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I was wrong. I think. Sort of. They aren't going with a Condorcet voting system, such as Schulze. They're going with an STV (single transferable vote) system (though the exact STV system is not mentioned.) I suppose they could go with a Schulze STV system, a sort of combination of the two.
Xhagen does state: "The exact method used for calculating this vote distribution will be announced and released to the public for review before the start of the election." Which I'm thinking must be a joke or a troll. How long before the election? I'm assuming the system will already be coded, and tested with sample data, before the announcement, so what sort of review will it be? It's not like it is going to be changed if there's an uproar, or that there'll be time to change it.
I'm thinking they want to give people as little time as possible to consider how to game the system by announcing the exact system as late into the process as possible. And then calling it a review process.
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There was talk on Twitter about there being a minimum of 28 candidates on the ballot. And to get on the ballot you'd need ~200 accounts supporting your campaign. I say ~200, because to get on the ballot for sure requires 200 supporting accounts, but if the minimum 28 candidates is not reached, then they'll start going down the list of candidates in order of those with the most support that is less than 200 accounts.
I started looking for this in the White Paper, but could not find it. Which was confusing the hell out of me, until somebody pointed out to me that all of these "rules" were in the devblog. I'd kinda skipped the devblog and went straight to the White Paper.
Maybe I'm missing the point of a White Paper, but aren't the election rules supposed to be codified into the official CSM document?
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Yesterday, in my SCHULZE! piece, I wrote a few throwaway paragraphs at the end of the article, detailing how I might vote, were the vote to happen today. I eventually removed it from the post, mainly because the commentary was focusing on the list, and it was ultimately detracting from the more important points in the rest of the post.
So, I had Ripard Teg, James 315 and Roc Wieler at the top of my ranked list. Which apparently confused the hell out of some people, and upset others. All three of those people are very different candidates, who all share very different views of the game. So how in hell could I rank all of those people so highly? People figured I should rank candidates with similar world views together.
The thing is, the CSM is not a political posting. CCP gets the most value out of the CSM by gathering a broad variety of opinions from the representatives. James 315 brings a certain set of values and opinions to the table, and I think it would be remiss not to have someone reminding CCP that a lot of people don't want their game increasingly carebeared. Ripard Teg brings a more balanced viewpoint on that issue, although he too does not want to see more consensual PvP enter the system. Roc Wieler is sort of an open book, and he'll soak up a lot of different viewpoints from the players and bring them to CCP's attention.
The CSM isn't about directing EVE development. Their job is to give feedback on development. The more varied the voices, the more information CCP ultimately has to work with. The more varied the voices, hopefully that results in better design.
My opinion, at any rate. I see it as an imperative to get many viewpoints onto the council. If people want fourteen Mynnna's on the CSM, then we really don't need to have anyone but Mynnna on the council.
If you're only ranking candidates with similar voices and opinions, then you don't really understand the role of the CSM at all. I'd tell you that you should feel terrible about yourselves, but I don't want anybody to feel terrible about themselves. Rather, reconsider how you're going to vote.
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I am pleased with the new devblog, though. An important criteria that I wanted has been met. Reducing the number of candidates on the ballot. This will go far to improving the election, and making the process more manageable for voters.
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The most important criteria for this election is still not being met. Any move towards improving the visibility of the election. There's been no mention of codifying the process into the client, which would go a long way to making more people aware of the CSM.
More work has to be done to create increased player awareness of the process, as well as further education of the process. I don't see CCP moving at all in this direction.
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Interesting preamble in the White Paper. Six and a half pages of preamble. The election process discussion doesn't begin until the seventh page. If the goal was to bore people with the process, mission accomplished. I skimmed and skimmed until I got to the juicy information. I don't need background in Kant, Rousseau and Hobbes to understand the CSM election process.
Though I suppose the lengthy preamble gives the CSM election that air of serious business that every internet spaceships game must have.
Hi, the initially confused one here. To clarify I was not of the opinion that you should group things together (it is your vote, do whatever you want) - I was confused about why you weren't. You explained and whilst I disagree with you, I accept your reasoning.
ReplyDeleteOne problem I have with James is that his campaign is predicated on a fallacious slippery slope argument. He also commits the genetic fallacy by stating that the problem with the game as it stands now is highsec thanks to all the buffs. This is a simplistic view and one that is easily defeated by CCP if they are content to leave the game as it is with respect to highsec.
One interesting thing any preferential voting system brings in is the political wrangaling around preferences. Candidates with aligned positions could easily allocate preferences (by instructing their voters with 'how to vote' information) to get a strong showing on a particular view. This change excites me as it adds to the political metagame of the CSM. Pre election promises, post election accusations of not acting in good faith... I'm buying a metric tonne of popcorn and waiting for the fireworks!
I couldn't agree with you more. I'm against James 315's platform, especially the specifics he's laid out but I believe its important to have his voice heard on the CSM. My only reservation in voting for him so far is whether he can handle being in an advisor role and not shut down once he finds out that the CSM does not have any decision making powers.
ReplyDeleteI especially like the changes to how the iceland crew is going to be selected.
"If you're only ranking candidates with similar voices and opinions, then you don't really understand the role of the CSM at all. I'd tell you that you should feel terrible about yourselves, but I don't want anybody to feel terrible about themselves. Rather, reconsider how you're going to vote."
ReplyDelete.....and you clearly don't understand the value or function of an STV system at all. allowing players to rank 14 candidates does NOT equate to picking the 14 members you want on the council. its still 1 account, 1 vote. the "S" in STV stands for singular, after all. the advantage of an STV (which you've completely failed to document in all your posts so far) is that it reduces undervotes and overvotes and the need for strategic voting in the first place. voters don't have to pick the Mitt Romney's of the race out of fear that its wasted on Ron Paul.
for example, the wormholers, who you like to shit on for putting forth multiple candidates, get to rank 6 wormholers at the top of their list, giving greater chance that their vote will go to a winning wormholer in the end, and a greater chance that a wormholer will win regardless of the number of candidates. informed by two step as to the progress of voting reform, there was really nothing stupid or wrong with them putting forth multiple candidates in light of the recent changes.
so here, after your string of sarcastic comments about wormhole candidates, you're proceeding to insult even more voters by claiming they don't understand what the CSM is about if they don't rank a diverse group in their ballot choices. classy, but par for the course where your blog is concerned.
for the record, ranking 14 candidates that all share similar values and beliefs is -precisely- what voters should do in this case, if they care about a certain type of person getting elected to the council. thanks for trying to educate everyone, and in the process giving away your own ignorance about how this stuff works.
maybe you DO need to read up on your political history after all, poe.
If I rank Ripard -> James 315 -> Roc Wieler ...
DeleteIf Ripard is elected and there is overvote, then some of that overvote gets transferred to my second choice James 315.
That's the point of ranking. I understand STV well enough.
I'm still confused. If your only goal is to get varied voice on the CSM, you might as well just vote for random people from random areas of the game.
DeleteYour ballot should be an *ordered* list of your *actual* preferences. If you want Ripard to win the most, you list him first. You listing Ripard -> James 315 -> Roc doesn't insure that all 3 of them get elected, only that one of them has a better chance of getting elected.
Nice dodge on the wormhole candidate question as well.
Fuck your five wormhole candidates. They're all carbon copies of each other.
DeleteAnd I'm not going to vote for random people, dumbass. I'm going to rank varied voices who I feel will put in the time and effort on the CSM.
You're not fully understanding STV yourself. You are in practice voting for multiple candidates if multiple candidates can win in the election because you're automatically leveraging everyone else's vote. While its true that you only end up casting a single vote that counts, that votes is being automatically placed in the most strategic place that will provide the multiple candidate outcome that you listed.
DeleteRe-reading the devblog shows that Poetic is actually right, oddly enough.
DeleteInitially, each vote will be placed on the candidate listed as 1st, but if found unnecessary either because the candidate has more than enough to make the top 14 or if they cannot make top 14 under any circumstances, then the vote will transfer to the candidate listed 2nd. This continues until the vote is exhausted or needed for a candidate to succeed.
Voting for similar candidates in the top x positions will only help to get x similar candidates voted in to the CSM. Voting for dissimilar candidates will ensure diversity if one or more of your top choices already has plenty of support.
It's interesting to me that you say the CSM isn't about advocating a change of direction in EVE's development, yet you're voting for a candidate who's entire platform is about advocating a change in EVE's development. And this same candidate also wants 13 other candidates to advise this change in development along with him, which also contradicts your values for a CSM.
ReplyDeleteCombine this with the fact that the change James 315 wants CCP to make is something that CCP is never really going to do, and has almost zero reason to do in the first place, both from a gameplay angle and from the business-case angle.
Why in the world would you endorse a candidate with a singular, unachievable platform, who violently disagrees with your values about the role of the CSM, and who is actively encouraging the existence of a CSM that violently disagrees with your stated values?
I know its hip to say "fuck high sec", but do try to have some consistency in your beliefs if you want people to take you seriously. Cause right now, you're looking as gullible as Gevlon Goblin.
It is about influencing design decisions. CSM members don't get to choose development, but they do get an opportunity to massage that development with their opinions and viewpoints.
DeleteHistorically, yes. Not the case anymore.
DeleteOkay, but do you really believe that anybody at CCP will be receptive to this "fuck highsec" "massaging"? If not (and I don't really see how you could think there would be such a person at CCP), then wouldn't a James 315 CSM slot just be a waste?
DeleteNony have you listened to Xander's interview w/ the man behind James 315? He comes across as very calm and reasoned. I think CCP would be receptive to him. No, they are not going to "nerf highsec to oblivion", but they might at least be persuaded towards the simple logic of more risk for more reward.
DeleteI listened to the interview, and actually I think that James 315 pretty obviously comes across as a guy who is not at all flexible, and who doesn't really care about other peoples' viewpoints all. After all, his main point is that anybody who is driven away from EVE by a HTFU attitude is a person the game is better off without. Furthermore, in that same interview he says, very clearly, that he's not interested in convincing potential voters of his points. Rather, he's seeking to gather votes from people who already agree with him. Call me crazy, but it's not hard to imagine that this is the sort of CSM rep he'd be as well. Who at CCP is going to listen to a guy who's not even interested in convincing anybody who doesn't already agree with him anyway? His basic advice to anybody who doesn't agree with his vision is to quit the game.
DeleteAll this shows is that you've never read the white paper. You act suprised at the pre-amble and lack of voting procedures. None of those parts changed at all, but you're writing about them having seen them for the first time.
ReplyDeleteNext time, if you're going to spend a year writing about the CSM, maybe do your homework on the CSM to begin with?
You fail to point out that reducing the number of candidates on the ballot, combined with an STV-style system, only allows greater "gaming" of the system to block out undesirables by large power blocs. You can reduce the number of candidates and improve the quality of the election on a FPTP system, but with a STV system.
ReplyDeleteBut whatever, you already pointed out that 28 candidates was the minimum, not the maximum, and there's nothing stopping 0.0 blocs from breaking into 200-vote mini-blocs to boosh candidates over the threshold, just as they did last year.
The forum-based "likes" system was a joke than, and still is today. Don't be a Jester and pull this "look what I told CCP to do and they did it!" bullshit, you're better than that
Some rambling comments:
ReplyDeleteWhile I understand CCP's desire to reduce the number of candidates on the ballot, in practice there's no way to do it without also permitting groups to game it and exclude people from the ballot. That's why the 200 votes system is no better than the likes system; any medium-sized group can make sure everyone qualifies if they want, or add extra candidates. My advice to CCP was not to worry about it; increase it to 200 likes if they wanted, but don't put everyone through the hassle of a preliminary election.
Pure Schulze (and other Condorcet systems) are not good multiple-seat election systems; they are trivially gameable in that configuration. Schulze-STV is computationally infeasible. My rough calculation is that doing it on a 40 candidate, 14 seat election on a fast PC would take over 9 years!
CCP doesn't need to decided on the actual counting algorithm until the election is nearly started, so there is time for community input. All STV systems are decent, some of the more complex ones are very good. My current favorite is Meek-STV.
I agree with you that a diversity of opinion is a good thing for the CSM, and that is one of the goals of this change. I disagree with Alekseyev Karrde about a ton of things, but we argue fairly, help refine each others positions, and have no problems cooperating on complex tasks. That has always tended to be the case on CSM, and I don't think it will change. However, one of the virtues of STV is it lets you vote your true preferences. So just vote for the candidates you would like to see on the CSM, in order of preference.
I am sure the White Paper will be updated in the next few days, so don't worry there.
Hey Trebor why are you such a booster of STV now when your own shitpile of a voting proposal changed it so much?
DeleteIf they forced everyone to choose 14 people, they could just count this the opposite of the way cross country is scored.
DeleteThe first person on the list would get 14 points, the 14th person would get 1 point. Then you get all the lists assign the points, count points, you have your victory.
Of course, you could say the point difference is high enough, that even without a full 14 votes choosen, you can still do the point system.
Be a simple way to tally the votes really.
I agree with your position on the STV and who to pick (as well as a diversified CSM being a plus), even though others seem not to...
ReplyDeleteBUT, why are you so sure that there will be less candidates this year? It is a MINIMUM of 28 candidates. It could very well be 40, if all of them get 200+ accounts to support them.
Review can mean "criticize" or "look through"
ReplyDeleteGoing from there, "putting up for review" can either mean "putting up for criticism" or "showing how it works so you know what maths exactly is happening behind the scenes"
I understood the dev blog to mean the latter, and for that going public just before the primary would be sufficient.
I sincerely doubt that CCP aims to have to implement any changes - especially as they clearly stated that they only have coding ressources for the voting tool right now.
It's pretty simple. I am going to vote for people who reflect my issues and outlook for EVE as my MMO of choice. They can be the most articulate and useful person in the world but if their opinions are completely opposite to my own then they don't get my vote.
ReplyDeleteNot a hard system to game, Goons put up 20 candidates, Test puts up 20 candidates. Ensures each has more than the 200 prelim votes. So only a few non block candidates will remain. As they will each require the minimum 200 votes to get on the ballot.
ReplyDeleteEasy to achieve.