[atlarge-discuss] voting and polling

["James Love" <james.love@cptech.org>]

I think TR deserves to have a new title...

In my mind, TR is discussing a substantive and strategic issue.  How might
one structure feedback loops from a large public.

1.  One issue is should the GA operate a lot differently from an at large,
even though there currently is no at large recognized by ICANN, and the DNSO
also doesn't have an individual constituency.

2.  Another issue is should the votes on substantive matters by public or
private, in either the GA or an at large.  Does the transparency of who
voted for what make the votes more meaningful?

3.   Another issue concerns how frequently one might want to hold votes or
polls, or how much of an exceptional circumstance this might be.   There are
pluses and minus for doing lots of few votes.   Part of the problem concerns
voter fatigue (and turnout), or the non-durable nature of a particular vote,
when there is continual voting, for example, on the same issue.

WRT 3, there is something to be said for mailed ballots, in that sends a
signal that a vote will be "important" and be enshrined and recorded in a
way that makes it "important" to campaign for a particular point of view to
be endorsed.  One might also have multiple feedback systems.  One observes
very little use of some web  based polling mechanisms.  But even these could
be more interesting if there were ways to address who could vote, and how
the poll results influenced real decisions.  Votes on leadership are real
decisions.  Many policy issues in the ICANN context seem to be advisory,
since the ICANN board has so much power, and TR is correct that the DNSO is
a funny animal.

There is also strategy.  How does one deal with very bad proposals for ICANN
"reform" when ICANN has crushed mechanisms for registering public opinion,
such as burying the existing very large at large voter roll, which only
ICANN can use, and which ICANN refusses to use.

Which is why, in the short run, I push for votes in the GA.  Of course,
having TR tell reporters the votes are meaningless stupid exercises, isn't
helpful.

 Jamie

----- Original Message -----
From: "Thomas Roessler" <roessler@does-not-exist.org>
To: "Micheal Sherrill" <micheal@beethoven.com>; "atlarge discuss list"
<atlarge-discuss@lists.fitug.de>
Sent: Friday, May 31, 2002 4:02 AM
Subject: [atlarge-discuss] T.R. had a coffee this morning.


: Congratulations.  We now have a "what does Thomas Roessler do or
: think" thread across no less than three mailing lists, it seems.
: That's a really sensible use of everyone's time and bandwidth.  May
: I suggest that you focus on issues instead of people?
:
: To make this abundantly clear: I have some views on what tools are
: more (or less) appropriate for the GA (votes are not, open polls
: are; as far as substantial topics are concerned).  I have these
: views for a reason.  This reason does not apply to an at-large
: membership - the opposite is true: Votes _are_ an appropriate tool
: for an at-large membership organization.  But then again, I'm not
: going to stop you (in fact, how should I even do that?) from using
: open polls if you prefer that.  Thus, it seems like we are in
: "violent agreement" on the substance of what I said, as far as the
: at-large membership is concerned.
:
:
: On 2002-05-30 21:40:32 -0400, Micheal Sherrill wrote:
:
: >Thomas Roessler has just given us his personal goals.
:
: No.
:
: On 2002-05-31 01:23:53 -0400, Micheal Sherrill wrote:
:
: >We would all profit by thinking through what we want to say before
: >touching the keyboard.
:
: Yes, indeed.
:
: --
: Thomas Roessler                          http://log.does-not-exist.org/
:
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