[LVS] Council pre-meeting Agenda (November 2nd)

[Spectatre]

NOTE: On October 27th, the clocks in the UK go back an hour - timezone change from BST to GMT.
This meeting will be taking place at 8pm GMT. If you're not in that timezone, that means it'll start ONE HOUR LATER than you will have been used to the past few months!
If you're not sure what the time is in the UK, the front page of the zedwork forum tells you the current UK time!

That said - meeting is afoot! Previous notes: https://zedwork.co.uk/wiki/Zedling_Coun ... 2019-10-19

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Two topics put to the forums from the last meeting. First item, the topic from Zed - wording was (somewhat) agreed at the last meeting, with the intention that it be voted on next meeting. Look at the wording, see if you're happy, discuss further below.

-If a topic needs to be voted on, council agree the wording of the vote with the scribe, who posts it in the pre-agenda for the next meeting. Any members who will be absent at that meeting may register their vote on the pre-agenda.
-If the wording of a vote is changed during the meeting from how it is written on the pre-agenda, and an absent council member has submitted their vote on the pre-agenda, then the new wording for the vote must be submitted to the next pre-agenda, to be voted on in the following meeting.


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Second item, kicked to the forums for a third time, is discussing changing our system for voting/nominations. Lots of discussion was had on this (see notes above), but no consensus was reached. Hopefully we can find one.

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Discuss the above, add new topics for discussion, apologise for not being at the next meeting, all available below!

[Spectatre]

On the put-votes-on-the-pre-agenda topic: sounds good!
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On the voting topic!

We didn't reach a consensus at the meeting, below is my suggestion based on the things that most people seemed to kinda be agreeing on. Thought it'd be a place to get discussion moving from.

1) Any Zedling present* wishing to join the council can request a vote via the host
2) The host then announces the candidate, and receives votes via private message
3) Any Zedling may vote; a candidate is elected to the council if they receive at least 5 votes
4) More than one election can take place in a meeting

*Khas' (below) suggestion to add 'present', which I agree with

Removes the nomination steps, removes the double-check-they're-interested step (if they're asking to be voted on, they are). Opens it up to non-council members, relatively (?) painless.

Example: At the end of the meeting, Host says 'anyone want to join council?' Zedling 1 asks to be voted on. Host says 'we're voting on Zedling 1, send in your votes'. If they receive 5 votes, they're in. Done.

Pre-empting possible queries:
-What if two people want to be voted on in the same meeting? They can be; their votes are dealt with seperately. Vote on Zedling 1, then vote on Zedling 2.
-What if we're going to hit the member limit? We have mechanisms in place to remove inactive players; we also have the means to increase or remove the member limit. If all else fails, 'first come; first served'?
-What if there's only 4 people online to vote? In that hypothetical, the host would be hosting Zed, LadyB, and the non-council member being voted on.
-Is 5 votes too many/should some of those 5 votes need to be council members? Nahh.

[KhasOrn]

My humble simplified wording suggestion:

-If a proposal requires a voting decision the council will resolve the wording of the proposal with the scribe to post in the pre-agenda for the next meeting when it will be voted on. Any member may vote on the pre-agenda.

-If there are any changes to the proposal during the following meeting all prior votes are void and the council will resolve the wording of the proposal with the scribe to post in the pre-agenda for the next meeting when it will be voted on.

* * * * * * * * * * *

My humble tiny edit suggestion to the Council Member nomination/voting protocol:

1) Any Zedling present wishing to join the council can request a vote via the host
2) The host announces the candidate and receives votes via private message
3) Any Zedling may vote; a candidate is elected to the council if they receive at least 5 votes
4) More than one election can take place in a meeting

* * * * * * * * * * *

In reply to: Spectatre » 19 Oct 2019, 22:33
-Are 5 votes too many/should some of those 5 votes be council members?

Maybe require a minimum of one (1) council member vote..?

In reply to: Memery » 20 Oct 2019, 04:26
1) On the first topic, I am happy with Khas' wording, however I did a bit of formatting:
-If there are any changes to the proposal during the following meeting, all prior votes are void. The council will resolve the wording of the proposal, with the scribe, to post on the pre-agenda for the next meeting.

I would (politely) argue that the council will be 'resolving the wording with the scribe' specifically to post...and thus 'with the scribe' probably shouldn't be interjected as separate from the primary subject of the sentence with commas in this case..? I'm fine with any 'breathing' commas or periods otherwise added.

2) To throw my two cents into the discussion on "is 5 enough votes blah blah". Let's just have an arbitrary number and see if it works. If someone is getting 5 votes from anywhere in the server it can't be a bad thing.

Sure - I'm game to 'see what happens' too

In reply to: ABParadigm » 24 Oct 2019, 19:52
1) "most organizations do have a nay in addition to their ayes"

I absolutely agree with this. Proper voting procedure does indeed have a nay and it should be applicable since it is a 'for or against' vote, not a 'majority wins' situation.

2) "I think we need to sit down, take a deep breath, and realize that the council is supposed to be semi-formal, not a free-for-all."

Again, I'm in complete agreement.

[Memery]

On the first topic, I am happy with Khas' wording, however I did a bit of formatting:

-If there are any changes to the proposal during the following meeting, all prior votes are void. The council will resolve the wording of the proposal, with the scribe, to post on the pre-agenda for the next meeting.

For topic 2:

I like Khas:' wording here again.

To throw my two cents into the discussion on "is 5 enough votes blah blah". Let's just have an arbitrary number and see if it works. If someone is getting 5 votes from anywhere in the server it can't be a bad thing.

Council members have the power to remove rowdy or inactive players. I see no need for their vote to be "all powerful" in the process. Typically, council members make up the majority of online players during meetings, therefore there is a high probability that to reach 5 votes, a Zedling would need at least 1 vote from a council member.

To summarise: wording is fine, I tweaked one part slightly. 5 is fine.

[Forseth]

First item:
Seems like a good idea. The only problem I see Is that non-members can now vote on council matters. Unless we double check who made what votes and remove the votes not belonging to council members, which frankly sounds like a pain. Do we have any solution to this?

I also approve of Memery's change of Khas's wording.

Second item:
Seems fine. The only problem I see here is that the voting process can take quite some time to finish. Since every wish needs a vote and everyone can vote (but probably dosen't know how). Other than that I don't have any objections.

[KhasOrn]

Replies at the bottom of my original post.

[ABParadigm]

Forseth, to my knowledge the idea was that every zedling should to be able to vote, rather than keep it specified to council members. Only allowing council members makes it rather undemocratic and really isn't a good reflection of who the server wants to be on the council, only who the council wants to be on the council.

I also agree with all of the above statements and ideas - I think nominations being removed is a good idea, and I think that all of the re-wording that occurred looks good.

An issue with Zed's topic - let's be honest, the chances it will change at the council meeting is incredibly high given the nature of the council and I just think we need to have a stopping point where we stop kicking it to the pre-agenda.

One more issue I have is if we're letting zedlings nominate themselves, why can't we vote "no" on votes? I think there needs to be a reason to vote no - I have recalled times where someone who at least 5 council members (yes, five), didn't think a player would be a good addition to the council, but they got voted onto the council by three (yes, only three) members thought they would be alright. I think there should be some form of "no" vote in a similar way to yes votes - maybe if you get more no votes than yes votes you wouldn't be elected onto the council - most organizations do have a nay in addition to their ayes. That being said, this might be a tangent, or another topic entirely. I thought it was somewhat related, so I thought I'd add it in. Please don't inject this bit into the actual vote or we'll need to kick it to the pre-agenda again.

I also would like to remind folks about meeting etiquette. I'd like to remind everyone that the council meetings really shouldn't be as out-of-hand as they are currently. Our hosts aren't giving strikes where they need to, sometimes not even appointing scribes - people are getting angry at one-another, and the meeting is going off the rails in a lot of other ways far more frequently than it should. The past meeting was ridiculous, perhaps one of the worst meetings I have gone to, and from what I have heard a few meetings prior were also really unstructured. I think we need to sit down, take a deep breath, and realize that the council is supposed to be semi-formal, not a free-for-all. I don't think anyone in particular is at fault, I am probably at fault too for behaving badly, or letting my attention wander. I just think that needed to be said, and possibly reinforced that we should be a model for the server, not a playground on Saturdays.

[Forseth]

Oh boy AB, this might be because I'm tired after a long night's work, but something is off here. Sorry in advance.

Forseth, to my knowledge the idea was that every zedling should to be able to vote, rather than keep it specified to council members. Only allowing council members makes it rather undemocratic and really isn't a good reflection of who the server wants to be on the council, only who the council wants to be on the council.

Um.. which topic? I'm assuming the first one since that's the one I had a complaint about, so I'll base my reply on that. No.. just no. I don't know why this topic was raised to begin with, because I wasn't there, but this is what the topic say in Spectatre's forum post

-If a topic needs to be voted on, council agree the wording of the vote with the scribe, who posts it in the pre-agenda for the next meeting. Any members who will be absent at that meeting may register their vote on the pre-agenda.

So, it is a council matter being voted on on the forum. Not for non-members of the council. Why would that be un-democratic? And my question remains, how to we solve the potential non-member voting?

One more issue I have is if we're letting zedlings nominate themselves, why can't we vote "no" on votes? I think there needs to be a reason to vote no - I have recalled times where someone who at least 5 council members (yes, five), didn't think a player would be a good addition to the council, but they got voted onto the council by three (yes, only three) members thought they would be alright. I think there should be some form of "no" vote in a similar way to yes votes - maybe if you get more no votes than yes votes you wouldn't be elected onto the council - most organizations do have a nay in addition to their ayes. That being said, this might be a tangent, or another topic entirely. I thought it was somewhat related, so I thought I'd add it in. Please don't inject this bit into the actual vote or we'll need to kick it to the pre-agenda again.

The one and the most significant objection I have against this, is the same as I had for the topic as a whole. The process must be swift. I don't think anyone wanna spend a majority of the meeting filtering through discussions of whether someone is worthy or not (that is what we are judging them on, by comparing they Ayes to the Nays). That stuff works for forums were people can write whenever they have the time in the day, where dialogs can continue over weeks. We have a fairly limited time slot and a lot of people from different time zones. Let's not strain the time limit further by pointless debate over simple things like this. It must be swift, easy to understand and under no circumstance generate debate whether an individual should or should not be part of the council. That, If anything, reflects poorly on the council.

[ABParadigm]

Um.. which topic? I'm assuming the first one since that's the one I had a complaint about, so I'll base my reply on that. No.. just no. I don't know why this topic was raised to begin with, because I wasn't there, but this is what the topic say in Spectatre's forum post

Not to sound blunt, but everyone in attendance was in agreement that this was a good idea the discussion was mostly circular and the scribe forumulated the current wording by the discussion that was created - they also agreed that the current nomination system is fatally flawed as is. Furthermore, not allowing all zedlings to vote makes very little sense - we already open server votes (i.e., ones regarding updates like updating to 1.13 and updating to 1.14) to be open to all zedlings. In addition, most real-world elections both allow candidates to add themselves to the ballot, and allow the entire population to vote. It seems to work, I don't know why we can't adopt a similar policy.

So, it is a council matter being voted on on the forum. Not for non-members of the council. Why would that be un-democratic? And my question remains, how to we solve the potential non-member voting?

This was a totally different topic, not the one pertaining to non-members of the council being able to vote on nomination. Please note when I say "vote" in this paragraph that it pertains to regulation votes, not nomination votes. This was just so absent council members could be able to have a say on votes rather than it being passed in the same meeting where some of the council members would be unaware of the change until it had already taken place. The vote would still occur during the meeting, the absent members would just be able to cast their ballot ahead of time. If it so happens that the vote changes in the meeting where the vote was originally scheduled to take place, then the topic is (again) sent to the pre-agenda, pending vote, so absent members can alter their votes accordingly.

The one and the most significant objection I have against this, is the same as I had for the topic as a whole. The process must be swift. I don't think anyone wanna spend a majority of the meeting filtering through discussions of whether someone is worthy or not (that is what we are judging them on, by comparing they Ayes to the Nays). That stuff works for forums were people can write whenever they have the time in the day, where dialogs can continue over weeks. We have a fairly limited time slot and a lot of people from different time zones. Let's not strain the time limit further by pointless debate over simple things like this. It must be swift, easy to understand and under no circumstance generate debate whether an individual should or should not be part of the council. That, If anything, reflects poorly on the council.

The process is certainly not swift as it is, nor does it make much sense. If we're allowing zedlings to nominate themselves, I believe we need a nay. There wouldn't be "filtering through discussions of whether someone is worthy or not," there would be a simple aye or nay, and there wouldn't be any discussion other than that. If they get too many nays, they don't make it.
If they get enough ayes, they make it. I have, personally, been in at least a half dozen organizations that do ayes to nays and it isn't done on a written forum - it is done there and now and works without hassle. The ayes and nays are there to prevent discussion, if anything - you don't need to give a reason, you just need to vote yes or no.

I apologize if I was too blunt during any part of this message, I just felt I needed to clarify what was unclear and reform my opinion.

[babybop224]

i think the voting system bow is simpler then how we talking about the new way , but i agree that we should have it in the forum so people that arent at the meeting can vote -purpledolpin224