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Re: Making the RMS resolution a Secret Ballot



Hi!

On 10.04.21 15:33, Didier 'OdyX' Raboud wrote:
Le vendredi, 9 avril 2021, 19.12:26 h CEST Sam Hartman a écrit :

I don't think changing our 25+ years worth of GR practice (and GR tradition)
*right in the middle of a vote* will do any good; not internally, and not
externally.

Do I think we should have procedures to decide _before a vote is called_
whether individual votes will be published after the vote? Absolutely; very
clearly. But do I thing we should do this change for that very vote, while
some votes have already been tallied, by "consensus" decision and/or pressure
on the secretary? No. Clearly not.

Initially I had no strong opinion about the issue.

Reading Odyx' arguments on keeping the ballot public makes a lot of sense to me though and I'm now in favor of keeping the usual decision making processes intact, and to change the constitution later in time - if the project wishes to do so.

I had also tried to rephrase for myself what I think Holger wanted to say with his email in clearer words ("really *bad*" is not something I can operate with). (Correct me if I misunderstood.) I came up with these two points:

- The decision process to change from a public to a secret ballot should
  be transparent, and not decided in a rush in the middle of a vote
  because it would undermine the trust in the existing decision making
  processes and potentially set a bad precedent.

- ~250 people voted on the GR until now, knowing the vote result would
  be public, and over 100 Debian members signed the open letter
  publicly. Let me add that a bunch also signed the support letter. One
  could assume that the people who voted and the people who signed the
  letters are okay with having their vote be public anyway.

I personally haven't been in contact with people who don't want their vote disclosed - and therefore I'm not sure how many people would be affected by keeping the status quo.

As I also mentioned when this thread came up here on the list, the initial email came from a pseudonymous account (with a questionable reference to the French Revolution), and while this person raised a certainly interesting and apparently important question, I feel we need to be careful not to get divided by making hasty decisions.

Take care,
Ulrike


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