[OpenID board] International Liaison board vote

Chris Messina chris.messina at gmail.com
Fri Jan 16 18:42:38 UTC 2009


I think that the medium to some degree determines when transparency applies.

I'm sensitive to Brian's point that revealing the current voting
trends could lead to a kind of groupthink behavior, where those who,
say, haven't participated in the discussions recently, will vote with
the majority.

That said, while consistency between BOD calls and online polls seems
desirable, there is a qualitative difference in our ability to
deliberate openly and discuss the issue of the vote in real-time
before taking a vote, whereas online, discussions can span much longer
periods of time and involve a greater number of participants, on and
off the mailing list.

One aspect that might persuade me to want voting tallies to be made
public while the vote is underway is the number of eligible voters on
a vote. For example, the current voting description says that "Members
can cast 1 vote" -- does that mean that ALL members of the OIDF can
vote? This seems like a rather larger potential number of voters than
on a typical board call — in which case transparency would work
against our cause (playing to Brian's groupthink point).

According to Section 3.1b of the Bylaws, regular members are entitled
to vote, as they were in the elections, so it therefore appears that
the larger number of potential voters suggests that tally of web-based
polls ought be kept confidential until the vote expires.

While we're on this subject, I strongly think that we need better
guidelines and procedures when calling a vote. I don't want to
overwhelm us with process, but a simple outline of what's at stake,
who's proposing it, how things are currently done and any discussion
-- would be extremely helpful in informing the membership of why a
vote has been called and what the desired outcome is.

To that end, I started a stub page which could use some work --
hopefully from folks who are more familiar with the voting process.
The Bylaws are noticeably weak in terms of guidance on how normal
polls are conducted, so perhaps this page could help us flesh out the
optimal procedure.

https://openid.pbwiki.com/Polls

Chris

On Fri, Jan 16, 2009 at 9:42 AM, David Recordon <david at sixapart.com> wrote:
> Agreed with DeWitt.  I believe there are also requirements in terms of
> notice and period of the vote in the bylaws which Dick and Scott looked into
> a month or two ago.
> I also would like to see us come up with some informal guidelines about how
> much prior discussion should be allowed for before an online vote.  On the
> phone we have time to discuss a matter and I'd hate to see us use the online
> tool as a mechanism to ever cut short fruitful discussion –-- which I am
> *not* saying happened in this case –-- and force a vote.
> --David
>
> On Jan 16, 2009, at 9:25 AM, DeWitt Clinton wrote:
>
> [Moving to the board public list.]
>
> Thanks, Brian.  That worked rather well.  I really appreciate the online
> ballots.
>
> Each BoD member's voting record will be made public after the ballot closes,
> correct?  I know our meeting minutes sometimes, but not always, record who
> voted which way in the case of non-unanimous decisions.  The inconsistency
> is likely just because we haven't discussed a policy here, not any
> intentional effort to keep things secret.  Personally I'd rather we just
> established the policy to always make the BoD voting records public, but I'd
> be interested to hear arguments for or against.
>
> I also noticed that, for this ballot, the running record is being hidden
> from the electorate.  For a BoD vote we can probably make the ongoing record
> visible to the eligible voters; just like it would be if we voted
> in-person.  We should strive to be consistent between the online and offline
> processes so there is no question about one being more or less legitimate.
>
> Thoughts?
>
> -DeWitt
>
> On Fri, Jan 16, 2009 at 8:48 AM, Brian Kissel <bkissel at janrain.com> wrote:
>>
>> Hello All,
>>
>> For some reason the email notification for the polling system is still not
>> working.  Please go to https://openid.net/foundation/members/polls and
>> select the International Liaison to OIDF board Executive Committee poll.
>>
>>
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>> Brian
>>
>> ___________
>>
>>
>>
>> Brian Kissel
>>
>> CEO, JanRain - OpenID-enable your websites, customers, partners, and
>> employees
>>
>> 5331 SW Macadam Ave., Suite 375, Portland, OR 97239
>>
>> Email: bkissel at janrain.com     Cell: 503.866.4424     Fax: 503.296.5502
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> __________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
>> signature database 3772 (20090116) __________
>>
>> The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.
>>
>> http://www.eset.com
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> board-private mailing list
>> board-private at openid.net
>> http://openid.net/mailman/listinfo/board-private
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> board mailing list
> board at openid.net
> http://openid.net/mailman/listinfo/board
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> board mailing list
> board at openid.net
> http://openid.net/mailman/listinfo/board
>
>



-- 
Chris Messina
Citizen-Participant &
  Open Web Advocate-at-Large

factoryjoe.com # diso-project.org
citizenagency.com # vidoop.com
This email is:   [ ] bloggable    [X] ask first   [ ] private



More information about the board mailing list