- From: Chaals McCathie Nevile <chaals@yandex.ru>
- Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2017 17:50:53 +0200
- To: "David Singer" <singer@mac.com>
- Cc: "David Wood" <david.wood@ephox.com>, "Harald Alvestrand" <hta@google.com>, "Jeff Jaffe" <jeff@w3.org>, "L. David Baron" <dbaron@dbaron.org>, "W3C AC-Forum" <w3c-ac-forum@w3.org>, "chairs@w3.org" <chairs@w3.org>, "ab@w3.org" <ab@w3.org>, "public-w3process@w3.org" <public-w3process@w3.org>
On Fri, 27 Oct 2017 09:36:41 +0200, David Singer <singer@mac.com> wrote: > Can I confirm that I think we’re settling on? As noted, I prefer one person one vote for technical decisions, but I can readily live with one member one vote. The rest is in there already, as I read it, and I am happy with it. cheers > If it’s a formal vote on a technical subject, then it’s one vote per > member organization. (And if it’s controversial, expect FOs, because we > shouldn’t be making technical decisions based on majority voting, but on > consensus and/or technical merit.) > > If it’s a straw poll, then the chair can decide who gets to participate > and what the tallying system is (e.g. “this vote is restricted to people > who have registered to attend the next f2f”). > >> On Oct 25, 2017, at 18:06 , Chaals McCathie Nevile <chaals@yandex.ru> >> wrote: >> >> TL;DR: There are arguments for both kinds of default. I find the 1 vote >> per participant more compelling, and otherwise we need to work out how >> participants other than member organisations vote. But I can live with >> either default, and think voting on it would be a reasonable way to >> resolve the issue. >> >> On Wed, 25 Oct 2017 03:51:00 +0200, David Wood <david.wood@ephox.com> >> wrote: >> >>> On 24 October 2017 at 05:52, Chaals McCathie Nevile <chaals@yandex.ru> >>> wrote: >>> >>>> From my perspective it is true that some organisation might try to >>>> fill the group to win a vote. In the unlikely event that an important >>>> issue really got determined this way and left people unhappy at the >>>> outcome, I would expect a formal objection. I expect part of the >>>> director's analysis of such an objection to include looking at any >>>> such attempt at "distorting the outcome" with about as much contempt >>>> as the particular case merits. >>> >>> Chaals calls this scenario "unlikely". Is it really? >>> >>> It might be worth noting that I recently (in the last two years) >>> attended a meeting where the CSS working group had a majority of >>> voting members attending from a single organisation. A quick check of >>> the membership of that group [1] yields: >>> >>> Google: 19 participants >>> Microsoft: 11 participants >>> Apple: 11 participants >>> Mozilla: 8 participants >>> >>> Without making any attempt whatsoever to infer whether those numbers >>> are a good idea (they might be for such a core WG), it is certainly an >>> existence proof that WGs can end up with a small number of >>> organisations dominating the active participation. >> >> Indeed. Especially for large groups working on a lot of stuff that is >> more about boring plumbing than exciting shiny stuff (WebPlatform, CSS, >> anything where one organisation is effectively leading the >> implementation efforts...). >> >> In such situations, some members' representatives say "I cannot speak >> definitively for My Employer, but it seems to me that...", while others >> say "our membership position is X". There are a lot of real examples of >> both, in practice. In the former case, it seems more useful to get >> individual [perspectives - in part because they are likely to come with >> clear arguments from various perspectives, whereas going with one vote >> per member we can expect a lot of the valuable discussion to be >> internal to the organisation trying to decide how to vote. >> >> If the issue is contentious enough to generate a formal objection, then >> having an archive of the discussion is likely to help the Director >> better understand the issues and reach a better decision faster. IMHO. >> >> On Wed, 25 Oct 2017 09:31:54 +0200, Harald Alvestrand <hta@google.com> >> wrote: >> >>> It's obvious for both "one person one vote" and "one company one vote" >>> how to stack the vote - in >one case, bring 100 of your closest >>> friends to the meeting; in the other case, tell every company >and >>> organization you work with to join up and send a representative. Both >>> have happened in >standards organizations we've worked with. >>> >>> The difference is that stacking the vote by adding companies: >>> a) takes longer >>> b) costs more - with some of that being money that ends up in the >>> W3C's coffers >>> c) is harder to hide (because it takes longer). >>> >>> If we have to have voting on issues that are important (and I think we >>> have to), I'd prefer the >option that makes vote-stacking take longer >>> and be more expensive for the stacker. >> >> This is the best rationale I have heard for defaulting to 1 vote per >> member. >> >> However, the reality is that W3C is also trying to encourage >> participation >> by people who are not in a position to join, meaning many groups get >> some >> invited experts. That leads to an asymmetry. >> >> I don't think there is an ideal default, and I would thus be prepared to >> let this particular question be resolved by vote. (Should that be by >> organisation or individual?) >> >> I would like to see a clear explanation of how Invited Expert votes are >> counted in such a situation, and what, if anything, to do with input >> from public contributors who are not members of the working group. >> >> Cheers >> >> Chaals >> >>> >>> >>> >>> On Wed, Oct 25, 2017 at 3:51 AM, David Wood <david.wood@ephox.com> >>> wrote: >>>> Hi all, >>>> >>>> On 24 October 2017 at 05:52, Chaals McCathie Nevile >>>> <chaals@yandex.ru> wrote: >>>>> On Mon, 23 Oct 2017 18:49:14 +0200, L. David Baron >>>>> <dbaron@dbaron.org> wrote: >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> I'm curious about the rationale behind one of the changes within >>>>>> >>>>>> #24, which covers voting *in working groups* (which is described in >>>>>> >>>>>> both the new and old process as a rare procedure that should only be >>>>>> >>>>>> used when consensus cannot be reached). >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> In the current process, votes in a working group MUST be taken >>>>>> >>>>>> per-organization (or group of related members). In the revised >>>>>> >>>>>> process, the default voting process (which can be overridden by >>>>>> >>>>>> charters) is that votes in a working group default to one vote per >>>>>> >>>>>> participant. >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> This change seems to introduce the risk that, if a working group is >>>>>> >>>>>> facing issues contentious enough to lead to a vote, it allows >>>>>> >>>>>> organizations to add new members to the group in order to change the >>>>>> >>>>>> results. This seems undesirable to me. >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>>> From my perspective it is true that some organisation might try to >>>>>> fill the group to win a >>>vote. In the unlikely event that an >>>>>> important issue really got determined this way and left >>>people >>>>>> unhappy at the outcome, I would expect a formal objection. I expect >>>>>> part of the >>>director's analysis of such an objection to include >>>>>> looking at any such attempt at "distorting >>>the outcome" with >>>>>> about as much contempt as the particular case merits. >>>> >>>> >>>> Chaals calls this scenario "unlikely". Is it really? >>>> >>>> It might be worth noting that I recently (in the last two years) >>>> attended a meeting where the CSS >>working group had a majority of >>>> voting members attending from a single organisation. A quick check >>>> >>of the membership of that group [1] yields: >>>> >>>> Google: 19 participants >>>> Microsoft: 11 participants >>>> Apple: 11 participants >>>> Mozilla: 8 participants >>>> >>>> Without making any attempt whatsoever to infer whether those numbers >>>> are a good idea (they might >>be for such a core WG), it is certainly >>>> an existence proof that WGs can end up with a small number >>of >>>> organisations dominating the active participation. >>>> >>>> Regards, >>>> Dave >>>> >>>> [1] https://www.w3.org/Style/CSS/members >>>> >>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Voting is a suboptimal approach for most important decisions anyway. >>>>> It is potentially useful to >>>stop a bikeshed discussion (not >>>>> because it gets a good answer, but because there isn't one >>>>> >>>apparent and it stops the time being sucked into different ways >>>>> to make a bad decision...). >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> An alternative perspective is the old HTML Working Group, which had >>>>> far more invited experts - >>>each given one vote - than >>>>> organisational members who were thus a small minority in any >>>>> official >>>vote. While I hope that was an historic anomaly, in a >>>>> group where one large organisation has 4 >>>times as many people as >>>>> anyone else doing 75% of the work, while I suspect there will be >>>>> other >>>problems it seems reasonable to let them have more than 1 >>>>> vote, in the broken case that this is >>>the only way forward on an >>>>> issue. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> So yes, there is a power shift in the "default" model. Between >>>>> Arrow's theorem, a sense that >>>very many questions are badly put >>>>> to vote in my experience, and the sense that this is already a >>>>> >>>case that should have been avoided, I'm not terribly concerned at >>>>> what the default looks like >>>because I think it represents an >>>>> attempt to save discussion on an issue rather than a soundly >>>>> >>>justifiable basis for claiming the answer is *right*. >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> cheers >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Chaals >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> (I'm coming to this from the perspective of a member of the CSS >>>>>> >>>>>> working group, which officially has 19 participants from Google, 11 >>>>>> >>>>>> from Apple, 11 from Microsoft, 8 from Mozilla, 6 from Vivliostyle, 5 >>>>>> >>>>>> from Adobe, 5 from BPS, etc., but has also never held a vote. But >>>>>> >>>>>> I'm under the impression that there have been a small number of >>>>>> >>>>>> working groups where voting was used a good bit.) >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> -David >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> On Wednesday 2017-09-27 20:36 -0400, Jeff Jaffe wrote: >>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Dear AC representative, WG Chair, or member of the public, >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> The W3C Advisory Board is forwarding a proposed Process 2018 draft >>>>>>> [1] to the Advisory >>>>>Committee for consideration and comment. >>>>>>> The plan is that, based on the received comments, a >>>>>revised >>>>>>> draft will be sent to the Advisory Committee for formal Review >>>>>>> prior to the November >>>>>TPAC meeting and that there will be >>>>>>> time for questions and comments on the proposed Review >>>>>>> >>>>>document at the TPAC meeting. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> [1]https://w3c.github.io/w3process/ >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> The major changes in this document and their rationale, with links >>>>>>> to the current process and >>>>>a diff from it, are provided in a >>>>>>> backgrounder [2]. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> [2]https://www.w3.org/wiki/Process2018 >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> We call special attention to issue #5 - designed to increase >>>>>>> agility for errata management >>>>>moving us closer to a living >>>>>>> standard model and issue #52 which updates participation and >>>>>>> >>>>>election rules for the TAG. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Please send comments as soon as possible (to facilitate response >>>>>>> preparation) and prior to >>>>>October 26th (a 4 week comment >>>>>>> period). Specific comments on the text are best filed as >>>>>>> >>>>>Github issues or even pull requests at the Process CG github >>>>>>> site<https://github.com/w3c/>>>>>w3process/issues>. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> More general discussion and comments should be sent >>>>>>> topublic-w3process@w3.org (Mailing list >>>>>archive, publicly >>>>>>> available) or toprocess-issues@w3.org (Member-only archive). You >>>>>>> may >>>>>discuss your comments on any other list, such >>>>>>> asw3c-ac-forum@w3.org, as long as you send the >>>>>comments to >>>>>>> one of the W3process lists above and copy that list in the >>>>>>> discussion. >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Jeff Jaffe, Chair, W3C Advisory Board >>>>>>> >>>>>>> Charles McCathie Nevile, Editor, W3C Process Document >>>>>>> >>>>>>> David Singer, Chair, W3C Process Document Task Force >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> -- >>>>> Chaals is Charles McCathie Nevile >>>>> >>>>> find more at http://yandex.com >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>> >>>> >>> >>> >> >> >> >> -- >> Chaals is Charles McCathie Nevile >> find more at http://yandex.com > > David Singer > > singer@mac.com > -- Chaals is Charles McCathie Nevile find more at http://yandex.com
Received on Friday, 27 October 2017 15:51:26 UTC