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Region Tags
We're all familiar with the region tags, but familiarity isn't always the same as understanding.
"I might have missed something while searching, but...what are (or where are) the definitions for these tags? I know that some of them are obvious for the most part, but there are quite a few that may have a variety of definitions. We have to make this easy for new NS players to identify and find the region that best fits their nation type."I'm not the first person to get bemused by regions tags. Game Player sounds like a good tag for Ludo fans, but NS has it's own definition. The Gameplay forum is described as "Talk about regional management and politics, raider/defender gameplay, and other game-related matters".
And what is F7er? Is it very different to FT:STL? It turns out that F7 is a forum. And FT:STL? Well, read on to get the big reveal.
About six months back, someone finally told me what FT:STL meant. And we agreed that it would be good to have an explanation of all the tags. Then, I finally saw the original thread about region tags, and gained some additional insight. So this is my attempt at an explanation of tags. You're welcome to suggest improvements.
Region tags were introduced to NS by 
SalusaSecondus on 10 May 2011. The 50 or so tags marked below as "suggested by" SalusaSecondus are ones I believe were in the original release. The original forum post has been edited a number of times (most recently in 2015), so it's hard to be sure which tags were on the original list. I've included links to evidence the dates when the various tags were suggested. Dates without links are assumptions.
Tags fall into two main groups - system tags, and optional tags. System tags are Game created, and cannot be removed. Optional tags can be added or removed by a regional officer with Appearance powers. Within these groups, I've split the tags into different categories. I made these categories up myself, so don't think of them as definitive. And it could be easily argued that some tags are mis-categorised.
Apologies to those nations receiving unwanted pings.
System Tags
Regions with Special Rules
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
Game created regions where new nations start out. | 10 May 2011 | |||
Game created regions where CTEd nations refound, | 10 May 2011 | |||
Game created regions which cannot be passworded, | 10 May 2011 | |||
Class regions are created by educators, and are | 10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 |
Regions with Security Council Resolutions
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
Regions with a Security Council Commendation | 8 Jun 2014 | |||
Regions with a Security Council Condemnation | 8 Jun 2014 | |||
Regions with a Security Council Liberation. Sometimes | 8 Jun 2014 |
District XIV revived the idea on 29 May 2014. 
Ballotonia added code to automate the tagging.Size (Every region has one of these)
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
Region has 1 to 5 nations. | 10 May 2011 | |||
Region has 6 to 10 nations. | 10 May 2011 | |||
Region has 11 to 50 nations. | 10 May 2011 | |||
Region has 51 to 100 nations. | 10 May 2011 | |||
Region has 101 to 500 nations. | 10 May 2011 | |||
Region has more than 500 nations. | 10 May 2011 |
Other Automated Tags
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
Regions 'featured' on or after 8th May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
Regions with no founder (includes all GCRs, certain | 10 May 2011 | |||
Regions created in the last 7 days | 19 Nov 2012 | |||
Regions that require a password to enter. | 19 Nov 2012 |
old' tag, and Neoplanta requested a 'year of founding'. 'New' seems to have been a spontaneous decision by Ballotonia in 2012 though.** New south hell's original suggestion had the name as "gated". A couple nations came back to this idea a year later. Syrakhstan, on
20 Jun 2012, and General halcones on 13 Sep 2012. Ballotonia added the tag on 19 Nov 2012.
Optional Tags
Interests
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
Animated regions, but filled with two dimensional | 10 May 2011 | |||
Communities that participate in the | 17 May 2011* | |||
New south hell said it best: "Fandom. There's a | 12 May 2011 | |||
Focused on regional management and politics, and / or | 10 May 2011 | |||
Communities that participate in the | 11 May 2011 | |||
"Some regions have nations answer their issues almost | 9 Mar 2016 | |||
Concieved for LBGT communities, this tag is also used | 26 Jul 2015 | |||
For clever people, who can handle more than one language. | 10 May 2011 | |||
Read "has Discord server". | 12 Jul 2017 | |||
Has an offsite forum. | 10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | ||
Communities that participate in the | 20 Dec 2013 | |||
Spoof themed regions. | 10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | ||
Religeous community | 11 May 2011 | |||
A role-player community. There are a number of | 10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | ||
A place to chat. | 10 May 2011 | |||
Do we really need a tag to find a surreal region | 10 May 2011 | |||
People play other games? | 10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 |
first evidence of it shows up.**Although "Issues Player" was requested on day 1, Codger had to 'bump' the suggestion
five years later before it was introduced.*** Despite there being some discussion of "LGBT" early on, it wasn't introduced until 2015, when raised in a
separate thread by Luxdonia. After the 2016 Orlando massacre, many regions added the LGBT tag as a show of solidarity, so much so that there was concern that the original purpose of the tag was being diluted.**** "P2TM" was originally refused (despite there being other forum-specific tags). It became a thing after
Esternial started pushing for in on 31 Oct 2013.Attitude
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
11 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
Ever wondered how this became a tag? I don't think | 10 May 2011 |
World Assembly
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
16 Sep 2012 | ||||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 |
Political (could be either in-game or OOC political stances)
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
10 May 2011 | ||||
9 May 2013 | ||||
9 Sep 2012 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
25 Feb 2012 | ||||
The 2013 request died quickly. This tag was only | 28 Jul 2017 | |||
11 May 2011 | ||||
Although requested on four previous occassions, it | 30 Jul 2017 | |||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | 0 Jan 1900 | |||
10 May 2011 | ||||
25 Sep 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
21 Nov 2011 | ||||
Read "Misogynists". Tellingly, more than 1 in 3 | 30 Jul 2017 | |||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 |
Gameplay
12/2/12.Roleplay
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
21 Nov 2011 | ||||
Future Tech: Faster Than Light | 10 May 2011 | |||
Future Tech: Faster-Than-Light inhibitors | 10 May 2011 | |||
Future Tech: Slower Than Light | 10 May 2011 | |||
11 May 2011(?) | ||||
10 May 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
This was intoduced as a counter-balance | 25 Feb 2012 | |||
21 Nov 2011 | ||||
Region has a map | 10 May 2011 | |||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
21 Nov 2011 | ||||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
15 Sep 2012 | ||||
10 May 2011 | 10 May 2011 | |||
10 May 2011 | ||||
21 Nov 2011 |
Ex-Tags
Some tags have since been removed.
Compass Tags
Compass tags must have been added by SalusaSecondus as part of the original release.
"Didn't we used to have the Northern, Southern, Eastern, Western tags? What happened to those?EDIT: Errant puppet post. ~Kenny"
No Campaigning Tags
No Campaigning tags must have been added by SalusaSecondus as part of the original release.
"Currently the No WA Campaigning tag is duplicated by the existence of the No GA Campaigning tag and the No SC Campaigning Tag. To make things easier for authors, could the No WA Campaigning Tag be removed, leaving the No GA and No SC ones intact? That way, delegates don't lose out on any choices, and life is made easier for campaigners."
Bears Armed, 4 Jul 2014: "Am I right in thinking that the 'No GA Campaigning' and 'No SC Campaigning' tags have gone, so that it's now legal to TG any delegate about such matters and up to the delegates themselves to set their 'preferences' to block those TGs if they don't want to receive them?"Wiki Tags
Wiki tags were added as a result of requests.
Tag | Interpretation | Suggested by | Suggested Date | Added On |
10 May 2011 | ||||
22 Nov 2012 |
It's not clear when the WikiStates tag was added, but Cromarty suggested it's removal on 20 Nov 2012. It stayed though.
Christian Democrats, 7 Jun 2014: "I think four tags should be removed:IIWiki
NSWiki
WikiStates
Theocratic
"I can understand why the NSWiki tag was removed, and the same of WikiStates, but II Wiki is used by a significant number of RP regions and it has helped users find each other and collaborate on worldbuilding. What was the reasoning behind the decision to move it?"
Sedgistan, 13 Jun 2014: "It was discussed amongst the mods a while ago, and never acted upon until now. If a region uses II Wiki, it should be pretty easy to find on that site."The NSWiki tag must have reappeared very quickly though:
Stormaen, 4 Jul 2014: "Not sure if it's been noted but we still have a NSwiki tag (which has long since went down) but we don't gave an IIwiki tag. Maybe worth changing that? A lot of nations are using IIwiki.."Sedgistan, 4 Jul 2014: "I'm also under the impression that another NSwiki now exists, hosted by Afforess."The NSWiki tag has since gone, but I don't know when it was removed.
Discussions
In the early days, most tag suggestions were rapidly added if the moderators saw the value in them. Of course, many suggestions were never implemented. And then there were a few cases where it took time to convince moderators of the merits.
Eco-Friendly
The same day tags were implemented, 10 May 2011, Errinundera requested:"Forest is an oldish region whose emphasis is environmental. Any chance of a tag along the lines of environmental, or eco-friendly, or green...?"
SalusaSecondus responded:"If you can find me a few other regions this would apply to, then yes."
Herrebrugh found some:"Well, There's Green Planet and Futaba Aoi.""And also Eco Sense and Ecotopia."
SalusaSecondus said:"I'll get another mod to look into this one."
Independently, a day later, Defero populus asked:"How about [...] Eco-Friendly"
Swkoll started maintaining a list of suggested tags. Amongst those that 
Aglrinia disagreed with:"12. Eco-Friendly :eyebrow: really? You'd be more eco friendly by getting off the computer and not spending energy arguing for another region tag."
Hard line commies added some applicable regions:"Yes, I found a few regions a tag like that might apply to: Hippiedom, Ecotopia, Forest and Green Federation come readily to mind. ..
Also, I prefer the term "Environmentalist" or "Green" to "Eco-friendly", a term I really dislike, because I don't think it means the same thing."
On the 19th, Errinundera revisits the topic."Anything new on an eco-friendly tag? It was to be considered by moderators, I believe."
Makiir:"Check the Tag Cloud"
Errinundera:"I already had. There's nothing there. I would like to know if the suggestion has been given consideration yet. And if the decision is not to have it, why not?"
All goes quiet for several months. On 14 Feb 2012, Santa Joanna asks:"What about adding the eco-friendly tag? There is quite a few regions which concentrate mostly on environment. You could eventually add industrial on the other side too."
Over the next week, five more people post their support.
Annoyed at the lack of moderator response, Santa Joanna posts:"Bump. So nice to be ignored."
Sedgistan, Feb 23, 2012"We don't address every suggestion made. If you want a response, it helps to explain why a tag would be useful, and why it matters to have a tag for it, rather than just have people mention it in the WFE."
Santa Joanna, Feb 24, 2012"There is a plenty of nations whose main goal is to protect the environment. I thought that the reason of adding eco-friendly tag is obvious - it would help them to find regions of like-minded individuals much more easily."
Welsh cowboy, who had earlier supported the proposal, suddenly changes their tune:"To me, this isn't needed:
1. I don't know if there's many regions who fit the description
2. If there are, they certainly aren't a vast number
3. Not all eco-friendly nations have to be in an Eco-friendly region
If every single region or pair of region's themes were put in the tag cloud, there would be such a large cloud no one could use it. What if I set up a Sesame Street region? There shouldn't be a cartoon tag just for that.
If a region wants to be Eco-friendly, in my opinion, they should put it on their WFE."
Luna Amore quips:"Come on, be serious. Sesame Street would obviously be filed under Puppet Storage. :p"
Santa Joanna defends the suggestion:"But there ARE tags like Theocratic, Video Games, Fantasy... These are also quite a niche, but they're really useful, because they give certain groups of nations an opportunity to find specific regions which couldn't be found using any other existing tag.
There's no need to create cartoon tag, Sesame Street could be easily found under "Silly".
But there's an utter lack of tags which are signs of environmental concern. And I assure you, that there's a plenty of regions which would love to use such tag, here's just a few largest examples:
- Forest
- Hippiedom
- Groland
- Deep Blue Planet
- Eladen
- Emeraldise
- Alternative Left
- Green Planet
- The Hill
- Ecotopia
- Ocean
Of course, not every eco-friendly nation wants to be in such region, but looking at these examples, much of them certainly do."
Ransium adds:"I guess being from the same region as Santa Joanna it makes sense that our interests are aligned, but I must say I'm surprised at those of you who say that they just can't see a use of an "ecofriendly" tag. I used to spend a long time using probable words like "eco" in the region finder looking for regions with similar environmental goals. And my feeling is the list of regions which would use an "ecofriendly" tag is significantly larger than what Santa Joanna listed. I mean when we have a tag as niche as "steampunk" I find it odd that people would think "ecofriendly" would be too niche (btw steampunk is awesome, I don't mean to criticize steampunk). And yes of course if your an ecofriendly nation you don't have to live in ecofriendly region, but it might be nice for ecofriendly nations to at least know 1) there are ecofriendly regions out there and 2) What there options are as far ecofriendly regions."
Bears Armed, Feb 25, 2012"I also talk to the trees support the idea of an 'Eco-friendly' tag.
^_^"
Flibbleites, Feb 25, 2012"All right, fine, Eco-friendly and Industrial tags created. Happy now? >:(
:p"
Ransium, Feb 26, 2012"But eco-friendly is so vague! There needs to be a "sustainability" tag which designates regions that believe resources should be used sustainably. A "earth first" tag which designates regions where the needs of the environment come before the needs of humans. A "pragmatic environmentalist" tag where the needs of the environment are considered but...
No, I'm kidding! :p Thanks for the eco-friendly tag!"
Feminist
Unsucessful requests were raised on four separate occasions for this tag:
Zephyrinia, 20 Sep 2012
Progavia, 18 Feb 2013
Gynetopia, 14 May 2013
The fertility harvest, 4 Mar 2014
It wasn't until 2017 that the tag was implemented, thanks to Maupof's efforts. Maupof had started a separate thread for the purpose of discussion on 28 July 2017.
Cruciland replied:"I believe we already have an "Egalitarian" regional tag. "Matriarchal" and "Patriarchal" could be added, depending on the type of narrative, but otherwise I find "Feminist" to be out-of-place. It tends to work better for describing policies than regional/governmental types."
Moderator 
Reploid Productions responded:"Actually, I'm not seeing an "Egalitarian", but that would be a good one to add to cover that stuff.
EDIT: There, "Egalitarian" is in the list."
Shefkland asks:"I fully support the inclusion of a feminist tag.
Also, not to sound rude, but why does there need to be a discussion about including a feminist tag but the egalitarian tag got added immediately? Just curious"
Luna Amore challenges:"What does a Feminist tag do that Egalitarian one doesn't?"
This gets several responses, and I've extracted only certain highlights.
Caelapes replies angrily:"accurately describe the political stance of a region, like the folks who have requested this tag and instead got sniped by someone else posting an unrelated tag suggestion in this thread?"
Guy:"'Egalitarianism' has been used far more frequently by anti-feminists than feminists recently. Indeed, it has attained status as an 'alternative' to feminism, particularly by MRAs"
Maupof:"No nazi would call themselves an egalitarian but many would consider themselves feminist to a degree
My point being that "feminism" as a social construct has a fluid and relativistic definition. It is not as simplistic as you try to make it seem. It reaches parts of political, social and ethical philosophy that egalitarianism doesn't while still retaining a more precise impression of it's overall meaning.
All the liberalist sjw regions will pick "egalitarian" because virtue signalling is what they do. But few would use "feminist" because of their aversion to things like positive discrimination, housework and public breast feeding, also because they believe feminism is synonymous with matriarchy."
Reploid Productions announces the addition of two new tags."The biggest obstacle was really, "Well, if we add X, then Y is going to start shrieking for a tag, too!" After a rather intense session of chair-throwing debate in the sekrit lair, we came to the conclusion that "Feminist" and "Patriarchal" cover the bases sufficiently."
Reponding to Free republics' earlier post ("If a "feminist" tag is added, then "anti-feminist" should be added as well for the sake of ideological balance."), Freethinkinganarchists residingwherever says:"Sure, there are lots of other tags denoting evil. Whoever uses it would be right at home, and it would be easier to know where they stand."
Oddly enough, at the time of writing, of the 122 regions tagged Patriarchal, 44 (more than 1 in 3) are also tagged Fascist.
Edited:
