Elections?

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Rumple C
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Re: Elections?

Post by Rumple C »

Swift wrote:
Ithildur wrote:This is all Rumple's fault. :mad:
As always!
I hate that guy.
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Zelknolf
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Re: Elections?

Post by Zelknolf »

Walls of text. Sigh.
kid wrote:No, this was not allowed, and no, this does look bad, even if the LA approved it after the fact.
Yes, it would have looked even worst (or would have been even a greater offence) not telling the LA at all.
That doesn't change the fact that not getting the LA's approval before hand, makes this decision an offence, regardless if he agreed with it afterwards.
If the appropriate channels were followed in the wrong order, that doesn't seem to invalidate the election, because all of the necessary approval and oversight happened. So what action is there to take? Demand a redo? How, and to what end? Election authority already announced the final results. Demand censure? We'd have trouble showing bad faith; it all certainly looked like a standard bookkeeping task to Foam.
Because I assumed that if he wanted to change his vote it was to give it to the losing party, and not further advance the winner.
The vote without the change was a tie. There's no losing party to assume would get the vote.
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kid
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Re: Elections?

Post by kid »

Zelknolf wrote:it all certainly looked like a standard bookkeeping task to Foam.
After the fact? I guess. When he did it? How the fuck did it look like standard bookkeeping when we can't find an example or a blank approval by LA that this is how you run elections.
Mind reading? Or perhaps he was effected by his own desires? I don't know... I'll never know, all I know is that it smells (which is why it was best avoided and done properly).

I thought a redo would be good to make sure things look clean, never demanded one (not that I can), just suggested, so our new elected LA (would likely have been SF again - which I would have been, before all this, very happy with) would start his term clean as a whistle and not smelly.

But that was clearly not going to happen, so I only wanted some acknowledgement of how bad this looks when an IA makes such a decision (which is not normal, or taken every election, or at all, and not in his authority to make, helps his buddy win... etc. We've been through this before).

I don't want to spank anyone, redo elections, punish people, whatever.
I can't have people though, doing wrong, acting like they shouldn't, and then refuse to take any responsibility for it, acknowledge anything in what they've done looks bad... Saying they'll do it again, and so on.
Personally it just makes me not trust these people, not trust their judgment and/or sincerity.

But I guess i'm the only one? that's fine, we'll have to disagree I guess?
Zelknolf wrote:The vote without the change was a tie. There's no losing party to assume would get the vote.
I was just referring to the party that was at the time down by two (at least when I saw rumple's request) which was Shadow. Not really important.

Anyways, said I was done, so I am done. Swear!
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FoamBats4All
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Re: Elections?

Post by FoamBats4All »

kid wrote:Anyways, said I was done, so I am done. Swear!
Sorry we couldn't convince you of the lack of shadiness. See you in-game.
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Re: Elections?

Post by Zelknolf »

If nobody was acknowledging that this looks bad from at least some angles, we wouldn't have four pages of discussion. People say completely incomprehensible things here all the time, but when they do there's nothing to explain or defend. The thread gets a page of people saying "lolno" and it dies.

But in terms of actions I can take? I can say that there's layers of oversight, and people respond to complaints when they can. Fellow in charge of the election allowed it; other candidate allowed it; change will probably follow because nobody's going to want a revisit of this discussion. It sounds like the new LA is sticking with vote changes allowed, but I'll bet that the process will be more visible and posted early so there's much less risk of people skipping actions for not knowing that they were an option.
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Re: Elections?

Post by shad0wfax »

kid wrote:No, this was not allowed, and no, this does look bad, even if the LA approved it after the fact.
HEEGZ allowed the vote change to count in the election; this is within his domain as LA. HEEGZ announced the election results after the election closed; this is his duty as LA. By definition, it was allowed, but you seem to think that it was not allowed.

If you truly believe that you are absolutely correct, initiate the recall process against the IA and file a censure complaint against the IA and the past LA. If you're not willing to do that, then you don't truly believe what you're saying.
kid wrote:Now, just to be clear, I have no problem with the results, I have a problem with how we got to the result.
The LA didn't. What you're really saying here is, "I wish that I were the LA, because I'd have handled it differently."

With a 17-17 election tie, and one user saying, "Can I change my vote" how do you handle it as the LA?

  • A: Allow change of vote in private via PMs, delete post requesting change from forums, not tell any players what you did, ask the IA to change the website database, by user number, sharing PM with user permission to document reason for change, because you're the LA, and a player's vote is anonymous, and you, the IA and the player can verify the 18-16 results and know that it was fair?
  • B: Leave the final vote at 17-17 and then inform the PA, delete the public request for vote change, who in this case did have tie-breaking authority that there really is no tie, because of user PM, and then have the PA by procedure announce the win for the candidate (the one she most likely would not have voted for). (Note that you'd have to verify the user is actually changing a vote and not double voting, via the IA
  • C: Leave the final tally on the website at 17-17 and leave the user's request to change his vote public, and announce to the public that the victory is 18-16 because of documented vote change? (Note that you'd have to verify the user actually is changing a vote and not double voting, via the IA.
  • D: Deny the user the permission to change his vote, forcing the election to remain a tie, then allowing the PA to break the tie, by Charter. This, of course, will bring up an allegation that the election was not fair or impartial because a user was forced by the LA to keep a vote that was against his will.
  • E: Deny the user permission to change his vote, and then strike his entire vote (for either candidate) as invalid, for being an election troll, thus resulting in a 17-16 win for the same candidate that the user was trying to change his vote to.
  • F: Some other option requiring description.
kid wrote:Because I assumed that if he wanted to change his vote it was to give it to the losing party, and not further advance the winner. That was my assumption as any reasonable person would assume. In a way I was half hoping he'll be allowed to, but knew that he can't.
Stating your opinion about what is allowed and forbidden as fact does not make it fact. By definition, he can and did change his vote, because HEEGZ counted the vote in the election. Stating your opinion as "reasonable" and hypothesizing that "any reasonable person would assume [this]," does not necessarily make your opinion reasonable, nor does it make your opinion shared by the norm of the population.

You're still debating this emotionally rather than factually and legally.
kid wrote:Now when the IA saw this I can only assume he was thinking something along those lines, the deference is he had less integrity and greater ability to manipulate the forum.
He had the utmost integrity, because he told every user on the website precisely what he did, then allowed the same option to all users. He couldn't have behaved with more integrity than he did. You also do not know if he had any PM or IRC conversation with HEEGZ about what he was doing; have you asked him if he PMd HEEGZ about this?
kid wrote:And so he made a decision that he was not allowed to make - decided that vote changes are always allowed, regardless of reasons - something no LA (who are in charge of elections let me remind you) ever decided before him... And he gave you the win.
This is a patently false statement. The LA oversees Admin. The LA allowed this change. The LA allowed the election result. The LA stated that this was allowed in the past. The LA also responded to you personally and told you that he was allowing it. By definition, and under the clear and unambiguous authority of the LA acting in his domain, via the Charter, this was all allowed. You personally believe that this should not be allowed and now you state that it is not allowed, but the two are not at all the same.
kid wrote:Believe it or not, I'm not "out to get you". I merely hoped that you'll be willing to operate on a trust worthy level, without cutting corners just because you can.
Clearly all that my attempts got me is a lot of self justifications and bold letters, and zero accountability. A shame.
HEEGZ and Rumple own all of the accountability here; I own none of it. I am accountable for myself and now also accountable for my duties as LA, which includes, among other things, the oversight of Admin for the duration of my tenure as LA.

My stance on this is stop your whining and start an Admin recall and censure process, presenting completely objective facts of Charter violations, with direct citations from the Charter to support your claims; you will witness my integrity when I discuss whether it is necessary to recuse myself from the process with the other Admin if there is any question of a lack of objectivity on my part.
kid wrote:And now i'm really done.
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Ithildur
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Re: Elections?

Post by Ithildur »

I can't believe this is still being dragged out; the explanations offered by several people seem satisfactory for everyone except one individual who is now effectively saying 'the previous LA, current LA, TA, and IA are dishonest liars and cheaters' with neither sufficient evidence nor clear strong argument to support such.

I thought Maxcell said it best. Yes, there may be room to point out 'hey, maybe we should tweak the process/documentation (along with a dozen other areas where our documentation could be improved/updated, yay, volunteers?) so things are more clear and folks know votes can be changed under conditions xyz', but it's gone a bit beyond that.

Honestly, I'd just recommend to the admins to be like superb customer service reps who rise above contentious customers and concede politely 'Good sir, I think we hear what you're saying, you raise a legit point in there somewhere; we'll tweak/clarify the process - thank you for being so concerned about making sure we're not cheating!' and go ahead and make some tweaks.

Yes, it's a thankless job, as someone put it well in another thread today.
Last edited by Ithildur on Fri Jun 19, 2015 7:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Elections?

Post by shad0wfax »

Zelknolf wrote:If nobody was acknowledging that this looks bad from at least some angles, we wouldn't have four pages of discussion. People say completely incomprehensible things here all the time, but when they do there's nothing to explain or defend. The thread gets a page of people saying "lolno" and it dies.

But in terms of actions I can take? I can say that there's layers of oversight, and people respond to complaints when they can. Fellow in charge of the election allowed it; other candidate allowed it; change will probably follow because nobody's going to want a revisit of this discussion. It sounds like the new LA is sticking with vote changes allowed, but I'll bet that the process will be more visible and posted early so there's much less risk of people skipping actions for not knowing that they were an option.
Ithildur wrote:Honestly at this point I can't believe this is still being dragged out; the explanations offered by several people seem satisfactory for everyone except one extremely skeptical individual who is now effectively saying 'the previous LA, current LA, TA, and IA are dishonest liars and cheaters' with neither sufficient evidence nor clear, strong argument to support such.

I thought Maxcell said it best; there may be room to point out 'hey, maybe we should tweak the process/documentation so things are more clear and folks know votes can be changed under conditions xyz', but this individual has gone far beyond that.
My path forward is to find a way to keep the results of the poll private until the poll closes, then to reveal the total votes to the public, but not reveal how a person voted.

To avoid "vote-trolling" I think it best that we find a way to prevent users from spamming F5 for poll updates during the election. To allow a user to change a vote due to the actions of a candidate during the election cycle has merit, and so I am inclined to allow all users to change their votes from the start of an election if we can keep the results of the election hidden until the polls close.

Because we don't have a mechanism to hide in-progress polls at this point, I feel that it would be best to keep all votes cast as final votes, and to handle any vote changes on a case by case basis privately in PMs with a user requesting a change, and then to post that request in the Admin forums, where proper oversight of database changes and a discussion about the merits of the individual vote change can occur. This hypothetical discussion and oversight isn't a formal process, nor is it something that I would codify in the Charter; instead, it's what I would do to maintain objectivity, some degree of transparency, and also preserve vote anonymity. I can honestly say that I'd have never thought it necessary to go to such lengths and I doubt that HEEGZ or Foam did either. But here we are now, letting one furiously smoking keyboard necessitate paranoid oversight in handling a narrow issue that's likely never to come up again.

I have no intention of amending the Charter to explicitly allow or forbid user vote changes. I'd rather leave it to the LA to oversee the election, and handle vote change requests on a case by case basis and avoid making our Charter overly legalistic on this individual matter. Other LA's in the future may decide differently.

The issue with this election is not that a vote change was or was not allowed. Rather, the issue is that the vote change request at the 11th hour was the decisive factor in the election no matter how that request was addressed:
  • Allowing the vote change meant that candidate B won.
  • Disallowing the vote change means that candidate A would have most likely won.
  • Nullifying the vote of the user requesting the change means that candidate B would have won.
This election was an outlier in terms of how close it was and also how it appears that one user's vote decided the election. I'll remind you that we had 34 votes cast and that 34 users decided this election. It just so happens that the users were split 17-17 and that one user changed his vote and it became 18-16.

Rumple_C did not singlehandedly decide this election; 17 other users with Rumple decided this election. Let's not lose sight of the fact that we had a very robust election.

It was a devil's choice for the LA, sure to cause drama regardless of which option was chosen. We see the drama from allowing the vote change here and now. I would have contested the results of the election if the vote change had not been allowed and the PA broke the tie in CD's favor, as I suspect she would have. Rumple_C may or may not have complained if his vote were negated entirely, even though the result of negating his vote entirely would still mean the same election outcome. Others may have championed Rumple's cause on his behalf, with or without his consent, stating that the LA denied the vote of someone for no reason or for the wrong reason and contested the results had his change request not been granted or had his entire vote been nullified.

Any action by the LA, including inaction, had the potential to set a dangerous precedent; this is why I dislike ruling by precedent and prefer to incorporate pivotal precedents into law formally or to reject them as unique cases that do not apply to the general process.

Although I became the LA because of the vote change allowance, this does not mean that I agree with the rationale behind the vote change. If Rumple truly felt that CD should not be LA for her own sake, then he should have not voted for her in the first place. If Rumple changed his vote for the lulz, then here we are, seeing the result of his change and knowing that he's enjoying his lulz.

As Zelknolf alluded to, we have layers of oversight and a process for everything. If any user of ALFA feels strongly that the Charter was violated or that an Administrator (or user) was acting in a manner that is forbidden, we have a recall and censure process; initiate them if you feel it is warranted.
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Xanthea
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Re: Elections?

Post by Xanthea »

I think it's pretty clear that they're cheating scum and not only should the election results be reversed and the offenders banned, but they should probably be hunted down and imprisoned IRL too.
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Re: Elections?

Post by shad0wfax »

Xanthea wrote:I think it's pretty clear that they're cheating scum and not only should the election results be reversed and the offenders banned, but they should probably be hunted down and imprisoned IRL too.
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Re: Elections?

Post by shad0wfax »

In hindsight the solution to all of this is as follows:
Rumple C wrote:Can I change my vote?
NO. BANNED!


That's what they did in ALFA 1, right? ;)
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kid
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Re: Elections?

Post by kid »

Can I change my vote?
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Re: Elections?

Post by Zelknolf »

kid wrote:Can I change my vote?
Only if you change it to be a vote for me for dictator for life and help me pick out a laurel wreath. There would be no election complaints in a dictatorship. There would be only mandatory elfcyb0r.
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Re: Elections?

Post by gribo »

Bread and circus, spoken as a great dictator. Also, yay, elfCyb0r!
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shad0wfax
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Re: Elections?

Post by shad0wfax »

I'd sure love to put our most active topics up for front page publicity. This topic probably isn't a very good example of why we like to play on ALFA.

Though, it does have two consenting for elf-cyb0r at the end. Maybe it is a good PR piece after all?
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