I suggest we revamp our activity checks.

Having them run from first-Saturday to first-Saturday sometimes means there isn't a full month between checks, but rather 3 weeks — and to be perfectly honest, I've demonstrated during the past few checks that asking me to post each character once during that period is just not realistic with my activity :P #gradschoolwoes

It's also frustrating because I never know if I'm going to lose someone, because I don't remember the date of every AC to be able to check against their most recent post and I don't want to do spreadsheets. I know some people have them and love them, but for me that's a waste of time when I could be posting and I just don't have enough time to start with :P

But I don't think I'm the only one — I keep seeing threads in Charmer's Chit Chat implying that everyone is kind of struggling with these. I just don't feel like our activity requirements align with our actual community activity at this stage of our life.

It's particularly a problem because of the post-AC penalty. For instance: times being what they are, sometimes I can only get on Charming once a week, on weekends. So say that I lose a character in a Saturday AC. I can't post to reactivate them on Sunday when I'm online, so I have to wait until the following weekend to request it — and because admin reactions aren't instantaneous I might have to wait until the next weekend to post that character. Which might be my only chance to do so before the next AC, so if I have homework/plans/whatever on even one weekend in a month, it's not really feasible for me to reactivate a character I lost in the previous AC.

Suggestions:

• Activity checks as currently run, but every other month (bonus: less work for staff, too!)
  
• If there's a way to run activity checks based on whether or not a character has any active threads instead of post count, I feel like that would help a lot - but I'm not sure whether that's an unfeasible logistical ask
  
• Counting by calendar month instead of Saturday-to-Saturday (would help me know where I stood and would get rid of the surprise!short months - IDRC when the deactivations happen so those could still be on the first Saturday to keep staff workload the same - and we already do this for posting wizard so I feel it's logistically possible)
  
• Examining whether the post-AC penalty is still necessary.
  

And yeah, I know I could have an absence up for my entire grad school career and it would help some if I kept requesting passes. But in my mind, that's just not what that thread is for. This isn't a dramatic change in my activity level — this is my activity level for the foreseeable future. So I guess the alternative is to just keep cutting down my characters, but I've already gone from 10 to 7 to 5 and like tbh I'm not confident in my ability to keep up with 5 under the current system.

The following 1 user Likes J. Alfred Darrow's post:1 user Likes J. Alfred Darrow's post
   Madeleine Backus

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MJ made the most Alfredy of sets and then two years later she made it EVEN BETTER

I thiiiiink the first Saturday of the month thing evens out so it's equal every month - I often ponder it on AC weekends but never devote enough brain to accurately calculate anything.

That said, I now always work on Saturdays and its the one reliable day where housemates are home and staying up later than 10pm so I as staff struggle to be any kind of helpful in the AC process of late. If it were back to 1sts I would actually stand a chance at being available to compile the list or pick up slack instead of being the slack.

  

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PW is also Saturday to Saturday xD

It was originally moved to the first weekend because that’s when staff is more likely to have time to do it. Even in my good months I don’t reliably have time to generate a list on a Tuesday between work and volunteering. Also, there are at least two months where holidays fall on the first—we rescheduled the January AC on more than one occasion for that reason!

What about moving it to the Sunday? That way Saturday can be a posting day without any overlap. I think generally most of the post-list “shadowposting” has been on Saturdays anyway?

The following 4 users Like Aldous Crouch's post:4 users Like Aldous Crouch's post
   Edric Umbridge, Madeleine Backus, Marlena Scamander, Ophelia Devine

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— Aldous walks with a cane and pronounced limp as the result of a splinching accident. —

— graphics by lady ❤ —

I’m all for this, with some slight differences:

— I like the current post count system. I think doing active threads, even if possible, would be a bad judgment of activity because (1) inactive threads could be reactivated last minute to show up on active threads and not be a good judgment for activity, and (2) under that system a character with no active threads on AC day but two archived threads during that month could get caught up in deacts.
— Make it a Sunday instead of a Saturday. I don’t know what y’all do with your Sundays, but I have weekends off so Saturday would be a perfect time to examine which characters I’ve missed rather than struggling on a Friday night after a long workweek to figure shit out.

The following 2 users Like Edric Umbridge's post:2 users Like Edric Umbridge's post
   Marlena Scamander, Roberto Devine

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— set by MJ! —

Totally concur with the ^above^ about the first Sunday being a good day for AC to give people more time to post.

I emphatically do not want us to go to every other month though, just putting that out there.

The following 1 user Likes Marlena Scamander's post:1 user Likes Marlena Scamander's post
   Lucille Lukeson

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MJ: still raising the graphics bar as of 2022

So after talking it over AT LENGTH with the staff except bean who is forced to agree with us now :P, we propose moving it to Sundays with a couple other behind-the-scenes tweaks to help reduce some of the hiccups! We will revisit in the new year, to see how the changes go, as we don't want to add any extra work if it's not needed! xD

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   Elladora Black, Lucille Lukeson

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— Aldous walks with a cane and pronounced limp as the result of a splinching accident. —

— graphics by lady ❤ —

Sunday seems like a good compromise! I know all of the rationale behind the way our activity checks work but like literally every AC for the last three months has left me feeling like I'd be better off quitting Charming than trying to keep up :P

  

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If part of it is the timing of things- could it be a change to allow someone to request their character back, even if its not processed until after the penalty expires? So if I've lost a character I can request it back on the day following the AC but it won't be processed until the penalty is over meaning that someone who is in Lynn's situ wont lose as much time?

The following 1 user Likes Madeleine Backus's post:1 user Likes Madeleine Backus's post
   Acacia Darlington

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Look what MJ did!!

Sunday seems like a good compromise! I know all of the rationale behind the way our activity checks work but like literally every AC for the last three months has left me feeling like I'd be better off quitting Charming than trying to keep up :P

And since that is the OPPOSITE of our goal I am hopeful Sunday will help xD Will check in after the January AC! <3

The following 1 user Likes Aldous Crouch's post:1 user Likes Aldous Crouch's post
   Ophelia Devine

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— Aldous walks with a cane and pronounced limp as the result of a splinching accident. —

— graphics by lady ❤ —

So after talking it over AT LENGTH with the staff except bean who is forced to agree with us now :P, we propose moving it to Sundays with a couple other behind-the-scenes tweaks to help reduce some of the hiccups! We will revisit in the new year, to see how the changes go, as we don't want to add any extra work if it's not needed! xD

in my defense I was playing cards

The following 2 users Like Cassius Lestrange's post:2 users Like Cassius Lestrange's post
   Aldous Crouch, Evalina Rosier

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MJ made this!