Voting system - Suggestion

Zuu · Post by **Zuu** » 27 Jun 2004 18:03

We had a discussion at the meeting 2004-06-26 about voting system: how shall we decide if we shall accept an idea or not?

That decisions is included in this document. But I also try to answer "How do I become a developer?", and how shall the votings be organized.

This is just a sugestion. Please send your comments / suggestions.

EDIT 2004-06-28:
I have updated the file. I read the meating log and saw that I missed that users shuld have 66% majority to accept a suggestion. This is changed now.
I removed the rule about what hapend if the result become 50/50.
I removed the rule about how mutch time you shuld spend on the project, to become a developer.
I updated the rule "...working against the goal..." to "...opposite the goal...".
TODO: We have to define the goal of the project. (which I believe is alredy done before.)

Hyronymus · Post by **Hyronymus** » 27 Jun 2004 21:41

Hmm, spending 8 hours a month on it -> how long does an average meeting take? But seriously: not everyone can be busy with the project right from the start. Other people can only kick in once other things have been past. I think a fairer judgement is to ask people what they want to contribute to the game if they want to at all. So let me be the first to play open card: I cannot program C++ (yet) but I do have translation skills (to dutch mainly) and am willing to do that. If documents need to be made or ideas gathered I want to offer my 'skills' too. If not too time consuming I can help drawing stuff. And if noone minds I would love to keep on eye on the management aspects of this game-under-development.

ChrisCF · Post by **ChrisCF** » 28 Jun 2004 00:02

Ideas open to change can probably be voted on by "simple raise of hands" over IRC or by PM (or something).

Anything which will substantially affect the game and cannot easily be undone should be dealt with in slightly more detail.

In this document, I'm not entirely happy with the following:

When developers vote to accept or stop[1] a suggestion these rules are used:
* 0% - 33% raises thier hand => Suggestion is stoped[1].
* 66% - 100% raises thier hand => Suggestion is acepted.
* >33% AND <66% => Users shall decide.

This appears to have been written as if to say that only a YES vote is important, leaving NO votes grouped with those abstaining, making it easy to defeat a motion by boycotting the vote. Some points to consider:

How to cater for non-voters. Do their votes count as an automatic NO?
33% may be a minority, however it may still be a significant proportion. Consider narrowing the margin for "general acceptance" to 20% or less.
Some people might not hold an opinion. Given a known number of people with access to the developer vote, should we impose a minimum turnout? What about those people that want to assert that they are uncertain on the issue?
First-past-the-post may not be suitable for all suggestions. What if we are looking at taking three or four options out of a list?
As previously raised, what qualifies someone for the developer vote? Can they be stripped of their vote? How is such a vote run?
In the case that something is referred to a user vote, why the two-thirds majority? What happens if a two-thirds majority is not in favour? What if there isn't also a two-thirds majority against?

charlieg · Post by **charlieg** » 28 Jun 2004 00:32

Red tape. Too much of.

TE will never get off of the ground if there's too much huff and puff. There is already a worrying amount.

Just go with consensus.

eXinion · Post by **eXinion** » 28 Jun 2004 07:28

ChrisCF wrote:Ideas open to change can probably be voted on by "simple raise of hands" over IRC or by PM (or something).

Anything which will substantially affect the game and cannot easily be undone should be dealt with in slightly more detail.

In this document, I'm not entirely happy with the following:
When developers vote to accept or stop[1] a suggestion these rules are used:
* 0% - 33% raises thier hand => Suggestion is stoped[1].
* 66% - 100% raises thier hand => Suggestion is acepted.
* >33% AND <66% => Users shall decide.
This appears to have been written as if to say that only a YES vote is important, leaving NO votes grouped with those abstaining, making it easy to defeat a motion by boycotting the vote. Some points to consider:

Let's go over them step by step, shall we.
On a side note: The following is my opinion! and nothing more.

How to cater for non-voters. Do their votes count as an automatic NO?

I do not think their votes should be counted as a no, I think votes (among developers) should be expressed via a certain e-mail address. Then everyone will get a message via one of the mailinglists (maybe a new one, only for developers??)

33% may be a minority, however it may still be a significant proportion. Consider narrowing the margin for "general acceptance" to 20% or less.

If 33 % of the developers vote in favor of the idea, it will be accepted, I think narrowing this to 20 % will get almost every idea in the list accepted at once.

Some people might not hold an opinion. Given a known number of people with access to the developer vote, should we impose a minimum turnout? What about those people that want to assert that they are uncertain on the issue?

A minimum turnout is a good idea, but what to do when that turnout isn't reached for, say, 5 times??
For the uncertainty: maybe a blank vote? The idea here is to reach the turnout, but not express any vote.

First-past-the-post may not be suitable for all suggestions. What if we are looking at taking three or four options out of a list?

I'm not sure what you meant with this.

As previously raised, what qualifies someone for the developer vote? Can they be stripped of their vote? How is such a vote run?

If votes are run via some emailaddress, the owner of that e-mail address (and therefore the person that handles the votes) will choose if a vote is valid or not.

In the case that something is referred to a user vote, why the two-thirds majority? What happens if a two-thirds majority is not in favour? What if there isn't also a two-thirds majority against?

If the two-thirds majority is not in favour, the idea is rejected... it's something like a 50-50 vote, but with the odds shifted. The reason we chose this, is because 'a lot' of users must be in favor of the idea, when the developers are, overall, not sure about it. Developing an idea that the developers were not sure about AND the users were not sure about (with a vote total of 51 % or so), is not very fun implementing...

I hope this will give you some idea of what we're doing here

Hyronymus · Post by **Hyronymus** » 28 Jun 2004 07:38

Consensus, as charlieg mentioned, means that the majority is in favour. If the majority doesn't reach a decision the idea is disregarded. This easily prevents a difference between 'real NO-votes (as proposed <33%)' and ideas that just don't get >66% of the votes.
Who will be allowed to vote are those that who appear next meeting and get voiced. Too bad for anyone else. We can't take the whole bunch of enthousiastics into account. If we have sincere doubt about an idea but don't reach a majority we can always decide to run a poll on the forums.

Korenn · Post by **Korenn** » 28 Jun 2004 09:37

Who is accepted as a developer?
# Someone who state that he/she will work with any part of the project.
# Someone that will not work against the goal of the project

not?

Zuu · Post by **Zuu** » 28 Jun 2004 11:34

Korenn wrote:
Who is accepted as a developer?
# Someone who state that he/she will work with any part of the project.
# Someone that will not work against the goal of the project
not?

Wops, against seams to have two meanings..

Zuu · Post by **Zuu** » 28 Jun 2004 13:48

I have updated the file. See my first post. Thanks for all comments.

ChrisCF · Post by **ChrisCF** » 28 Jun 2004 14:31

If 33 % of the developers vote in favor of the idea, it will be accepted, I think narrowing this to 20 % will get almost every idea in the list accepted at once.

Perhaps you misunderstood your own proposal here

It seems we would be rejecting out-of-hand any suggestion where you don't get at least one-third support amongst the developers. My suggestion was that we don't dismiss quite so many ideas out of hand when a number of devs are in favour.

A minimum turnout is a good idea, but what to do when that turnout isn't reached for, say, 5 times??

Exactly. That's why I've raised it as a point to consider. We can avoid situations where a single vote is cast, however we put ourselves at risk of repeatedly polling the same idea.

First-past-the-post may not be suitable for all suggestions. What if we are looking at taking three or four options out of a list?
I'm not sure what you meant with this.

First-past-the-post = everyone votes for one option only, the one or ones receiving most votes are chosen. e.g. if we return to climates, what if a particular idea is everyone's sceond favourite? Using FPTP, it gets rejected, because nobody cast a vote for it while it is still popular.

If the two-thirds majority is not in favour, the idea is rejected

So, only one-third need to be against an idea to stop it, which seems unfair.

PS. The announce mailing list is for announcements only, postings require approval. The discuss list has posting restricted to only those on the list.

eXinion · Post by **eXinion** » 28 Jun 2004 14:38

ChrisCF wrote:
If 33 % of the developers vote in favor of the idea, it will be accepted, I think narrowing this to 20 % will get almost every idea in the list accepted at once.
Perhaps you misunderstood your own proposal here
It seems we would be rejecting out-of-hand any suggestion where you don't get at least one-third support amongst the developers. My suggestion was that we don't dismiss quite so many ideas out of hand when a number of devs are in favour.

Now I get it... That might be a good idea, we'll have to discuss it at the next meeting or so

A minimum turnout is a good idea, but what to do when that turnout isn't reached for, say, 5 times??
Exactly. That's why I've raised it as a point to consider. We can avoid situations where a single vote is cast, however we put ourselves at risk of repeatedly polling the same idea.

Agreed

First-past-the-post may not be suitable for all suggestions. What if we are looking at taking three or four options out of a list?
I'm not sure what you meant with this.
First-past-the-post = everyone votes for one option only, the one or ones receiving most votes are chosen. e.g. if we return to climates, what if a particular idea is everyone's sceond favourite? Using FPTP, it gets rejected, because nobody cast a vote for it while it is still popular.

I agree here too, but we can use multiple polls for the climates, like: a poll for a snow climate, one for a candy climate, and so...

If the two-thirds majority is not in favour, the idea is rejected
So, only one-third need to be against an idea to stop it, which seems unfair.

yes, that's right... If 50-50 is better, we'll use that, it's a matter of opinion

PS. The announce mailing list is for announcements only, postings require approval. The discuss list has posting restricted to only those on the list.

I got that now

I was using another e-mail address for it... and it got rejected

I sent the minutes correctly this time

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