[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: [atlarge-discuss] On the Polling Booth



At 05:57 a.m. 31/05/2003, you wrote:
A bit of history...

A prior organization, the IDNO, utilized Joop's Polling Booth. Experience
with this mechanism resulted in the criticism that "only things that meet Joop's
approval get voted on, and that when votes are going against his wishes,
mysteriously the vote swings his way just hours before the polling closes".
Since this part of the IDNO Archives is still open and accessible everybody can read what really was said and done.
The above was not factual criticism, but an accusation by Mr Walsh (aka WXW) who sought (and succeeded) to control the IDNO in order to shut it down.

There was one occasion, I forgot which one, vote where it could indeed be observed that a vote that was originally to Mr Walsh ' liking and then turned for the opposing side of the argument to finally win.

I observed it while it happened, Mr Walsh observed it and every voter who checked intermediate results could have observed it too.
The accusation that I had anything to do with it is false and slanderous. While every member was free to remind his friends to vote, including Walsh, I only sent a voting reminder to *all* the members and in a scrupulously neutral fashion.
It is all in he archives.

That Danny now brings up Walsh' unsubstantiated accusations to discredit the one tool that could help us to self-organize faster, reflects only on Danny Younger himself. There are people who cleverly says the "right things" re ICANN but yet may be an active part of the forces that want to see us fail as a non-US organization.

Additional criticism focused on the proprietary aspects of the booth (it is
not open source and there are no tools to audit the results). In short, it was
perceived by some as a devise which allowed one man's particular agenda to
dominate.
Every Poll has that aspect when one person asks the questions and determines the choice of answers. From Judith's Mermelstein's "mini-poll" , to Jefsey'(+Bruces?) questionnaire.

The way to dilute or prevent bias is to give *every member* the right to submit polling questions to the Polling Commission.

The focus of our effort should not be on the software, but on the Rules that must govern its use. On creating a Charter that will not allow a single person to devise the questions and the answer options.
To make sure that the operator of any software carries out the will of elected people.


I have no reason to trust this tool.
Are you already a member?


It is amenable to manipulation. When
the creator of the Polling Booth is at liberty to review whatever poll/vote is
in progress and then contact his associates to cast last-minute votes should
the pending outcome not be to his liking, then you do not have a tool suitable
for the membership's voting purposes.

Unless *all voters* can do the same. Then such opportunities are equal for all.

-joop-


---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: atlarge-discuss-unsubscribe@lists.fitug.de
For additional commands, e-mail: atlarge-discuss-help@lists.fitug.de