CCP Caedmon has written a dev blog entry outlining CCP's release plan for COSMOS, a social networking tool that could be called "EVE away from EVE." According to Caedmon, the system's features will include "home, profiles, improved contact list and an improved mail system." Home will display your subscriptions to various feeds, such as news, blogs and status updates.

The first iteration of the new in-game mail system will be implemented with Dominion, the game's 11th expansion, when it launches this winter. The COSMOS Web application and calendar should be added in early 2010. You can read about all the features in the full dev blog entry after the jump.

According to a dev blog entry by CCP Ginger, the volunteer manager for EVE Online, data related to the Interstellar Services Department volunteer program has been stolen. While none of this information was in any way related to anyone's EVE player account data, CCP has launched a full investigation and shut down "all ISD servers and services to protect our volunteers and the integrity of the program."

While Ginger emphasized that "player billing information, personal information, and character/game information all remain completely secure," it looks like data regarding the volunteer program, including specific volunteers, was stolen. Ginger has warned all players, especially those who have ever been a part of the ISD, that "any e-mails sent from the @eve-crc.net domain are bogus and have been sent from someone pretending to be an official representative of CCP."

CCP Explorer has announced in a dev blog entry that the release of Dominion, EVE Online's 11th expansion, this winter will boost the minimum system requirements needed to run the game to Windows XP Service Pack 2. Also, CCP will officially begin supporting Windows 7 with the launch of the expansion.

Explorer compiled a list of technical dev blogs that have been written since 2007 to demonstrate just how often EVE Online is updated (it's a lot). "We update EVE because EVE needs to be fresh, vibrant and cutting-edge. EVE should be immortal, just as you, the pod pilot," Explorer said. Dominion will include the game's third graphics update and will update the in-game browser.

Even though Windows 7 won't be available for general retail until Oct. 22, 8.8% of EVE players are already using it. "The majority of our Windows users are still using Windows XP, or 49.5%, with 41.7% using Windows Vista but the increased Windows 7 usage has been at the expense of Windows XP," Explorer said.

Direct2Drive is celebrating its fifth anniversary by selling more than 50 games for only $5 each over five weeks. This week's offer is filled with RPGs and MMOs, which means you have until Sept. 28 to pick up EVE Online, Age of Conan or PlanetSide for only $5. And yes, this low price includes 30 free days of gameplay for each MMO.

While you're at it, you can grab titles like Neverwinter Nights 2, Assassin's Creed and BioShock for $5. So do you think you'll take advantage of these offers? With new expansions on the way for both EVE Online and Age of Conan, now seems like a good time to try out either of these MMOs for such a low price.

Also, SOE President John Smedley recently hinted on his Twitter page that PlanetSide Next may be in the works, so it might be worthwhile to hone your PlanetSide skills in anticipation. It's important to keep in mind, however, that SOE has made no official announcements regarding PlanetSide Next.

CCP Soundwave has taken the time to write a dev blog entry explaining why NPC corporations are now being taxed 11 percent. It seems the main impetus behind the change is to motivate players to join a player corporation, although Soundwave emphasized the tax is not meant to "destroy" NPC corporations.

There were other reasons behind the addition of the tax. Between war immunity and no taxes, NPC corporations had an inherent advantage over player corps. Also, it's unrealistic to think a government wouldn't tax its citizens. Soundwave says that the the 11 percent tax may be increased if it doesn't provide the intended balance. You can read the full blog entry after the jump.

UPDATE: You can now watch the entire Alliance Tournament VII on CCP's YouTube page.

The Alliance Tournament VII finals were held over the weekend, and Pandemic Legion earned the top spot in an almost clean sweep against Circle-Of-Two. You can view results and reports from each match of the tournament on the Interstellar Correspondents site.

The report on the final match contains some quotes from Shamis Orzo, the leader of Pandemic Legion, that discuss how the winning team prepared for the competition. "We tested a lot. I think we've probably had 'bout 15 organized practice sessions, each one lasting at least 2 hours," Orzo said.

You can discuss the tournament in the official forums, where congratulatory threads have been posted to applaud both Pandemic Legion and Circle-Of-Two for their victories. You can also look back on all the action on the EVE Tournament Twitter page.

Dominion, the 11th free expansion for EVE Online, is set to launch this winter, and CCP Abathur has posted a dev blog entry discussing the changes that Dominion will bring to the various classes of PvP capital ships. For example, the Titans' current AoE super weapon will be removed and replaced with "a new line of mutually exclusive super weapons, usable only by Titans."

Also, Motherships are being reclassified as Supercarriers and will get new Fighter Bombers they can launch to destroy capital ships. However, Dominion will not include the addition of any new capital ships. More information can be found in the dev blog entry after the jump.

The second qualifying round of the seventh EVE Online Alliance Tournament was held over the weekend, and you can watch all of the matches from Day 3 and Day 4 of the qualifiers on YouTube. The finals will be held this weekend, Sept. 19-20, via EVE TV in high definition.

You'll be able to watch the finals on the official Alliance Tournament Web site. You can also view results and statistics here or join in on the discussion in the official tourney forum. If you're a Twitter user, don't forget to add the EVE Tournament page to your feed.

Apocrypha 1.5.1 has been deployed and according to the patch notes, the EVE Online developers "believe that we have now fully eliminated desync issues as related to the physics simulation. More on this in an upcoming Dev Blog." Well, that dev blog was published today by CCP GingerDude and it explains in full detail exactly what these desync issues were and how the team got rid of them.

To start things off, GingerDude explains that desync is not lag, clock skew or time shift. Desync "is the situation when the server and your client disagree on the position of an object in space at a given time." After discovering that "desync was somehow related to many ships being in intersection with one another," the team started to work on a solution.

The blog entry details exactly how GingerDude and the rest of the team worked on the problem. You can read the full entry after the jump. As for 1.5.1, GingerDude says, "we may have jumped the gun slightly by calling the desync issue fully fixed in this patch when there may still be at least a hypothetical chance of desync." If you experience desync in the future, be sure to file a bug report.

"Councilman resigns amid insider trading scandal." This is the type of political headline you'd expect to see in the mainstream media, but instead it's made its way into the MMO world. Adam Ridgway has resigned from his position on EVE Online's Council of Stellar Management after it was discovered he bought and traded 2.5 billion ISK in items based on his knowledge of an upcoming game design change. Ridgway has been replaced by former CSM member Michele Boland.

For those who don't know, the CSM is a democratically elected council of players who communicate with CCP in order to continually improve EVE Online. "The rest of the Council condemns his actions and would like to express our sincere apologies to the players for this breach of trust," the CSM said in a statement.

Ridgway addressed the scandal in his own statement. "While attending the CSM summit I acted on some information which was revealed for personal profit and, of course, was caught," he said, noting he voluntarily resigned from the position. "I have had a tremendous time on the CSM. Rest assured that the issues that are voted for and pushed forward to Iceland are looked at and taken into consideration by CCP if technically feasible." More information on the issue can be found below.