Folks I am no math wizard, but it does seem to me that Avri's 
explanation is correct (and the later, more haiku version even better).  
If every single voter voted for one or two Council candidates and NOTA, 
then NOTA would win, and the candidate with the fewest votes would drop 
off.  Seems obvious to me.   The candidate with the fewest votes always 
drops off.

There is a reason that the letter I signed requested a halt on this 
election, and a new ballot....there has been a misinformation 
distributed re the significance of a NOTA vote.  Even though I 
appreciate the desire to reach a happy compromise at the EC discussion 
of this, it does seem that there is still a tremendous amount of 
confusion being sown about the process, and I mean no disrespect to 
anyone who has tried to clarify matters on this list.  I suspect poor 
NOTA is being deprived of well-earned votes, because folks either have 
not bothered to change their early vote, when they thought a vote for 
nota meant a vote for nobody on the slate, or because they are now 
totally confused.

I have a great deal of sympathy for Raoul's conclusion "What a bunch of 
bollocks for 4/4 sterling candidates who are all getting a seat anyway.
I think mistrust on *this particular election* can be forgotten, since 
there's hardly any chances of having more NOTAs than votes on any 
particular candidate. I mean REALLY."

My interpretation of all this fuss follow.  Possibly this is entirely 
predictable since I have raised these issues before in the all 
candidates meeting, and at the risk of driving more votes to NOTA, I can 
assure you I will continue to raise them:

1.  We need more people to run for office.  There is no real choice in 
acclamation.  That is a problem.

2.  Communications from elected officers need to be regular, clear, 
consultative and cooperative.  While I can see plenty of collaboration 
and cooperation and eagerness to help out in this recent flurry of 
communications, it is a great case for out little group to start with.

3.  When a few people are doing all the work on policy development 
processes, administration, cross community work etc.  they can get 
cranky and authoritarian.  There is a human impulse to say oh yeah, you 
come and put your shoulder to the plow and help.  We need to work on 
distributing the work load more fairly, and helping others, particularly 
those whose first language is not english, to get engaged in the actual 
work that is done at ICANN.  Sometimes the learning curve is very steep, 
and it must be extremely hard for non-english speakers to get engaged.  
(and good luck to them figuring out this recent dialogue, I am having a 
hard time and I am a native speaker :-)).

4.  We already have communications and cooperation problems at Council.  
We need to work on this honestly, in a spirit of servant leadership that 
is real, not feigned. This is not about us, the candidates, it is about 
representing civil society in a complex multi-stakeholder environment 
where money talks and we are grievously outnumbered.  IF NOTA gets a 
seat in this election, I hope he or she shares that view.

Stephanie Perrin


On 2016-08-25 7:19, avri doria wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I have to confess this explanation seems like obfuscating nonsense to me.
>
> A vote for someone counts in their favor
>
> A vote for NOTA says there is no other that's acceptable and counts in
> no ones favor.
>
> There can be at most 3 votes.
>
> In counting, those with more votes than NOTA are elected.
>
> I figure we can get into the exoterica of different voting systems and
> of which system is better  and what all of voting system's deconstructed
> possibilities mean once the EC goes to work to define procedures for our
> next election.  But lets try and fix this election first.
>
> I am still waiting to see an official response from the EC to the appeal.
>
> avri
>
>
> On 25-Aug-16 02:42, Tapani Tarvainen wrote:
>> Dear all,
>>
>> While the voting rules confirmed by NCSG EC yesterday may be familiar
>> and clear to oldtimers and mathematically-minded people like myself,
>> they may not be obvious to all. I try to clarify them a little.
>>
>> In particular the actual effect of None-of-the-Above vote to
>> candidates' chances of getting elected (that is, beating NotA) in the
>> councillor election is not quite intuitive. Chair election is clear
>> enough so I won't discuss it now, and I'm ignoring any symbolic
>> meanings as well.
>>
>> Key point: in the present situation, the only thing that matters in
>> deciding if a candidate gets elected is whether or not their vote
>> count is less than NotA's.
>>
>> With that in mind:
>>
>> In the councillor section of the ballot there are four boxes
>> one can tick: one for each candidate, let's call them X, Y and Z,
>> and one for None of the Above.
>>
>> This gives in effect eight different ways of filling the ballot:
>>
>> (1) Leave it empty - tick no boxes.
>>
>> This has no effect on the outcome, but will be counted as a valid
>> vote.
>>
>> (2) Select only NotA, none of the candidates.
>>
>> This will decrease all candidates' chances of getting elected equally.
>>
>> (3) Select one candidate, say X (but not NotA).
>>
>> This will improve candidate X's chances of getting elected
>> and has no impact on the chances of candidates Y and Z.
>>
>> (4) Select two candidates, say Y and Z (but not NotA).
>>
>> This will improve both Y's and Z's chances of getting elected
>> and has no impact on the chances of X.
>>
>> (5) Select one candidate, X, and NotA.
>>
>> This will have no effect at all on X's chances but will
>> reduce Y's and Z's chances of being elected.
>>
>> In effect the NotA vote will cancel the positive vote to X,
>> leaving only negative vote against Y and Z.
>>
>> (6) Select two candidates, Y and Z, and NotA.
>>
>> This will have no effect on Y's and Z's chances but
>> will reduce X's chances.
>>
>> Again, the effect of NotA is canceling out the positive vote
>> to Y and Z, leaving only the negative effect on X.
>>
>> (7) Select all three candidates (but not NotA).
>>
>> This will improve all candidates' chances of getting elected.
>>
>> (8) Select all three candidates and NotA.
>>
>> This will invalidate the ballot and it will have no effect on the
>> outcome. Invalid ballots will be separately counted, however.
>>
>>
>> The most counterintuitive cases are (5) and (6): if voting
>> for one or two candidates, adding NotA will actually
>> reduce the chances of your chosen candidate(s) being elected
>> (just as much as those of the other candidates').
>>
>> If everybody votes that way, that is, selects one or two candidates
>> plus NotA, no candidate can ever be elected.
>>
>> A simplified hypothetical example to illustrate this:
>>
>> Assume we have 400 voters with one vote each.
>>
>> The assume 100 people vote for X+NotA and 300 vote for Y+Z+NotA.
>>
>> Result: X gets 100 votes, Y and Z 300 each, NotA gets 400,
>> and nobody gets elected.
>>
>>
>> I find this system so bizarre that it actually never occurred to
>> me that it really was the intent in previous elections.
>> Indeed I failed to believe it even when people kept yelling at me that
>> yes, that was the intent. Well, I was wrong. Not for the first time.
>>
>> Good reminder that what someone thinks is obvious may not be so at all
>> to another. And in things like elections that can be dangerous, so all
>> such assumptions should be made explicit and written down.
>>
>>
>> Anyway, this is the system we have, longstanding practice,
>> and we are not going to change it for this election.
>>
>>
>> So, vote - but take care that you understand the real effect of your
>> vote, especially when thinking about voting for None of the Above.
>>
>>
>> ******
>>
>> For the future, however, I recommend reconsidering this and looking
>> for better methods, even changing the charter if need be. Perhaps some
>> type of approval voting, separate NotA for each candidate, or a vote
>> threshold would work. All such systems have their own pitfalls though,
>> it takes care to do them well. I will not go deeper into that now, but
>> I suggest it would be best to define the rules at a time sufficiently
>> far from any actual elections that thoughts of current candidates and
>> strategies will not cloud people's thinking. Of course election-time
>> discussions such as the present brouhaha should be very useful
>> material to review then, so by all means let the debate continue if
>> people aren't tired of it yet. It may prove worthwhile in the end.
>>
>
>
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