Polling Standards Commission

I wrote that last piece not to have #3 taken out, but to discuss re-wording it. I generally like #3, but think it could include more with little effort.

Mainly when I speak of poll procedures, I'm speaking of binding polls being validated for official use. I'm not really worried if Homie feels we should be at war, or if Lumpy wants to rename a city. Those polls are really only of any signifigance to that person or group. When a poll affects the nation as a whole, and needs validation as a binding poll, then poll procedures come into play.

I also do not object to quick polls for temporary measures, but they should follow some kind of format to allow validation for use in the turn chat.

I'm very glad this thread is here and don't mean to downplay any issue or short any ideas. On the contrary, I wish to spark more discussions and examination of those ideas.
 
to the poll-naming:
we should not use "infomational poll" though, as the "poll:" will automaticall be added and it will read "poll: informational poll: xxx", which sound a bit ... strange ...
i would propose:
"official" and "informational". they will then read: "poll: official: xxx" and "poll: informational : xxx"

maybe also a third and fourth: "rules official" and "rules informational" for rule changes. i believe the interest-levels on both issues (game decisions and rules decisions) are different, so maybe it would help ppl to distinguish between them.

also i would propose informational polls not to be sticky (is this a good idea? brought it here from somewhere else)
 
Originally posted by Cyc
I wrote that last piece not to have #3 taken out, but to discuss re-wording it. I generally like #3, but think it could include more with little effort.

Mainly when I speak of poll procedures, I'm speaking of binding polls being validated for official use. I'm not really worried if Homie feels we should be at war, or if Lumpy wants to rename a city. Those polls are really only of any signifigance to that person or group. When a poll affects the nation as a whole, and needs validation as a binding poll, then poll procedures come into play.

I also do not object to quick polls for temporary measures, but they should follow some kind of format to allow validation for use in the turn chat.

I'm very glad this thread is here and don't mean to downplay any issue or short any ideas. On the contrary, I wish to spark more discussions and examination of those ideas.
Click to expand...
Item 3 is being taken out because its wording needs further discussion - the list is just for those standards which have taken on an agreed fixed form, at least for the time being. I'm certainly not dropping it, just allowing other people time to add their comments and suggestions in response to your rewording. :)
 
Originally posted by disorganizer
to the poll-naming:
we should not use "infomational poll" though, as the "poll:" will automaticall be added and it will read "poll: informational poll: xxx", which sound a bit ... strange ...
i would propose:
"official" and "informational". they will then read: "poll: official: xxx" and "poll: informational : xxx"

maybe also a third and fourth: "rules official" and "rules informational" for rule changes. i believe the interest-levels on both issues (game decisions and rules decisions) are different, so maybe it would help ppl to distinguish between them.

also i would propose informational polls not to be sticky (is this a good idea? brought it here from somewhere else)
Click to expand...
Dis, I'm hoping that the eventual adoption of a set of standards will make such naming conventions unnecessary. Put simply: if someone wants a poll to be binding they follow the standards - and if not then they can do whatever they like, and their poll will be informational by default.

Until that time,however, it does make sense to use naming conventions as a temporary measure to reduce confusion. Might I suggest replacing "Official:" with "Decision:", and "Informational:" with "Opinion:"? I don't know that we need a separate variation for rules, since the title of the post should make it obvious what the poll is about anyway. Plus "Rules Informational:" would take up waaaaaay too much space in the title field!
 
As I see it, there are 3 types of polls. A full poll, which does everything the right way. A quick poll, which does either a very specific thing or a temporary thing. An informational poll. Things like the governor and FA ratings polls would fall under the quick poll rules. Here's what I've got from the new Constitution (taking the original rules, adding what we've worked on here and adding quick poll rules).

Code: 
Point 1 A poll is not valid unless a quorum of participation has been reached.
     a Council Votes quorum is 5 participants.
     b Citizen Polls quorum is 23 participants. (Simple majority of 45 
       respondents to the Term 3 Presidential election).
Point 2 All polls should have the following information:
     a Poll type in the header and first post.
     b Poll start and end dates/times in the first post.
          (1) Minimum poll duration should be 24 hours or longer.
     c Link to relevant discussion threads in the first post.
     d Inclusion of an "Abstain" option.
Point 3 Council Votes - If there was not already a citizen poll identical to
     the Council Vote, the leader who posts the Council Vote must also post 
     it as a Citizen Poll. This is to give as much response time as possible
     to the citizens for determination of their proxy votes.
Point 4 Official polls should proceed as follows:
     a Discussion thread, up for 24 hours minimum. Then,
     b Proposed poll, up for 24 hours minimum. Then,
     c Poll posted with link from discussion thread.
Point 5 Quick polls
     a When topic discussion is unwarranted or poll procedures cannot be 
       maintained due to time constraints, a quick poll may be used. Quick
       polls do not have to follow the time conditions noted above.
     b Results may be used to make temporary changes or specific, one time 
       decisions. They may not be used to make permanent article, law or 
       standards changes.
          (1) The specific action item must be noted, or;
          (2) A specific expiration of the change authorized by the poll should
              be noted. This should not be longer than the next turn chat.
Point 6 Information polls do not have restrictions and cannot be used to justify
     policy, plans or actions.
Point 7 All polls posted by Leaders are considered Official unless specifically
     noted to be informational in the header and first post.
 
Shaitan,

Do you think that we could make this easier (and avoid the need to change the constitution every month) if we simply said:

"Point 1 - B: Citizen Polls quorum is based upon receiving a total number of responsive votes equal to half plus one of all votes cast in the most recent Presidental election."

We would want to add wording that someone, such as the President or a Moderator, would post what that number is for all citizen votes during their term.

Bill
 
Oops. I did up the census rules and neglected to update the polls to match. Looking at poll returns compared to the election returns, using the Presidential election as a barometer is a poor choice. I've added a regular census of active citizens instead. That's neither here nor there (actually, it's "there"). The poll part is what's important. Here's how the first section should read:

Point 1 A poll is not valid unless a quorum of participation has been reached.
a Council Votes quorum is 4 participants.
b Official Polls quorum is 1/2 of the citizen census.
c Quick Polls quorum is 1/3 of the citizen census.
 
Out of curiousity, and your approach might well be better, but what did you find in your comparison?
 
Average poll returns for a 48 hour poll hovered just slightly over 50% of the presidential election returns level. Using 50% of the presidenital returns as the quorum level would require every poll to achieve what's essentially 100% turnout in order to be validated.

My idea of a census is to poll for participating citizens with a format similar to this:

A- I generally vote in the everyday polls.
B- I do not usually vote in the everyday polls.

Returns for choice A become the census of active citizens.
 
we could maybe use a new forum feature: as i understood TF, the mods can now see who voted (not what, but who). so we maybe would get an image which citizens are active and which are not from our polls.
we could use common knowledge levels for the quorum, as we see how many polls are invalid. we, for example, now know that 15 citizens seem to be possible for citizen polls.
if this tends to decline most polls, we can always change it.
we just have to make sure the change of this does not get invalid from the quorum ;-) deadlock, you know?
the other thing is that we dont have abstain in most polls, so most ppl who want to abstain can only do one thing: not vote. so the vote-count is not showing how many ppl looked at the vote and did not vote because they wanted to abstain.
if you look thru the polls, the ones with abstain have much higher participation (if they are sticky and so not drawn down the line to page 999).
 
48 hour polls get decent participation, as long as they aren't over a weekend. In that case, I'd recommend polls going for 72 hours so it hits a Friday or Monday. Advertising helps immensely. Posting a link to an official poll in the related department thread and in the related discussion thread helps people find the poll to vote on it.
 
Although I do not actually want to sit on this commission, I would like to say that I do not like the "Polls" sub-forum. Polls posted in the citizens forum seem to have a much higher voting rate. For the first few days that this sub-forum existed, I thought it was still the general info subforum. I don't know if people are missing it, or if those without high speed internet access just do not have the patience to switch forums.
 
While I do agree with Eyrei that polls are probably getting lower turnout, since I myself rarely enter the polls subforum (to my shame), I think we should leave it alone for a little while. People may start bothering to go in there once they find decisions are being made without their input. If poll participation doesn't improve within the next couple of weeks then of course we should definitely look at moving the polls back to somehwere more visible. That's my two cents/groats/whatever
 
Here is something I tried posting last night but TF was installing a new feature. The discussion has proceeded since I tried interjecting this but here it is anyway:

What you say makes sense Eklektikos. I guess I'm still a bit fuzzy on what a 'binding' poll is. 'Binding' as in "it is an impeachable offense not to follow"? Where are we on who can post polls? I realize that it is not up to this commission to define binding or who can post polls, but it is difficult to set standards unless we know these two things.
 
For the record, I am against adding rules about polls to constitution. These are standards or regulations or maybe even laws but they are certainly not constitutional principles. I guess I must go catch up on the constitution splitting discussion. (Not quite as much fun as playing the GOTM.)
 
hehe. i thought about posting:
"oh no! we will start the 3books versus constitution thing again!" after the post, but i resisted ;-)
 
I definitely agree with both of you on that point. There is a big difference between the two.
 
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