Join the new world

First of all I would like to congratulate Uv Ajed on his comfortable win on the 5th.

The team he has put together has many strengths and the tone his administration has struck out of the gate has been very positive and engaging.

I was especially pleased to see the attention given to Foreign Affairs. For a small country like India, the only way to punch above our demographic weight is to be involved and pro-active. I was surprised to learn that China has been paying no rent and happy to hear that our leaders were not content to simply sweep this fact under the rug.

In President Uv Ajed's introductory article there is a clear focus on community. This is also impressive and commendable. Too many times you read about prospective leaders making bold claims of what they can do for our communities... rarely do you see someone putting their money where their mouth is in such a bold way.

The outcome at this point is secondary, the initiative alone deserves to be highlighted and praised. Well done Mr. President.

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On the 4th I published an article to announce the fact that I had now spent 4 years in the New World. To mark the occasion I attempted to give away some Q7 tanks but only to those that could accurately answer 4 questions.

I only received 4 responses (how appropriate, I can't help but be amused by the symmetry). Of those, three were accurate but one person declined to claim one of the prizes.

Consequently I've decided to split the 100 Q7 in two and award half to each of the two successful respondents: Wild Quark and Edmond.D.

Note: the fourth answer was someone who just copy/pasted what Addy had put in comments... I debated whether or not I should even acknowledge this entry. In the end I decided I would award 5 Q7 tanks of my own supply to encourage this citizen to keep participating (and maybe make a bigger effort in the future).

Most people didn't want to do all the research and that's ok, but I have to tell you... I just participated in a little hunt myself and I had a ton of fun. I kept getting sidetracked reading old articles and wiki entries and that is when you realize just how rich and fulfilling this place has the potential to be.

So what were the correct answers?

1. My first vote ever was in a PP race, name the citizen I voted for?

Tom Hagen.

Where could you find answer? In my very first article where I give a step by step account of my first 14 days in the New World.

2. I've been PP of three parties, name the first one?

CPP or Paradox Party.

Where could you find the answer? The hint was in my choice of words earlier in the article. Also a quick wiki search would have highlighted some of my party activities of the past and narrowed down your choices to two (CPP, CPF). The third party I've been PP of was a small one that I eventually lost in a "PTO" because I wasn't paying attention, heh. The votes were 1-1 and I lost the experience tiebreaker.

3. What do I consider my greatest achievement?

30 articles in 30 days.

Where could you find the answer? I never explicitly say this which made this question the toughest to figure out. I was hoping my sentence "someone was going to force me to do what I've done best in eRepublik" would give a clue to people to search in media. If you made your way to this article, you would come across where I talk about the 30 in 30 challenge and how I invested over 100 hrs of my time and effort into it. To the best of my knowledge it is something that hasn't been done before or since once you discount spam and lol articles.

4. Name all the countries in which I've held citizenship?

Canada, US and India.

Where could you find the answer? In my first article published in India. I was hoping this was the easy question that would generate at least some partial responses.

Now I have an embarrassing admission to make... I initially intended V0027215516457 to be a hint/red herring. Parsed properly it would have given you a phone number for a company called Zanalan sales. Zanalan was not the answer to #1 but he was Tom Hagen's opponent in the CP election of the month I was born. In fact, they shared power that month. Had that answer been given to me, I would have said enough to encourage people to look at old articles and hopefully find the answer as stated above. BUT... it doesn't work. There was no reason to think that number was anything but gibberish... fail. That's what you get for atttempting to be too clever by half.

My last clue was the Ernest Cline link at the bottom and the Ready Player 1. Ernest Cline is a writer. Ready Player 1 is his story in which a game designer dies and his death launches a competition (easter egg hunt). He leaves clues to the World in his creations to be able to find the answers. Whoever does so first, wins the prize (in this case his wealth). Very entertaining book full of '80s references for anyone that wants to Geek-out a little.


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So there is one last piece to address... I was generously donated tanks this week in honour of the 4th and to allow me to run this little competition. In total I received 150 Q7s with the instruction to pay it forward.

I've given 100 out today.

That leaves 50... I will be contacting our President after publishing this article with the offer to include the 50 extra weapons for his community activities. I don't know if he'll decide to add it to one of his prizes and if it will be claimed for a future project.

In any case I want to thank the generosity of those that have been my friends on this journey, without you all this is impossible.

Thank you.