[busyrobot]

I'll try to cut as much loose stuff and find a few things that you say that are at least marginally on topic:

Originally Posted by Kaimetsu

Neither of us can measure the effect that a single person has. It's utterly impossible. How can you realistically say that Gryffon's poor roleplaying practices haven't had a negative influence on other people?

If you can't measure any ill effect and all you have to go on is that it could cause ill effects? The 'Oh the Universe is Chaos!' defense is exceptionally weak, we are talking about observable impacts of people's characters and the rules people play by. You want to start making rules without any observations - just your own personal theories - to back them up?
You are the one who is trying to establish some evidence for your theory, and if the best you can do is say I can't 'prove' your theory is wrong, then you don't have a case to demonstrate your theory is sound at all.

Originally Posted by Kaimetsu

Well, he hasn't posted anything new. If he'd designed a new backstory, wouldn't he have amended his thread by now?

Was he ever forced to change it? That's the kind of regulation I'm talking about.

You asserted it will likely lead to a rash of people doing this, and so far you have only seen one example, and that one person did not receive encouraging praise for those elements of his story, thus showing it is not encouraged.

Originally Posted by Kaimetsu

To argue or deny that he is actively damaging the server would take statistics that neither of us can produce without travelling into parallel dimensions with comprehensive surveys. Special effects, wacky hijinks, I know. It'd be awesome. But it's beyond our means.

But even then we could never KNOW if the statistics were sound or if it was a HUGE event of random convergence! (since you like the 'we can never know stuff' defense so much)

Originally Posted by Kaimetsu

What I can say is that his actions have a distinct potential for breaking cohesion on the server. That's it. Is he harming it? Probably, yes. But I won't assert that he definitely is because I don't have the wormhole generator. Same as I won't assert that firing my revolver is the same as killing somebody.

Making rules based soley on one person's theories also threaten to break the cohesion of a server. The question is, what is a likely to be dangerous threat? The server has not suffered for the presence of Shawn or Gryffon over the last several years, and has benefited from them.

Originally Posted by Kaimetsu

Wow, maybe you have been listening! But here's the second half of that synopsis: You haven't yet shown that I'm wrong.

Humans are humans. There are universal factors - rules that apply regardless of the minute specifics of the group. The fact is that egocentric roleplaying is as bad in your world as it is in mine, and claiming refuge because of some irrelevant distinctions is no less ridiculous than dismissing somebody's opinion based on their preference of hat.

You haven't shown you are right either...you are the one trying demonstrate a need for change here.

1) I agree with your synopsis in its general principle. What I disagree with, is your quick judgement about Gryffon being an egocentric roleplayer. He does not use his history to try to draw attention to himself, and has specifically avoided 'center of attention' positions in the past.

2) Your opinion was 'dismissed' because it held at its center a missconception of how this community self regulates that you obviously didn't have experience with.
See, your error was the reason your opinion was dismissed, which was then attributed (understandably) to your lack of involvement with the community.
There are issues in GK: No one knows how to have a war, some leaders think bugging ships is 'roleplaying' or at least have in the past, some leaders did not stop their members from PKing and disrupting RP events...there are numerous ones.
However, in this community, the persistant problems have to do with kingdom leaders that do not encourage roleplaying, not ones that encourage grand RP histories. People who DO want to RP, do so in the decent kingdoms, and really do want to be part of those communities, to the point that, they would want an RP history that works with the group, not against it.

These are factors that do not appear to be (based on your misconceptions here) a part of the communities you are involved in, and as such, they are factors of experience that made you ineffective in your assesment. Your hat analogy is totally off, because it assumes you are being dismissed for completely arbitrary reasons. You may contend the reasons you are being dismissed are not very compelling, but it does not mean they are arbitrary, so your analogy is at best, still a very bad choice.