Talk:Wikimedia Foundation elections/2021/Voting

Warum ist das nicht übersetzbar?

Warum ist diese Seite nicht übersetzbar? Alles, was mit den internationalen Wahlen zu tun hat, muss immer asap übersetzbar sein, Englisch allein macht die Seite unbrauchbar, ausschließend und ist imho klar anti-wikimedianisch. Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 17:02, 31 July 2021 (UTC)

Danke, Xeno, bitte das nächste Mal gleich mitmachen, JKoerner. Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 08:10, 1 August 2021 (UTC)

@Sänger: I find your comments to be antagonistic. I do not appreciate the way you engage with me. I *JUST* got translate admin rights last week and did not have time to read about how to do it properly. *I* asked Xeno if he could mark the page since I didn't know properly how yet. You're welcome. Best, JKoerner (WMF) (talk) 12:45, 2 August 2021 (UTC)

I find anything done only in English antagonistic, it reeks of the stale carelessness the monolinguistic anglophones have towards anything in any other language. This here is an international enterprise, nothing, that's available only in English should be treated as available at all. The WMF has millions of Dollars to support the international communities (which is, btw, the only raison d'être of the WMF, it's a support agency for all the diverse community, it has no reason to exist out of its own) could be used for such useful stuff instead of wasting it on futile nonsense like the rebranding bull**** or such. Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 12:54, 2 August 2021 (UTC)

Es muss schon wieder mal eine Übersetzung angestoßen werden, auf Deutsch habe ich es zwar schon auch so gemacht, aber die anderen Sprachen kann ich latürnich nicht. @DBarthel (WMF): als aktuellen Standardansprechpartner ;) Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 07:15, 16 August 2021 (UTC)

Hi, ist gemacht. Trotz Beobachtungslisten schaffen wir das nicht, jede Bearbeitung zeitnah zu kontrollieren und freizugeben, deswegen wär ich dir dankbar, wenn du mich weiterhin anpingst. Gruß, DBarthel (WMF) (talk) 07:53, 16 August 2021 (UTC)

JanEhlebrecht: Hi, why is there no note in the vote workfow that announce the restiktion that I habe to have 300 entries in wiki for voting or do I understand something wrong?--JanEhlebrecht (talk) 15:26, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

Moin Jan! Das wird hier erklärt, auf der Seite, die Du unter "Wahlinformationen" (bis gerade noch Voting information) in der Navibox oben rechts auf fast allen Seiten zur Wahl sehen kannst. Wenn Du direkt aus deWP hierherkommst, hast Du das eventuell nicht angezeigt bekommen. Deine Wahlberechtigung kasst Du übrigens mit diesem Werkzeug überprüfen. Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 17:18, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

$stv und $ustvr

Those are in T:4 in the section How to vote. Currently the point to the same page, $stv should imho point to the local language Wikipedia article about the STV, not just the page here. $ustvr is imho correct. If the first one should be really to this page here, the second sentence is superfluous. Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 09:11, 17 August 2021 (UTC)

@Sänger: Fixed, I used {{wd}} to point to the users' home language wiki. Joe Sutherland (Wikimedia Foundation) (talk) 23:33, 17 August 2021 (UTC)

Information about the candidates?

It would be good if each candidate had some information about themselves, what is their philosophy related to Wikimedia projects, what they intend to do if they get elected, their experience with Wikimedia projects, etc. --Thinker78 (talk) 19:55, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

It's there, just click on the names under the pictures. And you can as well look at the answers of the candidates to certain questions. Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 20:31, 18 August 2021 (UTC)

Mention that voter names are going to be published?

Under "What data is collected about voters?", it seems relevant to let voters know that they will be placed on a public roster after successfully placing a vote. For example, here. —Adamw (talk) 20:17, 19 August 2021 (UTC)

That's something that should not happen, elections should be free, equal and secret. I regard this as a grave breach of privacy.@AbhiSuryawanshi, Carlojoseph14, HakanIST, Mardetanha, KTC, Masssly, Matanya, and Ruslik0: Can you say something about it? Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 04:09, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

Hi, that is a feature of the software that have always existed. That someone voted is published, but what their vote was is not. Editor have used it to check their vote have been recorded by the software. It is possible for a vote to be struck, either automatically by the software if an account votes again, or manually by an election admin if they judge sockpuppetry for example. Such struck votes are clearly shown on the page linked to allowing interested parties to raise question if they feel a vote should not have been struck. This have not been raised as an issue in the many elections and votes that have used the software on Wikimedia wikis in the last many years. I have no problem with mentioning that the accounts that have voted are shown publicly, but I would disagree that this is "a grave breach of privacy". Thanks -- KTC (talk) 10:00, 20 August 2021 (UTC)

Prior experience in board? At least, a controversial move

Hi. I noticed with concern the approved qualifications to be a candidate, namely, board experience, executive experience, and a subjective experience. Although these requirements may have instituted to provide the board with candidates with certain experience, it completely flies in the face of democracy and inclusion. I have to point out that the requirements to be a Member of the United States Congress are: a minimum age of 25 years old, to have been a U.S. citizen for at least seven years before the election, and live in the state they represent. It doesn't require to have had experience as a member of other governing body nor requires to have been an executive, and it doesn't require experience in subjective matters. In addition, it is to note that reportedly the founders of the US didn't even want to institute direct democracy, but rather a form of representative democracy. I don't know the motivations of the board to institute the requirements aforementioned, but certainly it looks controversial, exclusive, and elitist. Thinker78 (talk) 04:59, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

And it ain't a prerequisite here as well, it's just a skill, that should be on board in at least some board members. If not with the elected ones, they should appoint one or two with those skills as appointed members. Wher do you see any such requirements in the Candidates requirements? Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 05:15, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

Admins and stewards

I think we need more transparency in those allowed to edit contributors or to semi-protect content that they feel shouldn’t be changed based on their own religious, political or ideological beliefs. They get to hide behind their screen names while they enjoy the freedom to completely rule, unabated, the edits of contributors. Something as important as Wikipedia shouldn’t allow unnamed, masked individuals to destroy what is seen as democratic. Right now, they feel untouchable, able to do anything they want on the platform with little to no oversight, completely anonymous. Transparency. If you are afraid to show your real name, what’s your agenda? MainEditoreditoreditor (talk) 14:01, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

They get elected and can as well get removed from their posts, stewards definitely, they are elected (and reelected) here on Meta, with admins it differs a bit from project to project, in my main project, the deWP, they can get demoted by the community if 25 members with voting rights want a re-election in one month, or 30 in half a year. They need 66% of the votes in each election to get elected, that's quite sufficiently democratic. If it is not this way in your project, start an RfC about it. Grüße vom Sänger ♫^(Reden) 14:53, 25 August 2021 (UTC)

"Do not rank candidates you do not wish to seat on the Board."

The "Voting Example and Best Practices" section says: "Do not rank candidates you do not wish to seat on the Board." I am having trouble understanding the reasoning here.

The provided example, which involves shirt colors, says that if you do not like the color orange, then instead of ranking it last, you should not rank it at all. The argument given is that "If other people vote and they rank orange shirts higher than blue, green or yellow, your vote could go to orange." But couldn't this only happen if all of your higher preferences (blue, green, yellow) were already selected or eliminated? In that case, why would it matter whether you ranked orange or not?

In the case of the Board, if there were multiple candidates you didn't like, then by not ranking them, you would be losing the opportunity to express your preferences among them. In the event that your other choices were eliminated and only those candidates remained, you could end up with a worse outcome than if you had ranked them, e.g. your least preferred candidate being elected rather than your second least preferred.

Am I missing something? Tim Smith (talk) 00:28, 1 September 2021 (UTC)

Tim you are correct--Fh1 (talk) 02:21, 4 September 2021 (UTC)

Hi Tim Smith, I suppose this can be seen several ways. If you do have a preference between the people you'd like to see on the Board, then perhaps you should rank them in this scenario. If there is someone you do not wish to seat on the Board, the recommendation (simplified, of course) is to not rank them. This way, there is no situation in which your vote could possibly go to that candidate in the Single Transferable Vote system. Best, JKoerner (WMF) (talk) 18:28, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

Again, that cannot happen unless all of your higher preferences have already been selected or eliminated. At that point, it is in your interest to have ranked candidates that you dislike, if you dislike some of them more than others. Following the recommendation to "not rank them" is ineffectual at best, and harmful at worst. Tim Smith (talk) 23:30, 8 September 2021 (UTC)

What you write generally make sense (with some caveats), but the page says something else:

• that «if you add orange to your vote: You have more of a chance to end up wearing an orange shirt», which is not true. It does not affect the result in any way.
• that you should «not rank candidates you do not wish to seat on the Board», which is a bad advice: if you think that some of those candidates are worse than others, you should rank them accordingly.

One important point that is worth highlighting is that adding lower-ranked candidates does not affect the likelihood of electing higher-ranked candidates.

The advice I would give is: rank as many candidates as you have an opinion on; and if you are left with some candidates that you think are worse than any candidate you have ranked, you don't want them elected, but if they are elected, you don't care which one is, then you can safely left them unranked. - Laurentius (talk) 18:52, 9 September 2021 (UTC)