Re: Don't disclose election results

On 6/6/2014 12:11 AM, Delfi Ramirez wrote:
>
> Dear Jeff, dear all:
>
> My apologies if my assertion "to introduce democratic procedural 
> methods for the W3C." has lead to a misunderstood.
>
> Far from my intention was to considero think that  the current 
> election methods are non-democratic, but to emphatize yourdecision for 
> a revision and ehnancement of the election system.
>

OK, thanks, no worries.

> best
>
> On 2014-06-06 05:31, Jeff Jaffe wrote:
>
>>
>> On 6/4/2014 6:44 PM, Delfi Ramirez wrote:
>>>
>>> Dear all:
>>>
>>> I have been quietly and deeply following yourconversation/discussion 
>>> about the possibility to introduce democratic procedural methods for 
>>> the W3C.
>>>
>>
>> I would be interested in why you think the current election methods 
>> are not democratic.
>>
>> There are many ways to run an election; each has advantages and 
>> disadvantages.  Some have argued passionately on this thread for STV; 
>> others have said that is too complicated.  But in any case, I don't 
>> understand why it would be characterized as not democratic.
>>
>>> As a public participant of this group, and not being affiliated 
>>> --yet --  with any corp that can represent a candidate,  I agree 
>>> completely with the observations of Charles expressed in the last 
>>> email.-
>>>
>>> There is the need to be cautios publishing data, even if we advocate 
>>> for an open web.
>>>
>>> There is also the need for transparency and the use of democratic 
>>> methods like elections are. Even if we all belong to different 
>>> cultures or scenarios. And considering the W3C as a consortium. I do 
>>> not see this as problem, but as an advantage.
>>>
>>> Consortiums may advocate and put in practice for themselves 
>>> democratic behaviours and protocols internally. This is good. It 
>>> brings whealth and health to the consortium and, besides,  
>>> tangential value for the companies who take part of this consortium.
>>>
>>> Being a public member, with no other interest than to spread and 
>>> advocate  the goods of web standards and apply them in fields of 
>>> work within companies or in companies, I would be pleased to see 
>>> that the consortium has similar democratic rules as a held has with 
>>> its stakeholders or leveraged shareholders. A reduced but positive 
>>> election system.
>>>
>>> To vote means to participate, and to participate means offering 
>>> solutions and work.
>>>
>>> My interests and appreciation for the work done by the W3C, where I 
>>> have been kindly invited and where I am taking part since the year 
>>> 1999,  is mainly because I consider it focused on a public common, 
>>> this is the web standards, and the web.
>>>
>>> As it is said before, to preserve the quality and excellence of the 
>>> work done by Chairsand Commitee of the W3C, the observations of 
>>> Charles expressed in the last email:
>>>
>>> - be cautious.
>>>
>>> - be transparent.
>>>
>>> - promote and advocate for all the necessary members.
>>>
>>> - organize internal charts
>>>
>>> - have an architecture of "presentation" which may allow the 
>>> internal infomation retrieved, to be this clear and comprehensible.
>>>
>>> cheers
>>>
>>> On 2014-06-04 23:54, Charles McCathie Nevile wrote:
>>>
>>>     On Wed, 04 Jun 2014 11:24:45 +0200, Jean-Charles (JC) Verdié
>>>     <jicheu@yahoo.fr  <mailto:jicheu@yahoo.fr>> wrote:
>>>
>>>         (omnibus reply) * I acknowledge there are cultural
>>>         differences which make it tricky to publish results given it
>>>         was not stated before the election began. But this is an
>>>         assumption. That'd be great if someone neutral (within the
>>>         team?) contacted each candidate in person to get their
>>>         actual feeling about it.
>>>
>>>     I'm not sure I qualify as neutral. But I have talked to a lot of
>>>     candidates and potential candidates over the years, and I thnk it is
>>>     pretty clear that right now publishing the number of votes named
>>>     candidates receive would have a chilling effect on how willing some good
>>>     candidates are to stand.
>>>
>>>         * I'm not sure these cultural differences still make sense
>>>         when it comes to anonymised results. If we read that
>>>         candidate "A" got 3 ballots and candidate "B" got 98, that's
>>>         probably fine with respect to the future life of candidate
>>>         "JC" or "Virginie", given that it's not so easy (out of 12
>>>         people) to identify who is A and who is B.
>>>
>>>     Right. For the moment, I would not support releasing more identifying
>>>     information than that.
>>>
>>>         * We're not a democracy nor a country FWIW. We belong to a
>>>         consortium and our companies pay an insane amount of money
>>>         to get there.
>>>
>>>     (I'm not sure it is insane - in our case we regard it as an important
>>>     investment, if not a cheap one - but Yeah).
>>>
>>>     Indeed. And when it comes to voting, we are a relatively small group who
>>>     find such data about what our competitors do quite valuable. Which is why
>>>     I think it is reasonable to be cautious in releasing it. I believe that
>>>     too much transparency will have an effect on the way votes are cast, and I
>>>     doubt this would be a good thing.
>>>
>>>     Secret ballots are secret for good reasons. Given the size of our
>>>     community, it isn't unfeasible to make some decent guesses and have a
>>>     pretty strong sense about what the data really means,
>>>
>>>         …I'd like to understand how such an amount of money do not
>>>         bring people to believe it's important to contribute, at
>>>         least when it comes to voting (for AB/TAG but also for
>>>         chartering). * Same thing on different angle, I was not
>>>         aware of such a poor engagement. Probably some more work
>>>         needs to be done here. AB? Elsewhere? I'll be happy to help.
>>>
>>>     I think it is unfortunate that AC members cannot afford to be more
>>>     engaged. But then, a lot of the members are quite small, and the cost of
>>>     serious engagement in everything the AC does is quite high. Focusing on
>>>     areas of priority to an individual member makes sense, so I doubt we'll
>>>     ever get the sort of engagement we would really like to have. Indeed, if
>>>     we are successful in becoming more directly relevant for developers and
>>>     others on a large scale, I suspect the price will be that they are even
>>>     less able to follow everything we do - not because it isn't transparent
>>>     but because the volume of information is too great.
>>>
>>>     A couple of things can help:
>>>     + dashboards
>>>     + information architecture
>>>
>>>     W3C has a pretty chaotic, as well as large, pile of information it
>>>     produces. This is not altogether a surprise - they devote their resources
>>>     to the most urgent things we scream for, as a rule, and a little to the
>>>     important things that have to be done. But taming and chanelling the
>>>     information flow to make it more efficient to process, and therefore more
>>>     effective, is a major task, and a very difficult one. Helping with that
>>>     strikes me as the single most valuable thing to do to increase engagement.
>>>
>>>         * As Daniel stated for himself regarding last year's ballot,
>>>         I'd really like to know my own results. It's important for
>>>         me to know if I needed two other ballots to get elected or
>>>         if I had 0 casts. That would determine my future willingness
>>>         to run again or not BTW. If this is really humiliating then
>>>         may be the W3C can communicate this information privately to
>>>         candidates.
>>>
>>>     I agree this information should be available to individual candidates if
>>>     they want it, in confidence (i.e. they would not be at liberty to start
>>>     de-anonymising the public data without more general consent).
>>>
>>>         * I don't mix transparency with trust. I trust the W3C not
>>>         to tamper with the results (but I trusted a lot of companies
>>>         not to tamper with my data until some revelations happened
>>>         last year so...). but trusting the W3C does not mean I do
>>>         not want to understand what's going on. The results of the
>>>         last 2 AB ballots bring a lot of information about the
>>>         direction the AC Reps want the consortium to take, detailed
>>>         results would probably bring a lot of additional valuable data.
>>>
>>>     Agreed.
>>>
>>>     cheers
>>>
>>>     -- Charles McCathie Nevile - web standards - CTO Office, Yandexchaals@yandex-team.ru  <mailto:chaals@yandex-team.ru>  Find more athttp://yandex.com  
>>>
>>> -- 
>>> delfin@delfiramirez.info <mailto:delfin@delfiramirez.info>
>>> http://delfiramirez.info <http://delfiramirez.info/>
>>> skype username: segonquart
>>> twitter:@delfinramirez
>>> common weblog: http://delfiramirez.blogspot.com 
>>> <http://delfiramirez.blogspot.com/>
>>> about: Technology Lover & good cook.
>>> place: Somewhere over Europe.
> -- 
> delfin@delfiramirez.info <mailto:delfin@delfiramirez.info>
> http://delfiramirez.info <http://delfiramirez.info/>
> skype username: segonquart
> twitter:@delfinramirez
> common weblog: http://delfiramirez.blogspot.com 
> <http://delfiramirez.blogspot.com/>
> about: Technology Lover & good cook.
> place: Somewhere over Europe.

Received on Friday, 6 June 2014 04:14:20 UTC