The WA Voting Bias

[Unibot II]

I'm not adding this suggestion because I think you've gotten your answer from [violet] via game changes: she just went through the trouble to create WA graphs for us.

[Lordieth]

I'm not adding this suggestion because I think you've gotten your answer from [violet] via game changes: she just went through the trouble to create WA graphs for us.

I don't understand. What do the graphs have to do with adding thread links into resolutions at vote? I like the new WA graphs, but how is that an answer?

[Mahaj WA Seat]

I'm not adding this suggestion because I think you've gotten your answer from [violet] via game changes: she just went through the trouble to create WA graphs for us.

I don't understand. What do the graphs have to do with adding thread links into resolutions at vote? I like the new WA graphs, but how is that an answer?

Ah, its cool. Violet has done a lot of stuff for us...so, yeah.

But its a nice idea.

[Lordieth]

I don't understand. What do the graphs have to do with adding thread links into resolutions at vote? I like the new WA graphs, but how is that an answer?

Ah, its cool. Violet has done a lot of stuff for us...so, yeah.

But its a nice idea.

Violet has, and the new features are fantastic, but that isn't what Unibot said. If the answer is 'no because we've had a lot of new features lately' that's fine. It just wasn't made too clear in his post.

[Flibbleites]

Yes, the 'lemming effect' does exist, but it's not a major problem, and it can be overcome.

It can be a major problem..

[The Murtunian Tribes]

Why don't you just remove any notation on how you voted, ie in your national happenings or whatever? That should curb peer pressure a bit, and it's a lot less complicated a change than most of these other suggestions.

[Primorum Libertorum]

So has there never been a proposal that got denied? And if there was at least one, how come the supposed bias did not work there?

[The Murtunian Tribes]

So has there never been a proposal that got denied? And if there was at least one, how come the supposed bias did not work there?

There has. Not very often, but it happens.

[Mousebumples]

NS Wiki has a good record of any proposals that reached quorum. (WA Timeline, UN Timeline)

[Lordieth]

Why don't you just remove any notation on how you voted, ie in your national happenings or whatever? That should curb peer pressure a bit, and it's a lot less complicated a change than most of these other suggestions.

Perhaps, but I don't think many people like the idea of taking, hiding, or withholding information we already have access too.

I think we also need to distinguish between trend voting and blind voting. The former is voting in favour of the majority voting figure, the latter are the WA members who at best only read the name of the resolution when they vote. These are two seperate problems. If more people participated in resolution discussion, it could help curb both.

Peer pressure voting seems more of a regional issue, although I can imagine other scenarios where this could happen. This would be very hard to curtail, and in some cases shouldn't be, like in lobbying or other political tactics.

[Mahaj WA Seat]

Why don't you just remove any notation on how you voted, ie in your national happenings or whatever? That should curb peer pressure a bit, and it's a lot less complicated a change than most of these other suggestions.

Perhaps, but I don't think many people like the idea of taking, hiding, or withholding information we already have access too.

I think we also need to distinguish between trend voting and blind voting. The former is voting in favour of the majority voting figure, the latter are the WA members who at best only read the name of the resolution when they vote. These are two seperate problems. If more people participated in resolution discussion, it could help curb both.

Peer pressure voting seems more of a regional issue, although I can imagine other scenarios where this could happen. This would be very hard to curtail, and in some cases shouldn't be, like in lobbying or other political tactics.

Peer pressure voting is rare, from what i've seen.

[Unibot II]

Yes, the 'lemming effect' does exist, but it's not a major problem, and it can be overcome.

It can be a major problem..

I don't think that had anything to do with lemming voting actually, if it was up to vote now I would have voted for it because it was hilariously bad ...

[[violet]]

I think the most common problem is:

Vote has 1,000 votes for, and 600 votes against. Players see the difference, and automatically vote for. Peer pressure in an odd form.

I don't believe this happens. People almost always have a good reason for voting the way they do. Track down a few nations and ask them why they voted that way; you'll get reasons.

No doubt some people skim-read resolutions and vote without completely understanding the implications, but this has nothing to do with the for-against tally.

The reason a resolution gets voted in and then shortly afterward repealed is that both resolutions make good cases.

[Unibot II]

I'm not adding this suggestion because I think you've gotten your answer from [violet] via game changes: she just went through the trouble to create WA graphs for us.

I don't understand. What do the graphs have to do with adding thread links into resolutions at vote? I like the new WA graphs, but how is that an answer?

Oh.. sorry for some reason I thought we we're talking about a closed voting box. Um.. I think it disadvantages authors who don't want to use the Official forums and I think our 'debate' threads operate with the same lemming effect as voting patterns. If you swarm a thread with positive comments, the negative comments are diminished.. if you swarm a thread with negative comments, those with positive comments don't bother to post or feel they must conform. I've employed this technique in various ways to manipulate C&C threads to my advantage after analyzing how GA threads tend to operate on this basis. The success of a debate or drafting GA thread is basically determined by the positivity of the first page's posters, the more negative those first 25 comments are, the harder it will be to wield positivity in subsequent pages.

[Flibbleites]

It can be a major problem..

I don't think that had anything to do with lemming voting actually, if it was up to vote now I would have voted for it because it was hilariously bad ...

The lemming vote was a problem there in that it was illegal and never should have come up for vote in the first place, but it did and the lemmings are the ones who passed it.

[Unibot II]

I don't think that had anything to do with lemming voting actually, if it was up to vote now I would have voted for it because it was hilariously bad ...

The lemming vote was a problem there in that it was illegal and never should have come up for vote in the first place, but it did and the lemmings are the ones who passed it.

I don't think so, we've seen other illegal resolutions shot down, Max Barry Day passed because it was too stupid not to vote for... I'm saying you haven't picked a very fair example of vote stacking because there are other factors independent of the vote stacking that may have caused the result. There are better examples of vote stacking, for example compare how many resolutions that TEP under Todd, Alsted and 10ki under Ananke (or was it Hockeynutville that stacked?) all agreed upon and stacked with how many of them failed... I think you'll find the result is nil or little to nil. The Lemming effect has been diminished however by having a notifier, but this hasn't reduced vote stacking, it's just partially negated vote stomping -- that's bad for authors who want to tightly regulate what doesn't pass, but good for authors who would rather most things pass than not.

[Flibbleites]

The lemming vote was a problem there in that it was illegal and never should have come up for vote in the first place, but it did and the lemmings are the ones who passed it.

I don't think so, we've seen other illegal resolutions shot down, Max Barry Day passed because it was too stupid not to vote for... I'm saying you haven't picked a very fair example of vote stacking because there are other factors independent of the vote stacking that may have caused the result. There are better examples of vote stacking, for example compare how many resolutions that TEP under Todd, Alsted and 10ki under Ananke (or was it Hockeynutville that stacked?) all agreed upon and stacked with how many of them failed... I think you'll find the result is nil or little to nil. The Lemming effect has been diminished however by having a notifier, but this hasn't reduced vote stacking, it's just partially negated vote stomping -- that's bad for authors who want to tightly regulate what doesn't pass, but good for authors who would rather most things pass than not.

OK then, how about this example, Promotion of Solar Panels, the resolution where I actually coined the term "Lemming Vote." A resolution so bad that before the voting ended even the author changed their mind and was voting against it and yet the lemmings pushed it through.

[Lordieth]

Unibot; Increased participation in the 'official' resolution at vote thread doesn't necessarily mean the lemming effect would increase. If more WA members looked at the argument itself and made an informed vote rather than blindly voting, that's better than not reading or even understanding the implications of the resolution at vote.

What you're talking about is a side effect of the thread looking more FOR or AGAINST, increased participation wouldn't make it lean more one way or the other on the whole in a negative way, if anything we would get a more varied spectrum of opinions and larger debate.

[Omigodtheykilledkenny]

OK then, how about this example, Promotion of Solar Panels, the resolution where I actually coined the term "Lemming Vote." A resolution so bad that before the voting ended even the author changed their mind and was voting against it and yet the lemmings pushed it through.

...and even with a counter-telegram campaign, and many major regions voting against, it still passed with like 58% support.

[Estovakiva]

Well, we are too simply to many people. Unlike the IRL-UN etc.

[Mousebumples]

Well, we are too simply to many people. Unlike the IRL-UN etc.

You're right! We should require that all active WA members post on the forums at least one time weekly to retain their WA membership! That'll fix everything! [/sarcasm]

[Jagalonia]

Well, we are too simply to many people. Unlike the IRL-UN etc.

You're right! We should require that all active WA members post on the forums at least one time weekly to retain their WA membership! That'll fix everything! [/sarcasm]

I would say restrict voting to the delegates, but that would only make things worse.

[Lordieth]

If there was a countdown timer before being able to vote, wouldn't more people check the resolution, increasing the chance they would actually read it? A history message could be sent to all WA nations, for example 'Voting on the resolution 'Example' to commence in 1 hour'

Possibly a bit annoying though.

[Mousebumples]

If there was a countdown timer before being able to vote, wouldn't more people check the resolution, increasing the chance they would actually read it? A history message could be sent to all WA nations, for example 'Voting on the resolution 'Example' to commence in 1 hour'

Possibly a bit annoying though.

Especially for those of us who HAD already read the proposal when it was in the submission queue (and, hopefully, on the forums) and already are informed on the issue at hand and would rather not have to stay up another hour (for those votes that start on the nighttime update) to be able to vote.

[Unibot II]

OK then, how about this example, Promotion of Solar Panels, the resolution where I actually coined the term "Lemming Vote." A resolution so bad that before the voting ended even the author changed their mind and was voting against it and yet the lemmings pushed it through.

...and even with a counter-telegram campaign, and many major regions voting against, it still passed with like 58% support.

Hhhm, 58% isn't a lot, and the lemming effect dictates that the major regions should have been able to sway them to against. When the feeders are against and the vote is still passing, a resolution has defied the norms of voting (e.g., World Assembly HQ). However there are similar but less talked about effects, one of them was just brought up, that's the irrational desire to pass something that is blatantly illegal or stupid as hell just basically to screw with the system, and then there is the pseudo-lemming effect, voters almost always vote for, likely because they assume if the resolution went through all the work to get up-to-vote the resolution must be pretty good. Perhaps the problem is we use "lemming effect" in a different meaning, a 'lemming' for me is simply someone who conforms their voting with the majority of voters.

Unibot; Increased participation in the 'official' resolution at vote thread doesn't necessarily mean the lemming effect would increase. If more WA members looked at the argument itself and made an informed vote rather than blindly voting, that's better than not reading or even understanding the implications of the resolution at vote.

What you're talking about is a side effect of the thread looking more FOR or AGAINST, increased participation wouldn't make it lean more one way or the other on the whole in a negative way, if anything we would get a more varied spectrum of opinions and larger debate.

It is a side effect, I'm saying that the forum provides more ambiguous information (stuff you don't need to know to vote responsibly) and can manipulate voters just as much as a nice-sounding title, to say one over the other is better is to follow the same elitism of the WA subforum ("I'm a responsible assembly member because I discuss things on the Official forums ... *purs*") that people complain about quite a bit. If you want to inform voters of well-hidden problems in resolutions and whatnot, I suggest running a regional information service to circulate objective articles about resolutions for regions.