[Draft] Deshret Activity Requirement Amendment

[Cormac]

Additionally, I would like to bring up the point that loses the activity requirement will make it easier for citizens who have other interests ahead of Osiris' interests to influence elections. What I mean by this is that if someone wanted to get specific people into office to push a certain agenda, this would make it easier for them. Just get a few people to apply for the deshret once and now they just need to maintain citizen activity rather than actually voting.

I think this concern is overblown, to be honest, but we could have resolved it by shifting to a simple posting requirement. Few were in favor of that. I'm not in favor of keeping the current system because it will continue the burden on the Keeper of tracking votes, which is, again, incredibly time consuming and tedious. If we continue making it a crappy chore to serve as Keeper, we're going to continue getting the same results: Inactive Keepers and an inactive Deshret. We need to be more worried about activity at this point than we are about unlikely security scenarios.

I know citizens have complained in the past about citizens who don't ever vote unless it is an election. I would want to see some expectations for our deshret in regards to activity. Perhaps require that a councilor needs to have voted in 50% of the past 5 votes or something. That is just an example. This would also not allow for new people to come in right before an election, become a deshret, and then immediately influence the results.

"50% of the past 5 votes." That would be even more difficult to track than the current system, as it increases the number of votes that need tracked as well as introducing in a new percentage that the Keeper will need to track. That would make the current system even worse on the Keeper.

I'm also completely against making people wait several votes before they can vote in the Deshret. Sometimes we go months without a vote in the Deshret. Again, we're worrying too much here about security and not nearly enough about activity. Our problem right now is activity in Osiris is in the tank, and we need to address that instead of trying to ensure that security threats which largely don't even exist are covered. We're going to secure ourselves into complete inactivity, and I will point out that the biggest security threat to a Feeder or Sinker is inactivity.

[Jakker]

Additionally, I would like to bring up the point that loses the activity requirement will make it easier for citizens who have other interests ahead of Osiris' interests to influence elections. What I mean by this is that if someone wanted to get specific people into office to push a certain agenda, this would make it easier for them. Just get a few people to apply for the deshret once and now they just need to maintain citizen activity rather than actually voting.

I think this concern is overblown, to be honest, but we could have resolved it by shifting to a simple posting requirement. Few were in favor of that. I'm not in favor of keeping the current system because it will continue the burden on the Keeper of tracking votes, which is, again, incredibly time consuming and tedious. If we continue making it a crappy chore to serve as Keeper, we're going to continue getting the same results: Inactive Keepers and an inactive Deshret. We need to be more worried about activity at this point than we are about unlikely security scenarios.

I don't believe simply thinking about security means that we are not also keeping activity a priority. One could argue that removing any activity requirement would allow for those non-regulars to return whenever they want and not have to worry about reapplying to the deshret. However, that is literally the only population affected in terms of citizens. But in that light, why do we have a forum? Aren't we restricting access to people? Why not just do everything in-game? To me, arguing that this is about activity doesn't hold up.

If you want to argue about activity, in regards to the Keeper, I also don't truly believe the point. If the matter of keeping track of voting is maintained, everything moves quite smoothly. It is simply at times, such as time, when it has not been maintained, that all this extra work is required.

Furthermore, I would argue this places MORE work on the Keeper because now they need to keep track of suspicious activity and councillors who have been so inactive that they need to voted to be removed. By having an objective standard, it gives a system. If we truly believe that this is the route to increasing activity, we are setting a terrible precedent for ourselves.

[Cormac]

I don't believe simply thinking about security means that we are not also keeping activity a priority. One could argue that removing any activity requirement would allow for those non-regulars to return whenever they want and not have to worry about reapplying to the deshret. However, that is literally the only population affected in terms of citizens. But in that light, why do we have a forum? Aren't we restricting access to people? Why not just do everything in-game? To me, arguing that this is about activity doesn't hold up.

It is about activity, in two ways:

1. It will encourage the Keeper to be more active by eliminating the tedious and time-consuming task of tracking each Councilor's vote, which will in turn stimulate Deshret activity. The Deshret is more active when the Keeper is more active.

2. It does, in fact, eliminate the hurdle of Councilors who, for whatever reason, fell inactive having to reapply for the Deshret, which will allow them to immediately resume activity upon their return.

Now, obviously, there are limits to how far we should go to stimulate activity. No, we shouldn't just get rid of the forum and confine all regional activity to the RMB, because that would actually eliminate many forms of regional activity altogether due to the difficulty of organizing it. That's taking a reasonable argument to an absurd extreme in order to make it seem unreasonable. The reasonable argument here is that this vote tracking system is a significant and largely unnecessary barrier to activity that we should eliminate. If we don't eliminate it, we're going to end up with more burnt out and inactive Keepers and a less active Deshret, as a result.

If you want to argue about activity, in regards to the Keeper, I also don't truly believe the point. If the matter of keeping track of voting is maintained, everything moves quite smoothly. It is simply at times, such as time, when it has not been maintained, that all this extra work is required.

And why do you think it hasn't been maintained?

With all due respect, you've not yet had to deal with vote tracking and you have no idea how tedious and time-consuming it is. The fact that it hasn't been maintained is actually evidence of how tedious and time-consuming it is, because if it were really as easy-breezy as you're making it out to be, it would be up to date. I will note, again, that it was Douria's one complaint about serving as Keeper, a persistent complaint that he outright said led him to be less active in the Deshret because he was having to spend a large chunk of time tracking and recording everyone's votes. Douria was, unquestionably, the best Keeper we've had. If it didn't work for him, there are very few people for whom it's going to work out well.

Furthermore, I would argue this places MORE work on the Keeper because now they need to keep track of suspicious activity and councillors who have been so inactive that they need to voted to be removed. By having an objective standard, it gives a system. If we truly believe that this is the route to increasing activity, we are setting a terrible precedent for ourselves.

You're making it sound like this is or will be such a common problem that it's going to create more work for the Keeper, when in reality there are very few people who are even this inactive, and when there are other Feeders and Sinkers whose legislatures are open to citizens upon becoming citizens with no further membership requirements at all. Those Feeders and Sinkers are not collapsing under a barrage of security threats. Why will we?

Bluntly: The security threat being proposed here is greatly exaggerated, especially when one considers the openness of some other Feeders' and Sinkers' legislatures without great peril, and we should be more concerned about why the Deshret sometimes goes for months without a single vote than we are about keeping imaginary security threats out of the Deshret.

[Jakker]

My most recent response had nothing to do with security.

If my opinion will be disregarded regarding the vote tracking, then I'd like to hear from Tomb or Andrew in regards to this. I will message them to post. I am not disagreeing that tracking isn't work, but I don't believe it is this impossible task that is stopping keepers from staying active like you are arguing.

[Datford-Zyvetskistaahn]

In TNP, I was Speaker for a time, around ten months, during which TNP's system for maintaining membership in its Regional Assembly was based on voting, though it has since moved on to be based on a posting model of the kind originally proposed here.

While I appreciate that Osiris has had a different development, I can't say that during my time I found the task of recording and checking voted to be particularly arduous (and, TNP's system was, in TNP's fashion, more complex than ours here in Osiris, as it required the tracking of at least the four most recent votes and for all votes to be categorised and recorded as legislative or non-legislative, for one needed to have either voted in the last twenty days or to have voted in one of the last four legislative votes), so, for myself, reducing the burden on the Keeper is not placed too highly in considerations.

I do, however, support the proposal as it will lower barriers to participation and move us closer to an all-citizens Assembly. The contention that it will leave us open to subversion by otherwise inactive members is, I think, overblown; certainly, if a group were to engage in a concerted effort to bring down the region, one would imagine that they would not be deterred by the need to vote every now and again, so the present system is no real barrier and I do not think that the need to post a few times each month would be either, though it would perhaps be more substantive.

If we truly believe there are Councillors working to subvert Osiris for their own ends, then to remove them by motion is surely a more proper course than hoping they forget to post, and if we similarly are suspect of an applicant then refusing them a place in this Deshret is better than permitting them to enter and carry out their plans subject only to the check of having to vote.

Now, the argument I could perhaps see for the extant requirement is that encourages engagement, as those compelled to vote may choose to review the debates to be informed and even to contribute themselves. However,it seems that the engagement, presuming it is effectively encouraged by the requirement, has not led this place to be an overly active one, though things have picked up recently.

So, returning to the lowering of barriers, this is the main point in favour of the Bill, to me. It allows Councillors to flow more smoothly between activity and inactivity, removing the need to regain membership of this place after each lull they go through, and coming back able to contribute again immediately may well encourage a fuller return to activity than having to apply for things and wait for the processing of applications all over again.


tl:dr I apologise to those disinclined to read so much, so a summary of it all is that lower barriers are a positive, while security risks and the burden of the Keeper are not so consequential.

[Jakker]

Perhaps this is ignorant of me, but I find it hard to believe that it is that challenging for a keeper to maintain voting records. Our current records are more complex than they have to be. Literally, all we need to do is after each vote, is list out who voted. No need to have links of list of everyone in the deshret at the given time. Those lists can be followed up with if someone needs to potentially be removed.

[Cormac]

My most recent response had nothing to do with security.

If my opinion will be disregarded regarding the vote tracking, then I'd like to hear from Tomb or Andrew in regards to this. I will message them to post. I am not disagreeing that tracking isn't work, but I don't believe it is this impossible task that is stopping keepers from staying active like you are arguing.

Something is certainly keeping our past Keepers from being active. If it isn't the vote tracking requirement, I would certainly like to hear from them what it is. The last legislative vote we had before the Osiran Honors Act was on October 7, 2015. All other activity since then has been driven solely by the Pharaoh (confirmations, PNG removals). That's a four month gap between any legislative voting.

Regardless, I also agree with Zyvet's broader argument regarding increasing opportunity and participation.

[Ridersyl]

I will say in talks with Cormac in the OFO Skype chat that I also expressed the belief that Keepers keeping track of voting is "not particularly arduous", as Zyvet put it.

Something is certainly keeping our past Keepers from being active. If it isn't the vote tracking requirement, I would certainly like to hear from them what it is.

I second this.

[Festavo]

It could be that the past two keepers had enough non-osiran responsibilities to keep them from going the extra mile for the deshret.

[Lord Ravenclaw]

I would honestly concur with that as it's hard to argue against knowing both of them.

That said I've always been a fan of voting based membership, just my preference mind.