kokonutz

As I said above:

And, frankly, I'd MUCH rather have this 'friendly amendment' process be a FORMAL process than have it be something the TB just sort of does behind closed doors by consensus or whatever.

tcook052

Stubbornly insisting that the current process is broken and the new & improved is better is not justification enough to amend the TB Guidelines. Colour me unconvinced that lowering the bar to foster fast fixes is something that really needs to be done and seems more like a solution in search of a problem.

CMK10

I'm not saying the current process is broken, but I also saw how this friendly amendment can be used for the good to improve the current process.

And also, saying it arose after a problem was discovered, and saying nsx and kokonutz have spoken of numerous examples when it's been helpful, I think it's a solution to an actual problem.

MSPeconomist

Me too. In fact, if the formal and open process incentivizes people on TB to be more careful before making and seconding motions, this would also be a very good thing.

MSPeconomist

It's ridiculous to accuse me of taking "little part in the discussion." In fact, in the public TBT thread on the rental car fora (not the voting underway thread that the TB Secretary started yesterday), as of about an hour and twenty minutes after you made the post I'm quoting, there were 65 posts in the thread, of which 8 were by me. In fact, five TB members participated there and I participated more often than all but one person. By the same time, the private TB thread on the topic had 46 posts, of which 8 were mine. All TB members (plus our Community Director) posted at least once there. The people with the most posts there had 11, 9, 8, and 7 respectively, so that my 8 posts would put me in third place (of nine) and definitely in the top half of TB for participation as measured by this metric.

There's nothing at all that's "preposterous" about expecting that when someone makes a motion to close A, B, and C, this is exactly what they mean: Exactly the list of the A, B, and C fora should be closed, specifically all of them and nothing more. If the person instead intends to close only A and B, or all of A, B, C, and D, then the correct list should appear in the motion. Similarly, if someone makes a motion (and it's seconded) which lists the set of fora to remain, then that list can only be taken to also correctly convey the intent of the people making and seconding the motion.

kipper

This.
That's your belief. Why not try it and see?
No. There's nothing that says all votes must take 2 weeks. If the motion needs to be "tweaked," then everyone can vote it down within a few days, and a new motion can be made.

CMK10

With this TalkBoard, votes will take a full two weeks, trust me.

nsx

I'm pretty confident in that belief. We have been trying to be more careful at least since 2013 and we have not reached 100% first pass success. I'm very patient but the time to act is overdue.

Also, we would slow down all motions in order to reduce but not eliminate the need for friendly amendments, which would remain unsanctioned by any formal process. That looks like a poor balance of costs vs. benefits to me.

kipper

Then define minor/friendly in the process (leaving it open can only cause problems later), or simply vote it down if it needs to be changed, and present a new motion.

MSPeconomist

This is what I've been saying. It shouldn't be left open for whoever is TB president to unilaterally determine what changes are minor or even "technical" (with the latter category of changes presumably not even requiring the approval of anyone else, including the person who made the motion, the person who seconded it, and anyone who has already voted yes).

tom911

Then come up with a rule that would allow the author of the proposal to withdraw the motion after the voting starts, once the problem with the motion is identifed. Seems much easier to withdraw the motion if there's some minor issue with it, and then come back and introduce a new motion with the corrected language fixing whatever was wrong.

Agree. Why not just allow the TB member that introduced the motion to take it off the table and come back with a new motion with corrections? Wouldn't that work?

tcook052

I'd by far rather see TB move in this direction than the proposal outlined by OP.

MSPeconomist

One would hope so, but some TB members are likely to insist that the vote proceed as quickly as possible, even telling us that we can just go ahead and vote on an "informal" motion [I was taught that all motions are formal, so I don't even understand what an informal motion is supposed to do unless it's merely a straw vote on some complicated principle that will be fleshed out later in one or more formal motions], where the "informal motion" doesn't even attempt to clarify exactly what steps we're supposedly voting to recommend. Specifically, if one or more fora are to be closed, what will happen to the posts that are already in those fora? Should they be deleted, archived, just left there in the closed forum or what?

MSPeconomist

Essentially, this is pretty close to the effect of a friendly amendment except that the friendly amendment requires the acquiescence of the person who seconded the motion and possibly those who have already voted yes.

In terms of TB specific rules and procedures, a friendly amendment would permit those who have already voted to change their votes (normally not permitted for TB votes) and also, according to the current discussion, not change the timing of the vote.

Withdrawal of the motion would appear to be a unilateral action by the person who made the initial motion. The clock would then reset when the replacement motion is moved and seconded. Site-wide announcement would be required followed by the new feedback period before voting can begin.

At the moment, I don't have strong feelings about these two options (except to point ouut that I've already said that if those who have voted yes are allowed to veto the friendly amendment, then we need to specify that the privilege only applies to those who voted before the friendly amendment was mentioned, in order to prevent someone from quickly voting yes on a deficient motion just to be able to torpedo it by refusing to approve the friendly amendment), but if changes are left to the discretion of the TB president (for example, to determine unilaterally what changes are to be treated as minor), then the scope of such changes must be defined so as to be clearly limited.

nsx

Would you please please try doing that? I'm stumped.

Although that's exactly where we are now. If you have a better idea I really want to see it. That's why we are having this discussion rather than rushing to a vote.