View and vote on the article here: Staff Digest - July 2005
Staff Digest - July 2005| Category | | | Summary | | Hey, everyone! It's that time again - Staff Digest time! Okay, so it's not as exciting as New Computer Day, or Free Money Day, but this comes around a little more often thanks to the hard work done down at zZine. This month was a little busier then last, |
| | Body | CAPR Forums- Open for Business July 19, 2005
Hisim has opened up the CAPR forums to Kernel+ as a way of getting more input on the public face of CA from our higher ranking members.
The Ugliness of Plagiarism July 19, 2005
For those who don't know what it is, plagiarism is when you copy someone else's work without giving them credit for it. In today's digital age of file-sharing and the free flow of ideas, proper citation for source materials is often neglected, which can lead to various legal and ethical issues. Plagiarism is a very serious issue, with potentially very real, legal ramifications for CyberArmy as well as the brigade sites. This most recent event has prompted a discussion about how best to both eliminate plagiarism from the onset, as well as deal with people who plagiarize.
To sum, CyberArmy recently encountered a situation where a member blatantly copied/pasted huge chunks of an existing source for an article. He was confronted about the inconsistencies in the writing and then was later confronted with the source material. This is not the first time that this has happened, either. Most brigades that accept user-submitted articles and tutorials have had someone try to slip something like this past them, and in some instances, the articles were published for quite some time before they were caught.
The issue was put up for discussion on the Ker+ Forum to allow members to brainstorm, bring their own experiences to the table, and try to come up with both a solution for prevention, as well as a suitable punishment for cases where this prevention is ignored.
The consensus was that the article be removed as soon as it is found to be plagiarised. Brigades will also make it clear that this behaviour will not be tolerated, and will lead to those involved being removed from publishing roles within the brigade.
It was suggested that one reason for this behaviour is the deadlines set by brigades, and the pressure placed on people who want to help CyberArmy by submitting articles. It was also stated that this tends to be more of a problem when producing FAQs.
Other suggestions were to add a section to /about that clearly covers what plagiarism is for those who obviously do not understand, or ignore, and details on how to cite material/resources. To produce a policy, and on all groups who produce articles of some form (and on their sites that accept content); add notes that submitting work indicates an acceptance of that policy. Failure to adhere to it results in whatever repercussions and removal of the article.
Projects System Beta! July 20, 2005
Thanks to the Dinah plumb0rs (w00t Phish), the CyberArmy ?projects system? has begun its final beta testing. This system is very exciting because it will help facilitate both inter- and intra-brigade projects, and help maintain project momentum once a project has been started.
All Ker+ members have been given the opportunity to help with final beta testing on the forthcoming /projects system. Members have been having a look around the system, experimenting with it, and trying to break it. So far there has been no negative feedback regarding bugs or problems with the system, so we hope to implement it soon.
CyberArmy Staff Meetings July 21, 2005
To help further include CyberArmy Kernels+ in the day-to-day operations of CyberArmy that Staff currently oversees, it was suggested that logs from Staff meetings be made available. As creation of a log might be an overly time-consuming process of whittling out non-topical material), it was decided that instead there would be a monthly progress report-type meeting for all interested Kernels and above so they can discuss current CyberArmy issues with Staff.
CyberArmy Member of the Month July 21, 2005
Don't forget to submit your pick for the CyberArmy Member of the Month!
The Rank of Marshal July 22, 2005
The role of the Marshal here in CyberArmy has traditionally been a brigade coordinator position. Generals who were selected for this job were promoted to Marshal, and then when they completed the job they were usually set back to General. Using the rank in this manner may appear to diminish the role of ranks and what they mean to some people. To help clear things up, a discussion was set up to figure out how to clarify the rank of Marshal, and to try to eliminate the demotion back to General.
A discussion was held over the use of a prefix to the Marshal rank, to differentiate between those Marshals who hold the Brigade Coordinator position, and those who do not. One reason put forward for the prefix was so that Generals could be promoted to the rank of Marshal without having to become brigade coordinators, and therefore could remain within their current brigade.
It was also said that, as brigade coordinators do a unique job within our community, their positions should be recognised with a unique rank (taking Chawmp?s CinC Advisor rank as the precedent for this). It was suggested that a "Field" Tag be introduced, so that Brigade Coordinators would be 'Field Marshals', and their role would remain much the same, without the prior confusion involved. This would also give another avenue for further promotion of staff generals and non-retired, non-staff, generals.
As well as the reasons mentioned above, this would allow the 'Marshal' and 'Field Marshal' roles to be redefined, with the Field Marshal rank getting the bulk of the Brigade Coordination responsibilities and the Marshal role taking on a lot of the higher administrative duties. One main point made was that this would also end the problems regarding Marshals being demoted to General when they no longer have the time for their Brigade Coordinator duties. The issue was voted on (see below) and is still being discussed and considered at both staff level and Ker+ level.
The thread was pretty much closed by a quote from Snarkles, "Marshal is not intended to be 'just another step up in the rank chain'... Staff Marshals have always been the people who've taken over the position of the CinC, and their duties need to prepare them for such." For this reason, it appears that the ranks of Trooper through Kernel will remain the standard ranks of the brigade system, with General being reserved for longstanding top tier C/Os and staff members, while Marshals are brigade coordinators who are groomed to one day take over CyberArmy.
CyberArmy Community Meetings July 23, 2005
The idea of having a community meeting where all CyberArmy members could get together on IRC and talk about various issues was proposed. Although it was supported by a few members as a good idea, it did not generate much interest, as many members already have various outlets available to facilitate interaction with the CyberArmy community as a whole.
It has been suggested that, in light of CyberArmy's current state, and with the staff's initiative to further input more effort into our community by holding weekly meetings, we should start hosting a CyberArmy Community Meeting once a month at the start of each month.
The Ker+ body would be responsible for the organization and management of meetings and dissemination of community opinions and ideas to staff in summary form. The topics held at the monthly meetings would not be largely administrative but more so a personal chance to contribute in some way. The meetings wouldn't be a strain to organize and a simple set of agenda items could be devised and used at each of the meetings.
The possibility of a trial was put forward, where issues and ideas would be passed to staff to look at further in one of their weekly staff meetings. The community meetings would be open to all members, trooper and up.
There were only a few responses, all expressing an interest and stating that it would be a good chance for CA members to contribute in an open committee, improve member motivation, and ultimately benefit CA as a whole.
Only one person offered to help with organisation, and the issue hasn?t been resolved yet.
Brigade Coordinator Designation Vote July 23, 2005
A vote was held in response to the issue regarding the rank of Marshal. The vote questioned whether or not it was a good idea to add to the Marshal rank a separate 'brigade coordinator' designation, thus opening up the Marshal rank to the normal chain of command. It was overwhelmingly a 'Yes' vote, but whether or not this vote will influence the final decision has yet to be seen.
After the discussion (above) a vote was held to gauge members' opinions on the matter. The vote proposal was on ?whether or not to introduce a prefix tag for Marshal's that perform brigade coordination duties. This tag would be, 'Brigade', and attached to the front of their rank. For example: Brigade Marshal (Brg Mar) Condor191?
Members cast their vote as Yes, No, or Undecided and a couple of comments were made. The results showed 9 Yes votes, 0 No votes, and 2 Undecided votes. Comments indicated that members saw the benefits as the distinction of brigade coordinators as opposed to other Marshals and the removal of the current self-sacrificial demotion requirement for when a brigade coordinator discontinues brigade coordinator duties.
While it has been agreed that there are issues that need addressing, discussion is continuing to see if there are any other solutions to the problem.
Updates to MyCA July 23, 2005
You may have noticed that MyCA now tracks the last 5 logins of your username, in order to help detect compromised accounts. An additional new change is the requirement to have a strong password. None of the current passwords are affected, but all future passwords will have to meet the following criteria (set by Chawmp): at least 6 characters, containing a mix of upper/lowercase or numbers/symbols, and do not contain any dictionary words. Thanks, Chawmp, for helping make CA a safer place.
Press Release Design July 24, 2005
CAPR is working on a new design for all CyberArmy press releases. This group deserves all of our support for the hard work they put in to generate more interest in CA.
Possible Opportunity for CA July 29, 2005
Snarkles has recently been contacted by a group that is offering a possible affiliation opportunity with CyberArmy. The group originally contact Snarkles because she runs the website hackergames.net, which is a great resource for finding games to test your technical know-how. The group that contacted snarkles runs free wargames and charges a small fee for teaching assistance if you want to learn new coding or hacking skills. In return for some kind of promotion of their services, CyberArmy would be made known to a whole new group of highly talented individuals. More to come.
Chaldev Requests your Help July 31, 2005
The Chaldev team is asking for your help in developing future CyberArmy challenges. While coders are not needed, if you have any great challenge ideas, please submit your suggestions through the Feedback form by selecting Feedback-Challenges.
That?s it for this issue of the Staff Digest. Remember, if you have any questions or concerns, you can always get help on the Help and Support Forum or through the Feedback form. See you next month!
- The CyberArmy Staff Digest Team
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