meep (100 D)
29 Jun 17 UTC
New player - submitting support orders
Hi. Could someone please explain the syntax for submitting a support order? It shows up as: Army at X support move to Y from Z.
So, X is the supporting army. But is Y the Army that is being supported or the territory that they are attacking?
Thanks!
10 replies
Open
brainbomb (295 D)
30 Jun 17 UTC
Have you ever been to Hell?
Some people have near death experiences and claim they see white light and hear heavenly music. Some have even claimed to have been to heaven and come back. But has anyone ever been to Hell? Like they go into a coma or have a near death moment and learn theyre going to hell?
8 replies
Open
Randomizer (722 D)
21 Jun 17 UTC
EU court says coincidence is good enough
http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/21/health/vaccines-illness-european-court-bn/index.html
Court ruling that scientific proof isn't needed to blame a drug for illness. Just get enough cases to establish cause and effect.
31 replies
Open
CommanderByron (801 D(S))
28 Jun 17 UTC
NORTH CENTRAL PA F2F Inquiry
My restaurant is looking to host a game night; I do not have a date or time but are there 7+ people in the area or willing to travel to Williamsport PA; if such an event were planned?
10 replies
Open
Scrub (198 D)
29 Jun 17 UTC
Live game
I've always wanted to try a live game and today I actually have a free day. Please join gameID=201182 and post more live games to join
0 replies
Open
WildcatSir19 (347 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Known World
How do you start a game of the variant Known World?
9 replies
Open
peterlund (1310 D(G))
27 Jun 17 UTC
(+1)
US image - steep decline
But I guess you don't care... ;(
http://www.pewglobal.org/2017/06/26/u-s-image-suffers-as-publics-around-world-question-trumps-leadership/
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MajorMitchell (1605 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Thank you Jamiet99uk for illustrating the fallacious "logic" & thank you Orathaic for that last post. The Chinese leadership are determined to drive China forward to becoming the world's dominant trading nation, so as you suggest they won't need to go to war with the USA, unless the USA reforms itself ( and I hope it does ) the Chinese will be able to exert it's economic power. Bit difficult to go to war with your "bankers".
It's an interesting question, out of Russia, China and the USA, which is actually the " least corrupt " ? In which of the three do the "lumpenproletariat and their offspring" get the best "deal" in terms of public health and education services and opportunities to advance based on individual merit and effort ?
orathaic (1009 D(B))
28 Jun 17 UTC
Re: China - http://www.sciencealert.com/china-has-officially-started-construction-on-the-world-s-first-forest-city
orathaic (1009 D(B))
28 Jun 17 UTC
Russia? Probably the most corrupt, China and the US are pretty dofficult to assess, because they are both monolithic organisations of hundreds of millions of humans. It is rather difficult to compare.

I don't know enough about either.
orathaic (1009 D(B))
28 Jun 17 UTC
But i did see a wonderful new project, it basically turns mobile phones into banking services (called M Pesa, and started in Kenya). In Afghanistan they ran a trial paying police directly via M Pesa to their mobile phones. The police officers in the trial were surprised to find they recieved a huge pay increase, as much as 30%. In fact, being paid directlyeat superiors no longer able to skim a percentage off the top.

Similarily there is a city where the state is requiring all taxis to use M Pesa, because oncethey have a written record of transactions, they can prevent tax dodging drivers accepting cash.

It could massively reduce fraud and bribery. Perhaps even getting rid of cash entirely...
It hasn't been developed in the west because we have vested interests in the form of credit and debit card companies (Visa and Mastercard, for example) who don't want mobile phone companies cutting out the middle man...
Ripple_Echo (100 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
"China will not go to war with the US until it knows it can win, and by then it will not need to."

This is actually a strong argument for interdependence. Speaking only in terms of military war, rather than economic or cyber: war is really only profitable for the military-industrial complex. I only benefits nation states on the whole when resources are extracted from occupied areas. We reduce territorial war through mutual trade and interdependence.

Now, as that sort of territorial zero-sum war has been mostly eliminated due to the current global trade and interdependence, we are left with the Military-Industrial Complex dictating the course of war, at least from America. Which means you have a truly vast amount of wealth generated from that nation being funneled towards perpetual profit war. The country as a whole isn't making money, but merely moving it from the common citizen to the Military-Industrial Complex.

To simplify my perspective, I'll ask the question "What if Everyone acted this way?" as a judgement of the morality of an action (be it an individual or nation state.)

What if all nations invested in war as heavily as the United States? Probably war, bloodshed, and wealth wasted on destruction (more so of each.)

What if all nations became stoic isolationists, trading only as much as necessary? Probably a massive reduction in global cooperation in terms of scientific cooperation (The value and prevalence of which should be obvious to anyone in science,) international treaties and agreements, and many other fine things that come with being foremost a citizen of the world rather than of a nation. We might even see the shirking of global responsibilities towards externalities like climate change.

What if all nations committed themselves to something like the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals? We would probably things like economic competition to become a green-technology leader like China is doing with solar. We might see countries investing in equality of education for all. We might begin to see other nations' problems as our own.

I really don't think we're going to solve massively complex, deadly global problems like climate change if we only each think foremost about our own nations. It is simply not in human nature to care about the "Out group" or the "Other." The Other is the Enemy, and my enemy's loss is my gain. That doesn't fix climate change. That's playing musical chairs on the deck of the Titanic.

I'll simplify my main point from this whole thread:
Each and every one of us needs to start thinking of ALL HUMANS as part of their in-group. We must all unite against an unrelenting enemy - an enemy that that does not hate or love or sleep or breath - the fundamental physics of climate change. We're all pretty screwed otherwise.
MajorMitchell (1605 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Great post ripple echo, imagine just how much change and improvement in the "ordinary person's life" could be achieved if we could get rid of this huge waste in global armaments spending, plus all the really exciting R&D, space exploration etc that would be possible. Plus we could really get on top of crime/terrorism.
Jeff Kuta (2066 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
"China will not go to war with the US until it knows it can win, and by then it will not need to."

China cannot win a war against the United States. Ever. Red Dawn is *not* a thing. Nukes exist. Boots on the ground are expensive.

"This is actually a strong argument for interdependence."

Interdependence is fundamental to modern society. But who is in charge of monitoring and policing the spaces in between nations? Who should be? At present, it's pretty much the United States Navy.
diplomat61 (223 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
@Leon, once again, the EU is not failing.
Ripple_Echo (100 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
"But who is in charge of monitoring and policing the spaces in between nations? Who should be? At present, it's pretty much the United States Navy."

@Jeff Kuta I'm not 100% sure what you're trying to say there. Are you advocating that much of the world *should* be policed by the United States? I think you can easily imagine how that might be problematic. If you're suggesting that it's an intractable problem otherwise, then I would still have to disagree. Just because there isn't a simple answer that's immediately obvious (or who knows, maybe there is,) that doesn't mean "oh well, it's good enough as it is." If you didn't mean any of that, then please elaborate.
Jeff Kuta (2066 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
@Ripple_Echo: I'm not suggesting that the United States should be, but de facto they *are* the only one doing it. Russia and China have reasonable navies, but they are pretty much localized. The U.S. Navy is the only one truly capable of projecting force across the globe.

90% of the world's trade is carried by the international shipping industry. Until teleportation devices exist, shipping will be crucial to interdependence. The safety of this trade can only be ensured by strong, legitimate navies. The trick is how do those who benefit from interdependence contribute if they don't have military might?
orathaic (1009 D(B))
28 Jun 17 UTC
Re: military-industrial complex, R&D and NASA, there is a huge amount going on where public money (tax payers) have their fundd pushed into the military-industrial complex (which profits privately); a but a huge amount of that ends up on your shopping cart. Teflon non-stick surfaces? Invented by NASA i think, the internet? Invented by DARPA to communicate between military installations.

NASA itself was originally an arm of the US military, used for propoganda purposes during the cold war.

So there is the magic success of the military industrial complex. Aside from foreign aid (tax payer money) to allies (who then buy US advanced weapons systems) which requires the R&D side of things to keep having the mos advanced weapons systems in the world... Of course once you develop them, others will copy you, and eventualy you'll want to sell things off privately to make some money... (See Iranian made drone which the US shot doen over Syria recently).
MajorMitchell (1605 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Yes Orathaic there have been all sorts of spin offs from military based R&D, but similar examples apply to Formula one racing car R&D, or in mining from "Oil Company" R&D ( the oil companies spend so much more on R&D than "metals" mining companies )
Given how much is spent on military based R&D that "group" could hardly fail to make significant progress in new technologies.
The more pertinent question is, is the military ~industrial complex the most efficient way to spend all that wealth in R&D ? Or, do the "goals" of the Military ~Industrial complex distort the ways R&D is driven and opportunities and possible applications are lost or delayed as a result ? Opportunity & lost opportunity costs ? Eg, could we have already cured many forms of cancer instead of developing better fighter jets/better tanks & bombs ?
Jeff Kuta (2066 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
The intelligence industrial complex has been creating spyware and rootkits for decades. Those have been appropriated and are now making profits for others overseas.
MajorMitchell (1605 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
A similar example would be to ask, is the best way to spend all the money spent on "medical" R&D to only have private corporate pharmaceutical companies spending on "medical" R&D ? Or does a mix of "private corporate", " private philanthropic" and "public funding( taxpayers via universities etc ) work out better ?
orathaic (1009 D(B))
28 Jun 17 UTC
Cyber war can probably be consider an extention of the military-industrial complex.

@Ogion, i'm not actually considering what i said to he a compliment to the military-industrial complex.

Publically funded research turning into privately exploited tech is not my idea of an ideal. Never mind the greatest minds of a generation being employed on highly lucrative terms meaning they didn't apply themselves elsewhere - actually there are problems you can't simply pour money on, and a finite ount of R&D brain power will continue to be one of them, until we have machines which can run themselves...

Better tanks require better automation, and automation will drive wokers out of their jobs and alter our economy in a fairly revolutionary way.

Better bombs required better telecommunications, which has already given use hetter mobile phones, and thus an amazing cyber-netic enhancement of humanity (though we are not seen as cyborgs yet, out brains are adapting to accessing information from google - in our pocket - rather than from memory...).

But more to the point, selling arms to less developed regions, so they can wage war against each other helps no-one's development. All you need to do is look a west aftica, 300 years ago the british sold guns in exchange for slaves, and suddenly there was an arms race to capture as many slaves as possible -> to get the most guns -> to avoid becoming slaves.

Previous they had won some slaves as a matter of capturing POWs, but now the demand for slaves made it the point of war (that and previous slaves were not chattle, and their children were often free rather than being bred as a under class). Then when the British outlawed slavery, the economy of the region collapsed.

I would consider this in a similar vein to the modern neo-colonial 'military aid' - which mostly benefits the military-industrial complex.
Ripple_Echo (100 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
@MajorMitchell "The more pertinent question is, is the military ~industrial complex the most efficient way to spend all that wealth in R&D ? Or, do the "goals" of the Military ~Industrial complex distort the ways R&D is driven and opportunities and possible applications are lost or delayed as a result ? Opportunity & lost opportunity costs ?"

This question is invaluable. Opportunity cost is an enormous factor to consider when weighing the true cost and benefits of large-scale industry as a whole. It's all a question of incentives versus values. Within any given stable power structure or system, sufficient individuals must be incentivized to act at least in part in the interest of maintaining the power structure. Depending on the nature of the system and power structure, maintenance of the system can lead to ethically questionable behavior of the aggregate, even if each individual acts more or less ethically.

That's all to say that something truly monolithic, something with as many intricate moving parts as the Military-Industrial Complex, as a *whole* will *necessarily* act in its own interest at least enough to maintain its current power, but more likely that not, will act to further its Power. What else is Power (that is to say, Power over people) for if not to further itself? Which brings us back to opportunity costs. If these large systems, which by their nature incentivize unethical actions, are funded by taxpayers, is it not deeply problematic in terms of global civilization? Even if the R&D that improves our lives comes most aggressively from the Military-Industrial Complex, is the human cost worth it? How about the genuinely frightful sums of money spend to build glorious war machines and sleek, precision rifles? Are inventive by-products of the tools of destruction worth the sweat of our brow?

For every bullet fired at "The Enemy," how much further do we progress as a species?
Zach0805 (100 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
The problem is that in China the stock market will collapse. It started to in 2015 but the government saved it but that only made the eventual crash worse. China may be growing at a staggering but the collapse will come. The Communist Party realizes this and is doing the best it can to delay it but the more they delay it the more damaging it will be.
MajorMitchell (1605 D)
29 Jun 17 UTC
I had a few follow up thoughts to my "medical R&D" post..along the lines of..not all new discoveries are then made available for widespread use, maximum benefit to the greatest number of people..some are suppressed...eg the oil industry buying up patents of more efficient ways to use it's products and suppressing their further development and application.
For example with medicinal research...global pharmaceutical company finds two ways to cure a disease, first way is with a synthetically produced molecular thingy that can only be produced in expensive high tech facility, which they can control, second way is simpler and low cost production...it's in that companies interest to maximise it's own profits, not cure all those sufferers "pro bono" ( for free )


78 replies
Yoyoyozo (95 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Largest pot game ever?
In September I'm going to start a game titled "Wrath of the Titans."
4 replies
Open
MajorMitchell (1605 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Contest to decide if Dipbro Brainbomb is real
World games, anonymous and names, Classic Anon and names, Classic, HDV & RP...all only five points to enter....passwords, crack them if you can ( they're very simple )
8 replies
Open
Hippopankake (80 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Need person
I need 1 more person for a modern game there is no password modern-8 is the games name
0 replies
Open
Hamilton Brian (760 D(B))
25 Jun 17 UTC
(+1)
GB 3 Game Tournament
Being in the middle of a pretty long, drawn-out game, I feel the need to flex some tactical muscle. I'd like to propose a 3 game, semi-anon, 24 hour phase, WTA series. Preference is for a high reliability (<80%) and moderate to high GR. 25 to 50 point buy-in. Once we get the 7, games will be created and PW messaged out.

1) Hamilton Brian RR 98%, general GR position of 177
17 replies
Open
wel_120984 (124 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Question about dislodgement and support
Hi guys!

I've been playing Diplomacy for one year but now I'm re-reading the rulebook and I've bumped into one question.
5 replies
Open
Maru (100 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Authentication is broken
Authentication is broken, people can't make new accounts.
2 replies
Open
Jamiet99uk (1307 D)
27 Jun 17 UTC
(+1)
Magic Money Trees
The UK's totally bankrupt Prime Minister, Theresa May, told nurses they couldn't have a pay rise because "there isn't a magic money tree".

But this week there was £1.5 billion of magic money to give to some extreme-right Northern Irish homophobes with strong connections to terrorism.
23 replies
Open
Wiza Mastermind (0 DX)
25 Jun 17 UTC
Unhelpful Allies
Quick question, does anyone get annoyed by allies who send you messages saying really obvious things about what other countries did last turn or where you could easily get a SC. Basically all the information that is super clear that everyone could figure out but they decide to tell you anyways. Am I the only one who feels this way?
21 replies
Open
brainbomb (295 D)
25 Jun 17 UTC
Braimbomb in vegas
So I just won 2.50$ after spending 23.00$. Ohhhh yea baby VEGAS
34 replies
Open
brainbomb (295 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
GATORS ARE NATIONAL CHAMPS
Hell yes. Florida just won the CWS for the first time in school history.
6 replies
Open
bakay_ilya (100 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
hey
Let's play blitz the game ,missing 1 man
0 replies
Open
AngrySeas (346 D)
28 Jun 17 UTC
Home Game
Is there a way to run a game from one computer? In a face to face game, players would submit their orders to the moderator who logs them into the program for resolution, afterwards updating the public board. Does anyone know how to make this work?
4 replies
Open
Manwe Sulimo (419 D)
20 Jun 17 UTC
Limited Libertarian Location
Thread for Libertarians to be selfish and greedy without the chiding from those on the left and right. It's our ball and we're taking it home!
22 replies
Open
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