I didn't consider when voting whether or not simple majority meant more than 50% in cases of more than two options. HOWEVER, my understanding of the discussion that preceded that item was majority vs. supermajority, and that a yes vote was just opposition to supermajority. Can we just assume that it meant no on supermajority and ignore the implication for votes with more than two options? It just seems that in a case with two interpretations, we should go with the less restrictive one-- and I see that as not also including a limitation on multiple item ballots.

See, I still think that for this issue only

I could be persuaded on this if it were clearly marked as Just This Once and there was some agreement in principle to simplicity. Not that my being persuaded is decisive, but my gut feeling is that we're kind of the in-the-beltway people of the board and it's better for us to wonk-out and produce infrequent and simple vote choices that can produce obvious results.

OK, I have to go home and I'm busy most of the evening so some final words:

Some folks don't want preferential balloting because "it's too complicated" or because they think a decision reached by a small plurality will be "good enough". I disagree. What I propose is that for this next round of voting, we try it out on the Votor Turnout" and "Seconds" questions. I will tabulate and post detailed results. If there are still complaints, we can vote on whether to ever do it again. I would just ask that we don't rule it out without trying it, because I think that some (not all, but some) of the objections will go away when folks see it in action.

I'm with ita and Lyra. The most.

Yup.

There is, however, a large disadvantage and I'm just going to keep pointing this out. It's more complicated.

I have to admit, I don't get this. I mean, yeah, if you're the vote-counter, then it's more complicated. (Though as John noted, not so complicated that you can't manage it via a simple spreadsheet.) But if you're a voter, all you need to do is rank the options. First, second, third, fourth. That's it. Count from 1 to 4 (assuming four options).

The disadvantage of the plurality of votes is that you can easily have a winner that most people don't like. In short, you can have over half the voters get shafted. It's not a system set up to deal with situations where you have more than two genuinely viable options.

Again: this is only an issue, at all, where there are more than two genuinely viable options. And it's in these cases that a plurality system can shaft over half the voters. On occasion it'll turn up the option furthest from a Buffista consensus.

Some folks don't want preferential balloting because "it's too complicated"

I said that.

or because they think a decision reached by a small plurality will be "good enough".

I said that.

I disagree

Ut! It's almost like you are disagreeing with me!

Which is fine. I'm amenable to trying things out, seeing how people respond to preferential voting. I'm not convinced that I have the right answers here. I am going to keep pushing in the direction of Good Enough as a check, and want to see new proposals defended against the argument that they're not worth the time or effort or thought. That it uses up some board capital to hold a vote, and we should be careful how we spend that.

Addendum, so maybe I am arguing for only having yes/no or choose-between-two-things votes. And that we use consensus to shape things that way.

Okay, I thought we were proceeding with things like the Roberts Rules and other board type votes. We should keep all votes to yes/no and hash it out in consensus. Here's how it might work in a voter turnout context:

Buffista 1 moves that 10 voters need to vote in order to meet the minimum number. Buffista 2 seconds the motion (and however other seconds necessary). Discussion. On the ballot the question reads: Do you think 10 Buffistas should constitute the minimum number for each vote to count? yes/no

Buffista 3 moves that 30 voters need to vote in order to meet the minimum number. Buffista 4 seconds the motion (and however other seconds necessary). Discussion. On the ballot the question reads: Do you think 30 Buffistas should constitute the minimum number for each vote to count? yes/no

And so on. This is really the way I envisioned voting when I voted on the first ballot of all yes/no items, and I think most people did as well. No offense to preferential voting, Aiiiiiiuseeriiiliian voting, progressive voting, non-essential voting, etc., but I think we should keep it simple.

I have to admit, I don't get this.

Let me put it this way. It's not too complicated for people to understand if they spend the time in this thread reading the arguments and coming to a decision. It's too complicated if we ask the voters to spend a lot of energy reading through the issues. That asking for a large commitment to governance of the board is itself a mistake. I pushed for voting because I believe it will lessen certain frictions in the board and because I felt like consensus had gotten unwieldy and wasn't producing accurate results (the will of the people). And I have always been fairly involved in Bureaucracy so it's natural for me to be interested in this stuff. But I feel that while there is some recognition that voting would be useful, that there's also resistance (culturally, individually) to commiting beyond a few simple processes.

Wolfram-- that won't work if we place a moratorium on talking about the same issues once they have been voted on.

I envision it more like:

1. I move that we decide a minimum number of Buffistas should vote in order for the vote to count.

2. A number of Buffistas agree we should discuss it.

3. We post something in press saying "Hey- we're discussing this.

4. We vote yes or no to this.

5. We then commence discussing the number

6. We post to Press that we are discussing the number.

7. We come up with a consensus of 1 or 2 numbers

8. We vote.

OK-- that seems worse then preferential voting!

I think that with most questions, we'll be able to narrow it down. Think of the example of the spoiler policy for Buffy/Angel. We had a pretty good consensus that a week was a good time to wait. Then we can vote yes/no on that.

Let me put it this way. It's not too complicated for people to understand if they spend the time in this thread reading the arguments and coming to a decision. It's too complicated if we ask the voters to spend a lot of energy reading through the issues.

It's also not too complicated if we say "just rank your preferences in order from 1 to 4" and let them do so. If a person doesn't want to read through all this stuff (which is eminently fair enough), they don't have to in order to vote. I feel there's a lot of confusion being generated that you somehow need to understand the system fully to use it.

Seriously, Australia is not known as a nation where politics is a national obsession; but its populace still manages to navigate this system. Many of them, I'm sure, don't really know how it works from there, but they know what's required for a vote, and if they do want to know more then they can.

I pushed for voting because I believe it will lessen certain frictions in the board and because I felt like consensus had gotten unwieldy and wasn't producing accurate results (the will of the people). And I have always been fairly involved in Bureaucracy so it's natural for me to be interested in this stuff. But I feel that while there is some recognition that voting would be useful, that there's also resistance (culturally, individually) to commiting beyond a few simple processes.

I agree; but I don't see ranking as anything but a simple process. And I think that the next time we have a proposal with more than two viable options, if we've chosen plurality we'll find out that it wasn't the simpler and less fractious option.