Forum:Voting system and reasoning

Forums: Index → Community discussions → Voting system and reasoning | Post

Okay, so, based on what happened on Beds's second nomination and these two forum posts, I would like to propose some other solution.

In my opinion, votes like "the user deserves these/those/that rights" are baseless and are not a valid argument to vote. So, what I very briefly suggest is that we create in RfA's and probably RfB's two sections: one for voting, another for reasoning.

With the creation of these two different sections, comments like the former could be avoided, as "reasoning" implies actual arguments: users' efficiency; how they could benefit from the tools; traits like being helful, caring; etc. No comments at all would be allowed in on the voting section. I think this could clearly separate the quantity from the quality, seeing as number of supports/opposes is very important, but arguments' strength is just as much.

Also, I'm terribly sorry for creating a separate thread for this when there is "Adressing issues with rights requests", but the page is very long and I'm not sure what the outcome was and how the system changed and if someone could sum it up and explain it to me, I would be grateful; and maybe this whole discussion I started wouldn't be needed. --RoseGui^{✿ (talk)} 07:12, July 10, 2013 (UTC)

Discussion

On a note, I have seen at least one thing change: no longer votes, just reasoning. But, to me, it's just as important to have votes, since they are a crucial part of democracy, and I also have no problems with changing "reasoning" to "discussion" or whatever it suits better, it's more a question of language. --RoseGui^{✿ (talk)} 07:32, July 10, 2013 (UTC)

Also, based on what some other wiki's do, we could adopt questions the nominee or requester would have to respond or maybe admins would have that responsibility themselves, though, there could be a set of questions already pre-determined. To me, this looks fairer than just commentary. --RoseGui^{✿ (talk)} 08:22, July 10, 2013 (UTC)

We recently overhauled the RfA/B system so that it's more discussion based (which puts a further emphasis on reasoning) and if there's no consensus to be drawn, the nomination goes to a vote. We've had two RfAs under the new system to date and they've gone pretty well to say the least, so I don't think we really need to majorly change the system (again) just yet. Lost Labyrinth • (c) • (b) 10:01, July 10, 2013 (UTC)

I know; if I had been around I would probably have discussed on the other forum, but I would like this to be given a chance, at least for discussion. Thank you for reading, --RoseGui^{✿ (talk)} 10:40, July 10, 2013 (UTC)

The system for RfA/B that we've adopted largely already does as you suggest. There is a period for building consensus through discussion. If that period passes and a consensus doesn't clearly exist, then a vote is held in which votes can only be made without attached reasoning or "weight" i.e. all votes "weigh" the same regardless of the person's motivation for voting. This equal weight prevents issues with trying to judge the validity of the reasons behind votes and instead treats any vote (by a valid participant) as valid.

At this point, I would be opposed to any large-scale changes to the RfA/B process because, as Lost Labyrinth has said, the past couple cycles have run pretty smoothly. It seems to me that you shouldn't fix what isn't broken. -- LostInRiverview ^{talk ~ blog} 14:47, July 10, 2013 (UTC)

I agree. I think the current system is working well and it's not worth it to try to change it now. --Bleeh^{(talk) (blog)} 05:13, July 11, 2013 (UTC)