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Thomas Dalton

20 Sep 2008 20 Sep '08

4:28 p.m.

Has anything been done to let people that have put their names down for membership know that the vote has started? If someone familiar with AWB or similar could go through and add a message to everyone's talk page, it would be good. I don't think we can expect everyone to be either on this list or watching the meta page.

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Ian A. Holton

20 Sep 20 Sep

5:24 p.m.

I think most people who put there name down should be on this list or either watching the page - at least I'd personally expect that from anybody willing to join as a member :) Still, it would be good to notify people on-wiki. On Sat, Sep 20, 2008 at 10:28 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>wrote;wrote:

Has anything been done to let people that have put their names down for membership know that the vote has started? If someone familiar with AWB or similar could go through and add a message to everyone's talk page, it would be good. I don't think we can expect everyone to be either on this list or watching the meta page. _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_UK http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l

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Thomas Dalton

5:35 p.m.

2008/9/20 Ian A. Holton <poeloq(a)gmail.com>om>:

I think most people who put there name down should be on this list or either watching the page - at least I'd personally expect that from anybody willing to join as a member :) Still, it would be good to notify people on-wiki.

I'm not sure I'd use the phrase "willing to join" - joining a chapter should be viewed as a good thing, not something you reluctantly agree to! I suspect some people that have put their names down don't keep a close eye on their meta watchlist - adding their name to the list may well be the only thing they've done on meta, there's no real need to be involved with meta in order to contribute to the projects.

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Owen Blacker

22 Sep 22 Sep

6:46 p.m.

I'd strongly advocate against relying on people watching a page to know about votes — I have far too many pages on my watchlist, so never use it any more, and pruning it to become useful again is one of those tasks I'm never likely to get round to. That said, User:Privatemusings put a note onto my User talk: page (presumably using AWB) over the weekend, which is by far and away the best way for us to inform people, imho. :o) 2008/9/20 Ian A. Holton <poeloq(a)gmail.com>

I think most people who put there name down should be on this list or either watching the page - at least I'd personally expect that from anybody willing to join as a member :) Still, it would be good to notify people on-wiki. On Sat, Sep 20, 2008 at 10:28 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com>wrote;wrote:

Has anything been done to let people that have put their names down for membership know that the vote has started? If someone familiar with AWB or similar could go through and add a message to everyone's talk page, it would be good. I don't think we can expect everyone to be either on this list or watching the meta page. _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_UK http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l

_______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_UK http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l

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Thomas Dalton

7:03 p.m.

2008/9/22 Owen Blacker <owen(a)blacker.me.uk>uk>:

I'd strongly advocate against relying on people watching a page to know about votes — I have far too many pages on my watchlist, so never use it any more, and pruning it to become useful again is one of those tasks I'm never likely to get round to. That said, User:Privatemusings put a note onto my User talk: page (presumably using AWB) over the weekend, which is by far and away the best way for us to inform people, imho. :o)

I believe everyone eligible to vote has now been notified personally. We have a well oiled machine here. :)

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Tom Holden

7:10 p.m.

Perhaps it would be sensible to notify again anyone who hasn't voted yet towards the end of the voting period (which would also serve as a confirmation for everyone else)? Tom -----Original Message----- From: wikimediauk-l-bounces(a)lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:wikimediauk-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Thomas Dalton Sent: 22 September 2008 18:03 To: wikimediauk-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org Subject: Re: [Wikimediauk-l] Notifying electorate of vote 2008/9/22 Owen Blacker <owen(a)blacker.me.uk>uk>:

I'd strongly advocate against relying on people watching a page to know about votes — I have far too many pages on my watchlist, so never use it any more, and pruning it to become useful again is one of those tasks I'm never likely to get round to. That said, User:Privatemusings put a note onto my User talk: page (presumably using AWB) over the weekend, which is by far and away the best way for us to inform people, imho. :o)

I believe everyone eligible to vote has now been notified personally. We have a well oiled machine here. :) _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_UK http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l

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Thomas Dalton

7:34 p.m.

2008/9/22 Tom Holden <thomas.holden(a)gmail.com>om>:

Perhaps it would be sensible to notify again anyone who hasn't voted yet towards the end of the voting period (which would also serve as a confirmation for everyone else)?

Only the election committee has that information, so one of them would have to do it (or publish a list of votes received). It's not a bad idea, but I don't feel comfortable asking the committee to do any extra work - I would be very happy if they volunteered to do it anyway, though.

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Andrew Whitworth

8:07 p.m.

On Mon, Sep 22, 2008 at 1:34 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Only the election committee has that information, so one of them would have to do it (or publish a list of votes received). It's not a bad idea, but I don't feel comfortable asking the committee to do any extra work - I would be very happy if they volunteered to do it anyway, though.

Since there are no hard rules for suffrage, it's not even possible to determine who is supposed to vote but hasn't. If the pool of possible electors was more well-defined, this would be a trivial task. --Andrew Whitworth

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Kwan Ting Chan

8:17 p.m.

On Mon, 2008-09-22 at 14:07 -0400, Andrew Whitworth wrote:

On Mon, Sep 22, 2008 at 1:34 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Only the election committee has that information, so one of them would have to do it (or publish a list of votes received). It's not a bad idea, but I don't feel comfortable asking the committee to do any extra work - I would be very happy if they volunteered to do it anyway, though.

Since there are no hard rules for suffrage, it's not even possible to determine who is supposed to vote but hasn't. If the pool of possible electors was more well-defined, this would be a trivial task.

I thought it was the list of people who noted an interest on being a member by the start of voting? KTC -- Experience is a good school but the fees are high. - Heinrich Heine

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geni

8:24 p.m.

2008/9/22 Kwan Ting Chan <ktc(a)ktchan.info>fo>:

On Mon, 2008-09-22 at 14:07 -0400, Andrew Whitworth wrote:

On Mon, Sep 22, 2008 at 1:34 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Only the election committee has that information, so one of them would have to do it (or publish a list of votes received). It's not a bad idea, but I don't feel comfortable asking the committee to do any extra work - I would be very happy if they volunteered to do it anyway, though.

Since there are no hard rules for suffrage, it's not even possible to determine who is supposed to vote but hasn't. If the pool of possible electors was more well-defined, this would be a trivial task.

I thought it was the list of people who noted an interest on being a member by the start of voting? KTC

There is. Problem is I'm not sure I should be saying who has and hasn't voted. -- geni

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Andrew Whitworth

8:29 p.m.

On Mon, Sep 22, 2008 at 2:24 PM, geni <geniice(a)gmail.com> wrote:

There is. Problem is I'm not sure I should be saying who has and hasn't voted.

There is? My bad. Still Geni is right. "Abstain" is just as valid a choice as "Yes" or "No" are, and we shouldn't be revealing people's votes. --Andrew Whitworth

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Thomas Dalton

8:43 p.m.

2008/9/22 Andrew Whitworth <wknight8111(a)gmail.com>om>:

On Mon, Sep 22, 2008 at 2:24 PM, geni <geniice(a)gmail.com> wrote:

There is. Problem is I'm not sure I should be saying who has and hasn't voted.

There is? My bad. Still Geni is right. "Abstain" is just as valid a choice as "Yes" or "No" are, and we shouldn't be revealing people's votes.

There is a difference between abstaining and not voting. Abstaining involves actively saying you abstain (and counts towards a quorum if we had one), not voting is a passive act. If people want to abstain, they can send an email saying so and that would be kept secret. (Also, abstain actually counts as a "no" in approval voting, although it would make a difference to the 50% rule we added on.)

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Ross Gardler

23 Sep 23 Sep

10:59 a.m.

Folks, it really is a bit late to be figuring out how to ensure your community are engaged. (For the record not everyone who is entitled to vote has been notified. I haven't for example. I'm only aware because I'm watching this list. At this stage I'm happy with that but it seems others here are not). Ross

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Thomas Dalton

4:13 p.m.

2008/9/23 Ross Gardler <ross.gardler(a)oucs.ox.ac.uk>uk>:

Folks, it really is a bit late to be figuring out how to ensure your community are engaged.

We've done the engaging the community bit (as much as we can without taking too long over it - there's plenty more to be done on that front once we're a little more established), this is about making sure the community that we have engaged know that we've moved onto the next stage and need their input.

(For the record not everyone who is entitled to vote has been notified. I haven't for example. I'm only aware because I'm watching this list. At this stage I'm happy with that but it seems others here are not).

Yes, you have, it's on your meta talk page: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:RossGardler

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Ross Gardler

4:17 p.m.

Thomas Dalton wrote:

2008/9/23 Ross Gardler <ross.gardler(a)oucs.ox.ac.uk>uk>:

...

(For the record not everyone who is entitled to vote has been notified. I haven't for example. I'm only aware because I'm watching this list. At this stage I'm happy with that but it seems others here are not).

Yes, you have, it's on your meta talk page: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:RossGardler

So it is, I didn't know though. Not too effective a way of communicating it would seem. NOTE: this is merely an observation, as I say above I'm happy with expecting people to be proactive if they are interested. Ross

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Thomas Dalton

4:27 p.m.

2008/9/23 Ross Gardler <ross.gardler(a)oucs.ox.ac.uk>uk>:

Thomas Dalton wrote:

2008/9/23 Ross Gardler <ross.gardler(a)oucs.ox.ac.uk>uk>:

...

(For the record not everyone who is entitled to vote has been notified. I haven't for example. I'm only aware because I'm watching this list. At this stage I'm happy with that but it seems others here are not).

Yes, you have, it's on your meta talk page: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:RossGardler

So it is, I didn't know though. Not too effective a way of communicating it would seem. NOTE: this is merely an observation, as I say above I'm happy with expecting people to be proactive if they are interested.

Expecting people to check their talk page seems a reasonable expectation. If you don't check your meta talk page, you should put a link on it to your talk page on a project you do check.

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Chris McKenna

4:39 p.m.

On Tue, 23 Sep 2008, Thomas Dalton wrote:

Expecting people to check their talk page seems a reasonable expectation. If you don't check your meta talk page, you should put a link on it to your talk page on a project you do check.

I've done exactly this, and got the message on my en Wiktionary talk page, which is currently the only project I check regularly. Chris -- Chris McKenna cmckenna(a)sucs.org www.sucs.org/~cmckenna The essential things in life are seen not with the eyes, but with the heart Antoine de Saint Exupery

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geni

4:49 p.m.

2008/9/23 Ross Gardler <ross.gardler(a)oucs.ox.ac.uk>uk>:

Thomas Dalton wrote:

2008/9/23 Ross Gardler <ross.gardler(a)oucs.ox.ac.uk>uk>:

...

(For the record not everyone who is entitled to vote has been notified. I haven't for example. I'm only aware because I'm watching this list. At this stage I'm happy with that but it seems others here are not).

Yes, you have, it's on your meta talk page: http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:RossGardler

So it is, I didn't know though. Not too effective a way of communicating it would seem. NOTE: this is merely an observation, as I say above I'm happy with expecting people to be proactive if they are interested. Ross

Unless people object I'm going to go through and remind those who have not voted on Wednesday. I'll try and identify their home projects as much as possible. -- geni

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Sam Korn

4:54 p.m.

On Tue, Sep 23, 2008 at 3:49 PM, geni <geniice(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Unless people object I'm going to go through and remind those who have not voted on Wednesday. I'll try and identify their home projects as much as possible.

I expect you're aware of it, but the SUL tool would be helpful for that -- http://toolserver.org/~vvv/sulutil.php -- Sam PGP public key: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Sam_Korn/public_key

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Thomas Dalton

22 Sep 22 Sep

8:29 p.m.

There is. Problem is I'm not sure I should be saying who has and hasn't voted.

The WMF board elections always have a public list of who's voted and nobody complains. The only time it could be an issue is if only a small number of people vote and it becomes possible to tell how people voted from the final results (eg. if nobody voted for X you know each individual didn't vote for X), but that's a fairly minor concern.

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Michael Peel

11:01 p.m.

On 22 Sep 2008, at 19:24, geni wrote:

2008/9/22 Kwan Ting Chan <ktc(a)ktchan.info>fo>:

On Mon, 2008-09-22 at 14:07 -0400, Andrew Whitworth wrote:

On Mon, Sep 22, 2008 at 1:34 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Only the election committee has that information, so one of them would have to do it (or publish a list of votes received). It's not a bad idea, but I don't feel comfortable asking the committee to do any extra work - I would be very happy if they volunteered to do it anyway, though.

Since there are no hard rules for suffrage, it's not even possible to determine who is supposed to vote but hasn't. If the pool of possible electors was more well-defined, this would be a trivial task.

I thought it was the list of people who noted an interest on being a member by the start of voting? KTC

There is. Problem is I'm not sure I should be saying who has and hasn't voted.

Why not just re-spam everyone, saying "If you haven't voted yet, do so before it's too late" (except phrased better)? Mike

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Thomas Dalton

11:38 p.m.

Why not just re-spam everyone, saying "If you haven't voted yet, do so before it's too late" (except phrased better)?

Because that really would be spam. I don't think we should annoy everyone that has voted just to get a few more people to vote without revealing the fact that they haven't so far.

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David Gerard

24 Sep 24 Sep

11:49 a.m.

2008/9/22 Owen Blacker <owen(a)blacker.me.uk>uk>:

I'd strongly advocate against relying on people watching a page to know about votes — I have far too many pages on my watchlist, so never use it any more, and pruning it to become useful again is one of those tasks I'm never likely to get round to.

I gave up using my watchlist at all in late 2004. My wikistress promptly plummeted. I'd recommend it to anyone ;-) There's a magic button to just wipe your watchlist and start over. I recommend it. - d.

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Owen Blacker

12:37 p.m.

(Off-topic) Oh, really? Now that sounds like a useful magic button; where might I find it? On 9/24/08, David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com> wrote:

2008/9/22 Owen Blacker <owen(a)blacker.me.uk>uk>:

I'd strongly advocate against relying on people watching a page to know about votes — I have far too many pages on my watchlist, so never use it any more, and pruning it to become useful again is one of those tasks I'm never likely to get round to.

I gave up using my watchlist at all in late 2004. My wikistress promptly plummeted. I'd recommend it to anyone ;-) There's a magic button to just wipe your watchlist and start over. I recommend it. - d. _______________________________________________ Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l(a)wikimedia.org http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_UK http://mail.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l

-- Sent from Google Mail for mobile | mobile.google.com -- Owen Blacker, London GB Say no to ID cards: www.no2id.net Get your mits off my bits: www.openrightsgroup.org Help us crowdsourcing video: www.theyworkforyou.com/video -- Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety -- Benjamin Franklin, 1759

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David Gerard

1:10 p.m.

2008/9/24 Owen Blacker <owen(a)blacker.me.uk>uk>:

(Off-topic)

On 9/24/08, David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com> wrote:

> There's a magic button to just wipe your watchlist and start over. I > recommend it.

Oh, really? Now that sounds like a useful magic button; where might I find it?

At the top of [[Special:Watchlist]] are links marked "View and edit watchlist" and "Edit raw watchlist". You can edit the raw watchlist and just blank it and save. (I'm sure it was easier last time I did this, but this works too.) - d.

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12 participants

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participants (12)

Andrew Whitworth
Chris McKenna
David Gerard
geni
Ian A. Holton
Kwan Ting Chan
Michael Peel
Owen Blacker
Ross Gardler
Sam Korn
Thomas Dalton
Tom Holden