Abandoned Submission Business Treaty of YE 40 Update

@Wes Yes the treaty actually does. Because the treaty sets rules that a business has to comply to in order to get a license and be considered legal. Meaning the treaty is excluding Businesses that do not comply to that(for whatever reason) meaning the nations do not have a choice in the matter on those. That means the treaty is taking away part of a Nation's own right to choose. And it's very much so infringing on self governence as well. Forcing them to abide by rules that shoudl be their own choice.

How a Nation conducts business should be that nation's choice No one else's. If say ASE decides to do business with the black market(they wont but it's an example) that has absolutely no effect on anyone else. Just because the ASE decided to do that doesn't mean the YSE has to accept them too. Nations always had the right to individually decide who they allowed to work in their territory, Akemi's is a perfect example of that. Making this treaty as a law offers no protections that weren't already there. All it does is create extra penalties and take away from faction's sovereignty. At least if we do it the way I suggest it's limited to only creating a IC system to explain what essentially was already there.

As written, it actually seems like the individual nations themselves can decide on what rules and standards are imposed. But it doesn't actually achieve much other that saying "businesses in this territory should do this or the FM can destroy them".

Is the overall goal of this system simply to establish a paper trail, and avoid outside influence? Maybe that should at least be mentioned. It has happened in real life, with organisations like OPEC and UN stuff. If the relevant nations here would even play fairly remains to be seen. If somebody wanted to start an economic war, for instance, ignoring your own trading standards as written, and dealing with criminals, is a perfectly valid tactic.

This treaty should actually specify the reasons for people obeying it, in other words. If it is supposed to allow one nation to cut off another, then related signatories should still be able to deal with them at their own discretion. The same goes for which currencies they accept.

If one nation has a problem with another doing this, then yeah, that is RP.

@Primitive Polygon that's because the treaty is kinda at a half way point right now. It's not how it originally was. And it still has a lot of influence form the discussion with @FrostJaeger to keep the Faction's self governance. Prior, it said specifically that unlicensed businesses are illegal, and listed the requirements for a business to be licensed. That is what took factions' freedom away.

I had Frost specficially remove that kinda stuff, and we had it set up to establish a licensed class of business. That followed these guidelines. And would be open to giving privileges to those that followed the license agreement. Where as it left the legality and judgement of those who don't have the license up to the Nation they were operating in. However because that still gave the option for unlicensed businesses, Wes wanted it to change.

What this treaty needs to avoid, and what for some reason it keeps trying to specifically do, is deciding on what is and isn't a legal business in any way. It's one thing to develope an international license with a treaty. But a treaty should not at all be governing how Factiosn treat companies in their borders. That means a treaty shouldn't be saying "Punish the people who don't do this"

I'm still not a fan of labeling indi businesses as rouge or denying them a license because they are independent. SARP is too big for something like that and its completely the kind of setting where you'd find rouge traders, Small independent companies out doing miscellaneous things like small scale mining and salvage without having any specific home port they frequent, Or just a station in the middle of nowhere with a ship maintenance or production facility as the equivalent as a privately owned gas station. Personally i agree with Prims stance on taking it to an RP perspective as well. And if i read it right Syao's stance on instead of making it mandatory make it incentive to having one of these licenses.

Independent shouldn't mean 'illegal'. It means independent, seeking their fortune in space. There's an appeal to that which this risks killing. I agree with incentives being the solution rather than criminalizing things with sweeping legislation like this. I'm also hearing a lot of good commentary that gives me even more doubts about this whole thing.

Maybe add some kind of stipulation that licensed companies are entitled to state-run military protection? Or at least law enforcement / emergency rescue support? This would count outside of native borders because the corporation's assets and personnel are naturally tied into a sovereign nation.

Independent companies could still exist, and even licensed companies could still operate outside of the law covertly, but such actions would knowingly be done outside of this protection.

Loss; 'Mercenary' companies are now seen as untrustworthy by the general populace.
Profit; Possible substance for police, pirate, corporate espionage, subterfuge, and general crime-based plots. Independent companies can still exist in some fashion, but they are absolutely on their own.

Primitive Polygon said:

Maybe add some kind of stipulation that licensed companies are entitled to state-run military protection? Or at least law enforcement / emergency rescue support? This would count outside of native borders because the corporation's assets and personnel are naturally tied into a sovereign nation.

Independent companies could still exist, and even licensed companies could still operate outside of the law covertly, but such actions would knowingly be done outside of this protection.

Loss; 'Mercenary' companies are now seen as untrustworthy by the general populace.
Profit; Possible substance for police, pirate, corporate espionage, subterfuge, and general crime-based plots. Independent companies can still exist in some fashion, but they are absolutely on their own.

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Yes this is the kinda route we should be on. Of course the fine details of what is and isn't applied will have to be worked out. But this is the kind of stuff a treaty should concern itself with, and the kinda stuff that adds to the RP.

I don't mean to be a pest or rude or anything like that, but what should I do with this submission, @Wes?

Made a minor update to the bullet point in Section II, Requirement 3.

Req. 3 makes bartering dicey. Makes it illegal to trade in your car when you're buying a new one.

Primitive Polygon said:

Maybe add some kind of stipulation that licensed companies are entitled to state-run military protection? Or at least law enforcement / emergency rescue support? This would count outside of native borders because the corporation's assets and personnel are naturally tied into a sovereign nation.

Independent companies could still exist, and even licensed companies could still operate outside of the law covertly, but such actions would knowingly be done outside of this protection.

Loss; 'Mercenary' companies are now seen as untrustworthy by the general populace.
Profit; Possible substance for police, pirate, corporate espionage, subterfuge, and general crime-based plots. Independent companies can still exist in some fashion, but they are absolutely on their own.

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Mercenaries have always been seen as untrustworthy; this is extremely exacerbated in a nation like Yamatai which has taken actions to ban them. Nepleslia has always been a place for mercenaries but it isn't as if they flaunt the high count of mercenaries. Rather, they simply provide a place for them to work because while the populace might not like them/trust them, they're still a cheap alternative to sending in the NPF or the Military and are generally sans legal paperwork if handled properly.

Also: I think this "treaty" is badly named. It needs to be a "Charter". It doesn't even include Nepleslia, which has a respectfully far more massive economy than two of the patrons involved (not to hate on either, but the Nesh simply don't have numbers or industrial might to match Nepleslia's econimic power). I think a big thing to remember is that the exclusion of Nepleslia in this will very likely cause IC repercussions as it might be seen as a powermove by Yamatai to discredit Nepleslia's authority as someone who should help adjudicate market principles to promote better business. Especially after the formation of NYRDS; their entire foundation clause was to promote better economic power for Nepleslia.

Rizzo said:

Req. 3 makes bartering dicey. Makes it illegal to trade in your car when you're buying a new one.

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False; the wording of that means that the business must use currency of the nation or accepted tender. And 99% of car trade-ins (for the exact reason bartering isn't really legal) involves a changing of additional funds. This means that you have two examples of this being perfectly fine.

1. Customer A comes in and wants to sell his car; the transaction is done by the dealership/business buying the car using DA. This is a legal transaction even if one party used bartering goods.
2. Customer A wants to buy and trade in to buy a new car; the business would receive additional money or transfer funds to the owner that is owed. As long as these funds are transitioned in DA, then it's fine.

In both of these scenarios, the reality is that the DA transaction is simply required to be in an acceptable currency. It specifically refers to financial transactions because it excludes bartering (trading my chicken for your pig) is entirely excluded from the charter/treaty legal-work. This is because while someone could buy up a ton of things in an illegal value, the companies and richer industries still need to regulate and help promote the use of acceptable currencies.

Unless I misunderstand, bartering isn't illegal; but this treaty/charter does frown on it and that's exactly the same as the real world. It's why we assign monetary value to objects; even bartering isn't bartering in the modern world.

My apologies, @Legix - the only reason I didn’t include Nepleslia as one of the treaty’s signatories is because you never made a post in this thread that said I had your FM permission to list them. >.<

Edit: @Wes - mind if I do what Legix suggested and rename this the “Business Charter of YE 40”?

FrostJaeger said:

My apologies, @Legix - the only reason I didn’t include Nepleslia as one of the treaty’s signatories is because you never made a post in this thread that said I had your FM permission to list them. >.<

Edit: @Wes - mind if I do what Legix suggested and rename this the “Business Charter of YE 40”?

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I don't recall ever being pinged to this thread; I also recall I FM-approved something before about business stuff. But c'est la vie.

Charter is not really appropriate, its a treaty that the nations have agreed to.

Nashoba said:

Charter is not really appropriate, its a treaty that the nations have agreed to.

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The reason I don't think it's a treaty is because while nations have made an agreement, it seems to very much focus on the organizational structure/control over what funds are used. Treaty may also further make issues raised ICly as to this being viewed as "either you're in the treaty and you're a compliant/helpful person or you're not"; this might offset nations into feeling as if they're being intimidated into enforcing this or be at risk of being considered an outsider. Name pressure, as it were, for something that very much seems to focus on the organization and formation of an organized economic exchange standard.

TLDR: I said Charter because this seems to want to simply organize things; it is a treaty but organizational documents tend to lean toward Charter; it is effectively both because of this and either name would work.

In character (which would make sense if it was a treaty) who's proposing this is what factions, how is knowledge about this treaty and knowledge that if it is signed how do those proposing it know it's actually being inforced.

These are the kinds of questions needed to be understood ifthis is going to be a in character treaty for factions

For example let's say a faction signed the treaty unless they were checking up with them daily there would be no way to logically track and make sure if they are fallowing it word for word

In character, It's being talked about at the YE40 IRC. IC discussions about it go there.

Charter - noun. a document, issued by a sovereign or state, outlining the conditions under which a corporation, colony, city, or other corporate body is organized, and defining its rights and privileges.

Treaty - a formal written agreement between two or more countries or governments

After receiving approval from @Legix (I think?), @META_mahn, @Soresu, and @Nashoba, I've added the Democratic Imperium of Nepleslia, the Elysian Celestial Empire, the Iromakuanhe Astral Commonwealth, and the Hidden Sun Clan as signatories of the treaty.

@Wes - would the Azoreans have signed the treaty following the conference (and if so, who would've been the one who signed it)?

Something that needs to be RPed out is if USO signed the treaty and what that implies.