about national
national is the replacement community for american. when it closed, many people were left homeless. we have a new name and look but our rules are very much the same. our focus on being organic is a strong one but we're not limiting the types or amounts of lines you come in with. we do ask, however, that your goal is to create a character you love playing! not to create one in hopes of getting a romantic line. if you can't function in a community without a ton of preplanned lines, national isn't the place for you. we find some of the best lines are ones you form organically and we think the longest lasting communities have always had people that are okay with joining and forming lines and connections through ic interaction not hanging around pbads for a week waiting for people to give you lines. don't form your character around the lines you get, form your lines around your character. and if this isn't your style, that's okay! we're just more of an organic focused community.

applying to the community and security
we will simply say that we're not a first come, first serve community. journals are in character with no underscores. you're required to have two backdated posts in your journal. one for ic contact and one for ooc contact. your ooc post should be public and contain basic facts about your character (ie: full name, hometown, birthday, age, occupation). also, consider that we really do look at examples when considering applications. we are a writing based community so we want to see scenes and narratives. we'd like to see at least one of each with a +1 of either. please make sure your scene has more than a couple replies to it. if you are truly in a pinch and have no scenes to give us, you can write out some bonus narrative content. we delete rejected applications. this simply means your examples weren't what we're looking for or we feel that you weren't a good fit for the community. we reserve the right to do so and do not respond to inquiries.

sometimes, assholes and spam get the best of people on ij. we cannot control what people do anonymously. we ask that you set your comment settings to registered or friends only. we ask that everyone here be kind to one another because at the end of the day this is just a hobby. we all have real lives and feelings and rp is the last thing you need to be treating people like shit over.

activity and interaction
first off, your flist cannot be out of date 7+ days. if you're going to be away for a week just let us know in the member's post so that you don't get dinged by this rule. you can be removed for having an out of date flist accompanied by not being on the friend's page anywhere for the same amount of time. we have this rule to frequently remove dead weight. we don't think it's hard to login at least once a week to update your flist.like most communities out there we will be on a 1 month updating schedule. you'll be required to complete two things in the span of one month!
1. your intro: when you first join, you'll have 48 hours to post an introduction in the sub community. we ask that you look over the last 10 or so intros on the page and make sure you're not duplicating a question. you must reply to the comments you receive. no posting and then disappearing. we know intros can be a pain in the ass sometimes but we do feel they're necessary! please try to be creative with your questions and posts to avoid the typical "favorite food, holiday, etc" if you can. if you are added after the 16th of a month, you will not have to update.

2. your interaction post: when you're first added, your intro counts as your "interaction" post. in your next 30 day cycle, you're expected to post something on the fp that is interactive! it can be another question, ffa, plot post, lyrics or another activity in general! so long as it's something for the entire community to participate in. just like your intro, you should be replying to the questions you've received, you should be active in your own ffa, etc.

3. your update: we accept a variety of updates here at national. in our opinion, updates should be providing some depth and insight into your character's past or present lives. narratives, mixed media updates, first person entries (blog posts, letters, etc.), phone posts with written components (voicemails, emails, texts, etc.) are all accepted. social media, simple "list" (top ten favorite movies, etc) type posts & playlists are not accepted for your updates though we would accept them for your interaction posts. we ask for variety as well. outside of narratives, try to do something different every month as a challenge. at the moment we have no word count for your updates but please keep in mind it's doubtful we'd consider anything under 200 words for narrative update.