Hazel Naming Rights

[Flpfs]

As I had no better place to put this, it is going on policy suggestions.

With the recent influx of many characters originating from the Hazel company, I have been thinking of a possible change for the lore:

Self-owned and excessively modified privately-owned Hazel models could not have the name "Hazel", due to copyright infringement on Biesel space.

Something similar already exists in lore, for Dominians who have broken edicts and refused to change their surnames (https://wiki.aurorastation.org/index.php?title=Empire_of_Dominia)

"Edict breakers and exiles abroad in human space sometimes find themselves pursued in the legal realm for infringing on the trademarks of their House if they refuse to change their surname."

 

Why this change? I feel as it perfectly fits the narrative of a corporate dystopia, as in my opinion I am sure that the Hazel company would not enjoy its name or likeness being attached to completely independent units whom it cannot control at all, and that have significantly diverged from the corporate message and behavior of a Hazel model.

[JeffMomentRed]

Feels like this should be in the lore canonization tab, but I bump it anyways. Hope the Synth-team enjoys this.

[The_Ill_Fated]

I don't see much of a point of this suggestion.  It doesn't seem to do anything, but curb player choice for their character's names for no real benefit.  

[Carver]

I'm going to be plainly blunt, I cannot for the life of me tell 98% of the current Hazels apart by name alone. It has been so genuinely confusing for me OOCly that I have to wait until I see the character on my screen to know who/which they are, made worse when they are so often drastically different individuals.

Anything that makes it more common for me to not have to memorize twelve different sets of numbers (I cannot memorize this many numbers to save my life) is something I support to the fullest extent.

[Roostercat]

As someone who used to be a maintainer, I do not think this is a good idea purely because - 

1. It can completely curb some character concepts
2. The lore staff already have a million and one things to keep track of, having to keep track of Hazels specifically just because they are a popular character theme would delve into the realm of way-too-nitpicky and not worth the effort.

[CourierBravo]

I don’t think this is a good change to make, especially given the reason. This is the first time in a couple years I’ve really seen Hazel lore even relevant, though largely because of a wave of people finding it funny to have so many characters named Hazel. I don’t think it’s fair to compare exiles dominians  to self owned IPC’s, and likewise punish all of these players because they’re doing a bit by this method. I think there’s a better conversion to be had about the prevalence of self or privately owned IPCs and what their quality of life should be. 
 

maybe a better alternative to this, but is still a very big ask that I still don't think is worthwhile, would be to curb it moving forward rather than retroactively. Something to the effect of “all hazel units manufactured in 2466 forward now must change their name post freeing themselves” or some sort of compensation provided as a reason to have at least a dozen characters (likely more) renamed. 

Edited June 20 by Bejewledpot
clarifying my second paragraph, expanded on last sentance of first paragraph

[CourierBravo]

7 minutes ago, Carver said:

Anything that makes it more common for me to not have to memorize twelve different sets of numbers (I cannot memorize this many numbers to save my life) is something I support to the fullest extent.

Make a list. You're right, you cant, or its just hard to memorize it, so I keep a list. Pretty much every hazel on the ship has a nickname. Just keep track of which numbers go with which nickname. I don't think thats a huge ask, and frankly, that goes a lot more with the theme of what hazels are then just cutting self owned hazels because theres "too many."

[The_Ill_Fated]

29 minutes ago, Carver said:

Anything that makes it more common for me to not have to memorize twelve different sets of numbers (I cannot memorize this many numbers to save my life) is something I support to the fullest extent.

 

With this, I think is the reasoning for the support of the majority of the individuals who have reacted positively to this.  A mild inconvenience is being suffered as a result of the similarity of names of the various Hazels, and rather than taking the time to engage with the individual Hazels, and learn them out via roleplaying, or writing them down somewhere for reference, a hammer apparently needs to be brought down and forcibly change these individuals so you might avoid.....mild confusion?

I don't think this is the sort of thing that should be encouraged on a serious roleplaying server.  Forcing other players to make what is, in some cases a substantive alteration to a character concept, so that you can avoid having to remember what number does what job.  

[hazelmouse]

This would badly disrupt numerous character concepts that depend on the indistinguishability of the line to work. The narrative thrust of a Hazel is that they're identical, and the character has to process what that means to them and what they're going to do about it. Forcing a change of name dulls that quite horribly.

Imperial Great Houses are major political institutions, I don't see nearly as much IC impetus for an IPC manufacturing corporation to care what a self-owned unit calls itself.

[The Stryker]

The position of the Synth Team on this is that Hazels are products that are bought and sold. If you buy a car and give it a new paintjob, change out the engine, adds a spoiler, what have you, it isn't the same car components-wise, but that doesn't stop you from calling it a Toyota, etc. Copyright would only kick in if someone else were manufacturing these Hazels.

It would be different if Hazel Electromotive were leasing out these shells, but the name of these IPCs is already out of the company's hands, especially when they're free.

[Carver]

1 hour ago, The_Ill_Fated said:

 

With this, I think is the reasoning for the support of the majority of the individuals who have reacted positively to this.  A mild inconvenience is being suffered as a result of the similarity of names of the various Hazels, and rather than taking the time to engage with the individual Hazels, and learn them out via roleplaying, or writing them down somewhere for reference, a hammer apparently needs to be brought down and forcibly change these individuals so you might avoid.....mild confusion?

I don't think this is the sort of thing that should be encouraged on a serious roleplaying server.  Forcing other players to make what is, in some cases a substantive alteration to a character concept, so that you can avoid having to remember what number does what job.  

It's a uniquely Hazel issue. ZIs, IRUs, Vaurcae and the lot of other 'strictly named' character types don't have it because there's more of an identifier in the chat box than two numbers and a letter. I shouldn't need to write a cheat sheet to remember the characters of a singular archetype, even if it's the sort of issue that only shows itself when there is an excess of the archetype.

[N8-Toe]

I think the whole "its hard to tell them apart" is sort of a feature/the point. and I kinda like it

[Carver]

6 hours ago, N8-Toe said:

I think the whole "its hard to tell them apart" is sort of a feature/the point. and I kinda like it

I would agree if it were by appearance, accent and so forth as well. But you’re left with characters of wildly different physical features in all corners barring name and species, where if you lined all of them up without giving any of their names then I would never be able to tell ‘oh these are all shells from the same model line’.

[FlamingLily]

Old suggestion but I have grown extremely motivated to comment on this after reading the whole thing.

 

This proposed change is, IMO, bad. This is a change that would stifle player creativity and character narratives. Hazels, as a class of character, are designed around identity. Who are they? What does it mean to be part of a mass-produced line of property? My Hazel is entirely built around the topic, and I genuinely think if I was forced to change its name due to a ruling like this, the character would no longer be playable as the whole identity crisis of being a Hazel would be invalidated.

 

Comparing this to the edict breaker thing - that's not something that stifles character options. Someone creating an edict breaker who maintains their surname is allowed to do so, and by doing so they are introducing a trait of their character that can be used for storytelling: that they're publicly and openly an enemy of the empire of Dominia. This proposal doesn't do that, it basically just says "You can't play a self-owned Hazel." This doesn't introduce any avenues of roleplay or storytelling, because this rule isn't really something you can break in character due to the way that self-ownership is set up. It's simply an OOC rule.