[Foundation-l] for the future...

[Andrew Gray]

On 03/07/07, Ayelie <ayelie.at.large at gmail.com> wrote:

> I think the e-mails will be considered spam by many (especially those who
> can't vote anyway) and will get a lot  more people annoyed than it will be
> appreciated by a few.

Interestingly, Greg's discussion of his responses shows pretty much
the converse - many thanks, and only a small handful of objections.
Remember the bulk of the community don't go near IRC or read a mailing
list.

[Frankly, sitenotice is never going to be the best method. It either
implies people who can't vote that they can, or  that people who can
vote can't - and if it manages to explain it clearly, it'll be seven
lines long with two footnotes and no-one will read it. Good reminder
if you know about it, *but*...]

[And, yes, it's possible to target the mails to only eligible users,
with a small margin of error over "spare" accounts and edge cases]

I think it might be worth restating my proposal in a nice succinct
form. - drop the central aspect. Have the Foundation run the voting
and the candidacies and so on, but leave the 'promotional' aspect up
to the communities, get the projects themselves to drum up votes -
whether this be by email, by local newsletters, by sitenotice,
whatever. Heck, turn it into a contest if you want, that always works
well.

Have a few basic rules - no specific promotion of candidates, etc, no
massive unrelenting barrages - but otherwise, leave them to it. Let us
see what works, what doesn't; what people like or don't like. If one
project has a neat idea, another can copy them; be innovative, be
decentralised, be energetic. Maybe appoint an "election committee" on
each project, maybe a respected neutral figure to coordinate,
whatever.

This is, after all, the community's election. It's their
responsibility to get each other to vote, and we should encourage them
in that.

And the best of all? If we end up with wildly skewed contribution
statistics, well, that's life. If a project was told "please go
electioneer" and sat on its hands, it can't really complain about a
lack of voice in the results.

-- 
- Andrew Gray
  andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk