Your Alliance
What IS an Alliance?
Alliances are collections of people that join together to help each other. Any planet at any given point in time will often have unused ships and fleets. There will also be people being attacked. It makes sense to join together to put these ships to use, doesn't it? Also, if lots of people attack a galaxy at the same time, it increases the chance of success.
How are alliances organised?
Alliances have several ranks within them.
The High Commanders (or HC's) are in charge of the alliance. There's no set limit for how many people are in this most powerful position, but generally there's between 3 and 5 who are in ultimate authority.
Then come Officers. They sort out the alliance attacks and defences, and are often responsible (together with some of the HCs) for the technical responsibility of the alliance. Some are in charge of intelligence, internal and external affairs, and even "scanners" - those devoted to scanning for the alliance.
Then there's the normal members. Some may help with duties within the alliance, but mostly they're required to be as active as possible and participate in alliance attacks and defences. Some alliances give points for attacking and defending, so they can keep track of how helpful alliance members are. Alliances generally are organised on IRC and often have their own forums and/or IRC servers to increase privacy and communication ability. Some alliances have a "minimum IRC activity time" together or instead of a points system - inactive players don't pull their weight in the long term and so often require a lot more defence than they give. At the beginning of the round, many alliances would prefer players with less experience but that are online 8 or more hours a day than experienced players that won't be on more than 2 hours a day.
So how do I join?
As previously mentioned, many of the alliances require IRC. Some of the bigger alliances require vouches (people already in the alliance knowing you and saying you're a good player), but many just interview and require a minimum activity time. A list of all the Round 14 alliances playing can be found here .