Guild Wars Wiki talk:Elections/draft B

Some quick notes to promote better understanding of the changes. Major changes:

1. Approval voting now; no more oppose votes, and "support votes" are just votes. Main reason is to promote preference-voting enough instead of support-voting only. Support-based results are nice, but a process with some basis in preference is more stably acceptable to the electorate in the long run. Voters can still to choose to go by support or preference and this is spelled out. Note that there is no longer a second election in the "all candidates are bad" case.
2. "Deciding winners" stage is spelled out as consensus regarding the vote, and with examples distinguishing it from a simple vote tally. Consensus directly regarding the desired outcome is assigned to the new "discussion only" stage.
3. Inserted "discussion only" stage to promote filling the discussion void. Goes a bit further than another proposal that did this by threatening a consensus resolution if lazy opposers don't speak up. This does not make the overall process a consensus process rather than a vote, but I wonder if people are just after the discussion-towards-consensus-aspect anyways.

Less major changes:

1. 100-edit requirement for voter eligibility now limited to last 6 months. Makes a bit more sense to me in principle; not a big deal if it's not liked.
2. Removed "Whenever a stage end date is changed to arrive sooner (through consensus), it should generally be set at least 3 days later than the time of that decision." Good practice but really don't need to spell it out for this community.
3. Various copyediting and folding stages in for succintness/clarity. Obvious reason.
4. Other stuff. Go review the proposal by reading and scrutinizing it directly; don't heavily rely on anybody's interpretation/summary, especially mine.

--Rezyk 01:30, 23 February 2008 (UTC)

I don't think this proposal solves any of my problems with the initial system -- that a simple vote is the primary determinant of the winner of the election and that ArenaNet is involved as a backup plan. The discussion phase seems superfluous. People can discuss the election in the months prior to its beginning, during the nomination phase, and during the vote phase. Further, most people have well-formed opinions of the front-running candidates before elections anyway.

I'm ambivalent about the approval voting mechanic. It solves some problems with off-site users coming in and voting oppose on everybody they dislike, but it removes the ability of the long-standing community to do the same with the candidate the off-site users support. Approval voting alone doesn't diminish the results of a candidate being highly polar. Personally, I'd prefer an average candidate that nobody has strong feelings for in either direction than a candidate that every either loves or hates -- our hybrid approval/disapproval voting gave a good vector for determining community feelings about that sort of issue.

—Tanaric 02:37, 25 February 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Tanaric on this one. I don't see the benefit on supressing the disapproval vote you are just not considering more information from the community. The discussion only stage before voting might be good sometimes, but I think most times it will be just time wasted. It was seen on this last election that little discussion takes place unless something forces it. -- Coran Ironclaw 05:12, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Hmm, straight disapproval voting is what gets you the neutral candidates. I do see some sense in wanting that for an arbitarator position. Backsword 08:15, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

I strongly oppose approval voting, if anything it makes preferences less clear due to a reduced number of options for expressing one's opinion of the viability of a candidate (rather than Support/Neutral[Abstain]/Oppose, there is now only Support or Neutral[Abstain]). Furthermore it allows no "error checking" by the community at large with regards to an individual normally outside of the community building up a small but focused faction and utilizing that tight basis of devoted support to acquire an advantage.

If we're going to decide bureaucrats by consensus, then we shouldn't bother with the vote, beyond it potentially being requested by those who are formulating consensus. One of the primary purposes of the vote was and is to provide a means of determining bureaucrats that does not get overly stalled as far too many wiki discussions of "consensus" do here. If you're truly looking for consensus in the "deciding winners" stage, you're delusional (figure of speech, nothing personal ;) if you think it can be fit into a week's time.

Minor element: I personally dislike the "last six months" change; I see no reason why someone shouldn't have a say simply because they decided to be a more passive presence on the wiki for a time. The initial 100-edit requirement was mostly put in place as both a guard against sock puppets and a token display of interest in the wiki community, and is not something that needs further expansion. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 11:37, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Agree with the last elelement. Same reasons IPs we're excluded. Out of laziness, I wouldn't mind seeing it changed to 50 mainspace edits. Easier to check, and harder to get away with spam to achieve. Backsword 08:15, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Backsword, with that requirement, I would be disallowed from voting. —Tanaric 15:33, 28 February 2008 (UTC)