Changes to the Stormrage Guild system

[Skandranon]

OK, after having reread most of the posts, what I see is that Tal and Mongo have very divergent ideas of what a Lurker guild should be. 
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I think the real issue at stake here isn't so much the structure of the guild so much as whether it can be a direction through which outreach should take place. Mongo's position seems more consistent to me when I look at it this way.

Basic objective, upon which we can all agree: We'd like more people to join our little corner of the web...but they have to be the right people. Let's leave the determination of what is or isn't "right" to another time. What's clear is that we all have this concept of a division between those we want here and those we don't. Therefore, it needs to be part of our outreach efforts to the community at large.

Mongo's view is that outreach is a function completely within the purview of the site, at least from what I can read out of his statements here and in the vision statement. New players should be drawn here for the very reason they've been drawn here in the past - good, detailed discussion about anything and everything game-related. Therefore, the Lounge shouldn't be tied to a guild (since discussion should be the drawing point) and yet a Lurker guild's members need to be well-behaved representatives of the site (because guild behaviour cannot be allowed to reflect poorly on the site). I think the distinction you made that "the guild not being tied to the site" and "the site not being tied to a guild" are different things is important. and I think Mongo wants the latter and not (necessarily) the former.

I don't see Tal's view as all that divergent. It only differs in that he thinks that outreach is a function that can be partially assumed by the in-game guilds. Not wholly, or mostly, only partially. The site's still very important - and it should be - but there should be nothing wrong with starting with guild first, site later, especially since it's exponentially easier for in-game Lurkers to reach out to people in a proactive manner (which is less like kicking the gate down than site adverts). Tal isn't talking about a stampede of script kiddies, just leaving the door open a crack for any opportunity that happens along, therefore requiring organization to ensure that such opportunities aren't abused.

Altogether, I don't see the difference here being necessarily about structure so much as it is about the underlying ideas which shape it.

Two pennies in the box.