Jeff Squyres wrote on Wed, 30 May 2012 at 11:36:09
2. The definition of "simple majority" was changed from how I have computed whether ballots passed or failed in the past. I don't know offhand how past ballot results would have fared with the new definition; I am guessing that their results wouldn't have changed because most past ballots were not as close as some of the ones from this week.
From my understanding, "simple majority" (i.e., what a vote needs to pass) was defined as the following:
floor(total_eligible_orgs_attending / 2) + 1 "yes" votes Meaning: abstains and misses count as "not yes", or (effectively) "no".
*** With these rules, I see no meaning for "abstain" (or "miss"). There is effectively only "yes" and "no". *** Meaning: everyone who thought they were abstaining at this past meeting were actually voting "no".
I understand that this was discussed in Japan and everyone in the room agreed to these rules. ***It is not what I would have advocated***, but I was not there. :-\
In all prior meetings, I used the following computation to determine if a ballot passed:
floor(total_yes_and_no_votes / 2) + 1 "yes" votes or, effectively:
more "yes" votes than "no" votes Meaning: abstains and misses do not count towards the result.
IMO this kind of change is not something that should happen in a single meeting. Just like we don't make large changes to the standard in a single meeting, I feel very strongly that the MPI Forum follow the same kind of process in making such significant rule changes as we do with tickets. To be clear, I believe that this change should have been brought up one meeting, voted in the next, and voted a second time to pass in the 3rd meeting. Yes, it would take time, but bylaw changes should not be undertaken lightly. The fact that some votes were still recorded as 'abstain' is an indication that this bylaw change was half baked. -Fab