[quote=MonkeyBusiness]
I would like to know if there are any people creating a nation in Cradle East before I create a nation and find out I am the only person in that location.
[/quote]

First and foremost, it's not quite creating a nation, it's creating a culture from which nations will be derived. In addition, I will be creating non-player cultural entities for those regions which lack enough cultures, so there's that.

[quote=Daglobster]
I'm probably going to make a nation for this, but I have a question. Do I have to take the map and shade it, or is that optional. I'm not quite sure how I would go about doing that...
[/quote]

It's highly preferred, but if you cannot, then just give a general area in terms of modern political geography.

I assume it would not be too difficult to use a basic image editing program such as Paint.NET (my preferred) or even just Paint. Seashore works wonders on a mac, and GIMP is fantastic on a great number of OS's.

EDIT:

Also, no flags yet, especially not during this proto-cultural phase.