As far as I'm aware, you only need view permissions on the spreadsheet to see the history and things, so that's all others will need. I assume this is the special edit permission you were alluding to above. As for altering votes, I don't think we should be able to. Someone altering their vote to change the entire already set outcome of a vote. If people really want to change their vote, I think we should have a way to call for a revote. Possibly by simply creating a proposition to repeal the previous one. I also think that maybe there should be a short discussion period for a proposition before voting begins. This avoids the situation were have now where we're discussing some possible and significant changes, as the vote is occurring. This discussion period would allow for any amendments etc. to be made and applied. I do think we're reaching the point where this is becoming too complicated for its own good, and it may be a good idea to delegate this role to a specific group of people who are familiar with a set process they can follow. Right now I wouldn't be surprised if the complexity of these votes could possibly scare away some new members. I'd suggest that we now create a small, interim council of just a few members, to coordinate the establishment of the outpost.
Okay. Fair enough, but I thought there was an age requirement of 15 or 17 for creating a Google account. But that might've been changed, or as I'd rather put it, 'fixed', as that's way too old to go without a Google account. I agree with that, then. Ah... I tried doing that, but couldn't figure it out. I'll check it out when I'm at a pc. Okay, that's nice to know. Could you explain why you think being able to change your vote would be bad? I don't see any problems with it. A short discussion period is very important, indeed. I wasn't able to share my opinion on the matter before people (only mba in this case, but still) started voting. That's a problem, I think. So before a proposition gets voted on, it needs to be discussed for some time. I don't think there should be a set time for it: the original idea can be posted in the thread and people can discuss, and when the council thinks we've seen most arguments, the actual form can be posted.
Say the final results of a vote were 3-2. One person changing their vote would change the entire result. Changing votes sets up an issue where people could begin voting deceptively or strategically, to ensure the outcome they want is passed (especially since we won't have compulsory voting). It would be much safer to vote on a proposition to amend or reverse the previous one, with all proper processes for discussion carried out beforehand, than risk someone essentially hijacking the vote. When you go to vote, it's assumed that you are fully informed. Hence the need for a discussion period before the vote.
That works. It doesn't seem to be possible for Documents, however. I also haven't been able to figure out a way to make users unable to delete files (I'm still trying to make the shared folder idea work). I found this online: But for me, that doesn't work. If I delete a file in a shared folder with any user, it gets deleted for the other users too, even for the owner. Access to it isn't lost as you can still find it by clicking the Info tab, but it disappears from the folder view which it shouldn't.
Edit permission is required for people to view the history. I found this out after doing some testing and searching for another project. I have no idea why Google did that, but they did. The permissions thing I described just uses general Drive permissions and combines them with the Sheets permissions. Drive is satisfied enough to give out history while Sheets won't let you edit anything. As 607 said, there is no way to do this in the other types of files. As for voting strategically and messing with things, it shouldn't be a problem even when allowing a change of votes. I assume you are talking about a group of players trying to make it look like a proposition will go one way then changing it. Ultimately, this shouldn't affect anything. Players should vote the direction they feel regardless of the current state of the vote. If a player genuinely has their mind changed half way through the voting process, then it is beneficial to let them switch it quickly instead of having to waste additional time re-voting on essentially the same proposition. I imagine that having a single spreadsheet or doc with normal edit permissions should be enough. It also isn't the only way to find votes. Whoever makes the vote can also link to it in a reply on this thread. If trolls attack, we can remove it and I can also continue putting active votes directly on the OP. As for the council, I am finishing up my current idea and will post that later today.
I suppose so. I'd love things to be more elegantly organised but doing it like you're proposing might make it simpler for people. I think I support your proposition, then... but we still don't know if we're allowed to change votes.
Here is what I have written out for a government system. I don't want to put it up for a vote yet but instead ask for discussions and ideas. Feel free to comment on the doc with what you think.
I like some of these ideas, but I think it suffers the inherent problem of being too complicated. I'll try to address this according to your sections. Part 1: Separating the overall GO from the different claims is a good idea. However the idea of then separating further into districts I don't think is great. You are never going to get enough members, living separated enough, to be able to fairly or evenly separate districts. I also don't think you want to restrict people to districts, they want to feel like they are free to move around, there shouldn't be anything trying to confine them to a certain place. People are going to have houses and whatnot in multiple places, over multiple claims, there is only a arbitrary way to assign them a district. I also think it borders on too complicated, to be requiring people to update and check a google doc to see the district they are in. Part 2: As for voting membership, I don't think there should be a minimum membership time before you're eligible to vote. I think when a vote is occurring, is when you will get most activity, and therefore most chance to attract new members. Not allowing them to participate form day is probably going to push a fair number of prospective members away. Part 3: As I mentioned above, I don't think districts are entirely feasible. However, the system you've described here could work well to govern each of the claims. The number of leaders I think should be flexible depending on the overall size and population of the claim. As for voting, while the idea of being able to challenge the leaders at any time may be good, I think you should require a petition with a minimum number of signatures to be completed first, and then put all leader positions up for election. You should probably also consider setting maximum term lengths. Part 4: The system you've described here could possibly work for an overall GO system, with the representatives from each district (claim under my suggestions) forming the council. However, I again have to suggest that equal representation, for claims that will be of vastly different sizes and populations, is not a great idea. Part 5: This sounds alright, again however, I'm not a fan of the idea of a voting and non-voting population. Part 6: Sounds cool, obviously though my suggestions above would alter this slightly. Part 7: This is a good concept. Obviously as I said above, your ideas for districts would basically become claims under my suggestions, and your ideas for the smp9 claim becoming the GO. You've got some good ideas here, and I might see if I can apply some of these to my idea.
I agree with all of mba's suggestions. @jkrmnj: why do you think districts would be a good idea? (this might sound aggressive, it really isn't ) Oh, and I just learnt something cool about Google Docs: if you're viewing a document but not making any changes or participating in chat, you'll remain anonymous! This means I won't have to fear I'll accidentally open a document with my personal account while somebody else is looking at it too; that's very nice!
Thanks for the detailed response. The idea behind districts was to offer players a way to still enjoy the outpost even if they are in a minority. Basically, I was imagining that players would join districts that features similar minded leaders and would match their play style. As I was typing out having 8 District Leaders total, I started to wonder if it would be too much and I now see that it is . Giving players in the opinionated minority a chance to participate and have fun is still something we should strive for, but I see why 4 districts won't work. Do you think having maybe 2 districts would work better or, as you mentioned, just making a new claim if it is needed? I want to avoid putting the Central Council in charge of the GO as a whole because, as someone previously brought up a few pages back, the GO isn't necessarily restricted to just this one outpost, or outposts in general. Giving the Central Council that much power would restrict possible projects and would remove the check on them created by the community. If we go the route of no districts, just having one District Council (or whatever we would call it) of 3ish members could work. As for voting population, I was considering the possibility that someone who is a member of one district switching just to vote and leaving right after. This would greatly hurt the independence of each district. Once again, if we go the route of no district, this is easily solved and can be removed. If we don't, we could allow new members who haven't previously belonged anywhere to vote but those switching have to wait. Finally, I like your idea for challenging. There is no reason to remove someone that everyone likes so term limits wouldn't make sense.
Another reasons district wont work, Ill give an example from the past. There was an attempt to unite the East Wild under one flag a while back, and it went pretty well for a while, but once district were assigned it felt some district were more important than other, it may not of necessarily been that way but its the way if felt, and being ruled by a central government where you have little say from so far away wasnt appealing. Just my two cents for any future plans
I'll respond to your stuff about the districts a bit later when I've got my own adjusted proposal. I wasn't really being specific in regards to the powers that a central council would have. But my basic proposal is that you'd have a few leaders for a claim, and then they'd come together to form a council for the entire GO (over however many claims and servers it spans). Most of the power would be given to the claim leaders, however the GO council (or whatever we'll call it) would manage affairs that concern the entire GO. Things such as deciding on the voting systems, managing internal relationships, managing relationships with other non GO outposts, ensuring that every claim is accessible and has all of the vital facilities it requires, among other things. I'd look at it as something akin to the European Union or the United Nations. Term limits would prevent the system from becoming a bit stale. Eventually people would feel that they don't really have an opportunity to participate, which could result in them becoming disinterested and leaving. Term limits, or periodic elections, would bring around a bit of excitement and could reengage people, would would have otherwise not been bothered and just stuck with the status quo, or just left.
If you couldn't tell by the likes I just bombed most people involved in this thread with, I'm joining in. I'll probably put my input on stuff tomorrow when I'm not tired and can think properly. Time to *probably* cause problems with voting.
Alright, so I've now put together another possibility for a political system. I've taken inspiration from jkrmnj's earlier proposal. Any feedback is welcome. Part 1 - Claims: These are the first level of government, representing each claim (essentially town or outpost) of the GO. For example, our current claim Albion would be one, Volt could be another. The residents of these claims (there is no strict definition of resident, realistically anyone could vote in any election, it becomes to complex to try to keep track of people) would elect a small number of representatives (the number depending on the size and population of the claim) to govern it. These representatives would govern by consensus, if a consensus can't be reached, it goes to popular vote. They would only be able to create and manage the rules of their own claim. Elections for these representatives would take place every 3 months. However, if a petition is presented with enough signatures (5-10?) then an early election must be called, for every representative position. Part 2 - The Global Council: This is a council consisting of all representatives from every claim, over every server. It meets to determine and vote on rules affecting all of the GO. Rules passed by the GC would supersede any rules passed at a claim level. Decisions should be made by consensus, however a two thirds majority vote can also pass rules. If a consensus can't be reached and a two thirds majority vote is deemed inappropriate, it goes to a popular vote. Meetings of the GC are run by the President, who also selects an executive from its members. Part 3 - The President and the executive: The President is the head of the entire GO, and is elected by popular vote every three months. The President can be removed and go to an early election by a two thirds vote of the GC. From the members of the GC, the President will form an executive. This executive would be charged with ensuring that the GO is working internally, managing its external relations, relations with staff, and formulating rules to be proposed in the GC.
If the representatives can't come to a consensus, they would usually go to a two thirds vote. But say it is an issue of significance, just two thirds of representatives in support may not truly reflect the will of the people. Or the issue may be highly controversial, then the decision can be given to the members of the outpost.
I like a lot of those ideas. I decided to do a massive edit of the Google Doc I made earlier incorporating many of your ideas into it. You can read it here (same link as before). I changed a few things that I didn't really like. Here is why I changed those things: I removed any reference of a leadership based on population. If the definitions of a citizen will include everyone in EMC (as you said it does in your post), then the population used in calculating number of leaders will as well. There is no way to base number of leaders on population without strict definitions of who is counted and a way to track it. I disagree with the Global Council for the same reasons I mentioned earlier. The Global Council would essentially remove the popular vote system of the outpost and put everything into the hands of a few. This is especially true if it were passed now since the exact same people leading the claim would be the people leading the outpost as a whole. It makes it much harder for new players to participate or to try and start a new project with the GO if the leaders have their own agendas because of their own claims. I don't see the problem with having a slow system that requires direct input from the community on propositions that could make massive, sweeping changes to the GO. It also removes the ambiguity around what needs a consensus and what doesn't. I like your idea for the executive although I don't like how much power it has. If we remove the Global Council, it puts many of the executive's responsibilities in the hands of the community automatically since the community can decide if things aren't working and propose and pass propositions for the GO. In this situation, all the president would have to do is talk to staff and maybe represent the outpost externally. The voting system will also (hopefully) pass later today. I will work on a voting guide and try to have it done in time. Also, thanks everyone for contributing to this. I feel like this kind of back and forth helps make things fun and creates a better system.
