Re: New rules for the elections [was Re: Nomination process should not be public until after deadline]

[Bill Haneman <Bill Haneman Sun COM>]

Vincent Untz wrote:

> Hi Daniel,
>
> Le vendredi 28 octobre 2005 Ã 11:05 -0400, Daniel Veillard a Ãcrit :
>  
>
> > On Fri, Oct 28, 2005 at 03:38:15PM +0200, Vincent Untz wrote:
> >    
> >
> > > On Fri, October 28, 2005 00:21, Olav Vitters wrote:
> > >      
> > >
> > > > I suggest to keep the official candidates and the amount of candidates
> > > > secret until after the nomination deadline. Candidates can of course
> > > > announce their candidacy publicly, but I hope that when the official
> > > > list is not known, nobody will run just because we do not have 11
> > > > persons yet (or something like that). I also hope this avoids the
> > > > not-so-known people from responding when they see the 'big names' on the
> > > > list.
> > > >        
> > > This proposition makes a lot of sense to me. Is there an objection to
> > > this?
> > >      
> >  Well, I would object on the ground that no democracy function that way
> > and it's a strange precedent. Plus it somewhat oppose all free-speech 
> > principle you would find in democracies.
> >    
I have to agree with Daniel that this is a strange notion.  Although I 
understand some of its potential appeal, in the absence of some kind of 
no-confidence process in the event that procrastination results in the 
statutory election of an unsuitable Board, I think it's too high risk 
for Gnome.

Face it - Foundation members as a whole live busy lives, and even active 
partipants are given to procrastination.  This suggestion would make it 
possible that 11 (or even more easily, 7) unsuitable people are elected 
to the Board, and the Foundation would be nearly powerless to do 
anything about it.  It also means that realistically, the knowledge of 
"who's running" would be confined to those "in the know" through private 
communication, IRC, etc.

As Daniel says, not very democratic in the end.

Bill

> I'm not sure I understand. The idea here is that candidates register
> themselves by sending a mail to some e-mail address that is not
> foundation-announce (which is what we've been doing until now).
> Candidates can announce their candidacy publicly if they want. Then, the
> list of candidates is made public.
>
> The only difference is that the e-mail is not sent to
> foundation-announce. Having all the candidates announce themselves on
> foundation-announce kind of make their announce official, while it's
> not.
>
>  
>
> > > Also, I would like to see a rule about Planet GNOME and similar sites:
> > >      
> >  And blocking the media ?
> >  Damn I would not vote for you if you were candidating for a Grenoble's
> > mayor position, that's frigthening...
> >    
>
> I'm not saying we should block the media. I'm saying that we should try
> to let each candidate be able to use the same way to express themselves,
> especially on media that are closely related to GNOME (like Planet
> GNOME).
>
> If you feel having rules for this is wrong, then okay. Just tell me that
> you prefer option a. This is why I'm asking for feedback :-)
>
> Vincent
>
>