[Koha] First things first for a Koha foundation

Mon Oct 12 18:05:06 NZDT 2009

[Reposted with a few corrections.  Just my point about why we should avoid
excess haste even when pursuing a matter urgently.]

Nicole,

I certainly sense the urgency in the Koha community to move forward,
however, we should not make the same mistake which brings us to this
urgency in the first place.  A party acting with too little consultation
has left us with the problem which we are now facing.  We cannot solve
that problem by replacing one unilateral process with another.

Ultimately, much activity of the Koha community needs to be delegated to
representatives through a democratic process so that not every decision is
taken by the entire electorate.  Some basic questions will always need a
vote of the entire electorate.

If the design of previous ballots had not been so confused even given the
difficulty of designing questions so that they are both well understood
and neutral, then I might have less concern.  However, we have adopted no
formal process for good ballot design which might constrain mistakes such
as the ones which we have had and almost had on recent ballots.  Designing
ballots well can be tricky and the only criticism I make of those who have
designed recent ballots is not consulting widely enough about their
design.

The questions at issue in the foundation forming poll are not especially
contentious but the process is of vital importance.

1.  FUNDAMENTAL IMPORTANCE OF BALLOT DESIGN.

Ballot design is so vital to any democratic process that it should not
start with a small committee with no popular mandate for the task.  How
ballot questions are put naturally effects the outcome of any poll. 
Failing to make the ballot design process democratic at the beginning
undermines the legitimacy and support being sought through an otherwise
democratic election process.

Leaving ballot design to a small committee alone, especially when the
whole electorate has not had an opportunity to choose the ballot design
committee or representatives understood to be charged with forming a
ballot design committee, is a great mistake.  If the whole electorate
chooses a ballot design committee or representatives who's positions are
understood to include appointing a ballot design committee, then the
process could be demonstrated to be democratic.  However, this has not
happened.

2.  DEMOCRACY AND EFFICIENCY.

Open democratic consideration of questions is not intended to be a
maximally efficient process.  Open democratic consideration of questions
is intended to be a fair process which consults those affected by
questions at issue.

There is something less efficient than democracy.  A poll in which one is
uncertain of the meaning of the results because we are uncertain whether
the questions were well understood is less efficient than a democratic
process where the questions have at least been reasonably considered in
advance by those who are being asked to answer them in a ballot.  Racing
ahead with a closed ballot drafting process will be liable to retard
progress afterwards, not advance it.

3.  BALLOT CONSULTATION PROCESS.

You make the presumption that having general comment on the drafting of
the ballot would be an unreasonable and interminable process.  Yet you
have not asked how one might propose to conduct such a process.

Start a thread on final ballot drafting in the Koha list with some main
subject tag that may branch with variant subtopics.  Post the first draft
which your committee proposes and then give people a definite time limit
in which to comment.  Seven days may be a good time limit for the comment
period and I would not suggest that the design issues are so problematic
that any more than fourteen days should be set as the time limit.  Try to
post any revised drafts from the ballot design committee in the middle of
the time period.  The ballot committee members should certainly comment
themselves.

[I have several suggestions for the ballot upon which I am working.]

After the comment time period has expired, then have the ballot design
committee produce a final version on which we will all vote.  Even if the
comments do not produce any changes in the final ballot produced by the
ballot design committee, it will have given the electorate a genuine
opportunity to participate in how the poll is conducted.

There is nothing so vitally threatening to the Koha community that it will
cease to exist if we take a week of additional time to have open
participation in drafting a ballot on which everyone is being asked to
vote.

There will necessarily be many ad hoc legacy processes which will persist
until we have the time to consider and introduce more formal structures in
those areas where more formal structures are actually needed.  We should
not start by undermining the popular voice in how a popular vote is
conducted.

4.  COROLLARY VOTING ISSUES.

In addition to ballot design, there are other issues about what procedure
is used when there is no absolute majority on a question which can have
only one choice.  We should know what will be done before the vote has
taken place and not be choosing a method afterwords when the question
arises.

The aim should be to maximise voter preferences and not eliminate
preferences and choice with oversimplification.  Ranked ballots allow
sophisticated voting preference analysis to determine outcomes with a
simple ballot but people need to understand the process.

See "Preferential voting",
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preferential_voting ; and other related
articles such as "Condorcet method",
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Condorcet_method , and "Schulze method" ,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schulze_method in Wikipedia.  Several
software projects use the Schulze method and variations on it.

5.  ACTUAL EFFECT.

I will explain in another thread thread that a Koha foundation cannot
govern the general development process in a free software project because
it would not be free software in such circumstances.  However, popular
vote should be able to decide key questions in areas for which people give
it the resources such as trademarks, internet domain names, and whatever
else people contribute over which a Koha foundation could exercise control
and use to the benefit of everyone.

Thomas Dukleth
Agogme
109 E 9th Street, 3D
New York, NY  10003
USA
http://www.agogme.com
+1 212-674-3783

On Sun, October 11, 2009 22:10, Nicole Engard wrote:
> Thomas,
>
> This request - while I understand where it's coming from - is a bit
> unreasonable.  If I were to submit the poll for review by everyone
> then we'd never get the official poll up and answered and move
> forward.  That said, I am not working on the poll alone, there are
> several people helping me make all of the changes that were requested
> before.
>
> Thanks
> Nicole
>
> On Sun, Oct 11, 2009 at 1:54 PM, Thomas Dukleth <kohalist at agogme.com>
> wrote:
>> Nicole,
>>
>> Please be certain to submit your draft of the final survey to the koha
>> mailing list with ample time for public comment, correction, and
>> amendment
>> before it would go live.  All Koha community ballots should be a matter
>> of
>> public discussion.
>>
>> I raised the issue in more detail with reasons in an earlier message in
>> this thread which you may not have yet had the opportunity to read while
>> busy at the conference which you have been attending.  See
>> http://lists.katipo.co.nz/pipermail/koha/2009-October/020612.html .
>>
>>
>> Thomas Dukleth
>> Agogme
>> 109 E 9th Street, 3D
>> New York, NY  10003
>> USA
>> http://www.agogme.com
>> +1 212-674-3783
>>
>>
>> On Sun, October 11, 2009 13:58, Nicole Engard wrote:
>>> I have been out of town, but I will get the final survey up early next
>>> week and we will see where the community stands and make a final
>>> decision and move forward with the  plan to have a foundation behind
>>> Koha.
>>
>> [...]
>>
>>
>>
>
>