I wish to raise the question of whether or not Grex members who choose to
remain anonymous should be allowed to vote on issues, and set into motion
a discussion about this.

152 responses total.

   I don't see how a fair system can accomidate psuedos getting a vote.
Whats to prevent people from taking out multiple psuedo accounts, making
them members for several months so "they" can influence a vote?
   It might be good to have voting be a physical thing, FTF.  But we would
have to allow for people who are distant (tbyernes, sjr, etc.) to be able
to vote electronically.

The founding group discussed this issue when we were talking about
how to handle such votes as would need to be taken until bylaws
were adopted by the membership that established more permanent
rules.  The sentiment was strongly for the principle of "one vote
per person".

If you believe in that concept, it seems to rule out total
anonymity -- the identity of all voters would have to be known at
least to whoever was supervising the voting process, to insure
that nobody was using pseudo accounts to amass additional voting
power for themselves.

(STeve's response slipped in.)

   Huh?  I must have missed that meeting.  I thought the reason
for requiring a certain amount of financial input was to make
pseudo-takeovers difficult, and that we would let pseudos vote.

I think the requiring the pseudo to have a paid membership and having one
of the staff or Board of Directors (if we go that route) personally know
the pseudo's real (legal?) identity would be sufficient to allow him/her to
vote.  This would also keep the one person, one vote in place.

Re #5:
It's not a bad plan, but somehow I have trouble believing the pseudos would
agree to it.  It may be the only way possible, though.  Are there any
pseudo members now?

   Is there a person on the system reading this that is using a psuedo
who can talk about the other side of the coin?  In a perfect world I
guess there would be no problem with this.  If someone can come up with a
reasonable system that allows for voting psuedos yet at least partially
defends against buying lots of memberships I'd be all ears.

I was under the impression that the agreed-up scheme was:

        1. To vote, you had to be a paid-in-full member for at least three
           consecutive months, including the month of the vote;

        2. Membership was $6/month or $60/year; thus the minimum "voting fee"
           was $18;

        3. Only checks would be allowed for payment-by-mail; if a person
           wished to pay cash, then they would have to present payment
           in person, so as to make it somewhat more difficult for a single
           person to purchase multiple memberships (the reasoning being
           that it's more difficult to conceal your identity in person than
           through the mail), as well as the simple fact that it's a bad
           idea to send cash through the mail.

Of course, this is just vague recollection based on my memory; I don't
have any notes or anything, so I could be wrong.

I think that's about how it was.

 re #8:  How would a cashier's check provide any keys to their identity?

A cashiers' check can usually be traced, despite what some TV shows
have indicated, banks tend to require identification for almost everything
other than breathing.  Money Orders from the corner store, on the other hand,
can be totally untraceable past the store as long as there is no camera
snapping pictures of the purchasers.  (I HAVE seen Cashiers' checks, BTW,
there is a space on them reading 'Remitted by' or similar things, with
the name of the person who posted the money to the bank.)

And, money orders are not unreasonable either.  I used them for several years
before I had enough of a cash flow to rate getting a checking account.
Now that I think of that, bank money orders don't require identification
either, you gave them the cash, they give you the order.

Upshot, unless you go about verifying members' information regularly, they
can put anything on a money order by way of sender ID.

Or the pseudo could send a friend to pay the membership fee.  I think
we ought to require that pseudos have at least one (maybe two or three)
members vouch for him or her.

What would be the problem with creating a membership category for pseudos
which would not include voting rights?  If pseudos want to buy memberships,
why should we object to accepting the money?

This response has been erased.

I naturally wish to have voting rights, yet I comprehend the difficulties
involved.  I intend to refrain from complaining, whichever way this issue
is decided.

   I don't see why a pseudo could be very active on the system, and maintain
their "real" identity for paying money, etc.
   I also wonder how many we're talking about here.
   Would a 'verification' process like what Dan and Glenda talked about be
reasonable?  I think that might work, if there wern't too many who wanted
to come forth in this manner.

  Part of the beauty of being a pseudo is that there are no predefined
  images that distort the ideas that an individual were to come up with.

  For instance.  Any idea I might propose here, might be tainted by the
  fact that I am on staff at M-net, or a board member on AIS.  As a 
  pseudo, no one would question why I would bring up any particular
  issue here.  

  For me I might consider this not to be an issue, but for others, 
  this may be a very real concern.  Even so much that having one
  staff member know who they are may be undesireable.

Well, there's no restriction on bringing up issues, Jim...
You could bring up stuff, and try to get as many people to side with you
as you want...

   Yeah, but he'd want the idea considered on its own merits,
untainted by the suspicions of the paranoid.

  I think pseudos should be able to have voting rights even if nobody knows
who they are.  If it comes down to someone with a lot of money wanting to 
use gobs of it to swing some vote on the system, requiring all the members to
be actual people doesn't buy you any more security against that.  What's to
stop them from paying for 20 of their closest personal friends to become
members and swinging the vote that way?  
 
  If having paid money to the system is going to be the requirement for 
getting a vote, then you have to accept the fact that the person who has 
the most money can muster the most votes.  If people are really, really
concerned about this happening then grex should probably establish an
executive position with some sort of overrideable veto power.  Personally
I don't think that's such a hot idea, but it would be one possible 
safeguard against a would-be tyrant with deep pockets.

  Another benefit of allowing pseudos to have voting rights is that it
could provide people with desirable anonymity when it comes to voting on
certain volatile issues.

This response has been erased.

What would stop them from paying 20 of their closest friends is
that they'd have to persuade 20 people to go along with the
concept.  To get 20 votes as pseudos is much easier -- could be
done by a conspiracy of one.

I think, though, that the real danger in allowing completely
anonymous voters, some of whom could be duplicates of the same
person, is not that gobs of votes would routinely be bought, but
that the knowledge that it *could* be abused would engender
chronic suspicion that it *was* being abused, thus souring the
whole electoral process.

Before getting too carried away about pseudos, it may make sense
to check out the legal requirements, especially regarding non-profit
organizations.  I believe we actually have to keep a "membership list"
on file, possibly for public inspection.

re #23:  But, it might not be as difficult to pay somebody to start a
         membership, and to turn it over to you.

I doubt that anybody would find such a scheme to be worth the amount of
money involved.  Perhaps, if this is truly a concern, Marcus's bill of
rights idea should be reconsidered.

This item is now linked as #3 in the pseudo conference.

Re #24:  Interesting point.  Can anybody corroborate it?

Here's an interesting thought.  If you allow pseudos to vote, do you
allow them to hold office?

   Thank you John, for saying things so well in #23.  I'd like to know what
other systems do or are planning to do, with regard to psuedos.  M-Net?
AIS? who else?  I think looking at what others have done here might help us.

AIS only votes on officers.  Since the Club is constrained by many limitations
there is really very little to vote on.  It will try anything as long as
the impact on resources are reasonable.  As to a person trying to control
the system with a load of pseudos... I can't see anything to gain.  The
resources are very flexible and nothing is really restricted except those
things that will end up having our service taken away.  Anyone trying to
do this really must have money to throw away.

M-net is still in a transition phase that may involve joining with A-net.
As such, no real policy on pseudos are currently being implemented.
Discussions may evolve, but committee run organizations take time in
creating this kind of policy.  Not much to vote on yet.

Please, UMCC is the name of the organization.

Of course.  However, we are all used to referring to these organizations by
the address we access.  It *is* UMCC, but the first name published was AIS.

Hey, it looks like grex might have an opportunity to be a pioneer
in the area of Sensible Pseudo Policy (henceforth known as SPP).
(I'm serious.)

As Marcus suggested, I do think we need to pin down the
implications of being a not-for-profit corporation -- which
Grex is, don't forget.  Depending on what the legal requirements
are, they might render much of this discussion moot.

  Suppose we allow pseudos to vote if they are an assumed name
registered with the county government?  After all, we are allowed
to get checking accounts then, and can pay with personal checks.

I believe anonymous users are presently allowed to vote until the
membership decides otherwise.  Is this correct?

Voting members are anyone who has a three-month paid membership
that includes the period during which the vote is conducted.  That
doesn't bear directly on the anonymity issue, but expresses the
conviction of the founding group that a certain level of financial
commitment to the system should be a prerequisite to an electoral
say in the selection of officers and determination of policies.
Grex is no different in this regard than most other clubs and
cooperative organizations.

Re #34:  But you're not allowed to go to the polls on election day
and cast multiple votes under your various pseudonyms.  In order
for democracy to work, people have to have a reasonable degree of
assurance of the integrity of the one-person-one-vote principle.
Without that, voters becoming cynical about the whole concept of
government by the people, as plenty of real-life examples show.  I
have nothing against pseudos and offhand don't see why the
identity of a voter would have to be known to *all* of Grex, but I
don't see how to allow totally anonymous voters without making it
too easy for somebody to vote more than once.  If somebody can
come up with a workable scheme that allows total anonymity and
avoids that loophole, I'm all ears.

But as has been pointed out, all of this is moot if our status
as a corporation requires us to keep membership of "real" people.
Somebody needs to research that one.

(next-to-last line should read '...membership lists of "real" people'.)

No, my recollection was that for the first vote (which will
probably concern how further voting should be done) only members
who are paid-up for three months and somehow "known" would be
able to participate.

Myself, I'll push for all members, whether their true identity is
known or not, to be allowed voting priviledges.  I feel pseudos
are one of the more creative and whimsical aspects of computer
conferencing and for the most part a very positive force.  So why
not start out, anticipating pseudos will be good citizens, and
tolerate the few that may not fullfil those expectations.  If it
turn out that allowing pseudos voting rights is a raging problem -
*then* address it. But I'd rather not think up exotic, worst-case
scenerios, and then use those to set initial policy.

This whole medium is very interesting not because of how closely
it follows the rest of our predictable, everyday interactions, but
because of the delightful differences.  Pseudos are a good part of 
the charm of this system and we should extend them the courtesy of
our trust.  Amen.

John slipped i.  You may be seeing a rare difference of opinion
between us if you read closely.  But of course, I'm right.

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss