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sm-discuss - Re: [SM-Discuss] Project Lead Vote for the remainder of the 2010 term

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  • From: Jeremy Blosser <jblosser-smgl AT firinn.org>
  • To: sm-discuss AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [SM-Discuss] Project Lead Vote for the remainder of the 2010 term
  • Date: Wed, 16 Feb 2011 03:41:24 -0600

On Feb 16, flux [flux AT sourcemage.org] wrote:
> Jeremy Blosser (jblosser-smgl AT firinn.org) wrote [11.02.16 05:45]:
> > The final vote tally is as above, 6 aye, 5 nay, 2 abstain. Our policy
> > states "Votes require a simple majority (greater than 50% of all votes
> > cast) to pass." If we do not count abstentions toward the majority
> > requirement, that's 54 in favor. If we do count abstentions, that's 46%.
> > Under most traditional voting systems abstentions don't get counted,
> > however our policy specifically says "all votes cast", which makes it a
> > count based on the total cast. That was done deliberately, with the
> > intention that abstentions would count so that NOTA votes would matter--we
> > technical people tend to want our NOTA votes to count, even if it means
> > votes fail and have to be tried again.
>
> I have a very different interpretation of those same rules. For me
> abstention is abstention. The abstention vote "counts" in that a lead
> doesn't get demoted for not casting a vote in consecutive voting calls,
> but, IMO, does not count either for or against what is being voted on.

It's not really a question of interpretation. The words are there, I'm the
one that originally wrote them and know what I meant, and even without that
they have a normal meaning in procedural language. Abstentions are "votes
cast". We require at minimum that a majority of the leads participate and
a majority of the votes cast are in favor, which means at minimum the
winner got affirmative votes from a number of developers greater than 25%
the total number of leads.

If you look at how our full voting policy is written this may be more
obvious; really, there should not be "no" votes in an election, even with
one candiate, there should only be that candidate +1 or "abstain":

"Votes MUST be sent via private email to the Project Lead or the Assistant
who called the vote as an ordered list of the candidates or 'abstain'."
...
"Votes require a simple majority (greater than 50% of all votes cast) to
pass."

So really for this particular vote, assuming the "no"s are interpreted as
"abstain", the outcome was 13 votes cast, 6 of them for the one candidate
available.

> If the abstention vote counts in the way you interpret it to, then
> having abstention as an option is moot, because it results in exactly
> the same as just saying 'nay' to begin with (thus, abstention = nay).

Which is correct, and is exactly why it's recommended that normal voting
systems not use percentage of votes cast or "members present". It makes an
abstention equal to a no in that an abstention contributes to the vote
failing. Nevertheless this and other permutations are at times desired,
when a minimum overall affirmative vote is the goal, and even standard
societies have votes that require "majority of membership". In our case we
wanted minimum requirements on participation and affirmative votes to elect
someone.

> I think if that's the way the votes really work, we should either remove
> abstention as an option or at least make it very clear that abstention
> results in nay, rather than true abstention. Otherwise, abstention works
> the way I interpret it to, and perhaps that should also be made more
> clear in our voting policy.

If people want to change the policy moving forward the easiest would be to
specify that people can submit an ordered list of the available candidates,
"none of the above" (counts in the total votes cast), or "present" (does
not count in the total votes cast but does count as having participated).
If we did this though we'd also want to adjust the "majority of leads must
vote" to include a minimum number of affirmative votes required. We didn't
intend a system where every developer votes, all but 2 abstain, and that's
able to elect someone.




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