Public Investigation #6: Chat Poll Ignored

[Cyc]

We seem to be on at the same time again Dis.
5 turns were played, saved and posted. Then all hell broke loose following the post.
If I read your second question coreectly, no. There were no decision votes about the trade brought up in the forums. Basically like most selling/trading of new techs/lux's/resources the idea is spontaneous and then proceeds very quickly with a spot vote of those present. At least that's the way it normally works and polls from the forum usually can focus that far in advance.

 

[disorganizer]

ok. then i am sorry for two things:
1) i find donsig guilty of having a spot votes and then ignoring it. sorry donsig
2) i would have found it ok to stop the chat without any vote.

why?
well i think 1) is clear.
2): no decision base there for the chatters to know what citizenry wants. DONSIG was RIGHT! but IMPLEMENTATION was WRONG (once again).

i would propose:
FINAL WARNING! ANY FURTHER ACTION AGAINST THE CONSTITUTION WILL RESULT IN IMPEACHMENT.
IN FUTURE, YOU MUST FOLLOW ANY POLLS YOU CALL!

just a proposal, maybe somebody will make it sound better. i think if donsig cares to defend in here, we will then maybe should go to a guilty not-guilty vote soon to start discussing the measures.

 

[disorganizer]

i read it now...
i still have my opinion to donsig and something more:

the chat was a mess. indiscipline strikes our game! if we continue like this, we threaten a chat-less demo game! i think about a public investigation of the whole cabinet for more discipline and being more serious in official matters till tonite.
for now, i only set up some rules for the chat. yes they are strict. yes they are hard. you didnt want it another way.
i nevertheless left the player in duty the controll of how strict it will be, but gave him measures to quite the room.

i will not sit still and watch chaotism destroy the turn-chats like we had it in the beginning. before this happens, i cancel the all-voice option again.

i believe almost nobody at the chat really knew what was voted about, who voted and especially who voted for what. donsig didnt even give a summary nor was able to follow the voting indisturbed.

now back to topic:
this is no excuse for that he ignored 2 spot-votes with his action. still i believe stopping was right, but he did NOT do it because it was right(!!!). he did definitely NOT want to stop the chat, as all others did. When he called a vote, the result was not his and suddenly he wanted to stop the chat. He tried to vote and again it was not his.
That is definitely not the way to go. So guilty i say.

Another point (important!):
I would also say:
The matter of trade will not be discussed any further because this matter was already voted as spot vote. So we trade medicine, even if this is evil and not in sense of democraty. The decision was taken in chat, so we will have to live with it (PI following?).
The only discussions we should accept is to whom and for what we trade it (a kind of self punishment, but it must be).

 

[eyrei]

dis, I believe a forum vote of citizens supercedes a chat vote. We do not have to make that trade if the citizens vote not to. Personally, I want to make the trade, as you can see from the chat log. However, I did not want to make a major decision like that without even notifying the citizenry.

Rain,

You can't defend as democratic an action that that violates a vote of citizen representatives.

We shall see. I am trying to do just that in this thread.

As you said, Donsig's actions violated a vote of citizen representatives. However, that vote of citizen representatives violated the decision making power of the citizens. I believe the latter is a higher crime.

Your idea of representation is that someone who votes for you decides what it is to happen, while those who vote for others do not count. A rather curious idea of democracy.

As you have not presented any evidence to support this, it is probably about time you stop with these feeble attempts to damage my character.

 

[Rain]

Originally posted by eyrei
As you have not presented any evidence to support this, it is probably about time you stop with these feeble attempts to damage my character.

I am not discussing your character nor can i damage it. Any actions you have taken were your own and any consequences arising from them are equally your responsibility, so its inappropriate to suggest it is my doing.

As to evidence - there were a majority of cabinet who voted in the vote that was ignored. Were they not elected by the people? Do you think you are the only person who was elected? My point is the actions taken remove the voice of those representatives and consequently their electorate, leaving only those who voted for the minority vote being heard.

 

[eyrei]

Originally posted by Rain


I am not discussing your character nor can i damage it. Any actions you have taken were your own and any consequences arising from them are equally your responsibility, so its inappropriate to suggest it is my doing.

As to evidence - there were a majority of cabinet who voted in the vote that was ignored. Were they not elected by the people? Do you think you are the only person who was elected? My point is the actions taken remove the voice of those representatives and consequently their electorate, leaving only those who voted for the minority vote being heard.

You seem to make the assumption that everyone agrees with the actions of the other cabinet members in the chat, and that everyone voted for them. Your assumption is wrong, and that is precisely why I wished the turns to stop.

 

[Rain]

Originally posted by eyrei


You seem to make the assumption that everyone agrees with the actions of the other cabinet members in the chat, and that everyone voted for them. Your assumption is wrong, and that is precisely why I wished the turns to stop.

First I would make no such assumption nor have i stated anything of the sort. Nor would i presume as you do, to know what what everyone thinks.

The objection to this matter is based on a violation of the constitution. There may be many things occur which i or you personally do not agree with. That does not give us the right to overturn due process. You or I might not agree that a given decision is wise. The proper venue is then to raise your objection and submit to the voting process. It is equally then appropriate to respect the outcome of the vote and not to attempt to deny to its validity because it was not the outcome you sought.

Additionally i did not state that everyone voted for those representatives - by the same token everyone did not vote for Donsig or any other representative. This is why we have votes - To ensure that a majority of the people are heard by the mechanism of a majority of representatives asserting itself in cabinet votes when such votes are called.

 

[eyrei]

Originally posted by Rain


First I would make no such assumption nor have i stated anything of the sort. Nor would i presume as you do, to know what what everyone thinks.

The objection to this matter is based on a violation of the constitution. There may be many things occur which i or you personally do not agree with. That does not give us the right to overturn due process. You or I might not agree that a given decision is wise. The proper venue is then to raise your objection and submit to the voting process. It is equally then appropriate to respect the outcome of the vote and not to attempt to deny to its validity because it was not the outcome you sought.

Again, I agree that the constitution was violated, yet I do not think any harm came from it. As far as overturning due process because I object, I will say again that I did not disagree with the trades, but rather with the way in which they were decided. I believe that part of the reason the President decided to end the turns was because he saw my point.

I do not presume to know what everyone thinks, but I will stand by my assumption that not everyone agrees with making these trades. I know for a fact that the President does not like these trades, so I am led to believe that there are others who think the same.

This matter of national importance needs to be discussed by citizens on the forum, and I have opened the appropriate thread. I hope that more attention will be paid to the two discussions I have opened than to this investigation.

 

[donsig]

I do not even know where to begin on this one...

Unfortunately there seems to be no constitutional guidance for *prematurely* ending a turn chat. *Prematurely* is not quite the correct word to use as there seems to be no constitutional guidance for the number of turns to play in a turn chat. The 10 turns every other day clause seems to be gone and I can find nothing in the constitution about how a turn chat should be ended. Our ten turns per turn chat seems only based on tradition now. However, there is also the tradition of stopping a turn chat if something new and unexpected arises.

I think we were all caught unaware that we could get such a high return on selling medicine. We have no set policy on selling techs but historically we have been very selective about doing so especially concerning sensitive techs (such as those required for building a wonder). Selling this tech was not discussed ahead of time in the forums even though we knew we would have it three turns into the turn chat. When we acquired the tech in 1330 AD there was no mention of selling it. It wasn't until two turns later (when the turn 5 save was uploaded) that the idea of selling medicine came up. As soon as it was propsed eyrei asked that such a decision be made in the forums. There are several angles to look at regarding this trade:

1) Should it be sold at all?
2) If so, which trade or trades do we take?
3) If we do the trade(s) and get communism should we then stop and allow governors to reconsider their build queues in light of police stations being available?
4) If we do the trades what is our plan for building universal suffrage, theory of evolution, Hoover dam and military academy? (We were considering changing Pherris to factory as a result of the sell med discussion.)

After an hour of discussion it seemed as though we faced a big decision and I personally got to the point where I felt more analysis was needed. Given the fact that one cabinent member (eyrei) adamatly called for stopping and another (Chieftess) even suggested it at one point, I concluded that stopping was in the best interest of everyone. If the spot vote is reaffirmed by the citizens as a whole then the trades will be done and we will move on at least knowing we took the time for everyone to give some input on a very important subject. If the spot vote is not reaffirmed then there may be some truth to the fact that those who can attend the turn chat do have more power than those who cannot.

As for the actual calling of the spot votes, they were my attempt to find a *political* solution to the mess. The first vote (to sell medicine) was suggested by Chieftess and sort of seconded by punkbass2000. I went along and the vote was 3-2 with eyrei calling for more time (in the forums) as the game situation had become more complicated. Much discussion followed as we tried to reach a consensus. As the discussion included wonder building and changing build queues it became more and more apparent that we had indeed reached a complex point. After the long debate RedRain and curufinwe voted to sell and eyrei abstained. It occurred to me that even if we did the trades we'd still have to stop and look at wonder building and build queues. Given that it seemed appropriate to just stop where we were (end of turn 5 - save already posted) and have the whole business hashed out in the forums.

 

[Curufinwe]

Were you not saying yourself Donsig that a few people shouldn't have all of the power to make a decision. If that is true I'd like to point out that in your thing it says that one person asked for a stop and one suggested it (thus 1-2 votes for it) and in your last post you say that those persons voicing it makes it in the best interest of all, added to your opinion (2-3 votes for stopping) this still is even less democratic than the already semi-democratic turn chat.

 

[Chieftess]

Yes, I did bring up a suggestion to stop and discuss, however, I also said that it should happen after the trades where done (since they had been voted on). Donsig called for a vote on stopping, which binded it.

I'm also concerned about the issue of constantly stopping for citizen polls. Not that I'm against citizen polls (I'm not), but too much bueracracy could destroy the game. If we find a major situation every other turn or so, it's going to take a LONG time to finish the game! Citizens voted on techs as these links show:

The vote for Falcon's Proposal
The vote for refining

What they can't do it say how to get them. That's because we simply don't know. It would be very cumbersome to stop for every dicision like this. Emergency situations, as far as I know, involve a nation declaring war on us. Sure, we could vote on the cabinet turn instructions. Let's delay the turn chats 2 more days for that. Oh, and give another 2 days for an unexpected turn of events in turns 2, 5, 7, and 9 (as an example). See the picture? 2 weeks (or more) just to play 10 turns! Worst case scenario is 2 days per every turn! (that's almost 1 month!) Citizens vote for people because those people have their views, and the citizens expect them to carry them out in office. In a real life democracy (i.e., the US) when the President puts foward a bill to congress, congress votes on it, not the people. Can you imagine elections (and life for that matter) week after week if that happened in real life! That's why citizens vote for leaders based on their views.

If there is a problem, it's that the cabinet is only so large. That's because we modeled it after the game. We do have council members (Shaitan, and Rain), who do speak for the people. They could make what-if polls if they wish. (i.e., what if we can get a tech via trade). We've made other tech trades in the past, and the game wasn't stopped because of that.

 

[Chieftess]

Speaking of game stoppages, that would mean we could have stopped the game at turn 1, just to reassess Greece, India, and Iro., and their trade status (i.e. trying to stop the war). Almost every decision can effect everyone. (military, foriegn, domestic, science, trade, culture etc.)

BTW, here's the ways of acquiring techs (for any era)

- Goody Huts
- Via gifts
- Via trades
- Via extortion
- Via the Great Library
- Via research

And while we're at it (I hope you're noticing my sarcasm)
...
That would mean we should stop before raising or lowering the science rate. What if governers, and/or the people wanted that extra cash for an improvement?

See, there could be a multitude of reasons for stopping a game. If it's not considered an emergency, a few will find a way to make it fit the 'emergency clause'.

 

[donsig]

EDIT: This is a reply to Curufinwe's post.

I guess we have to differentiate the types of decisions being made curufinwe. No, I don't think it is right for only a few people to make policy decisions on things like selling techs. When it comes to a procedural decision to stop the process so we can bring more people in on a policy decision then I think a minority can be enough to make the procedural decision. It is a judgement call because we don't want to endup with a minority of one holding us up everytime someone disagrees with something.
I must confess to being quite ignorant of the current constitution. I was unaware that we could still have cabinet votes in the chat. I thought all chat votes had to be citizen votes now.

 

[donsig]

Historically, we have not put much effort into research as our stragegy was to build the Great Library. Medicine may well be the first tech we've known that no one else has. While not an emergency situation, selling medicine is a very important issue and one that should really be looked at carefully.

 

[chiefpaco]

Eyrei: As you said, Donsig's actions violated a vote of citizen representatives. However, that vote of citizen representatives violated the decision making power of the citizens. I believe the latter is a higher crime.

A harsh view for every decision made during the round. Neither was the trade rejected nor was the stoppage of the game approved by citizen voting. We do not currently endorse "superior voting" if all votes are based on citizen response.

The turns may stop. But on what grounds? 1 citizen calling? If that is so, many votes will come to the forum because most votes are not unaminous. Neither was there sufficient support to ending the turn nor was there sufficent support to reject the trade. What measures can we make to ensure that 1 citizen can call for a stoppage? How could we ever finish? The game may be stopped, yes, perhaps on a majority ruling. I see no reason why one or two citizens may call for the end of a chat and it be automatically carried.

Also, do not put the trade results on trial. Whether or not the trade is made, the citizen vote at the chat should stand as the official "will of the citizens". After all, the trade vote was clearly voted upon and the "abandonment" vote was not clear to the point of stoppage. Our rules in this process are clear. All unplanned events during chat are brought to the chatroom and voted on. If the citizens feel the decision is too important, they may abandon the game. However, a consensus is needed in either case.

The lack of control and decision-making on the part of the player this round is shocking. The player must be prepared to announce precise votes after due course and follow them immediately. While the votes were discussed and called, they were not followed. Furthermore, citizens should know better than to drag on and on about the concequences of not voting the same as they did.

The harm done is great. The same rights are applied to the citizens in the turn chat as they are in the forum. I would stand for the same treason should a forum vote be similarly ignored. In this case, two votes were ignored. The power of one or two citizens in the turn chat disrupted the round and brought the game to a dreadful and contentious halt.

 

[chiefpaco]

Oops, double post.

 

[eyrei]

Originally posted by chiefpaco


A harsh view for every decision made during the round. Neither was the trade rejected nor was the stoppage of the game approved by citizen voting. We do not currently endorse "superior voting" if all votes are based on citizen response.

I do not consider a vote of 8 people to be superior and more representative than a vote of 25 or 30.

The turns may stop. But on what grounds? 1 citizen calling? If that is so, many votes will come to the forum because most votes are not unaminous. Neither was there sufficient support to ending the turn nor was there sufficent support to reject the trade. What measures can we make to ensure that 1 citizen can call for a stoppage? How could we ever finish? The game may be stopped, yes, perhaps on a majority ruling. I see no reason why one or two citizens may call for the end of a chat and it be automatically carried.

If a majority ruling is required to stop the game, then those at the turn chat can continue pushing through their agendas indefinately without ever consulting the rest of the population.

The constitution says, I think, that the player may stop the game at any time. So if the chat poll is not overridden by a citizen poll, and the trades are carried out immediately upon the start of the next turn, there is no crime. It is not as if the President continued the turns without making the trades. They can still be made, but we will first ask the rest of the country what they think.

Also, do not put the trade results on trial. Whether or not the trade is made, the citizen vote at the chat should stand as the official "will of the citizens". After all, the trade vote was clearly voted upon and the "abandonment" vote was not clear to the point of stoppage. Our rules in this process are clear. All unplanned events during chat are brought to the chatroom and voted on. If the citizens feel the decision is too important, they may abandon the game. However, a consensus is needed in either case.

I do not think Donsig even had to call a vote to stop the turns. He could have done that on his own.

The lack of control and decision-making on the part of the player this round is shocking. The player must be prepared to announce precise votes after due course and follow them immediately. While the votes were discussed and called, they were not followed. Furthermore, citizens should know better than to drag on and on about the concequences of not voting the same as they did.

I hardly consider that vote taken in 'due course', as it included almost no discussion.

The harm done is great. The same rights are applied to the citizens in the turn chat as they are in the forum. I would stand for the same treason should a forum vote be similarly ignored. In this case, two votes were ignored. The power of one or two citizens in the turn chat disrupted the round and brought the game to a dreadful and contentious halt. Again, why should the minority ever rule a decision in this game?

Had a forum citizen poll been ignored, I would not be supporting Donsig right now. When a minority takes an action only to ensure that the rights of the majority are upheld, I do not see a problem.

 

[chiefpaco]

Originally posted by eyrei

I do not consider a vote of 8 people to be superior and more representative than a vote of 25 or 30.

So should we apply the same logic to forum votes that garner 8 people? That is ridiculous. No matter how many people vote on anything, a vote is a vote. Again, the rules of the chat are clear: All decisions that are not made clear by forum discussion are voted on and the game is played on. If the group feels there is too much controversy, "They" can abandon the game. Just because the player feels there is too much controversy does not give them the right to abandon. That is giving power to one citizen above all else and contrary to the fundamentals of this game.

If a majority ruling is required to stop the game, then those at the turn chat can continue pushing through their agendas indefinately without ever consulting the rest of the population. The constitution says, I think, that the player may stop the game at any time. So if the chat poll is not overridden by a citizen poll, and the trades are carried out immediately upon the start of the next turn, there is no crime. It is not as if the President continued the turns without making the trades. They can still be made, but we will first ask the rest of the country what they think.

If a minority ruling is required to stop the game, those at the turn chats have absolute power to interrupt the flow of the game, as we have just observed. By your logic:

- the 1st vote we held was a vote on changing Cyrus to a University.
- I voted against
- I would have the right to call and carry an abandonment of the game because I felt the decision was too important.

Clearly I would be derranged to do so. However, what possible standards would we have for accepting such a ridiculous power? Well, we could take a vote and see what the majority thinks, like we do for ALL decisions. It disrupts the game otherwise.

I do not think Donsig even had to call a vote to stop the turns. He could have done that on his own.

The game is played by citizens, not by one. At no time is one citizen's opinion carried higher than another. If no agreed reason comes to stop the game, then there is no reason it should stop. Again, why should any particular citizen, regardless of rank, decide the outcome of the game, as was done here?

Donsig clearly put himself above and beyond the citizens in this case and I also call for punishment.

 

[eyrei]

I think some of you are missing my point. My point is that even a consensus of eight people does not qualify as a majority in a group of thirty. Therefore, if even one citizen feels that the group at the turn chat is not representative of the total population, he/she has the right to call for the turns to stop. I suggest we make an investigation mandatory any time a citizen calls for a game to stop, and states a reason for that opinion and the game continues. Those who wish to continue must be sure that they actually do represent the will of the people in their votes as they will face possible punishment if they are wrong.

 

[donsig]

Originally posted by chiefpaco
The turns may stop. But on what grounds? 1 citizen calling? If that is so, many votes will come to the forum because most votes are not unaminous. Neither was there sufficient support to ending the turn nor was there sufficent support to reject the trade. What measures can we make to ensure that 1 citizen can call for a stoppage? How could we ever finish? The game may be stopped, yes, perhaps on a majority ruling. I see no reason why one or two citizens may call for the end of a chat and it be automatically carried.

Once again we are faced with a poor set of rules. there is nothing in the constitution about stopping the turn chat or even about how many turns should be played. In the absence of constitutional guidance in this area there will be no more spot votes about ending a turn chat as long as I am president. If anyone requests a stoppage I will listen to both sides and decide on my own whether to continue or not. Now, if I do have the authority as designated player to stop for what ever reason I see fit then I can do so even after a spot vote on whether to continue playing or not.