If I thought 50 was THE RIGHT NUMBER, I wouldn't care what the winner was.

Fair enough. Only enter a first choice then.

To me majority means 50%+1.

In Canada you have more than one person on a ballot (last election, 5, I think) the person with the most votes wins. The party with the most seats in Parliament forms the government. If they have 50%+1 of the seats, they have a majority government. If they have less than 50% of the seats, with the other 50%+ seats being held by (at last count) four other parties, they are still the government, but a minority goverment and can be ganged up on by the other parties and voted down and then our government dissolves and an election has to be called. We had one government that lasted all of six months.

My point, and I don't really have one, is that maybe we need to define our terms before we vote on things.

If I thought 50 was THE RIGHT NUMBER, I wouldn't care what the winner was. if it wasn't 50, it wouldn't be right!

You could vote for 50 alone.

And other people could vote for "fifty, but if not fifty, forty, and if not forty, thirty is OK, but twenty? It'll be a cold day in hell".

Your right to vote for fifty isn't infringed by their right to vote for a cascade of less and less desirable numbers.

And, really sorry you feel that way, PMM. But people are seconding the proposal that we try the prefs-voting thing just the once and see if it's as annoying to take part in as it is to discuss.

OK-- can we agree to stop nattering on about voting methods and such--

Do preferential voting for this round only.

From now on, we will form SIMPLE QUESTIONS.

Can we all agree on this?

We are driving people out of Bureacracy by becoming bureacratic. The whole reason I voted for voting is so that we wouldn't be driving people away from decision making by having long, hard to follow conversations.

Plei speaks for me.

And, really sorry you feel that way, PMM. But people are seconding the proposal that we try the prefs-voting thing just the once and see if it's as annoying to take part in as it is to discuss.

My inner libby gets all sorts of freaked out by extreme regulation, I guess, and as illogical as the slippery slope is, that's what this feels like.

(And in my experience, prefs-voting is even more annoying to do than to discuss, so I'll just be in my corner shuddering in horror.)

extreme regulation

I really don't see the "regulation". If you believe in voting at all then you presumably want us to have a usable, fast-working system that doesn't leave people feeling cheated?

The prefs thing is a very inclusive system which tries, perhaps too hard, to let people feel their votes count.

I really don't see the "regulation". If you believe in voting at all then you presumably want us to have a usable, fast-working system that doesn't leave people feeling cheated?

I voted for voting because I thought it would make a lot of people think they'd be happier, and at least stem some of the more common "I'm not represented" complaints. Not because I want people to get a warm fuzzy about process.

Honestly, however, I'm cynical enough to believe that any system is going to make someone feel cheated, and I think that very inclusive is code for "obfuscatey and confusing to the casual user."

I also disagree that the quorum should be meaninglessly low. If three people want something they should get it? No. Cannot disagree more. Quorum, in our context, is about trying to stop the vocal minority from railroading people.

I agree with Kat. Yet again. I fear we are starting to merge brains.

If one very strange (and nameless) person wants to start a krav maga thread, the only way Ithey win is if no one else votes. And if no one is against a krav thread, why shouldn't there be one.

Because we voted to require a mininum number of votes. That’s the main reason. I assume that the majority of folks who voted for it thought the number would be meaningful. I realize that some--Wolfram I think--voted for it but want the number to be very low. So we have a low option to suit dem folks, and a middle option to suit dose folks, and a high option to suit t’other folks.

I for one thought that “simple majority” meant over 50%. I’m fine with having a plurality win, but that technically wasn’t what I voted for. In other words, I’m fine with keeping it simple and letting the most votes win, even if it’s under 50%.

Also, I don’t see a big difference between this preferential model and a run-off vote, except in the amount of discussion it would generate. But that’s enough.