In the effort of dealing with OOC in RP rooms:

[Auvic]

So it shouldn't come as any surprise to anyone that visits the politika forums that there's been something of an issue in regards to OOCing in RP rooms.

How could you fix this? You could amend the rules.
Under the assumption that the rules are to be changed, there's two ways ( that I know of, at least ) that it could be done:
1. Modify rule #9 of the AUP so that it requires that someone petition a room for OOC-silence before kickings and so forth start happening.
Yes, I've said "You agreed to the rules when you entered the chat" in response to people saying "Well, people have/do/will OOC", but that really goes both ways. If we're going to assume that people ought to have read the rules before entering before we kick/whatever them, then it should be equally fair if we explicitly say that any RPer that petitions for OOC-silence should be heeded.
OR
2. Revert tK's rules to how they were in some obscure number of years ago, and do the thing were OOC just gets you kicked.
I won't pretend to know exactly how it worked, or what the circumstances were at the time - but regardless, people were RPing, and the amount of RP then far surpasses the amount of RP now.
Ask any of the oldies, etc. ( I'm not one of them. )

On the other hand:
How else could this issue be resolved?
There are a number of options available to users both inside and outside of the chat.
Inside of the chat, the no-OOC rule can be avoided by whispering and creation of new rooms, for the most part.
Whispering is pretty obvious.
In regards to the creation of another room, though, I've heard it mentioned that using another room to OOC would "split the community". I don't quite get the reasoning for this, seeing as how you could just log an OOC handle to OOC in an OOC room, and RP as you will in an RP room. The potential problem of willy-nilly kicks/bans from this user-created room can be easily solved by asking a mod to demote the room creator, at which point nobody can kick/ban aside from a global mod.

I'll note that people have suggested the use of the /ignore function as a reason for why people shouldn't need to complain about 'excessive' OOC. However, should an RPer use the /ignore command on an OOCer, it removes (until relogging, which is analogous in effort to the OOCer simply moving to another room) any possibility of that RPer ever RPing with that OOCer(on that name, obviously).
Because of this, I don't think the "You can just /ignore OOCers" defense is a valid point for justifying OOC in RP rooms.

Outside of the chat, however: numerous skype conversations have been held before, and messengers are available as well. Both have, are, and will continue to be used to engage in the planning of RPs - and there's no reason why people absolutely must forgo these resources.

[Auvic]

In the off chance I missed something pretty obvious with my original post, I'ma reserve this spot here. Pretty sure someone'll have more reasons for one thing or another.

Ah. The first thing I missed:
What's my personal stance on things? I don't mind how things are now. When I need to OOC, I hit people up on messengers/whispers/in an OOC room. If a mod tells me I need to stfu, I'll leave the room and/or use whispers. Pretty easy, right? I've never had an issue with it, and I don't think I'll start having one anytime soon.
IF and ONLY if a rule needs to be changed, I would rather see OOC banned globally(aside from designated OOC rooms) and force integration to happen.
Amending rule #9 could be done, certainly. Until I see otherwise, however, it seems like nothing more than pandering to people who are too lazy to seek other solutions.

[1337]

I approve.

[Xachariah]

Option 2 is the one I like better. I can recall that time, myself - there was very, very limited OOC, of course, but it was always either clarifying things or making isolated comments. If people wanted to carry on an OOC conversation, either they whispered or just stopped RPing and went to an OOC room.

As far as I can recall, this was pretty much the heyday of tK's random RP, and people weren't even allowed to have multiple usernames logged in at any one time. Yet, now that they can, if they so choose, have fifty names in at the same time, they simply refuse to just use a designated OOC room or make their own.

Pretty sure my standing can be deduced pretty easily from the above two blobs of text.

[Soja]

In Ye Olde Days™, there weren't any moderators. The Keep 1.0 was a shitty HTTPChat run place that crashed regularly, had no registration system, and NO MODERATORS. Rather, we had a joke of a rule enforcement body called The Magistrates. We mocked them mercilessly because, hell, they couldn't actually DO anything. Back then, though, OOC was less of a problem. People actually apologized for OOC interruptions and full blocks of text.

People policed themselves because they were more interested in RP than in treating TK like the typical shitty AOL chat room, a butt of our frequent jokes.

It wasn't until maybe 2006ish that we updated the rules after the initial rewrite of the AUP. Some small manner of OOC has always been allowed under the condition that the people involved REIN IT IN before it gets out of control. OOC isn't the problem; it's the persistent OOC that is the problem.

[Frown-chan]

Even if the RPers themselves are involved in it? Whatever. You guys want to have a rehash of Arena_OOC_Discussion and a dead Arena? Go ahead.

[SilverStreak]

OOC isn't the problem; it's the persistent OOC that is the problem.

Perhaps that's part of the issue; a judgment call needs to be made as to whether or not the OOC is persistent enough to be disruptive to RP.

Some people seem to see a lot of room for interpretation, and others seem to see very little.

Personally, I'm of the belief that a certain amount of OOC whilst RPing is healthy and crucial to the success of that RP.

If there is an ammendment, perhaps it should be targetted to cut out the OOC that is superfluous to the RP at hand.

An OOC conversation about, say, seamice, probably won't be beneficial if you're RPing in The Cafe, whereas an OOC discussion about expresso machines might make a bit more sense, and be pertinent to the players.

I don't know, maybe that still leaves too much gray area, but perhaps it's worth discussing?

[1337]

OOC isn't the problem; it's the persistent OOC that is the problem.

Perhaps that's part of the issue; a judgment call needs to be made as to whether or not the OOC is persistent enough to be disruptive to RP.

Some people seem to see a lot of room for interpretation, and others seem to see very little.

Personally, I'm of the belief that a certain amount of OOC whilst RPing is healthy and crucial to the success of that RP.

If there is an ammendment, perhaps it should be targetted to cut out the OOC that is superfluous to the RP at hand.

An OOC conversation about, say, seamice, probably won't be beneficial if you're RPing in The Cafe, whereas an OOC discussion about expresso machines might make a bit more sense, and be pertinent to the players.

I don't know, maybe that still leaves too much gray area, but perhaps it's worth discussing?

The moderators already do this. They lurk and wait for a while to see if OOC, even if completely unrelated to rp, will develop into talk of RP'ing. It's only after a sufficient amount of time of nothing but OOC or at a request of another user that they step in.

[SilverStreak]

OOC isn't the problem; it's the persistent OOC that is the problem.

Perhaps that's part of the issue; a judgment call needs to be made as to whether or not the OOC is persistent enough to be disruptive to RP.

Some people seem to see a lot of room for interpretation, and others seem to see very little.

Personally, I'm of the belief that a certain amount of OOC whilst RPing is healthy and crucial to the success of that RP.

If there is an ammendment, perhaps it should be targetted to cut out the OOC that is superfluous to the RP at hand.

An OOC conversation about, say, seamice, probably won't be beneficial if you're RPing in The Cafe, whereas an OOC discussion about expresso machines might make a bit more sense, and be pertinent to the players.

I don't know, maybe that still leaves too much gray area, but perhaps it's worth discussing?

The moderators already do this. They lurk and wait for a while to see if OOC, even if completely unrelated to rp, will develop into talk of RP'ing. It's only after a sufficient amount of time of nothing but OOC or at a request of another user that they step in.

Oh, allright then. I'll withdraw.

[Auvic]

Even if the RPers themselves are involved in it? Whatever. You guys want to have a rehash of Arena_OOC_Discussion and a dead Arena? Go ahead.

I don't really see what the issue is with this, especially given that this exists:

I can recall that time, myself - there was very, very limited OOC, of course, but it was always either clarifying things or making isolated comments.

In which case, OOC that's relevant to the RP at hand is still happening.
Just not, y'know, "Hey. So I just realized my character is a lot like Dante."
Or
"So did you watch (insert anime here)?"
Talking about swords and shields in the Arena when there's people that use swords and shields? Sure. But you know as well as me that that's not all you guys talk about when you OOC.

That being said, of course, I still don't see why RP in the Arena can't be arranged outside of the Arena, just as RP in the Forest or any of the other rooms can/are. ( I almost mentioned Pub there, but I haven't actually taken a look inside the place in quite literally more than a year, so I wouldn't know how it works there anymore. Back when I did RP there, though, RP was pretty spontaneous, and didn't even need OOC arrangements at all. People just entered and left at will, and that's how RP worked. Go figure, right? )

I noticed that you made a reply to the "why not make another room+use other handles" suggestion in the other thread, and that your response was, more or less, "Doing that would be inconvenient", to which I have to ask - how is doing what is already within your power more inconvenient than asking people to go through the lengthy process of changing rules so you can be inconvenienced just a little bit less? I mean, you might as well start haranguing Webby to put in a friends list on tK so you don't have to bother with opening a messenger to see if people are online, because clicking another window/program/whatever would be similarly "inconvenient".

I'll concede that yes, using another handle to OOC is inconvenient. So inconvenient that you couldn't possibly consider it, and you'd rather risk getting kicked/banned/raise a ruckus on the politika forums afterward? I'm not quite so sure.

tl;dr:
Yes, opening another handle is inconvenient.
No, it's not really inconvenient enough to merit that the rules be changed instead, imho.
Any other rationales for why business shouldn't continue as usual?