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English version:

Date of interview: 26-29.04.2010

Today I’m interviewing one of the most recognizable community builders: burakkocamis. He’s the co-founder of PHOENIX and a part of PHX main HQ. He’s also ‘guilty’ of starting eFifa project. I must say, that those interview was a pleasure for me. As I’ve encountered many people in eRepublik being so rude, every guest I’ve hosted here so far was so nice. I’ve also received invite from Burak to spend thus summer in Istanbul (which I’ll consider seriously, as I keep also Geokos’ promise for my trip to Thessaloniki). Let’s take a look on how burakkocamis answered my questions.

Q: Hi! As usual, first question for all participants: Can you introduce yourself to our readers? What's your real name, where do you live, what's your age (you can specify it somehow, if don't want to tell your exact age, for ex. "hot teen" or "I-remember-how-lif e-begun-on-Earth" etc.) what're your hobbies besides eRepublik and how your journey with eRepublik has begun.

A: Hello! First of all, thanks for your interview offer. I use my real name and surname in the New World, eRepublik. My name is Burak and surname is Kocamış. I live in Istanbul, Turkiye. My age is 16 (so baby, not?).Istanbul is the greatest places for you to do your hobbies. I am a big fan of Galatasaray and I go nearly every game of it. Beside it, I love to play basketball. Of course, I'm a student and school gives me so many chances to do funny things besides studying.You know what it’s like.
I've joined the New World on September, 2008. I had seen it on a forum of Galatasaray fans’. eRepublik is the greatest game I've ever seen.That's why we are playing this despite its disadvantages. I was a poor citizen in my first month. In second month, I had became a politician and one of important voices of Turkiye. After V1 launch, I became a member of government for jobs like Minister of Communication, Minister of Technology etc. In this period, I’ve also founded the 1st eFootball community in eRepublik.
I was one of the founders of Lazocracy (http://wiki.erepublik.com/index.php/Lazocracy) in May. I was the International Relations Administrator of Lazocracy for 3 months. In August, Lazocrates had came back to Turkiye again. After that, I'm in government since August 2009: as president in September and as MoFA since November. Ok, let's speed up. We founded PHOENIX after PEACE GC collapsed. I was the 1st Secretary-General of it (actually with Kistru). After we organized the alliance, I became a simple member of PHOENIX Headquarter and now I'm here as MoFA of Turkiye and a member of PHOENIX HQ.

Q: I’m looking at your achievement list and must say… wow. You are co-founder of PHOENIX, founder of eFIFA, Turkish long-term MoFA, ex-President and eRepublik Ambassador. You’ve done many great, great things for eRep community. From what should we start off? Maybe something lighter: eFIFA. Can you introduce the whole idea to our readers? What are the basic rules, why and how it become so popular and so on. And why it’s inactive at the moment?

A: Thanks for your kind words... eFIFA was the first eFootball action in eRepublik. Even George Lemnaru, co-founder of eRepublik has talked with me about this idea. I believe that there will be official sport competitions of eRepublik in future. eFIFA's system is simple. Countries – federations – leagues – clubs – footballers.
The important point is that we had been playing the games on Football Manager 2009. We had edited the database of it with our own data and let the game give the result of matches. Furthermore, we had been broadcasting all matches on an internet TV (just like Justin or something like this) on the evenings. People were watching themselves on the pitch while playing. Turks were betting, fighting for it... It also had some financial sides. People gained money from it. Of course, I did too (but no so much?!).

Q: Let’s move to more serious topic: PHOENIX. As a co-founder, you must be proud how the whole alliance act nowadays? EDEN, to be honest, is falling to pieces while PHOENIX stands united. They were of course some failures as South Africa, but we’ve seen also great cooperated work, for example: the conquering of Rhone Alps and Brandenburg. Do you think PHOENIX will go on? I’m also interviewing Feherlofia Koppany at the moment and he got the point: regional alliances can do way more better than global ones. What’s your point of view?

A: Sure, I'm proud of PHOENIX. I think it is the only global alliance in the world. After US left from EDEN, it is not a global alliance anymore. It is even not an unity alliance. US and her friends (Brolliance) are moving together. Poland and Spain are much stronger and they are also moving together with their friends in Europe (Romania, Croatia). PHOENIX has got 17 members officially and good friends from out of alliance like Entente country and Mexico, Chile etc.
eRepublik always works the same. Wars go on and one side wins; the other side gets defeated. ATLANTIS was strong, PEACE was more strong. 1st EDEN was strong, PHOENIX is stronger. Poland and its friends are strong now as much as PHOENIX. Any of them can't win this war completely now but if we look to near future, PHOENIX is going to achieve more victories.
When I get to the subject "alliances"... I think, it is about the current military system of eRepublik. Wars are not going truely. It shouldn't be much easy. There are so many battles and wars. It is not good for all. It is worse for global alliances. If all of alliances collapse to smaller ones, regional alliances will be logical. But while more than 10 powerful or middle-powerful countries have the same friendly relations, regional alliances can't resistance alone against global ones. They will have to make relations with rest of the world. We had seen it at Beta.

Q: As you’re MoFA of Turkey, I must ask you some questions about your relations with your neighbor countries: Israel and Greece. Today we’ve seen Greece conquering one of Turkish core regions once more. I can understand your antipathy to eGreece due to RL long-term conflict (same as for ex. Polish-Russia), understand why you’re fighting against each other over and over again. Does same think affect relations with Israel? Or it’s maybe kind of pay off for 4th WW? I’ll recall, that Israel is also the part of Sol, mostly asian defensive alliance. Actions like that make Sol nations closer and closer to EDEN, don’t you think? Or maybe it’s high time, same as for Entente countries, to decide: EDEN or PHOENIX? And what with actual Greek offensive? Will we see the counterattack?

A: Israel and Greece.. Yes, I've been receiving the same question in every interview. I'm pleased to answer. If you wish, I'd like to clear the relationship between Greece and Turkiye.

I'm a socialist in RL world. I believe in brotherhood of all world nations. So, I don't have anything against Greeks and Jewish people as well. Yes, Turks and Greeks hate each other in RL. That's a fact but it's not the reason of war here. It just makes the war more bloody.
We have 4 neighbors. Bulgaria and Iran are our allies. Greece has high iron region which was our region for more than 6 months. Because of eRepublik's economical and political system, countries who have high resources are getting stronger by incomes, production etc. The main reason of Greek war is that. We see Central Greece as our original region in eRepublik but we don't have anything with Greece from RL ; except Macedonian issue.

We have been fighting with Greece for 9 months after Greece had won her freedom from Turkish conquest in Beta and first V1 months. The only reason was Central Greece. Anyway, 2 of these countries are really strong in diplomacy and social things(even although they are not much good at military).So, the war is exactly a World War. By this reason, it is going on. It is a symbol war between EDEN and PHOENIX.I don't have any idea about future of it, it depends on our and their babyboom efforts. They are better than us currently. Even if I had some strategies for near-future, I'd not say them in public media surely.!

There wasn't any Israeli citizen up to May. I was the first person in Turkiye who supported freedom of Israel. They got it because Lazocracy let them get it in May or June as far as I remember. We had nothing with Israel but they signed a MPP with Greece in October, if I'm not wrong. It means a war declaration against us. Israel-Turkish war had opened.
We started fighting because of this. They participated to Greek-Turkish war and blocked us in order to give advantage to Greece.

We solved our problems with some diplomacy. We were going to sign a peace treaty with Israel after we got a word from them to be neutral in Greek-Turkish war. They betrayed us again. They agreed with Greece and got Greece into Israeli core regions to threaten us on Mediterranean .After that event, Turkish people can't trust Israel anymore.
We still had some open doors for peace. We even talked 2 days ago for peace conversations after our last funny attacks. We had just attacked for fun and babyboom. They attacked us again with Greece and Greece has conquered Mediterranean because of rest of PHOENIX being busy with World War. This is the issue of Israel.

Also, I'd like to say something about Macedonia. We had encountered some events with Greece because of this. Our Macedonian brothers are always with us. I understand that Greece has problems with accepting this. So, myself and Greek MoFA had agreed on a treaty to stay neutral in both side's internal problems.(Greeks had some avatars to support Kurdistan which even doesn’t exist without Northern Iraq).

Just after it, they called our Eastern Anatolia as Armenia in their official press. Treaty has been broken. We always support the freedom of Macedonia with the name "Republic of Macedonia".
For last sentences, I'd like to talk about Sol. Sol had already chosen its side by helping US in Asia. That's a fact. Sol is not a neutral alliance as well as Entente in my opinion.

Q: You've said, that in real life you're a socialist. What do you think about socialists' activity on eRepublik? I've seen in countries like eAustralia or eCanada (which haven't seen communist system in RL at all), spread of communist-oriented parties. Is eRepublik appropriate place for such doctrine, to finally come true? Maybe it's worth trying? Do you have any personal thoughts 'bout that?

A: Actually, eSocialism is a bit different from real one even although they base on the same ideas. I've been thinking on such project for a few weeks. I think, I'm going to publish something about eRepublik's future (something long). In eRepublik's future, new political, economical and social modules will be needed. I'm not talking about the new Military and Economy Modules. They are really good but not enough. eRepublik will never stop to improve itself. It should be faster than current speed. Anyway, I believe in future of eRepublik. Socialism, communism, revolution or kingdoms, empires etc. Things are depend on systems in eRepublik.
Currently, I don't see anything about revolution in the New World. The communist movements around the word are just depended on RL ideologies of people. There are also communes for production but any of them really work globally. A global revolution needs more. It needs "real eRepublik socialist/communist ideologies".
To sum up, I believe that whole world will be socialist one day. I believe it’ll come, in both eRepublik and RL. But it is not that time. The New World is not ready for that.

Q: You're eRepublik Ambassador. Can you, please, introduce your function to the readers? For what you're responsible? Is Ambassador program a successful project? Or is it a failure?

A: I became eRepublik Ambassador in period of translating eRepublik into Turkish. Ambassador Program of eRepublik isn't working actively now. But it was a good try. Getting players into administration & moderation of game is always the best way for these kinds of developments.
For now, we, ambassadors, don't have any responsibility. Unofficially, ambassadors work for their countries in eRepublik organizations. They might be leading persons of their own countries, because they are capable of providing the communication between administration and public.

Q: Standard question for all participants recently: V2. What are your expectations? Will military module change to better? Or will it discourage most less ambitious players? And what about 24h planning? Do you think admins chose the right way of development?

A: I think, it’s still not enough. eRepublik has great potential to be improved to be more like real life. It should NOT be only for wars. Unfortunately, military module is the base of game now.
If we get back to V2… To start off, I wouldn't call it V2 actually. These are only some new modules. We can call them 1.5 or something like this.
I liked all developments in V2. I see no problem with all of these new features. I was dreaming of more realistic things but these are also enough for now. I believe that, in 2011, we will have really a better game.
Military Modules are extremely better for new citizens. These graphics can get new players.
24h planning and new economic modules are also good for global economical functions of the New World. I believe that it will be good... But as I said before, it’s still not enough.


Q: One more question, as it's interesting topic - HelloKitty.
Do you think PHOENIX will manage to retake Heilongjiang from China once again? Will PHOENIX push back EDEN once again? You're starting to lose, Western Australia, Heilongjiang, Hungary, Rhone Alps. What now?

A: We also lost Mediterranean. I think, it is like new turn-system in battles of V2. Now, it's EDEN's turn. To be honest, I hope it to end as soon as possible 🙂
I don't have certain ideas about the resource crisis at Asia. Anyway, PHOENIX has power to continue to manipulate Asian geography.

Q: And the very last one: What's going on in Turkey politics at the moment? Why congress is trying to impeach actual president? Is that because of Greek 'trip' through the whole country?

A: We had always opposite sides in politics. We still have and it's not the bad thing. Opposite sides are needed in politics to make the government better. I had been reading the articles in media. Even "Big Empire of Hungary" is living hard days. Turkiye is not so strong but has important fronts. Turkiye is doing more than she can do. By its result, we are living a conquest on our original lands now. After last night, we had retreated from 2 battles wrong, most
probably. I'm not caring about the action. It happened and there is nothing to do anymore. Now apart of congress is trying to impeach him. I don't agree with them. I'm pleased with my current president. These kinds of mistakes might always happen.

Thank you for the interview.

_____
Next interview with: Josh Frost
Signed for the interview: Marco Polo, Jazar, Feherlofia Koppany, dSoKre, Ond3L
Undecided for interview: Bic deWille, Owner
No response/denied interview: BattalGazi, Durruti, Cerber
Readers propositions: none

Stay tuned!