CCP has been pumping out dev blogs regarding Dominion, the upcoming 11th expansion for EVE Online. Today, Abathur posted a blog entry that delves "a little deeper into the inner workings of the upgrades of space available to you through the new Infrastructure system." For example, Abathur explains how players will have to destroy their enemies' Infrastructure Hub in order to gain access to their upgrades.

In addition, Jasonitas published a blog entry this week that outlines the two new epic arcs that will be introduced in Dominion. The arcs focus on the Guristas and the Angel Cartel pirates factions and will allow you to "fly with the 'rats in 0.0, looting and plundering and fighting like only they know how."

Check out both blog entries after the jump.

As we reported earlier this week, CCP has released the list of applicants for the fourth Council of Stellar Management. In order to provide players with information on the candidates, Luminus Aardokay (aMUSiC) and Quivering Palm (Spirit) held a CSM debate last night on their Planet Risk radio show.

Candidates Helen Highwater, Mike Azariah, Song Li and TeaDaze presented their platforms in the three-hour show, which you can download as an mp3. More information on the CSM candidates can be found in the Jita Park Speakers Corner forum on the official EVE Online site.

CCP has posted the results of the candidacy application period for the fourth Council of Stellar Management, and the company has accepted 49 of the 60 applications. The rest were rejected due to passport issues, EULA violations and "Internet lolsters."

According to the post, "the age range of the candidates is between 21 and 54 with the average age of 33 years." Only one female player is running for a seat on the council. You can view the list of applicants here in preparation for the upcoming election, which will be held from Nov. 12-26.

CCP announced today that it will be adding a PLEX timer in an attempt to strengthen its anti-fraud measures in its Pilot License Extension program. According to the post, a maximum 60-minute delivery delay will go into effect for all PLEX added to the system after downtime tomorrow, Oct. 20.

For more information on PLEX, check out the system's EVElopedia page. As the entry states, "PLEX offers an alternative way for people to pay for their subscription without the use of our more conventional payment methods. Using PLEX, pilots can earn game time simply by playing EVE."

While the Dec. 1 launch date for Dominion may seem to be in the distant future right now, it's actually only about seven weeks away. In order to test out the upcoming changes in a live environment, CCP has announced that the team "will be running a series of fleet fights and other mass-tests on our main test server, Singularity."

The tests are tentatively scheduled to begin on Thursday, Oct. 15 at 5 p.m. GMT. However, an issue has been found on the test server that may postone the testing. Keep an eye on the thread for any updates to the testing schedule. If all goes according to plan, CCP is going to need at least 100 pilots (preferably more than 400) on Thursday.

The full announcement can be found after the jump. Also, check out the rules of the test server before logging in for the event.

One of the elements that has always fascinated me about EVE Online is the stability and resilience of the in-game economy. What you may not know is that CCP has a team of economists that work with the development team to provide players with a stable economy unlike some of the other MMOs out there. We had a chance to sit down with the Lead Economist for CCP, Dr. Eyjólfur Guðundsson, to talk about the EVE economy and what makes it so special.

ZAM: First of all, what is Unholy Rage? I mean, there was a discussion earlier on it, but what are the underlying principles of it?

Dr. Eyjólfur Guðundsson: Unholy Rage is simply the name of a task force that we put together within CCP to fight off activities that are very well known within MMOs in general - they're usually called gold farming. In general, it's behaviour where players - but I don't want to say players, because they're not really playing the game - it's the behaviour where individuals use the game as a business for themselves, rather than using the game as an environment to play. This is very prevalent within all MMOs, but the problem is that these entities are usually using tools and additional tools that are not allowed to use to give themselves additional advantages, so they can gain more than a regular player. So that's really what we're going after.

ZAM: And this task force lead to the banning of several thousand people, as I understand it?

And now for something completely different. When you think of CCP, you probably picture ships flying through space in EVE Online, or maybe even wonder what you'll see in DUST 514. Whatever images pop into your head, I doubt a rap group was one of them. Well, say hello to Permaband.

Members of the CCP team formed the group and posted their video for the song "HTFU" on YouTube. According to the link on the EVEOnline Facebook page, the song was performed and produced in house. Oh, and they "spit hot fire." It's true. Here's a taste of their rhymes: "Every day is a fight, there's no room for bloopers. Bugs coming at us like in Starship Troopers. We help when we can, every child, every man. Treat the boogie man to a permanent ban!"

Check out the video if you don't believe me. Actually, wait a minute. If you're at work, don't watch the video yet. Wait until you're home. As CCP puts it, the video's "not safe for YOUR work, sorry--so quit and join us so you can watch it."

We learned an abundance of new information during the CCP Presents keynote on Saturday. After the presentation we sat down with EVE Online's Lead Game Designer, Noah Ward to get clarification on some of the newly announced features including Planetary Interactions, Mining Enhancements and the rise of the Jovians.

Noah Ward: Hi, my name is Noah Ward, I also go by Hammerhead, and I am the lead game designer.

ZAM: First of all, can you just go into a little bit more detail about the sovereignty capture system that's going in?

Noah: It's really simple, and that was the whole goal of it. You just plunk down your clay marker and that's really all it takes. There's a bit of a timer. In order to take it back, you have to have 51% of the gates in the system controlled with these, we'll call them "disruption beacons," I don't know if that will be the final name. Basically you have to have, what we consider air superiority of the space in order to make the clay marker vulnerable.

ZAM: OK, so there will be new planets and stars. Does that have anything to with DUST? Are those in preparation somewhat?

Even though DUST 514 was officially announced at GDC Europe / GamesCom in August, CCP was reluctant to share anymore information until they could do so before the fans at the 2009 EVE Fanfest in Iceland. After the special presentation, we sat down with CCP CEO Hilmar Veigar Pétursson and Creative Director at CCP Asia, Atli Már Sveinsson to talk about DUST 514, EVE Online and how they'll compliment each other. Check it out!

ZAM: Dust 514 is a persistent universe where the characters and the world will be persistent and every battle will be significant and all of the outcomes will affect both worlds. Can you go into some detail as to how persistent some of those features are going to be, and how they will affect both EVE Online and Dust 514?

Atli Már Sveinsson: Obviously the character progression is quite persistent. Your wealth is persistent, or not. But in terms of conquests or control of planets, this is, I think, the main thing that is certainly persistent.

Hilmar Veigar Pétursson: The fundamental communication between the games is that players can contract Dust mining rings to fight over territories on the planet. Where we go beyond that initial standpoint is something where we sort of go with the flow, as we've always done with our game design ideas, where we see where people take the ideas, and we follow the track. So we're very much thinking about the link and Dust alone as a model and DUST together with EVE. So it's really starting there and leading from there.

If you weren't one of the 3,000 viewers watching the CCP Presents Keynote today, you'll be excited to know that there was plenty of new information about DUST 514 and what's to come after EVE Online: Dominion. In addition the announcement that EVE Online now has over 302,657 subscribers, CCP CEO Hilmar Veigar Petursson told the crowd that the company has a new goal of reaching 600,000 active users. Considering the EVE Online team is now 5x the size it was at launch, this is definitely a possible and something to believe in.

Make sure to check out our summarized after the jump and stay tuned for our DUST 514 gameplay impressions, and transcribed interviews covering DUST 514, EVE Online and the overarching economy.