[Discussion] Streamlining voting process.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I'm proposing an edition to the voting and discussion rules whereby:

1. Discussions are limited to 4 days, with a minimum discussion length of 3 days. At the end of 4 days, the measure must either be seconded or tabled within the space of another 24 hours; the measure cannot be validly seconded before 3 days have passed. This guarantees at least 72 hours of debate while setting a firm limit on the course of discussions.

2. Voting period is reduced from 7 days to 6 days. This is the minimum possible which guarantees at least two weekend (friday, saturday, sunday) and two weekday (monday, tuesday, weds, thurs) days in combination in any voting thread no matter when it is started. This is a reasonable length of time to let Senators vote while still at least slightly speeding up the voting process.

3. Votes are automatically closed and the decision immediately implemented if the vote passes the level of mathematical certainty (i.e., where any remaining votes cannot reverse the standing result).

The basic goal is that all the results of all measures should be known in 10 - 11 days. This substantially speeds up the current process and guarantees a fixed timetable will be followed.

This measure is being proposed in response to the interesting line of complaints wherein the Senate is judged as being ineffective and spending to long talking about issues instead of acting to resolve them in a timely fashion.

I am merely proposing this measure as a possible solution for those complaints, and if anyone has any objections please, let's hear them, as it may be the measure is unnecessary or inappropriate, but since these concerns were brought before the Senate I have decided to represent them with this measure.

[RedImperator]

I think this is a pretty good idea, actually. It would solve the problem of the "discussion" that goes on forever and then peters out without a vote, and I agree that 7 days is probably more than enough to keep a vote thread open.

[The Yosemite Bear]

but I wanna fillibuster....

[Knife]

Disagree, not everyone is one everyday and have to become updated biweekly or more. Honestly, it's a bbs, I can't think of an issue that has to be resolved in a week or so with detrimental problems.

[Kuroneko]

As formal rules modifications, I think they're superfluous, or, in the case of the second, unwarranted.

There have been proposals regarding discussion rules in the past, but to my knowledge the current procedure is more a matter of general agreement and etiquette than formalities (as far as I'm aware of, there has not been an actual vote on this, unless I've managed to completely miss it, in which case please pardon my absent-mindedness). That's all it needs to be--if some senator considers an issue pressing enough, just let him or her motion for vote sooner.

The second simply isn't worthwhile.

As for the third proposal, if by "automated", you mean "scripted", then it's too much of a hassle, since polls that are both fast and one-sided enough are also uncommon enough to be dealt with a case-by-case basis. If you simply mean calling for implementation on a vote that has been decided on before the time limit, that's certainly a good idea, and would technically not be against current rules so long as the poll remains open for voting until normal experation. Since this affects Mr. Wilkens the most and the senate has already dumped too many obligations on his shoulders, I'd say that would primarily be his decision.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Disagree, not everyone is one everyday and have to become updated biweekly or more. Honestly, it's a bbs, I can't think of an issue that has to be resolved in a week or so with detrimental problems.

I agree with this, and with Kuroneko. If someone feels that an issue is sufficiently pressing, let them motion for a vote after a few days of discussion. Furthermore, I'm not seeing the real value-added utility for making the voting open for one day less than it is now. It's not as though the extra day will cause the collapse of Imperial rule and the rise of rule by Testingstanis. Finally, the Senate really doesn't have much say as to what happens to things after we vote on them; as the implementation Senate votes falls largely upon the board staff.

[Ender]

keep it as is.

[Ted C]

1. Discussions are limited to 4 days, with a minimum discussion length of 3 days. At the end of 4 days, the measure must either be seconded or tabled within the space of another 24 hours; the measure cannot be validly seconded before 3 days have passed. This guarantees at least 72 hours of debate while setting a firm limit on the course of discussions.

I'm dubious about this one. Four days sounds rather brief.

2. Voting period is reduced from 7 days to 6 days. This is the minimum possible which guarantees at least two weekend (friday, saturday, sunday) and two weekday (monday, tuesday, weds, thurs) days in combination in any voting thread no matter when it is started. This is a reasonable length of time to let Senators vote while still at least slightly speeding up the voting process.

Better. Once the issue has come to a vote, it should resolve quickly, although I don't see how reducing the the limit by one day makes that much difference.

3. Votes are automatically closed and the decision immediately implemented if the vote passes the level of mathematical certainty (i.e., where any remaining votes cannot reverse the standing result).

This one definitely makes sense. There's no reason to delay implementation once the outcome of a vote is certain, although I see no reason to close the poll if there are Senators who still want to cast their votes just to formally register their opinions.

[LadyTevar]

Ain't broke, don't fix it.

Don't you have better things to do than bring up non-issues, Marina?

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Ain't broke, don't fix it.

Don't you have better things to do than bring up non-issues, Marina?

I've received enough PMs from Testing people saying this aspect of the Senate's operations was broken, and that they wanted a quicker, more efficient Senate--Mr. Coffee's that I posted here in the Senate was most notable--that I decided I could spare five minutes for this.

[Connor MacLeod]

Making changes just to satisfy other people seems pretty silly to me. Fact is there's going to be people who will hate the Senate no matter what is done, simply because it SD.net and SD.net loves to have targets (and people always have their targets). I'm fucking tired of the whole "Senate vs Testing" BS because its just more drama, just more polarization, and just more personal grudges (on both sides, ,because its been ppl in Testing AND the Senate both that have fanned the flames.)

[The Duchess of Zeon]

Well, I was thinking to remove some of the ire by formally making proposals from Testing toward Senate modifications with this thread, that's all.

[Connor MacLeod]

I'd be happy if you could, but the fact is I think at least some of hte ire is motivated by people having a "Target" to latch onto. The phenomenon of "chew toy" isn't unkonwn here after all, its something of a tradition (Good, bad or whatever, you take your choice.) and usually when you have "duellists" each tends to view the otehr as a chew toy.

If there's really a problem that we somehow need Senate feedback on and need it rapidly, why not just impose some "quick-rules" - we dont even need the entire Senate to decide it or even vote. Or (even better in my mind) Just let the mods/Supermods/Admins decide. (though I expect we'll starrt seeing people bitch more about that, so really what we'd be doing is spreading around the targets.)

Edit: considering that there are people who dislike being "tied down" to the Senate (IE the events leading up to Sonnenburg's departure.) this idea seems reasonable, as long as we can pick some reasonably fair people for the "quick" process. I know I dislike the idea and I wouldnt mind having a group of people dedicated ot making such "rapid" decisions without need of my input.

Another thing we can do to streamline things is to just raise the bar on requirements for certain kinds of "issues." If we're goign to have another "Someone needs to be punished" thread, we incorporate much stricter standards of evidence and demand it be coherently presented (rather than "here, I think this guy/gal is being a dick and needs to be punished, find the evidencec for it for me on your own in this massive thread") and if the standards aren't met (either for evidence or cohernecy) its summarily tossed out until they prove otherwise.

And if we get people (Senators, or whatever) developing a history of frivolous or "personal" grrudges being aired here, then we can just start instituting punishment (say, if a Senator does this again, ,we strip him of his/her Senate status for an indefinite period, with repeat offenses elading to permanant removal.) Same for non-Senate folk who decide to do the same.

And as a final measure, if a Senator is directly involved in the issue, he/she cannot directly bring it to the attnetion of the Senate. (Non-Senate folk can't do this anyhow) It should be assumed that a Senator will only post this if it is deemed "worth" posting. (And again, if its not or if a Senator involved ignores this, then its tossed out summarily.)

[CmdrWilkens]

Here are my thoughts:

- For anything which requires immediate attention the Mods/Admins have always had authority to act. Virtually nothing within the real of the Senate's responsibilities (policies, rules, perma ban polls (not all permabans), and ser groups) should require attention in a time period less than a week. For raging idiot trolls the Admins have the power, and at one point the proclivity, to ban on site. I think it bears reiterating that the Senate is deigned as the slower and more deliberate (and transparent) version of board administration. The quick choices shoudl remain in the hands of the Admines. I think more Mod/Admin activity would be preferrable above trying to get a body as large as the Senate to act quickly.

- That said I think speeding voting up is an admirable idea. Within that I would suggest a few changes, that we could incorporate in the rules update I'm still working on.
1) Any vote which has reached mathmatical certainty may be closed upon reaching that point and the decision impelemtned
and/or
2) Voting runs for 4 work days with a work day being defined as any day 12 noon GMT Monday through 11:59pm GMT Friday

I will have more but that will be when i can get a comprehensive rules revision before everyone.

[Kuroneko]

Well, I was thinking to remove some of the ire by formally making proposals from Testing toward Senate modifications with this thread, that's all.

That's a good idea, but probably not necessary by this point, since the HoC vote is now near certainty. The HoC will probably accelerate discussions both due to the viewpoints it brings and by providing additional social pressure to address whatever issue the rest of the board feels important (and if there is no such perception about some topic, then there's probably no reason to rush it either). Meanwhile, there's also the contrary concern of the Senate becoming bloated in legalese to consider.

The third proposal is a good idea, and there's even nothing in either the letter or spirit of the rules to prevent it even without amending them, since the poll can stay open for the full week without it affecting the decision.

[The Yosemite Bear]

mind you I'm one of those with odd work hours, sometimes I dissaapear for a few days (like the funeral I went to earlier this year, or my crashes over the last two years)

[Mad]

1. Discussions are limited to 4 days, with a minimum discussion length of 3 days. At the end of 4 days, the measure must either be seconded or tabled within the space of another 24 hours; the measure cannot be validly seconded before 3 days have passed. This guarantees at least 72 hours of debate while setting a firm limit on the course of discussions.

I disagree; fast-tracking discussions isn't conducive to making the best decision. If a motion is forced early, before the subject has been thought out well enough, the vote will probably fail and several days will have elapsed before the process can repeat itself with a more thought-out motion.

Constituents can always PM Senators if a subject they feel strongly about isn't getting enough attention. If that isn't working, then the subject probably isn't important to the Senate at that time. Under this proposal, the subject will simply get forcibly tabled and then it'll be even longer before any further action can take place.

Nobody benefits.

The real solution is to get the Senate to care about the subject that is apparently being ignored.

2. Voting period is reduced from 7 days to 6 days. This is the minimum possible which guarantees at least two weekend (friday, saturday, sunday) and two weekday (monday, tuesday, weds, thurs) days in combination in any voting thread no matter when it is started. This is a reasonable length of time to let Senators vote while still at least slightly speeding up the voting process.

But what if Thursday is my free day and the vote starts on Friday?

A week should allow more people to vote. Proposal #3 helps to make Proposal #2 moot. But there's still a catch...

3. Votes are automatically closed and the decision immediately implemented if the vote passes the level of mathematical certainty (i.e., where any remaining votes cannot reverse the standing result).

Sounds fair.

However, there's still that catch: we've had votes pass before and no action taken. Speeding up the voting process isn't going to guarantee that action is taken more quickly.

[Coyote]

The real solution is to get the Senate to care about the subject that is apparently being ignored.

How about a Senator can ask the Whip to use his magic Group PM list to nudge folks to look into a subject if it appears there's no traffic? Say, after... 3 days from the time it has posted?

[CmdrWilkens]

The real solution is to get the Senate to care about the subject that is apparently being ignored.

How about a Senator can ask the Whip to use his magic Group PM list to nudge folks to look into a subject if it appears there's no traffic? Say, after... 3 days from the time it has posted?

Senator's can alway nudge the Whip, or nudge the Admins, or nudge the Admins to nudge the Whip.

That being said I'll explain, at least to a degree, why I do what I do in terms of riding herd on discussions:

I've essentially manuevered, rather publicly admittedly, into a position where I can exert an amount of influence in the Senate compeletely disproportionate to my ability to physically enact any changes. That being said it also makes me very sensitive to the charge of over reaching. I know it can come across as me being alternatively overbearing on the Senate and then under-involved. It stems from the fact that as Whip I have just enough rope to hang myself but not enough to actually corral this forum so right now I tend not to push unless there is at least the beginning of a consensus. That means I ride herd on a very subjective basis but the basis is mostly centered on whether on not I feel that my intrusion into the discussion could be seen as over-reaching.

So yeah that was a long speech rather tangentially related to this discussion but I think it bears speaking.

On the main topic I think the proposal to get a Chancellor in here (and I'd be fine if it is or isn't me) with power enough to implement changes would go a long way to improving things as would the insta-implementation when a vote reaches mathmatical certainty.

[Connor MacLeod]

How we streamline it and what we do probably depends on two things: Fairness vs speed. I dont think you can quite do both, depending on how "reasonably" fair you want to be, but my impression was that part of the reason for the Senate's existence is to take away the idea that the "Mods are acting unilaterally/unfairly/overlordish" or whatever, despite the fact we know its not a democratic board. Fine, but then I guess that also means things are slow, because you're adding more people to the pool, so to speak, and things always get more complicated.

Of course, if thats true, ,then it seems to me people (some people at leasT) are complaining because the Senate is too slow/unwieldy/cumbersome and that somehow creates/exacerbates drama, but the fact it ever came about tends to suggest there were people who were annoyed with the pre-Senate system as well. Which again brings me to my point that "someone is always going to bitch about it no matter what we do." for whatever reason they choose.

Also how "fast" is fast exactly do we want it? Just a little faster, or alot faster? If its the latter case, then excluding or limiting Senate involvement is probably the ideal solution (and if people bitch about it later they can go to hell IMHO )