WHY, May 11, 2010

Emperorcontest.com is a project to voluntarily organize the planet to be ready to represent humans to any aliens who might visit, without interference by established national governments. Thinking about and answering why someone else should choose to be below you in a hierarchy should identify qualified ambassadors who will know when to bow down to aliens or not, depending on who they meet. We don't want just anybody getting contacted and selling out the planet prematurely, see The Alien Perspective for ideas about what is out there. This contest will: increase freedom and improve leadership by demonstrating a leader selection process where everybody gets their choice, improve communication by promoting author and artist use of the public domain and increase kindness and compassion by being an example of a successful gifting business. Read about the problems with: closed single-winner elections, information ownership and buying and selling with set prices.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS FOR EARTH SLAVES, April 25, 2010

1. "I don't want to sign-up as anybody's slave. Slavery is wrong and illegal where I live. No masters! No class system! We are all free equals here." ANSWER: We are not all equals, that's a bad myth. We can't help looking up to some and looking down on others. The servitude we're talking about is strictly voluntary and not illegal. "Slave" and "emperor" are just the two extremes we're using to define a hierarchal relationship. Let's only use these two labels and realize that to some people, for some things, we are followers (slaves) and to other people, for other things, we are leaders (emperors). It will be a happy day when each individual must only follow those they have personally chosen to be above them.

2. "I don't want to be bought or sold. Something about a price seems wrong." ANSWER: Emperors might want to transfer slaves to other emperors for many reasons. If the reasoning was explained and they agreed, some slaves would follow their emperor's suggestion to transfer to another emperor, even if they were sold, traded or gifted, but it would only be a suggestion. You can simply change your choice for emperor instead of complying with any suggested transfer.

3. "Jesus / Muhammad / Vishnu / Buddha / God is the emperor of Earth and the only master I need." ANSWER: Ask your chosen emperor of Earth what they would do if they could visit our planet today and make a contest entry for them. Include what emperor services they are offering. It is definitely time for some intervention, no matter what their approach to slave management. Did they teach you that there is only one true emperor, lord or god and that you can only be their slave if you choose only them? Look for choices that embrace competition. You can choose more than one emperor of Earth to represent you and change your selections whenever you want.

4. "If I am going to sign-up to be somebody's slave, I don't want any secrets kept from me." ANSWER: There are good reasons and bad reasons for keeping secrets. Some emperors might hide some information until you choose to follow them and participate in their projects. Hopefully we will see a variety of strategies on this topic. Sometimes you need to learn things in a sequential order to build up concepts that you need for more advanced topics. Some information is best shared through private, one-on-one conversations to avoid the confusion that would result from having a public audience. An emperor who seeks to reduce or minimize secrets from their slaves is about the best you can hope for. If they keep secrets from you, ask them to put you on a path so that someday they can tell you the secrets and justify why they were kept from you.

5. "I sent an email to my favorite emperor contestant to sign-up as their slave and support their ideas and they said that all of their slave positions are full and they have a waiting list and an application process. They told me a suggested donation to pay for processing and to prioritize my request. Should I pay and apply?" ANSWER: There's nothing wrong with paying a fee, but maybe you can find more inclusive leadership that accepts and organizes all volunteer slaves without making them first go get some amount of some kind of money.

6. "I did not choose my mother or father to be my emperor, why do they act like they are above me?" Try calling them only by their first name instead of mom, mother or mum or dad, father or pops [translators: use similar family structure words]. Ask your chosen Earth emperor(s) to send them a letter. If you are a legal minor (usually under the age of 18 years) you may be forced into being a slave to your parents. Look for emperors who use more than just age to determine adult status.

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS FOR EARTH EMPERORS, October 17, 2009.

1. "I don't want any slaves but I have an important 'save the world' idea that needs to get to the right people." ANSWER: Choose one or more emperors to represent you (sign-up as their slave) and give them your idea.

2. "Will emperor of Earth contestants retain copyright of their contest entries?" ANSWER: No. We are sharing our work in the public domain without copyright or other restrictions on reuse. Using the public domain gives any reader the freedom to modify, translate, republish and distribute the information that the contest generates, maximizing its reach and allowing it to evolve to its full potential. Copyright laws and enforcement with police, courts and jails is violent, wasteful and not necessary to motivate contestants.

3. "Can I make a video for my contest entry?" ANSWER: Following the principle of using fewer, less complicated tools that are easier to make, contest entries will be published with paper and ink. You can link your entry to another website with a video, but also transcribe it into written form for Internet searching and printing.

4. "I really want to sign-up as a slave for some emperors, but I have not found anyone I think is qualified." ANSWER: It can be very difficult for some people to voluntarily submit to the leadership of another. Instead of thinking in absolute terms, look for planet-level projects that others are leading that you would like to participate in and choose to be their slave to support their projects. Choose one or more upward links at all times (three or more is recommended to avoid the potential for abuse in situations where slaves have only one upward link and want to leave) so that the resulting hierarchy does not have a dangerous pointed top but instead has a large group of top-ranked Earth emperors who are linked together from choosing each other and working on common goals.

5. "I want to work on local problems in my city, state / province and country instead of global issues, should I start local emperor contests?" ANSWER: You could start an emperor contest to organize your street, neighborhood or school, but if you offer an alternative government to an established system, you might start a revolution and be jailed or even killed for treason by those who seek to maintain the current government system. Instead of trying to change how an established government picks its leaders, start a contest to govern the oceans before some less voluntary system develops out there (see The Seasteading Institute). You might start a website contest to take care of Antartica or approach the owner of a small island somewhere, but besides that, national territory lines are already drawn around all the land on the planet.

6. "I see how this contest can work and I want to end up with a small number of slaves so I can give each personal attention and help them start projects and manage their own slaves. What can I do so that I attract quality over quantity?" One approach would be to rank your slaves somehow and spend more of your time and energy working with the top-ranked. You could suggest to lower-ranked slaves that they instead choose from your top-ranked slaves for their Earth emperors. Some emperors will have such a narrow specialty that they will only attract a few slaves.