People of Fanatikos,

In the interest of fairness and clarity to all citizens, I hereby announce the foundation of the Polling Standards Commission. This citizen group has been established by your President to help ensure that our citizens can make informed decisions on all matters that shape our nation.

I am looking for a panel of no more than six citizens, including myself. If you would like to assist in the composition and enforcement of the guidelines for our future polls, please express your interest in this thread.

Respectfully,

Donovan Zoi
President of Fanatikos

------------

The members of the Polling Standards Commission are:

Donovan Zoi
ravensfire
DaveShack
greekguy
Black_Hole
Strider


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A Proposal

In order to make the transition to new standards easier to bear for all, I propose that a Poll Template be kept in our Polls Forum for easy access. This template will allow all officials to insert their information into a pre-made format, instead of needing to worry about too much pomp and circumstance.

Your feedback will be appreciated.

The duty of the Polling Standards Commission is to help all citizens understand and implement proper polling procedure, based on current law.

Our Constitution states:

Article J. Will of the Assembly
Elected Officials must plan and act according to the Will of the Assembly. The Will of the Assembly is the aggregate wish of the citizens of our Fanatikos. It is determined by unanimity in a completed discussion, or by the majority vote in an official poll.

Our Code of Laws states:

Section J.1 Polling Standards
Polls posted by an elected official on an area they control are considered official and binding unless specifically stated otherwise. Polls posted by citizens, by officials outside their area or by officials in their area explicitly noted as such are considered unofficial, and do not bind officials in any way. Officials should, however, take such polls into account during planning.

The description and initial post for all official polls should be stated in a clear and neutral manner.

The initial post should contain a link to all relevant discussion threads. Each option should be explained if not immediately clear. The time frame for the poll, and how the results will be interpreted should also be in the initial post.

All official polls must be open for a minimum of 24 hours to be binding. They are strongly encouraged to be open for at least 3 days.

Official polls should be flagged as “Public” unless directly concerning another Citizen.

Please reference the Code of Laws section on polling. Yes, it's in there.

-- Ravensfire

Thank you, Ravensfire. Well then, this shall be a group to help monitor those activites that fall within our laws. I will update the first post soon.

Are you interested in joining the cause?

I knew I shoulda just kept my mouth shut ...

Sure!

-- Ravensfire

I will volunteer for this August body.

Wait, it's September. Well, anyway I'll still volunteer. :lol:

i'm sure i can help out every now and then. just somehting else to balance between my city, my paper, the info office, and my real life. ;)

EDIT: just to be sure, this means i'm signing up...

Welcome, DaveShack and ravensfire!

Knowing your past contributions to Fanatikos, I am honored to have you as part of the team.

Ravensfire, you will be happy to note that I have updated our introductory posts to recognize our current laws. Thank you for correcting me on my 2am blunder. ;)

If you guys need someone else I'm in

I'm willing to join. This is most likely based off of my comments anyway.

I'm willing to join. This is most likely based off of my comments anyway.

Tell you what, Strider. I'll give you credit for the idea if you give me credit for the implementation. ;) Welcome aboard!

Also, welcome to greekguy and Black_Hole!

It seems that this citizen response already puts us over my proposed roster limit. So we shall start with a panel of six.

Tell you what, Strider. I'll give you credit for the idea if you give me credit for the implementation. ;) Welcome aboard!

I thought you'd jump at the oppertunity to give me the credit and the blame. :lol:

Anyway, that was just an observation.

I thought you'd jump at the oppertunity to give me the credit and the blame. :lol:

Anyway, that was just an observation.

:rotfl:

Didn't think of that angle. Guess we should wait to see how this shakes out, eh?

Might as well get discussion started...

So... stove-top Ramen noodle or Instant Microwave Ramen Noodle?

Seriously, before we start shooting bullets at eachother, while claiming they have ideas written on them in small font. Let's try to agree on a set of goals that the polling standards should contain. I'll start it off:

Flexibility
Clarity
Detail
Summarizations (first person to tell me it's not a word gets there toes removed and forced fed them)

One thing I think we should definitely do is that everytime a poll comes out and there is something wrong with it, a PSC panelist should post what is wrong with it, why it is wrong, and how to fix it in the future.

Might as well get discussion started...

So... stove-top Ramen noodle or Instant Microwave Ramen Noodle?

Seriously, before we start shooting bullets at eachother, while claiming they have ideas written on them in small font. Let's try to agree on a set of goals that the polling standards should contain. I'll start it off:

Flexibility
Clarity
Detail
Summarizations (first person to tell me it's not a word gets there toes removed and forced fed them)
well http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=Summarizations
Summarization is the act of summarizing, and verbs aren't meant to be made plural :D

Shall I get a sharp knife?

The only real power this commission seems to have in its power is to educate the citizens on how to conduct good polling, and what to expect in a poll. We can try to influence repolling if a really bad poll comes along.

In defense of Strider's vocabulary, you need a slightly better dictionary. :p


One entry found for summarization.
Main Entry: sum·ma·ri·za·tion
Pronunciation: "s&-m&-r&-'zA-sh&n, "s&m-r&-
Function: noun
1 : the act of summarizing
2 : SUMMARY

Merriam-Webster Online (http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=summarization)

Thanks for the link DaveShack. I also need a dictionary.

One thing I think we should definitely do is that everytime a poll comes out and there is something wrong with it, a PSC panelist should post what is wrong with it, why it is wrong, and how to fix it in the future.

I think that greekguy pretty much sums up our mission in a nutshell. Since there are six of us and we all vote, there should be no problem in carrying out this task.

The one thing I would like to add to this is the development of a poll template that any citizen can use. All they would have to do is paste their info over the generic prompts in the template.

For instance:

Sponsored by Department Name

can be easily changed to

Sponsored by Foreign Affairs Ministry


This should save the pollster a significant amount of time and will lead to more consistent polling for our nation. I will try to work out a rough draft sometime this week.


Might as well get discussion started...

So... stove-top Ramen noodle or Instant Microwave Ramen Noodle?

Seriously, before we start shooting bullets at eachother, while claiming they have ideas written on them in small font. Let's try to agree on a set of goals that the polling standards should contain. I'll start it off:

Flexibility
Clarity
Detail
Summarizations (first person to tell me it's not a word gets there toes removed and forced fed them)

As ravensfire has pointed out, our standards are pretty much our laws so we should have to use too much thought here.

If you are going for something else here, I may be missing it. Can you please explain further if you are proposing anything beyond what is stated in the Code of Laws?

a poll template eh?


{Question}
Sponsored by {Department Name/Title}

Options
1. {Option - Explanation if Nessecary}
2. {Option - Explanation if Nessecary}
3. {Option - Explanation if Nessecary}
4. Other
5. Abstain

{Screenshot (If Nessecary)}

Discussion (#)

Note: This poll will be open for {hours} hours and is {public/private}.


The above is pretty simple, but it will stop polls like:
Do you approve of building here?

... our standards are pretty much our laws so we should have to use too much thought here.

I think there are two elements that we can approach here.

First - the legal requirements, otherwise known as Section J.1 (Polling Standards) of the Code of Laws.

-- Polls by leaders within their area are official unless noted otherwise
-- Polls by citizens, or leaders outside their area are unofficial and do not indicate WotP
-- Description and initial post for official polls should be stated in a clear and neutral manner
-- Link to ALL relevent discussion threads
-- Options explained if not clear
-- Time frame stated, minimum 24 hours, encouraged for 3 days
-- How the leader will interpret the results stated
-- Public unless directly concering another citizen

Here, I see the PSC helping all leaders follow these rules. The template idea will be a GREAT help, especially for new leaders.

Second - guidelines. This would purely come from the citizens, and are ways to help make better decisions. For example - don't poll until the discussion has had time to run. While nothing prevents a quick poll, we can work with leaders to prevent those things from happening. Some of these guidelines can be reflected in the templates (for example, don't poll ideas that are generally regarded as less than optimal in discussions).

Finally, feedback to officials. Posting harsh comments in the poll will certainly get the point across. It also hurts the message. Likewise, posting well after a poll doesn't help either. Polite corrections either in the official thread or through a PM would probably be best. Tossing something like that in a poll thread could cause a distraction from the poll that isn't needed.

Just some thoughts ...

-- Ravensfire

@Black_Hole:

Great template! I used it to good effect in the following 2 polls. :)

Wonder Poll: Mausoleum of Mausollos in Olympus (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=128241)

Which Government Should We Aim For? (http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=128240)

Please look these over and tell me what you think. I am particularly interested in your opinion of my Spectrum Poll definition from the Mausoleum poll.

Time to bring back an idea from our recent past.

PSC - thou art reborn!

-- Ravensfire

Time to bring back an idea from our recent past.

PSC - thou art reborn!

-- Ravensfire

I don't think this group has died. it's just there haven't been too many polls lately and most of them have been done pretty well....

but i guess a bump was needed just so some people remembered it is still here. thanks. :)

so are there anymore comments on the following poll template?


{Question}
Sponsored by {Department Name/Title}

Options
1. {Option - Explanation if Nessecary}
2. {Option - Explanation if Nessecary}
3. {Option - Explanation if Nessecary}
4. Other
5. Abstain

{Screenshot (If Nessecary)}

Discussion (#)

Note: This poll will be open for {hours} hours and is {public/private}.



also if we posted this as a sticky, we should also post the relevant CoL article on polling

Personally I still think the world would be a better place if use of the "other" option were prohibited on pain of being forced to read every single evolution/gay marriage/George Bush is teh devil!!!11!1!1one thread ever posted in OT in their entirety, but aside from that one small, doomed gripe the template looks fine to me.

Other is pretty much an admission that the discussion didn't last long enough for all options to be considered. It is overused but not much you can do with volunteers (albeit elected).

Which is exactly why I don't like it - I've always been in favour of a slower game with more time for discussion between turns and dead against leaving polls open to allow half-baked, relatively unscrutinised plans the opportunity to sneak their way through to legitimacy.

However, since I couldn't convince people of this over the year or so during which I was a very active demogame participant, I'm not about to pursue the issue with any great vigour now that my energies are mostly directed elsewhere. If the citizenry prefer their desicion making processes fast and half-arsed then it's no skin off my nose. ;)

Which is exactly why I don't like it - I've always been in favour of a slower game with more time for discussion between turns and dead against leaving polls open to allow half-baked, relatively unscrutinised plans the opportunity to sneak their way through to legitimacy.

However, since I couldn't convince people of this over the year or so during which I was a very active demogame participant, I'm not about to pursue the issue with any great vigour now that my energies are mostly directed elsewhere. If the citizenry prefer their desicion making processes fast and half-arsed then it's no skin off my nose. ;)

I'm in favor of an "other" option if the poll requests input about a topic that has many answers. A poll asking "In which city should we build X wonder" should not have an "other", as all cities should be listed. A poll that asks "Which city should we keep from Germany" should include all German cities. Likewise, a poll asking "Which tech should we research next" should have all the techs available to be researched. Back when the nation was polled on the building site of Priapos, however, we asked "Where should we place Priapos"? The nation was given two choices that had mainstream attention, along with an "Other". The reason this "Other" option was necessary, unlike the previous examples, is that it would be impractical to list all the tiles in the poll.

I would suggest that "Other" only be used if the poll could not practically list the entire set of options. How big would a list have to be to be "too practical"? Well, try it and see, and if the PSC determines that they would've gone the other way, a precedent has been set that will serve as better guidelines for the future.

Which is exactly why I don't like it - I've always been in favour of a slower game with more time for discussion between turns and dead against leaving polls open to allow half-baked, relatively unscrutinised plans the opportunity to sneak their way through to legitimacy.

However, since I couldn't convince people of this over the year or so during which I was a very active demogame participant, I'm not about to pursue the issue with any great vigour now that my energies are mostly directed elsewhere. If the citizenry prefer their desicion making processes fast and half-arsed then it's no skin off my nose. ;)
Sorry, although I value you (and DaveShack) as Demogame politicians and Leaders of our nation, I have to disagree.

DaveShack is not entirely correct when he says "Other is pretty much an admission that the discussion didn't last long enough for all options to be considered." Sometimes a topic is talked to death (as you stated you tried for a year or so...) and the desired options are still not listed in a poll. Let's face it. The reason we have the PSC is because most people can't write polls. (:blush: excluding anyone who reads this...). I haven't seen very many polls written this DG, so I can't really comment on them. But if people are now writing good polls all the time, it damn sure took them 7 DG's to learn.

In my experience, there have been ALOT of polls where I didn't like any of the options. What was I to do to express my opinion? Chose the lesser of evils? I don't think so. I wanted to vote, so I voted OTHER. That option holds the promise of a ctizen being able to express themselves in a poll even though they don't fall in with the majority or the minority. Isn't that our right?

I agree with you - "I've always been in favour of a slower game with more time for discussion between turns and dead against leaving polls open to allow half-baked, relatively unscrutinised plans the opportunity to sneak their way through to legitimacy." DUH...:rolleyes: That's what I've always said, too. I sure you remember. But the option OTHER goes in our polls.

OK, there are instances where other is appropriate. It is especially important to have an other option in poorly written polls. :lol: I'm pretty sure that other has even won a few times. ;)

That's what I've always said, too. I sure you remember.
Sorry, but who are you again? ;)

Polling standards , smoling pandards. who cares i mean do you really think if all polls meet your standard that the standard poller will be happyer or the demogame will be better. and the question everyone wants to ask. What standard will the polling stanard commisson keep to. I think we need to outline very clearly a set of standards for this organisation before start stantardising others. ALso i would like to join your group and chair the Polling standards complaints procedure standardisation committe. and be minute taker for the Negro Polling standards committe. (we must look beyond colour when making our polls).

Polling standards , smoling pandards. who cares i mean do you really think if all polls meet your standard that the standard poller will be happyer or the demogame will be better. and the question everyone wants to ask. What standard will the polling stanard commisson keep to. I think we need to outline very clearly a set of standards for this organisation before start stantardising others. ALso i would like to join your group and chair the Polling standards complaints procedure standardisation committe. and be minute taker for the Negro Polling standards committe. (we must look beyond colour when making our polls).
the board is currently limited to 6 members...
plus someone with your attitude on polling standards shouldn't be in the comission....

I knew this organisation was racist, aimng your polling standards are the poor socialeconomic groups with less education and limited polling abilitys.

I recommend stopping before a moderator comes along and makes it official.

Sorry, but who are you again? ;)
:lol: You remember me. I'm the guy who would vote for you no matter what office you ran for. Good to see you again. Too bad you're occupied elsewhere.