[Accepted] i310 - Impersonation of Organic Species

I think it's rather important for our day to day station life to reflect the lore of our universe. Namely there's a topic i would like to adress which is Biesel laws regarding IPCs. Due to tention between organics and IPCs all shells are required to wear a tag which distinctly designates them as an IPC. Not wearing a tag or attempting to remove it is a serious crime and is punished by Biesel law. Yet it is not reflected in any way in Aurora's regulations. If security happens to stumble upon a tagless shell they can't really do anything with it. Not wearing a tag is not covered by any regulation we currently have so all we can do to fight the synthetic threat is to report it to a head of staff and ask him to do something. And the head of staff can say "fuck it" effectively commiting a crime. So that's basically a big "fuck you" from NT to Biesel which feels pretty weird considering the regulations themselves are mostly rules that Biesel makes NT enforce on their stations. To fix this i'm suggestion to implement a new regulation reflecting this side of Biesel laws.

i310 - Impersonation of Organic Species

This regulation has multiple benefits including allowing investigators to get busy on quiet shifts by looking for a stray tagless shell bladerunner style (your empty records are finally going to bite you in the ass) and more immersive regulations reflecting current universe lore. The relevancy of this regulation will increase with that cool suggestion about a new IPC model being implemented (see https://forums.aurorastation.org/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=10816) as identifying a tagless shell will become difficult as ever resulting in a spike of paranoia and requiring actual effort to identify a shell (as opposed to passing by with a handheld health analyzer).

This is something I'd like [mention]CakeIsOssim[/mention], [mention]Senpai Jackboot[/mention], and possibly [mention]Zundy[/mention] as Mr. Biesel to weigh in on before I take a look at the regulation's impact on the station/game. Depending on their combined view of synthetic life in Tau Ceti post-Antag Contest 2, this might be implementable, or it might need tweaking.

Positronic brains are sentient in relation to species IPC's and not station bounds (unless cake wants to correct me) so you can't just "scrap" them. Another thing to consider is that tags can't be removed without critically compromising the chassis I.E the IPC won't function if the tag is removed once tagged so a repeat offense is largely impossible. However, by all means keep it as is but remove "scrapping at the majority command decision ".

Positronic brains are sentient in relation to species IPC's and not station bounds (unless cake wants to correct me) so you can't just "scrap" them. Another thing to consider is that tags can't be removed without critically compromising the chassis I.E the IPC won't function if the tag is removed once tagged so a repeat offense is largely impossible. However, by all means keep it as is but remove "scrapping at the majority command decision ".

I was looking all around forums for any information on legal status of tagged and untagged IPCs in Biesel. There's really very little. Lore devs will have to step in and clarify it all but it's all very customisable and the final version may differ. As for tag removal, i know it's possible to do in round without effectively killing yourself especially if you have someone helping you and i know that once you remove the tag you can then spawn without it if certain conditions are met. Or at least so shell players told me

Just to start off, it is Tau Ceti law that all IPCs are tagged, not just shell frames.

From the "General Synthetics" wiki page:

"Artificial intelligence is not considered sentient under any major entity’s laws or constitutions, and even in the scientific field, AI is not considered to be sentient."

It was also once ruled under the Tau Ceti Supreme Court that synthetics are not considered under the Republic's constitution and are therefore not subject to legal capital punishment and may be punished freely at the will of their creators. This was before the 2nd antag contest, however, so these two snippets of information will likely change.

The current lore for androids becoming IPCs, and IPCs becoming free individuals, indicates that only IPCs are considered sentient and able to purchase their freedom. It is possible to be an IPC and not be a self-owned free individual, however.

I do agree that some form of regulation is needed to enforce tagging. Corporate Regulation is written in tandem with Biesellian law (for the most part), though I'm unsure about the addition of a singular regulation that pretty much only applies to IPCs. Specialized regulations directed at only one party are usually avoided, I believe. I would like to get into a discussion with those responsible for drafting regs to see what can be done about it.

There are other regulations that apply to IPCs weirdly that I'd also like to discuss, but, those are not the topic of this policy. Perhaps I shall get into touch with a few people about them.

I do agree that some form of regulation is needed to enforce tagging. Corporate Regulation is written in tandem with Biesellian law (for the most part), though I'm unsure about the addition of a singular regulation that pretty much only applies to IPCs. Specialized regulations directed at only one party are usually avoided, I believe. I would like to get into a discussion with those responsible for drafting regs to see what can be done about it.

The initial version of my draft was called Impersonation and covered posing as another person in general. However the nature of IPCs and tagging is rather specific and their social status is different from the status of other species. So i ditched the general regulation in favour of regulation covering synthetics specifically to reflect the unique nature of the issue and booted it up to red infraction to reflect the lower status of IPCs and also warrant HuT. It is reasonable for NT to HuT stray IPCs to pass them to Biesel law enforcement however the same punishment for a guy who stole an ID and wore it with a mask seems a bit excessive to me.

Also can someone elaborate on as to why aren't non-shells tagged in our code?

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The initial version of my draft was called Impersonation and covered posing as another person in general. However the nature of IPCs and tagging is rather specific and their social status is different from the status of other species. So i ditched the general regulation in favour of regulation covering synthetics specifically to reflect the unique nature of the issue and booted it up to red infraction to reflect the lower status of IPCs and also warrant HuT. It is reasonable for NT to HuT stray IPCs to pass them to Biesel law enforcement however the same punishment for a guy who stole an ID and wore it with a mask seems a bit excessive to me.

Also can someone elaborate on as to why aren't non-shells tagged in our code?

I want to make it clear that holding until transfer should only be for repeat offenders, not for those who resist the tag upon first being found without one before we fall down that slippery slope. Not saying you implied it, I just want to catch it before there is a possibility of it becoming a trend. Also, since IPCs (and their employers/owners) are canonically fined for lacking or resisting being tagged, an option to pay the fine (say, 750 credits?) instead of receiving a tracking implant should be added. If they repeat the offense, they should still be implanted with a tracker upon incarceration.

Also, unless it's broken again recently, all newly created IPC characters should spawn tagged by default, shell frame or not.

Alrighty. It's been a week and a half and I don't know if boot has comments to add. The CCIA team has also expressed an interest in developing this regulation and it is likely to be implemented. The exact phrasing and severity of offenses are likely to be tweaked, based on lore team feedback here and in future internal discussion.

Going to go ahead and move this to accepted, since it's on our radar now. Not locking it just yet.