Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Military history/Coordinators/September 2013

Questions

I have a few questions to all candidates that will be nominated. The answers could be interesting for everyone who plans to vote. So come on and answer them. ;)

• If you are a Coordinator running vor reelection: What were your goals at the beginning of your last term? Have you achieved most of them? Which failed and why? Which are running but could perform better? Will new goals base on the achieved goals of your last term?

• What goals do you have for the following term? Keep the MilHist-Project running? Developing new areas and task forces? Any projects to increase the number of project-members or cool down the project from its strong focus on GAs and FAs?

So much for my questions. I will not vote in the following election but am highly interested in your answers. Maybe someone else would like to add some more questions? --Bomzibar (talk) 17:26, 4 September 2013 (UTC)

Votes

• Is there a maximum number of votes we can cast? I seem to recall that last year it was three. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 23:30, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
  • @Crisco 1492: There is no maximum (and, to the best of my recollection, there has never been one). Kirill ^[talk] 23:35, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
    • Crisco, you might be thinking of the Military Historian of the Year award, in which we do limit final votes to three. I was thinking of that as a precedent when I mentioned on the coord talk page, in responding to Marcus, that there could be some merit in voting limits at these elections but everyone else seems fine with it being unlimited. Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 00:26, 17 September 2013 (UTC)
      • Alright, thanks. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 05:35, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Eligibility to vote

G'day all, looking at some of the editors that are voting, I admit to thinking "who is that?". I was pleased to see the interest from members of the MILHIST project that I haven't otherwise encountered in my time on WP, and it is great to see people joining the project in the last few weeks that are showing an interest in the coordinator election. I have even been the beneficiary of votes from the latter, so maybe I shouldn't raise this, but I have a query about eligibility to vote. We should probably have a sensible cut-off for eligibility. At least one vote appears to be from an editor that doesn't appear on our member list, which I understand is a requirement. In most RW elections, there is a general guideline that no one can register to vote after nominations open (or the election itself starts). New users registering accounts, or users that have been essentially inactive for six months prior to the election, (who are of course very welcome to join MILHIST or resume editing at any time), have voted already in this election. Such users may have little if any knowledge of those nominating other than looking through "User contributions", and I think we are looking for some judicious application of experience of the project in deciding who our coordinators should be. Given we had a three way tie for lead coordinator last year, this is not just an issue of semantics. Happy to be howled down if people think we are not playing for sheep stations here. Thoughts? Peacemaker67 (send... over) 04:16, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

• Actually, most of this is addressed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Military history/Academy/Becoming a coordinator, specifically, the following section:

Who gets to vote in the election?

Traditionally, only editors who are also members of the project are allowed to vote. We occasionally have input from non-members too, many of whom have contributed greatly to Milhist and/or our articles without ever joining up. The views of non-members in good standing are welcomed, but this courtesy is not extended where there is evidence of external canvassing. If candidates intentionally engage in campaigning for the purpose of becoming a coordinator or lead coordinator, they should expect to receive a sanction from the project.

We are of course monitoring for those who would game the system, but by and large the election is set up to be a simple majority to vote to allow for those who want to vote to do so regardless of extenuating circumstances like time active with the project. As I penned before, coordinators be thou for the contributors, so the people we are held accountable to should be allowed to vote for us with as little obstruction as possible. If you like though we can revisit the issue at a later date and discuss the matter, if you feel it would be in our benefit to do so. TomStar81 (Talk) 04:29, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

(edit conflict) In past elections, we've been quite liberal in this regard, and have permitted votes from pretty much anyone who cared enough to show up. Personally, I don't see any particularly strong reason to change this approach unless there's evidence of deliberate manipulation; the current structure of the coordinator tranche means that the election is not particularly competitive—with the number of candidates at 15, candidates will be evaluated only based on their level of support relative to the fixed minimum threshold, so no candidate risks being denied a seat because of support for another candidate—and the lead coordinator position has become more of a primus inter pares one in recent years anyways (and particularly given the joint lead coordinatorship we've had over the past year). Kirill ^[talk] 04:50, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

Thanks Kirill. I'm happy. Peacemaker67 (send... over) 05:22, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

I'm delighted with how the election is going ... there's more feedback than in past years, and it's more positive and specific. We need that, at least once a year. - Dank (push to talk) 11:37, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

It's good to see. I always try to explain why I'm supporting someone, and enjoy hearing why people support me. Of course feedback in the election is somewhat slanted, since we only have approval votes, but it's still useful to hear what people think you're doing right, and what they'd like to see you do more... ;-) Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 12:09, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

The current system appears to work quite well. The only area that I think might be worth refining for next year is the method of selecting the lead coordinator. I was quite happy to vote for all of the candidates. There was a good mix of experience, new blood and sub-disciplinary interest/expertise represented in the mix and all of the newer members of the project (with whom I was unfamiliar) had been vouched for by experienced editors whose opinions I respect. Notwithstanding, I wouldn't want to see a first time coordinator thrust into the lead coordinator role - the present system allows this possibility (although I expect this is an atypical outcome in practice). Perhaps a separate section to vote on a lead coordinator with a limit of three votes per voter? This would have the advantage that those who only wanted to be a coordinator but didn't think they had the time and/or experience to opt out of consideration for lead coordinator. Cheers, AusTerrapin (talk) 14:38, 17 September 2013 (UTC)

How much worse if we don't have enough people "Just showing up" to form a quorum? Doug (talk) 15:41, 19 September 2013 (UTC)