A new breed of alliance emerges from the freelancers in EVE
Yesterday the Genesis region, home of CONCORD and the widely accepted centre of civilised space, played host to events far from usual, even for this heavily trafficked region of space. Converging from all over the known universe, ships flocked to the CONCORD Assembly station to celebrate the formation of a new alliance. An alliance which, according to its founders will allow pilots to “choose their own destiny”, as was announced by senior alliance officials. This alliance calls itsself the FLA, or the “Freelancer Alliance”.
After a short celebratory party involving the distribution of a large selection of food, drinks and other consumables as well as a firework display outside the station perimeter, the FLA fleet, comprising of ships ranging from industrial to Battleship class vessels set course for Sheroo, where the main celebrations were to take place. These celebrations involved a frigate tournament, several impromptu duels between corporation members and a raffle for a brand new battleship, won by one Jon Catterall. Clearly the festivities displayed demonstrate the ideals upon which the alliance is based are tangible; these being that of freedom, kinship and the ability to co-exist whilst having different viewpoints on any of a myriad of different subjects.
Speaking with senior alliance officials Jack Soul and Anjelle, a picture was painted of a group of pilots each with their own goals, joined together in a fellowship to help each other achieve success in the EVE universe. A safe, secure place in which new and old pilots can co-exist peacefully without pressure to do anything they don’t wish to. This alliance will also not have any political ambitions, it was even stated that unless there are exceptional circumstances where the entire alliance thinks with one mind they will remain as neutral as possible. The first of these ‘exceptional circumstances’ has already come to light, this being the controversial issue of piracy, as stated by Jack Soul, "We would like our members to try to be mature, and remember that their action reflect on the rest of us, so we tend to prefer members who will not actively be ‘less than savoury’".
Guidelines like these however pose a serious question when it comes to freedom: How can a pilot be truly free when they are still expected to subscribe to rules which may or may not reflect their own personal opinions? In response to this Anjelle released the statement: "This is the one and only part of FLA which involves regulations - we do not approve of the grief that is inflicted over honest pilots by the pirate elements of our society. We also include other guidelines such as keeping a degree of respect between one another; however these should all be considered common sense. In sacrificing these small ‘freedoms’ you actually amplify the overall freedom for the entire group". They went on to publicly thank several individuals who had worked hard in the run up to the alliance consolidation. "I would also like to thank, Ariana Fiedala, PowerGel, Sir Juju and all the other people who have worked hard for this alliance to get started".
Clearly this is a very ambitious and idealist concept, however whether this alliance will meet with little success due to its nature of a completely free community, or alternatively becoming a powerful coalition of pilots for the exact same reason remains to be seen.
