Re: Elections

[Glynn Foster <Glynn Foster Sun COM>]

Hey,

> (Where was this posted? Somehow I missed it completely, and I think the rest
> of the board at last night's meeting might have too...)

I think it was probably only posted to membership-committee. I meant to
forward it on, but forgot. In any case, the mailing list is open now, so
you can see it in the archives.

> A couple of meetings back, the board decided that we should either stay with
> the status quo, or go with the findings of a casual referendum. There hasn't
> been enough time to have the referendum, so I feel that we should stay with
> the same system (in terms of process *and* technology) as last year. We can
> sort out anonymous voting for next year.

Just out of curiousity, what is a 'casual' referendum? I guess I was
under the impression that posting our intentions to foundation-list was
enough. We got a few people saying 'Hey wait a minute, ...', and there
was enough discussion about it. I don't think there were that many
people who were against it. It seemed mostly confusion about the
process, and the thread seems to have died out.

> Although I think your outline of the process is great (pending some input on
> the security of the IDs and hashing, etc), I don't believe we should shift
> to anonymous voting until we've had the casual referendum, to ensure that
> our membership agrees with the change.

Obviously, speaking for myself, I actually think we should go ahead with
anonymous voting. I mean, no one has cared about the voting system
before, and that was just hacked together at the start of the
foundation. A lot of people haven't even seen the script, or wanted to.
I just don't think a change in process warrants a full referendum,
especially since our bylaws say that the membership-committee are in
control, having been appointed by the board.

Anyway, there's not a huge amount in the bylaws about this, but here's
some stuff from the charter -

=======================
A referendum can be issued by any member of the foundation. 


To be accepted, a request for a referendum must be endorsed by 10% of
the Membership. The maximum number of valid endorsements from Members
affiliated (as defined above) with any one corporation or organization
shall be 5%.


An electronic voting system will be established online, with members
voting on a web page or by e-mail. In order for a referendum to pass,
1/3d of the total membership must participate, and 2/3ds of the
participating members must approve. There will be a mailing list for all
of the members, and all referenda must be announced to the list by the
initiator before they are opened on the voting system. At least three
days must pass before the referendum is closed, and no referendum can
remain open for longer than fourteen days.
========================

Not much else other than that. I guess if we're all in disagreement we
could just hold a quick referendum *before* the elections. We have
plenty of time to do this it seems. I still stand that we should just
use the JFDI principle ;)

Glynn