From the time of being voted down, I think.

I'd say a 24 hour period for seconding is too short. Wolfram, for example, has 3 and it's only been a few hours, but some people can't access the board every few hours. I was off for over 24 just yesterday/day before.

Please ignore the crazy person. I forgot where I was.

For selfish reasons I'm inclined to say 48 too, but I honestly think 24 is long enough for sufficient active members to see a proposal and second if they want to. And as long as it can be re-motioned after a week (without having to wait the 3 or 6 month period) I think 24 hours is sufficient.

I actually think this (the how long from seconding) could be aded to this proposal.

For selfish reasons I'm inclined to say 48 too, but I honestly think 24 is long enough for sufficient active members to see a proposal and second if they want to.

From the voting patterns we've seen, the majority of voters do their voting in the first 24 hours. It might be worth cosidering (just as a strategic point for folks doing proposals) that if you propose something on Saturday you might have less chance of getting your seconds than on a Tuesday (during the day). But we'll just leave that notion out there as a bit of parliamentary cunning.

One topic at a time, critters, one topic at a time.

I advocate 3 and 6 as choices, and am campaigning for 6. Because of the "didn't we just discuss this?" factor, and because imagine if someone really really wanted a Nutty's Cottage Cheese Butt Thread, and it got voted down, and she kept bringing it up every interval she could -- we'd be formally debating Cheese Butts four times a year! And imagine if this happened with more than one thread proposal, four times a year each! We'd never get anything done.

So, 6 months is best. "Except under obvious emergency".

Huh, I think Nutty's butt just convinced me.

I think actual voting people do soon, but for people to mosey on over to somewhere to second something? might take longer (though I suppose the suggestor could go to some other thread and say "yo, I know you you and you are in favor of this, come second me!").

I definitely agree a year is too long. I vote 5, just to be contrary.

(And Sean's earlier statement is tripping my "say something lascivious" button, but I'm trying not to).

(really trying hard)

My two cents - go with the 3 months and 6 months as the choices (1 year is wayyy too long in internet time).

I see good points for either selection. I tend to like new threads (even if I don't post in them), so I feel new thread votes could be brought back up every three months without much friction. Other issues, though, require more "space". In my final analysis, I think the benefit of that outweighs the need for gratification of new threads, so I believe 6 months would be the best period of time.

because imagine if someone really really wanted a Nutty's Cottage Cheese Butt Thread

You have got to quit running down your ass. It's a perfectly nice behind.

So, 6 months is best. "Except under obvious emergency".

Since we've got several days (and most folks seem to be favoring the right, i.e., 6 months, answer) I'd suggest that a time-sensitive issue could bump a less pressing issue. So if, for example, banning were an issue decided by vote and that issue came up while there was a thread-adding discussion in Lightbulb, it could be moved to bump the thread issue for the nonce, deal with the banning, then return and discuss the thread again afterwards.

By what mechanism? I don't know. Probably seconding. But I'd stress that folks not abuse this process because if disruptions become the norm then there will be resistance about letting something like seconding (a fairly light and easy trigger to effect) drive it.