On Thu, 8 May 2008, Ian Kelly wrote:
> I could make the agreement. I could make the agreement a contest.
> Therefore the contest is a possible agreement I could make. What's so
> complicated about that?
Sorry to get on aside about "regulation" and R101, that was a side-issue
without bearing here but I found the historical part of that interesting.
> It's ironic, then, I would disagree with you. Switches are state that
> are attached to entities by the rules, not intrinsic properties of the
> entities themselves. A contest, on the other hand, is a type of
> contract; by R2136, a contract is "made into" a contest. (This is of
> course somewhat blurred by the fact that R2162 explicitly defines the
> phrase "to become X" in relation to switches.)
This is where I disagree as well: I think contest-ness is an extrinsic
property granted to contracts by specified Agoran mechanisms, the way
playerhood is an extrinsic property granted to persons by Agora. As such,
the granting of that property is not within the scope of the contract
(or the judgement, because the judgement is the contract), but within the
scope of Agora's mechanism described R2136. You've stated your case
clearly and I think this is just a difference of reasonable opinions
where the rules are silent.
1. A person can declare emself a person, but can't declare emself a player
other than through the registration process.
2. A contract can declare itself a contract, but can't declare itself a
contest, even at the moment of its creation, other than through the R2136
process.
Since the judgement *is* the contract ("the judgement is in effect as a
binding agreement"), it is bound by (2).
I wouldn't be surprised either argument prevailing here (and I wouldn't
appeal one going your way, though I would appeal one based on R101). It
was always risky to give equity cases the ability to affect things
flexibly, but I thought it was worth the risk. I think the best solution
that preserves the flexibility while limiting abuses is to make equity
cases appealable by anyone (so inappropriate scam-equity judgements can
get tossed out as inequitable).
-Goethe
