09-07-2024, 07:42 AMAephino Wrote: Btw the people you're referring to aren't apathetic to this; that's likely the opposite of the word you want to use. People are upset for a number of reasons:
1. Russia ended up receiving 2 applications to keep their federation
2. There were 8 nations already with ≥5 users that were pre-selected as optimal nations
3. Quebec isn't a nation
4. Quebec already exists as a team with the same name on the site
5. There's a trend on the site of users getting jobs based on name recognition (not even saying that happened here - I'm sure the app was great. just a trend people notice)

During my 3 year tenure in IIHF HO, applications to smaller federations that have resulted in an increased engagement to/within the federation have been few. Appointing a federation head just because they applied for a current federation isn't always the best decision in terms of stability and engagement. Even the pre-selected nations of 5+ players would still fall within that "smaller" federation focus where the long-term stability of the federation would be more uncertain.

Being a couple of seasons removed from the switch from Austria to France, France as a federation still has the lowest amount of "natural born" players (17, Ireland is second fewest with 19) which puts a lot of emphasis on the federation being active with transfers, which some federations have had more success with than others. Even Independent Russia with currently 28 "natural born" players have long had issues with an active federation as a consequence of which has resulted in a lot of additional workload for the IIHF HO in making sure all federations follow the preparations for each tournament.

I can only speak for myself in regards to the IIHF vote in this appointment but I would say that the "winning" application was the one I had the least prior knowledge about as a user. At the end of the day when all else was equal in the final applications, I weighed IIHF long-term stability over the constraint that a IIHF federation could not be split from another or that it would not be a valid application because of an IRL non UN Nation status. Note that we use Federation within the IIHF, not nation, as Great Britain in the current IIHF sense is not a nation either but a region encompassing England, Scotland and Wales.Players creating from Northern Ireland have been given the right to choose who they want to be assigned to at the start, Ireland, Great Britain or Unassigned. EDIT: I misinterpreted something in a discussion said long ago, this is not the case.

My viewpoint on this has slightly changed since the last time applications for a federation promotion was taken. I remember applications for both Québec and an African Confederation at the time which I gave a low "score" right at the get go due to them not being generally recognized federations in the IIHF sense. As my own workload elsewhere has increased and the lack of applications for IIHF HO, my priorities shifted towards favoring applications that I think would provide a stable federation both now with the current applicants and the future when they eventually move on to other endeavors.