Secretariat's Council (MEMBERS ANNOUNCED)

[Excidium Planetis]

I think a Read Only subforum (for non-councilors) has been the one suggested by most (all?) people so far.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False-consensus_effect

Have you actually run the numbers to confirm that there is no consensus? I mean, I know not everyone agreed, but I did count at least 4 or 5 who did agree to a read-only forum, which is a sizable number in this community.

[Christian Democrats]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False-consensus_effect

Have you actually run the numbers to confirm that there is no consensus? I mean, I know not everyone agreed, but I did count at least 4 or 5 who did agree to a read-only forum, which is a sizable number in this community.

This part of the conversation has been going on for less than 24 hours. Four players have agreed, two have disagreed, and one doesn't even support the council idea. That's not a consensus.

[Excidium Planetis]

Have you actually run the numbers to confirm that there is no consensus? I mean, I know not everyone agreed, but I did count at least 4 or 5 who did agree to a read-only forum, which is a sizable number in this community.

This part of the conversation has been going on for less than 24 hours. Four players have agreed, two have disagreed, and one doesn't even support the council idea. That's not a consensus.

No, but it is a majority (which is what Ara claimed: "most"). And Hannasea/DSR doesn't support the Council idea but did say that the forum should be public or at least have a declassification system.

[Imperium Anglorum]

Echoing what Gruen said on the last page, if this is an advisory council with no powers, it's pointless and someone may as well just participate in the debates to make sense of it all.

Otherwise, if it has power, it wouldn't be something that I can say I would support. There are a number of problems with (basically, what this is) self-policing. The system set up would be inherently conservative and it would be extremely hard to change anything at all. Furthermore, I am also very concerned about the ability to disentangle political views and legality challenges. If anyone remembers UFoC, one will recall that anything that he also believed was illegal happened to coincide with those things he did not like. And I can say that this is true with all players — things we do not want passed are going to receive more scrutiny than those which we do like. For example, the great opposition to the proposals which CD put forth manifested themselves into legality challenges extremely quickly. I doubt that if supporters would have put those proposals under anywhere near as much scrutiny.

Secondarily, if we go with recusing — then two options occur: (1) people don't want to have to recuse themselves and (2) people don't recuse themselves. The former is easily manifested (and, I would argue, is manifested in moderators now) in "I don't want to be accused of being biased. Thus, I won't say anything". The second is also easily manifested in "I don't believe I am biased because I believe I am right". Both (possibly together) would make recusing things impossible.

I think that handing over legality challenges to players would also actually kill the GA beyond the people who are already here. New players will see a calcified clique with all the power and this would quite literally be a WA Elite™. They would also find many things which they propose (because of the new paradigm they bring to the table) heavily scrutinised, under the fire of legality challenges, and (with a self-policing body which I don't believe can be relieved of bias) found to be 'illegal'. They won't play such a game. And I don't really see any reason to why they would.

To Banana's subject: I don't see any greater conflict of interest in the comparative. While the main impetus of this proposal here seems to be aimed at me and Mouse, it is basically the question of whether a legality challenge can be expressed without also bringing in political views. And I would say that the ability to do that is the same — whether one is a delegate or not. A person on this council would care about the GA. They would do so because they play in the GA. And doing so requires that they take a political opinion on things in the GA.

On an aside, I'm off on holiday, so this is just a periodic check-in.

[Christian Democrats]

I think that handing over legality challenges to players would also actually kill the GA beyond the people who are already here. New players will see a calcified clique with all the power and this would quite literally be a WA Elite™.

I don't believe players should see the council. A private forum and no badges means less elitism and less politicking. Of course, players who frequent this forum would know who the councilors are; but their deliberations would be akin to those of juries with a judge (moderator) finalizing the decision.

[Araraukar]

*snip*

I think you'll find it's more due to a failure of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_consolidation as my brain apparently didn't bother to do an actual count beyond "more people have explicitly agreed than have explicitly disagreed".

Secondarily, if we go with recusing — then two options occur: (1) people don't want to have to recuse themselves and (2) people don't recuse themselves.

With mods at the helm of this thing (even if they wouldn't have veto), that's unlikely to happen. They can fairly easily (which is part of why I'm slightly afraid of and in awe with mods like Reppy) sort out things behind the scenes to see who should recuse themselves and if that didn't happen, then a reminder, warning (not RedText) and expulsion would be likely as escalations.

I think that handing over legality challenges to players would also actually kill the GA beyond the people who are already here. New players will see a calcified clique with all the power and this would quite literally be a WA Elite™.

Unless, indeed, there were term limits and limited number of consequtive terms - then anyone with solid enough knowledge could get in. Like take Gruen/DSR/Hannasea, he could quit for a year or two again, come back in a new incarnation and be acceptable to the council after he had updated his GA knowledge with the important bits that had happened since he left.

Additionally to which, even if this council didn't happen, we should have mentors.

(with a self-policing body which I don't believe can be relieved of bias)

Oh ye of little faith. But if you don't have examples of non-corrupt politicians in real life, I guess I can't blame you.

On an aside, I'm off on holiday, so this is just a periodic check-in.

Enjoy your holiday!

I don't believe players should see the council. A private forum and no badges means less elitism and less politicking. Of course, players who frequent this forum would know who the councilors are; but their deliberations would be akin to those of juries with a judge (moderator) finalizing the decision.

In the interests of keeping tabs, is that "for council", "against outer wrappings of office", "for a sub-forum" and "against publicly Read Only forum"?

[Christian Democrats]

I don't believe players should see the council. A private forum and no badges means less elitism and less politicking. Of course, players who frequent this forum would know who the councilors are; but their deliberations would be akin to those of juries with a judge (moderator) finalizing the decision.

In the interests of keeping tabs, is that "for council", "against outer wrappings of office", "for a sub-forum" and "against publicly Read Only forum"?

Yes, I support the council idea, oppose badges/masking, and support a private subforum.

[Excidium Planetis]

I agree almost entirely with Ara's latest post. More specifically:

• Mods can remove players who don't recuse themselves.
• There should be consecutive term limits.
• There should be mentors anyways

[Bananaistan]

To Banana's subject: I don't see any greater conflict of interest in the comparative. While the main impetus of this proposal here seems to be aimed at me and Mouse, it is basically the question of whether a legality challenge can be expressed without also bringing in political views. And I would say that the ability to do that is the same — whether one is a delegate or not. A person on this council would care about the GA. They would do so because they play in the GA. And doing so requires that they take a political opinion on things in the GA.

On an aside, I'm off on holiday, so this is just a periodic check-in.

It's not specifically aimed at you and Mousebumples at all. Yes the weight of your votes based on your current endorsement count is very significant but you're also one vote of those who decide whether a proposal makes it to vote or not. IMO it's cleaner and easier to just completely avoid all concerns about delegates by not allowing players to be both a delegate and a member of this council and would avoid some of the issues you have raised regarding bias and recusing.

However, the entirety of your comment gives me pause for thought and there are legitimate concerns there but the form of the council may address these adequately.

[Excidium Planetis]

It's not specifically aimed at you and Mousebumples at all. Yes the weight of your votes based on your current endorsement count is very significant but you're also one vote of those who decide whether a proposal makes it to vote or not. IMO it's cleaner and easier to just completely avoid all concerns about delegates by not allowing players to be both a delegate and a member of this council and would avoid some of the issues you have raised regarding bias and recusing.

Also, why are you against Delegates becoming Council Members again? Is it because of their voting power, or the power they hold over their region? If the former, why does it matter for Delegates like Tinfect or Wrapper, who have 3 and 4 endorsements respectively last I checked, and thus wield practically no voting power? If the latter, are you also going to ask that ROs and Founders not be Council members?

[Bears Armed]

(Okay, yes, this post has been delayed for longer than I [and maybeso some of you, too] originally expected, but I have kept up to date with the discussion...)

At first thought, I liked the idea.
However on further consideration, and having read other people's comments, I'm not so sure.
If this proposed Council is going to be purely advisory in nature, with a Mod still needed to approve the actual decisions, then I agree with those who've said that it basically it would just duplicate existing discussions in this forum so that the Mods studying those -- and maybeso, in some cases, asking (as has been mentioned they already did on at least one previous occasion) for a Mod-selected spokesperson from each side of an argument to summarize their position -- should be enough.

If more GA-experienced Mods can't be appointed then -- although, obviously, there's no way to make this happen other than by asking for volunteers -- more of the existing Mods becoming familiar with the GA's rules, precedents, & conventions (and showing that they've done so, by participation in this forum) would be a LOT more useful than an advisory council that would still depend on having one of the few "qualified" Mods present in time to make decisions based on the opinions expressed (over whatever period of time is necessary for "enough" of its members to express their opinions, and that Mod to evaluate them) before the proposals concerned hit the voting floor.

[Tzorsland]

My thoughts so far from the thread.

I know several people have mentioned that this forum serves as a source for legality arguments. I'm going to disagree with this somewhat. The current forum is filled with proposals that never even make it to the submission stage. When proposals do they are filled with a lot of nonsense side bar conversations. As someone who only pays a minor glance on the proposals in the forum, I know, just when the resolution comes up for a vote I have to skip half the discussion on the resolution and mostly just go to the last page. Searching for legality arguments is a practical nightmare.

I'm not sure what "advisory" really means here; everyone is talking about different things. If that means that the mods have the right to veto a decision, I'm perfectly fine with that. A mod is going to have to implement the removal off of the queue or the suspension of the application of the vote anyway. If that means that the suggestions are almost always going to be ignored, then forget about it.

So I think a number of things are in order here.

It has to be a separate forum, just like "Moderation" is separate. The threads exist for specific purposes, legality challenges and related material only.

The members have to act OOC at all times. Let's say I was appointed. I'd probably use my original account even though Frustrated Franciscans was my WA member. And if a legal resolution came about that was strongly against one of the principles of Pro Life International, I would still strongly approve it because the purpose of the group is legality challenges ... not whether it's a good or bad resolution. That's for the voters to decide.

Part of the function of the group is going to be archiving and summarizing. The first problem we have to address is the appearance of inconsistency.
Part of the function of the group is going to be working transparently. The second problem we have to address is the hidden nature of the action. That's necessary for moderation, but not for writing resolutions.
Part of the function of the group is going to be positive results. It's not enough to say "WRONG ANSWER, THANKS FOR PLAYING." You have to explain why it is wrong, and how it can be made not wrong. When these rulings are made in a consistent manner and explained in a simple manner, you will see, over time, less and less examples. You will still see examples, but it will be easier to show newer writers where to go to understand the problems they are having with their proposals.

Finally, I would rather see moderators here than not here. Absence in this sense does not make the heart grow fonder. Even when I strongly disagree with a moderator, I appreciate them more when they post frequently than when they don't post and only come down to bash people. At the very least you do need to read these forums. Otherwise you will be wondering why there are so many people with pitchforks and lanterns outside the castle gate. You will know why and you will have already prepared the molten lead.

[Krioval]

I pop back into the GA forum and find this waiting for me. That's either really good or really strange timing. Anyway:

I like the idea of a council/court/whatever where the person/group challenging the legality of a proposal gets to make a statement, the proposer/supporters make a statement, and then there is a period for public discussion among the council. Afterward, I would also support a private channel in which the voting is done, with a moderator announcing the result, including a dissent if there is one.

I see no reason for term limits, restricting membership based on being a delegate, or anything other than recusing oneself if there is clear conflict of interest. I would presume that the moderation staff would choose people for this council who are able to separate their personal views on a proposal's topic from the question of its legality. In the case where somebody is clearly biased, the moderation staff can intervene.

[Araraukar]

I like the idea of a council/court/whatever where the person/group challenging the legality of a proposal gets to make a statement, the proposer/supporters make a statement, and then there is a period for public discussion among the council. Afterward, I would also support a private channel in which the voting is done, with a moderator announcing the result, including a dissent if there is one.

So is that both "for fully public subforum where anyone can post" and "for advisory council only"? I don't think anyone's suggested your exact combo of conditions before, so trying to simplify a bit for record-keeping.

I see no reason for term limits, restricting membership based on being a delegate, or anything other than recusing oneself if there is clear conflict of interest. I would presume that the moderation staff would choose people for this council who are able to separate their personal views on a proposal's topic from the question of its legality. In the case where somebody is clearly biased, the moderation staff can intervene.

Also "for moderator-selected council", "against term limits" and "for mods setting and enforcing a code of conduct for council members"?

[States of Glory WA Office]

Araraukar, could you please list all of the points on your checklist? For the purposes of making my position more clear, I'd like to give it a shot.

[Krioval]

So is that both "for fully public subforum where anyone can post" and "for advisory council only"? I don't think anyone's suggested your exact combo of conditions before, so trying to simplify a bit for record-keeping.

1. I'd like a publicly viewable subforum where the councilors and the legality challengers/defenders can post in order to get all the arguments squared away. I think a secondary private subforum would be used for the councilors to come to a decision that the moderation staff can use.

2. I'd also like for the decision to be binding, though I'm not so convinced that further appeals will never happen. Maybe a period of careful review by moderators to make sure that the council is functioning properly? If everything is working as it should, I would then like to see the mod staff let the council do its thing.

Also "for moderator-selected council", "against term limits" and "for mods setting and enforcing a code of conduct for council members"?

3. Well, the mods are going to be reviewing everything the council does, so they're ultimately in control of who sits on the council. I think user-submitted nominations work as well, but mod oversight, especially early in the council's existence, would be necessary.

4. I'm against term limits (and delegate exclusion), yes.

5. I think that the code of conduct needs to be hammered out between the mods and the first generation of councilors, but the mod staff will have to have a strong hand in its setup, at least initially. I think that enforcement of that code will likely be in the hands of the councilors themselves, unless there is a dispute that requires a higher authority.

Does that clarify things, or have I just managed to be more confusing?

[Separatist Peoples]

4. I'm against term limits (and delegate exclusion), yes.

Definitely this. If players are worried about popularity contests, that might color their opinion. Sure, they are ultimately beholden to the prevailing winds of opinion in the forum, but the alternatives aren't ideal. WA-wide votes would suffer the same low-information voter manipulation proposals see. Forum-wide votes leave the voting process open to nonmembers who peruse the forum but don't participate. And if we only poll those who regularly participate, well, then we're right back to accusations of elitism, because how, exactly, do you define a forum regular to determine an objective standard?

The moderators know what they're looking for to handle this, and they are eminently qualified to be impartial on selection of people who can integrate with the team, at least. Your opinions regarding rulings may vary. Let them pick.

[Sciongrad]

For the record, I agree wth basically everything Krioval just said.

[Excidium Planetis]

4. I'm against term limits (and delegate exclusion), yes.

Definitely this. If players are worried about popularity contests, that might color their opinion. Sure, they are ultimately beholden to the prevailing winds of opinion in the forum, but the alternatives aren't ideal. WA-wide votes would suffer the same low-information voter manipulation proposals see. Forum-wide votes leave the voting process open to nonmembers who peruse the forum but don't participate. And if we only poll those who regularly participate, well, then we're right back to accusations of elitism, because how, exactly, do you define a forum regular to determine an objective standard?

The moderators know what they're looking for to handle this, and they are eminently qualified to be impartial on selection of people who can integrate with the team, at least. Your opinions regarding rulings may vary. Let them pick.

I don't know about the others who support term limits, but I'll clarify my own position:

I completely agree with you SP: the Council should not be elected. Strong supporter of democracy that I am, I just don't see it working for what is essentially going to be the Supreme Court of the GA.

I do, however, support term limits. I believe the moderators should appoint members to serve terms, but that they can't serve more than X consecutive terms. This, I believe, would keep opinions in the Council fresh and would eliminate any potential claims of moderator bias or elitism because the Council membership would be changing all the time.

[Araraukar]

The moderators know what they're looking for to handle this

I thought they were asking us because they couldn't agree on exactly what they're looking for. And if non-Wrapper mods aren't too hot on reading through the various threads for our opinions, I feel sorry for them for having to shift years' worth of stuff to check for and verify player integrity...

...unless they've been keeping tabs on us all this time...

[Christian Democrats]

I'd like a publicly viewable subforum where the councilors and the legality challengers/defenders can post in order to get all the arguments squared away.

Isn't that what this forum is for?

Also, we don't need full-blown hearings. Player A submits a GHR against Player B's proposal, the moderators inform Player B that someone has submitted a GHR and that it says roughly such and such, and Player B makes a counterargument in the proposal thread. One GHR, one notice from the moderators, and one post from the proposer.

I think a secondary private subforum would be used for the councilors to come to a decision that the moderation staff can use.

I agree.

[Separatist Peoples]

I don't know about the others who support term limits, but I'll clarify my own position:

I completely agree with you SP: the Council should not be elected. Strong supporter of democracy that I am, I just don't see it working for what is essentially going to be the Supreme Court of the GA.

I do, however, support term limits. I believe the moderators should appoint members to serve terms, but that they can't serve more than X consecutive terms. This, I believe, would keep opinions in the Council fresh and would eliminate any potential claims of moderator bias or elitism because the Council membership would be changing all the time.

I think term limits would just increase the workload of the moderators, so I'm not sure I'd like to see term limits. Half the reason this is being done, I suspect, is to cut down on workload.

[Calladan]

I'd like a publicly viewable subforum where the councilors and the legality challengers/defenders can post in order to get all the arguments squared away.

Isn't that what this forum is for?

I thought the Council would be a limited number of people ruling on purely technical issues, rather than the ENTIRE WA ruling on (for want of a better phrase) role-playing issues.

So here I could object to Proposal A because I don't want to legalise bear-bating, but in Council (if I were a member, which I admit is really not all that likely) I couldn't object to it on those grounds because that is an RP matter not a "legal" matter.

It would clear up A LOT of the OOC clutter that goes on in this forum currently (just as a matter of opinion).

[Tzorsland]

Isn't that what this forum is for?

No. Simply put no.

The forum is for drafting resolutions, but that is for the nuances of the proposals. Legality issues might come up in the threads but the threads are not for legality issues.

One submitted, the drafting threads become the threads for the actual debate. Again, legality issues might come up but the threads are still not for legality issues.

One major problem is that the forum is a hybrid of IC and OOC. Legality issues should never be addressed in character.

[Imperium Anglorum]

About whether this is the right forum, I would say that over the last few years, the proliferation of legality challenges has bogged everything down into legality issues and not drafting. Drafting support on this forum is near non-existent unless provided with an obligation of regional support or finding someone who agrees with it. The total inability of people to run a challenge which isn't a legality challenge, actually, has been quite the boon for me and ... some others: we can run telegram campaigns unopposed.