Rigged Wiki:News/The Cull

For a more recent post reflecting updates to this policy, please see https://implyingrigged.info/wiki/Rigged_Wiki:News/The_Cull_Revisited

Right after the Fetus /merit/ decided to check the support and interaction of every board in the Cup. We did this after realizing just how not okay we were with teams in the Cup competing with no effort being put into them to represent the board and went to work on beginning The Cull. We made a massive spreadsheet with every team and dove into many archives to find each team's polls and threads to try and gauge their level of interest and the effort the managers were putting in. From the results of this search we singled out a number of teams that met most or all of the following criteria:

• Not polling the board.
• Not updating the roster in general.
• Not having matchday threads.
• Getting told to fuck off or not getting any response (while keeping in mind board size and individual board's moderation).

We set out to investigate all of those teams closer and Of the teams we focused in on eight were in the babby. The managers of those teams were reached out to about their interactions with the board and discovered that one of the teams we'd singled out had had threads and the manager were putting in effort just we hadn't found their threads so that left us with seven outstanding teams. Of those seven teams four attempted to make threads and one got a non-zero response. This left us with six teams three of whom had tried to interact but failed and three that did nothing.

Our research and then the manager's efforts (or lack thereof) to raise interest during Spring brought us to the following verdict: The six teams in question are to be put to sleep effective immediately and their qualifications for upcoming tournaments are forfeit.

One thing we are aware of is that in spite of the manager's lack of effort there are likely some people out there who are fans of these teams or just like their matches so here is how these teams will be able to return to the Cup. A concern that he have is that with this change we will see a sudden and mysterious influx of LIFELONG fans who want nothing more in the world than to rep their team so to discourage that these teams are all being put to sleep for at least three months until after Summer. After Summer these teams will be eligible for autopilot status same as any other team but will not be allowed to compete with a manager until after Autumn. We feel this is a pathway for the team to return to the Cup with the assurance that the failings that lead it to this point are unlikely to be repeated while giving /merit/ a large degree of oversight to the process.

Should one of these teams be autopiloted in Autumn they will be given back their placement they would have had if not for this action (eg pot 3, fetus, etc).

I have not named the six teams being culled until now because I wanted it first understood the reasoning regarding how we got to this point in the hope that people will know that we are doing this after a good amount of due diligence and thought.

The teams being put to sleep as part of The Cull are: /t/, /out/, /p/, /c/, /y/, and /adv/. Here are the specific reasonings for each of the teams.


 /t/: So this is the one you're all expecting but they still deserve an explanation. When /merit/ checked teams' history of interaction the last thing anyone could find was in 2014 when the team was starting out but there was an effort at the time.
http://archive.loveisover.me/t/thread/612119/#612119
http://archive.loveisover.me/t/thread/522650/#623070
http://archive.loveisover.me/t/thread/629999/
Since then however it seems as though there was nothing in the way of threads. After the Fetus Pybro was asked about reaching out and this post from the documentary threads Pybro is known to curate is that attempt.
http://archive.loveisover.me/t/thread/771491/#771512
A single reply in an existing thread is the lowest response possible that is not "fuck off" or complete silence and because of that we have decided that that is not enough for us to divert from our initial resolve to remove /t/.

 /out/: Like /t/ /out/ is a team that has never really had threads. Their last thread before Spring was after their miracle run in Autumn 15 when all eyes were on the board and the thread is very clearly inhabited by people who are just stopping by for well wishes.
http://archive.nyafuu.org/out/thread/630762/#630762
Because of this Jack was requested to make a thread as all the teams in danger were and this was the result.
http://archive.nyafuu.org/out/thread/1014089/#1014089
A "fuck off" and a "SMOKEY" were what resulted from that. Until /out/ can prove interest in Autumn or whenever the dream is on hold for the /out/doorsmen.

 /p/: When /p/ were brought into the Cup there was a very real spark surrounding them that existed beyond what could be written off as falseflagging. They produced entertaining games and were a good team to watch if you didn't loathe the team for existing like some do. But that said whatever interest was there seems to have faded if /p/'s Winter thread is any indication.
http://archive.nyafuu.org/p/thread/3019541/#3019541
If you've been paying attention you'll know that what came next was us asking Fuji to make a thread and he obliged by making a disguised thread that was also one of another /p/ related topic.
http://archive.nyafuu.org/p/thread/3074340/
The /p/ army is an empty field and the team will watch from afar until they can earn their way back in.

 /c/: The eternal weeb bandwagon /c/'s homegrown interest has always been tenuous. Their strategy the last time they ran a poll, which was over a year ago, was to airdrop into existing threads and hope that people click the survey link.
https://archive.loveisover.me/c/thread/2662024/#2669608
https://archive.loveisover.me/c/thread/2619573/#2626081
https://archive.loveisover.me/c/thread/2664667/#2670050
https://archive.loveisover.me/c/thread/2605666/#2625397
This was iffy at best and a while ago so we asked Gerb to use Spring as an opportunity to gather interest. If you've been following /4ccg/ you'll know he admitted he did not do that so as a result /c/ will not be returning in any capacity until they have proven their interest.

 /y/: This one is probably the biggest surprise to a lot of people. /y/ has historically had threads that sometimes got a non-zero number of responses
https://yuki.la/y/2315107
https://boards.fireden.net/y/thread/2212433/#2212531
https://boards.fireden.net/y/thread/2195365/#2195365
https://boards.fireden.net/y/thread/2269003/#2269003
It's always good to try but the lackluster threads aren't what drew us to single out /y/, it was their most recent poll. While the poll got 25 responses there was a very serious catch, THE POLL WAS NEVER POSTED ON /y/. Instead it only was circulated on the wiki, over Twitter, and likely the Yaoi Discord (formerly the Yaoi IRC) that SDA has stated his polls were posted in the past. To note this Discord has been mentioned once on the board ever so I would not consider it in any way the /y/ anything.
https://boards.fireden.net/y/thread/2392552/#2392552
The team belongs to the board so to us that the poll was never posted there is ludicrous.

SDA like the rest was told "By the end of Spring we ask you to make a thread in order to engage the browsers of /y/ with the Cup in any way you deem acceptable." Instead of making a thread SDA alerted the people on the Yaoi Discord that the Cup was happening. Discords relating to Cup teams or board Discords (not that this is either) can be a supplement that goes along with reaching out to the board itself but it's not a substitute and as such SDA did not provide the interest we asked him to get during Spring so as a result /y/ is going somewhere other than the fetus for once.

 /adv/: Before Autumn 15 /adv/ was placed in the qualifier on the grounds that they never interacted with the board and an anon made a thread for the team as a direct result of that decision.
http://archive.4plebs.org/adv/thread/16296259/#16296259
Clrs didn't quite get the hint from that since there haven't been any /adv/ threads since then. Unfortunately Clrs was not able to be reached before or during the Cup because he wasn't even here for every matchday but if he wants to see /adv/ play again I'd advise him to back to the board and actually do what a manager should do and represent the board.