Join the new world

Hi there,
I'm here to introduce one of my oldest in game friends and a man I admire incredibly. A lot of the time we haven't seen eye to eye yet his success on both a national and international scale is staggering. So I'm glad to bring you an interview with Iain Keers, The Unity Party presidential candidate. He does tend to occasionally waffle on, but it's good waffle and well worth the read. Enjoy!


Tell us a bit about yourself and your role in eRepublik up until now?

Well I joined eRepublik in December 2008. When I joined, I 2 clicked for about a week. It was very confusing- the game itself said I was now a member of the army, but articles from the UK armed forces said I needed to apply. Nobody spoke to me or contacted me beyond an official "hello" message which seemed to me to be from the game itself. Eventually, I joined TUP ingame, and messaged the PP Squiddy, who got me onto the forums and involved. As soon as I was given that little taste of the game, I threw myself into it.

In my early life I spent a lot of time debating and arguing with my fellow party members about how the party should be aligned and what we should be doing as a group. In February TUP backed the Destiny Coalition to get Final Destiny into government. That was the last time TUP used old campaign methods. After that, we completely changed, and I was happy to be part of that change. In April we backed Malta_1990 for Country President, and when he won he and Roadrunnerspeed (incumbent MoF) picked me to take over the Ministry of Finance. My first experience of government was being thrown in at the deep end as a Minister. I was given the keys to the orgs, a few words of wisdom and left to work it out myself.

Over the following six or seven months I got more and more involved with the game, becoming a kind of permanent Presidential advisor on economics. Through my international contacts with Dishmcds and Antonio Salgaldo, I became involved with the PEACEKeepers, the PEACE GC mobile wing. This eventually secured me an officer position and access to the PEACE Warroom, which at the time was at the upper end of the PEACE hierarchy. It was incredible for me, a player only (at the time) eight or nine months old, never been a President, to be rubbing shoulders with some of the oldest and most powerful figures in the world.



In December, by the time PEACE collapsed, I was well known and a PEACE emeritus advisor on military organisation and economics. When Phoenix was born as a meeting between a few Emeritus from every country, I was one of the first to speak in favour of a broader alliance including the UK being reborn from the ashes of PEACE. The idea of rebirth, plus a suggestion long ago by former CP JerryGFL led me to suggest the name Phoenix as a good one for the alliance. At first, I thought they were going to choose an acronym, but vicious lobbying against silly acronyms finally won out and they selected Phoenix.

When the first draft of the Phoenix Treaty was posted, I was honoured to sign it as Phoenix Treasure, one of the Triumvirate of elected emeritus members who led the alliance. At the time the other leaders were both old and well known figures, and I was a bit of an odd one out in my own eyes at least. However I quickly organised the treasury, binning initial funding plans and building a vast monitoring system for global economies which has developed and is still kept to this day. With the help of Clueless (ex-CP of Serbia) and a few other guys I managed to make the Treasury into something amazing, and ran it for six months, the longest serving Phoenix official. When I stepped down Mitch Rapp and then Nysex replaced me. However I am still present at the highest levels as an advisor to Phoenix and member of the strategic council.

Over the last year and a half I've served a total of fourteen (I think!) terms in the cabinets of two countries, for two months jointly. I have served as the leader of international military brigades and private militias. I have worked as a lowly bean counter and as the foremost economic advisor in at least one half of the world. I have worked with three major alliances and around forty countries, helped draft and discuss the treaty of the alliance we live in and then seeing it to fruition. That's about it so far 😃

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What made you decide to run for president this month?

Well this month will be the hardest ever for the Presidency in my opinion. With V2 almost certain to be implemented during the term, we will see mass chaos in the global economy, military upheaval in every state and huge domestic changes which we will need to inform our population about. The complexity of moving a huge and experienced population into what is essentially an entirely new game will result in huge die-offs and all-round madness. I saw all of this coming, and desperately wanted someone competent to be in the hot seat when it happened.

When I first realised that Woldy wasn't going to be running I admit I panicked a bit. I've always avoided running for President because I felt that the position would constrain me in my real life- I didn't want to have to be sitting up at 4am fighting an f5 battle with an enemy to try and get in before them. However, it turns out that this month that may be possible, and combined with the huge need for competent and experienced leadership I decided to ask my party to consider me for their candidate. I hope that my economic competence and wide range of experience in all areas of eRepublik will make me a natural choice for the country. That said, I'm not taking anything for granted and am working extremely hard on a set of manifestos and more importantly post-electoral plans for the UK.

So in short: the necessity for strong leadership into V2; the necessity for a CP who understands the economy module and can respond to it; the necessity for a big government which can communicate and involve new players.


(Keers has got it covered)

What do you think qualifies you for the role, especially during the month with lots of changes to erep?

Like I've already said, I have long been involved with the economic side of the game. This also involves daily communication with economists from every country, recognised leaders in their fields both ingame and often in real life. These guys have studied the modules as hard as I have, and I hope that the conclusions we have come to will help prepare our countries for the big leap into V2. One of the saddest things about V2 is the sheer lack of communication from admins. Probably one in a thousand or less people are even aware of the ideal disposition of skills in the new modules- few people have the inclination to work it out mathematically. Having a CP who understands not only the market in all its intricacies but also the effect of every change on every area of the UK will be a massive benefit to our country, and will build on our reputation as a global economic centre.

Outside of specific V2 related stuff, my experience in alliance politics, local politics, military organisation, communications and so on qualify me for the very generalist position of CP. I've always believe that to properly manage someone, you need to understand the job that they do and be able to do it yourself if necessary. I would feel comfortable stepping into any of our ministries now, organising the people there and getting going. I feel like that's a vital skill in V2- now is not the time to be letting them "get on with it". Letting people get on with it is basically the equivalent of doing nothing once you strip away the rhetoric. No, I want to support ministers, be there for them, be able to bounce ideas back and forth, form a proper dialogue and make positive changes. Sometimes a shake-up is a perfect opportunity to shine, and I want the best of the UK to show in the aftermath of V2.


Keeping people connected, working together.

What widespread changes do you want to bring in, and how will they help the country?

I think "widespread change" will basically be the norm next month. As much as I do love expanding operations, this next month won't be a matter of choice but necessity for all the candidates involved. Basically the measure of a candidate imo is how well prepared they are not just in terms of planning but mindset for v2. For example, a strong, comprehensive plan for the economy is a must for me straight away. Such a plan would involve directing people in migrating their skills, and then directing new players into crucially undermanned industries post-V2 when the formulas are given to us and we can work out the maths of it all.

In addition we will need to expand our government system to study the new modules. We sit now on our laurels a little, after well over a year of V1. We know how the current economy module works. We know how to make eRepublik dance to our tune. In V2, we won't have a clue. Not only will we have to work out exactly how everything works, we'll have to interpret it for new players. We have to explain time management, we have to explain customisation, we have to explain wellness, happiness, why players shouldn't spend their treasure map gold on lana and her buddies. We have to explain why they no longer have to live in London but possibly should do anyway. We have to explain why they shouldn't spend all day training and one hour working. It's going to be a massive pain, and for the first month at least it's going to be enormously busy accumulating, processing and distributing that information.



In addition to that huge task thrown at the feet of the MoHA, there is the task of recruitment and retention. With the game becoming more graphical and taking longer than 15 minutes a day, we are appealing to proper gamers. People who don't just mess about on browser games. We are at risk, so to speak, of a baby boom. Brits are notoriously leery of anything which can be completed in 5 minutes, then requires a whole day to play again. In V2, the elusive community aspect which many (including myself) found so hard to track down will no longer be essential to gameplay, only desirable. So we really need to start making major preparations for a baby boom. That involves a whole extra realm of research and preparation.

I could go on all day, but I'll leave you with one final widespread change, which is the military. I won't be messing around with command, or anything at all for that matter. It's the armies business what they do, and so longs as they do what is required of them I don't really care how they do it. However, in V2 the armed forces is going to need to be more active and organised than ever. Moving players across the game board (so to speak) and actually making gains will require a lot of concentration and hard work. That said, there are going to be an awful lot of players wanting to go wild without joining the army. The best solution to this is to take those people, put them in companies (if they want), give them weapons (if they do), and educate them as best as possible about wellness on the battlefield, about strategy and get them to follow !! orders about where an how to fight. Not only will this at least give our new players a chance to survive, it will mean that we will have a list of people to badger about joining IRC and actually taking part in the real war.


Our awesome troops testing out new technology.

And finally, why should people vote for you over glados?

I'm not going to talk about GLaDOS, not because I don't respect him, but because I do. GLaDOS has been both an opponent and a friend of mine since the moment he stepped into the UK. We've fought, but we maintain a degree of respect between us that means you'll be hard pressed to find us attacking each other in the media or on the forums. I would encourage all our supporters to follow this example- though clearly not everyone does. I find that negative campaigning and trying to put down the other candidate backfires on you and your candidate, and that it suggests you have nothing positive to say about the election.

People should vote for me because I have experience. Because I have wide-reaching and comprehensive plans and understanding of the nitty-gritty of the game. Because I know all of the international community and they respect me for the hard work I have done. Because I am a good communicator, and try and keep my ideas in the media not behind closed doors. Finally, because I have always, without fail, put the ordinary people of Britain first. From the first day I joined the forums and was criticised for being a noob, 18 months ago, and the first time I was put down in a debate for trying to voice my ideas. I have always fought for you, for your right to express yourself, and for your right to enjoy your game without being harangued by the internet tough guy culture you find around games like this. A vote for me is a vote for just that.

Experience, Ideas, Community.

Thank you for taking the time to interview me 🙂


These guys know the score.

So there we have it, if you were unsure about who to vote for, or if you wanted even more reasons to vote for Keers then hopefully you mind has been put at rest! A fantastic candidate with a wealth of knowledge and an experienced background, I wish both Iain and Glados the very best of luck on election day.

Thanks for reading, please vote and subscribe!
IndieKid



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