board77

OK - I'll leave it as is. "conduct" is the way we have referred to voting in other places so I think it should be clear enough to most people, and if they're not sure they can always ask.

Once an actual binding vote takes place, people will have the thread to look back on. What we found with Michel Delving and with our very first Hearing is that you have to actually do it before you know for sure what's understandable and do-able and what isn't.

Jn

This bit is a little unclear to me:

Quote:

Question 4: approving the final two paragraphs of ¶1

The Committee will be convened by posting a sticky thread in the Business Forum announcing that a vote has been requested and accepting volunteers until the committee is filled. Any registered member may serve on the committee, unless the vote concerns the age-restricted forum, in which case committee members must be 18 years of age or older.

With respect to "accepting volunteers" - is that strictly first volunteered first accepted - or would the committee be able to pick and choose?

Good question, Ethel.

Until now, we have accepted everyone who volunteer for any committee.

But as you'll see in the Standing Committees thread, there seems to be agreement that we need restrictions on the size of committees. The first committee in this convention, with 21 members, was somewhat unweildy.

So I guess the principle would have to be "first come-first served" until the committee is filled.

I think the current wording implies such a process. If the committee could pick and choose its own members, we would have to add text to that effect.

Jn

Jnyusa wrote:

I think the current wording implies such a process. If the committee could pick and choose its own members, we would have to add text to that effect.

I agree that this is implied - and perhaps need not be made explicit so long as we're all clear on it.

And so long as we believe that all of the membership will be clear on it.

In general, my rule is that its better to explicitly saying something then assume that everyone will imply the same things that I imply.

I want very much to believe that the membership will be clear on this.

I would have to change that sentence in an awful lot of places if we decide it's not clear.

But I really do think that when it says "accepting volunteers until the committee is filled is sufficiently plain that you don't hang out in the thread until you get the group of volunteers that you like, and discard others who volunteered earlier.

I'm not sure who would do that hanging out, either. The convening of committees is really a self-organizing process. What will probably happen is that someone will state in the Business forum that we need a vote about something, and either the Mayor or a Loremaster will pop in and say that it requires an initiative by five members. A few more people will say they want to vote, and a Ranger will open a thread and report who's asked for the vote so far and call for the additional affirmations needed until there are five - or two rangers could do it by themselves - or the Mayor if he/she sees it happening and agrees. And in that thread they would call for additional volunteers until they had a committee. Voila.

The members of this board have never been shy about organizing things that need to be organized. I think it will be alright.

Jn

Good enough for me.

Sounds good to me. I think it's plain enough. If you wanted it to be a bit more explicit, you could add "accepting anyone who volunteers until the committee is filled."

Editted for code.

I was just about to say, "Great idea," Mossy, and then it hit me that the committee does not actually accept 'anyone' who volunteers, and what I said above was a bit misleading.

If the composition of the committee calls for five members, one of whom is a current Ranger, and the first four volunteers are regular members, then the fifth has to be a current Ranger. So they would have to wait until a Ranger showed up to volunteer and reject other volunteers in the interim.

But I didn't want to have to re-iterate so many things in every clause ... and maybe that clause does have to be more carefully throught through so that it is clear without being impossibly long and redundant.

I need to take a break from this now and get ready for tomorrow picnic, but I'll come back later tonight and look at the text with fresh eyes to see if there's a way to rephrase the filling of committees.

Jn

Voronwe,

Thanks for the numbers.

These concern me. We may be at the highest point of interest due to the subject and the nature of the current membership. In spite of that, I think most votes never made it past a count of 50. I don't like it, but expecting even 30% may be optimistic and it might be prudent to consider something less.

Jnyusa,

I posed a question about the filling of committees elsewhere, before I noticed this discussion. Who has the authority to decide a variable size committee is full?

My only disagreement with the ballot the way it currently stands concerns the issues of variable percentages. I don't like the idea of not knowing what the rules are before the game starts.

IdylleSeethes wrote:

My only disagreement with the ballot the way it currently stands concerns the issues of variable percentages. I don't like the idea of not knowing what the rules are before the game starts.

I'm not sure I understand your comment, Idylle. Needless to say, the the percentage would always be set before any vote actually began. What I want to avoid is having a rigid structure that doesn't fit every situation. To me it makes more sense to have a committee that knows the ins and outs of a particular vote set the final percentage for a particular vote, rather to have this committee dictate what that percentage needs to be without having any knowledge of the content of the particular vote.

That having been said, if you don't like the choices that give the future committees the option to choose between different percentages, then don't vote for them.

Idylle,

I saw your comment in the other thread, and I had thought about that but sort of decided no one would notice. (Yes, I do that sometimes.)

But now that you have asked, I think the presumption would be that we would fill the committee to the max providing there are sufficient volunteers. That is, no one would be turned away until we hit the max. But we could convene the committee with fewer members if there are not enough volunteers.

It's really a question about maxima and minima because what happens if we can't meet the minimum? The committee would not form, I guess. Is that OK? It seems to me it would be indication that the committee was not really needed to begin with.

On the variable percentages, if one percentage wins the vote, then that will be it for that particular voting form. Was that what you were asking? The committee would only have discretion if we vote to give it to them. If there are committee members who prefer that option then it needs to be on the ballot.

Jn

About that other issue ... would the following text be more acceptable to people, as being more explicit?

The Committee will be convened by posting a sticky thread in the Business Forum announcing that a vote has been requested and accepting volunteers in order until the committee is filled and composed as required.

And, going back to your post, Idylle. I'm sorry to have been a bit flippant because I now see that this might be a fairly serious issue and one that should perhaps be built into the opening paragraph of the Article about standing committees.

Suppose people are not volunteering for the committee. How long should we wait before deciding to abandon the process?

Suppose a committee that allows 9 to 13 people has eleven people in it, and they convene and begin working on the problem, whatever it is. Two weeks later someone else raises their hand and says, "I want to be on the committee, too." Are they allowed?

Much as I hate the idea of opening a thorny issue at this point ... because what I really have to do is cook potato salad for a picnic ... this is something that we should probably discuss.

Jn

edit: we should probably take up the discussion HERE

Voronwe,

This is what I wrote earlier:

Quote:

Arbitrary and capricious.

You can ask for a vote. We might let you have it. If we allow it, we might let it express your concern. Whether or not it expresses your concern, we will hold the vote. If we want it to pass we'll accept a simple majority, but if we really don't like the idea and haven't distorted the wording enough to serve our purposes, we'll ask for 80%. Have a nice day.

I haven't changed my mind.

Jnyusa has suggested mitigating the lack of control issue by having the member asking for the vote to be on the committee. I can't say that I like it, but it is less distasteful and I can agree with it.

The variable percentage to win a specific type of vote is an invitation for manipulation. I see nothing that justifies the risk. I think it is irresponsible to create opportunities like this. If it is going to be allowed, there should at least be broad categories of issues identified with a corresponding percentage required to win. Someone should be able to propose something without having to wonder what it will take to win. This unnecessarily introduces turbidity into the process, which is unsuitable for a place that intends to be transparent.

I have no idea what categories might fill the bill, Idylle. The two things so far where we've needed to agree in advance that the vote was going to be binding were issues with the Invite Forum and opening the board. Neither of those issues will ever recur.

We got a short list of things that will require a binding vote. From the ballot:
1. Moving to a new server
2. Altering the terms of ownership for the board
3. Elimination of a Forum and/or restructuring of the forums which would entail mass renaming and/or moving of subfora and threads.
4. In the deletion of threads, any departure from the policy stated in Article 8.
5. In the creation of new forums, any departure from the policy stated in Article 9.

I suppose we could add percentages that would be required in these cases, but: (1) that will complicate the article quite a bit if we have to give voting percentages for each voting form for each item above; and (2) it doesn't really solve the problem because the place where we'd like not to be capricious is with the issues that we don't foresee in advance. Those are the issues in which inertia will favor the status quo.

I can't think of a way around this unless we say that if the members of this committee vote to give discretion to the members of the other committees, then we will re-visit categories for which percentages should be fixed and amend it into the Article in a second round of voting.

Just btw, this committee, the committee on Charter amendments, and the Election committee are the only ones for which the charter says anything about voting percentages. It's not clear whether other committees will end up having to conduct votes.

Jn

edit: you know what? I'm making this too complicated. Those things on the list are the important things looming in our future. We could specify percentages for them if that would partially resolve the problem in your mind. I would suggest doing it, though, only if we don't vote for fixed percentages on the ballot. What do you think?

Quote:

The variable percentage to win a specific type of vote is an invitation for manipulation.

I completely disagree. In fact, having participated in the decision to set the percentage for the two different accumulation votes, I find that comment to be quite upseting. Are you saying that I have been manipulating the community?

Perhaps it is time for me to back away from this process, and separate myself from the governance issues of this community. People seem to think that I have too much influence. I scare the crap out of Farawen, and Idylle thinks that I am engaging in manipulation. When all I ever wanted to do was just be one of the grapes.

Voronwe -

I'm pretty sure Idylle is thinking about future, hypothetical situations. I say this based on his very first response to my very first draft.

The fact that the committee can word the ballot and also set the percentages does mean that they could gaurantee from the start which way the vote would go. I think it's rather obvious that the people who sign up for a committee to organize a vote will be those who are most concerned about the issue - in either direction.

We've taken many steps to ensure that formal authority will not become entrenched here and I think what Idylle is saying is that this provision would pull in the opposite direction. I have to agree that it would be more likely to work in favor of the status quo than against it; and that of course is the opposite of what all your efforts have been about.

Jn

Jnyusa wrote:

The fact that the committee can word the ballot and also set the percentages does mean that they could gaurantee from the start which way the vote would go. I think it's rather obvious that the people who sign up for a committee to organize a vote will be those who are most concerned about the issue - in either direction.

Well, the truth is I essentially was the committee on the vote on when to open the board; I worded the ballot and I also set the percentage. So by Idylle's definition, I was engaging in manipulation. But if anything, I set the percentage in a way that was antithetical to the results that I wanted, in an effort to be fair. I think that the people who sign up for a committee to organize a vote will mostly be those who want to see the vote be conducted fairly, just like most of us who have volunteered for this committee have done so not to promote some personal agenda but rather to help create as well-governed community as possible.

I really dislike the idea of having rigidly set percentages, but if that is the will of the majority of the committee, then it will be done.

Well, the truth is I essentially was the committee on the vote on when to open the board; I worded the ballot and I also set the percentage. So by Idylle's definition, I was engaging in manipulation.

Ummm ... no, he's not saying that you engaged in manipulation, rather that an unscrupulous person placed in the same position could engage in manipulation because there's no check on his/her discretion.

I'd like to think that everyone on the board would have an interest in fairness, but in truth what lots of people want is for their voice to count just as much as everyone else's while everyone else's voice counts just a little bit less than theirs.

Jn

Thanks, Jn. And my apologies to Idylle. I'm afraid I am having quite a hard time being objective right now.