User:OneKarma/Forum/Functions

To form a more perfect mode of human governance, there must be established a forum to which all persons may apply for announcements, reviews, proposals, discussions, and voting. One must have access to a public, organized log of all relevant information to accurately assess any issue. The current iteration of the General Assembly does not - and more importantly cannot - provide this information in an efficient manner. The only vehicle capable of efficiently presenting this mass of information is a computer, and the only proper fuel is a network. We can use a simple wiki to determine many potential structures of a cyclical, online GA, and then determine the best methodology.

[Note: This proposal presents only a suggestion of some core ingredients. I am probably missing a good number of points, so at this time I ask that criticisms and friendly amendments be proposed via the Discussion tab (top left). Thank you for reading. --OneKarma 13:30, 8 November 2011 (EST)]

Sections in need of review:
4. Cycle
5. Voting
6. Review Process
7. Structure of Forum

Premise

Until there is a properly defined and logged assembly process, there cannot be any true consensus. In an age of social technology, physical attendance should be required of none. To maximize both efficiency and inclusivity, the GA should be hosted online, where a massive population has access. This proposal aims to embed equality within every step of the assembly and decision-making process.

Forum Requirements

1. Continuous GA cycles to avoid time restraints (addresses individual schedule and/or transportation issues)
   
   • Proposals can be suggested, discussed, drafted, reviewed, edited, re-drafted, and voted upon
   • Establishment of quorum only when minimum percentage (to be determined) of possible votes are cast
2. Full transparency and documentation
   • Short-form summaries of discussions/events, supported by searchable archive of long-form documentation
3. 'Citizenship,' for security purposes (no voting twice, nor voting in place of another, etc)

Proposal Process

All decisions must undergo the following 5-step procedure:

1. Discuss - (at least 1 GA Cycle?, includes determination of quorum?)
2. Motion to Vote - full description of discussion and consequences of voting, at least 1 GA Cycle, needs '1st' (primary authors) and '2nd' supporters (not primary authors)
3. Vote - at least 1 GA Cycle, may be blocked, needs quorum to pass
4. Post to Review - at least 1 GA Cycle, may be blocked, needs quorum to pass
5. Implementation - effective immediately and indefinitely unless amended, needs full public effort (and enforcement?)

Minimum time to reach implementation: 4 GA Cycles

(Weekly?) Cycle

Please view the forum demonstration for the description of a standard proposal structure.

1. Day 1 (Sunday?), 00:00 am - GA Opens
2. The newest set of DISCUSSIONS are posted
   • Discussions can be voted into REVIEW by a 3/5 majority (of an undecided minimum quorum size)
3. The newest set of proposals are posted
   • Voting and discussion may happen simultaneously
4. Results of last voting period are posted
   • PASS - proposal is implemented immediately
   • BLOCK REVIEW - move to discussion and vote upon legitimacy of block(s)
   • GENERAL REVIEW - continues into next proposal discussion and vote period
   • DENY - remove from consideration
5. Proposals passed from previous week are posted in vote-space
   
   • An individual vote may be updated at any time within the cycle
     
6. New proposals may be hung for discussion
   • Discussion is open for duration of week
7. Blocks are discussed and voted upon
   • Positive - Block is justified (Needs 10% of potential)
     
   • Negative - Block is not justified (proposal returns to quorum to be re-voted upon, with particular block negated)

Voting

Vote choices may be determined per proposal, but the general guidelines are:

1. Positive - vote to Ratify as-is (needs 90% of potential)
   
2. Negative - vote to Deny
   
   • Un-Clarified negative
     
   • Irrelevancy - not relevant to movement, or too early to determine need
   • Needs minor changes (changes required involve no more than language/clarity - suggest changes?)
     
   • Needs major changes (changes required involve functional aspects of the proposal - suggest changes?)
     
   • Block - the proposal is not sound/does not support the common good
     
3. Neutral
   
   • Null - not prepared to vote, not fully informed?
   • Absent - vote not cast (default)

Case Results

Case percentages may be altered per individual proposal (maybe per level of proposal: global, regional, working group, etc), but the general guidelines are:

PASS Cases

Proposal accepted as-is; to be implemented at the start of the next GA cycle

• [ZERO Blocks] AND [at least 90.0% votes Positive] (max Blocks: zero)

DENY Cases

Prop cannot be edited; must be hung entirely anew if it is to be presented again. (Other consequences?)

• [at least 2.0% votes Block] (max Positive: 98.0%) - needs edit, blocks must be justified(?)
• [at least 35.0% votes Neutral] (max Positive: 65.0%)
• [at least 30.0% votes Negative] (max Positive: 70.0%)

UNDECIDED Cases

Prop can be presented again but must be amended

• [more than 0.5% votes Block] AND [less than 2.0% votes Block]
• [else]

Review Process

1. Review and vote on Blocks:
   • Any Block receiving at least 10.0% votes Supportive leads to denial of prop.
     
2. Review Undecided cases

Structure of the Forum [needs a bit of TLC]

It is likely that the most user-friendly forum will be hosted via wiki. If this is the case, there must be established a general structure of pages that makes efficient use of all contributions. This will include:

1. Main page structure
   • Page naming (OBIT???)
   • General description
   • Premises
   • Proposal
2. Discussion structure [needs more than minor tlc]
   • The main page shall serve as the 'current' iteration of the proposal.
     • The author of a proposal shall have exclusive rights to edit (and to permit others to edit) the proposal on the main page.
   • The discussion page connected to the main page shall serve as a conglomeration of all issues.
     • The discussion page shall be an evolving work. If little discussion is necessary, discussion may remain on this page. If it becomes large, it must be organized into general sections, the summaries of which are posted on the main discussion page, and perhaps external, live-updating documents will host further discussions.
     • Issues shall have a general summary and a link to the particular discussion.
     • Discussion of specific issues (as noted by main discussion page) shall be hosted externally on a live-updating doc host (such as Google Docs).
     • Every issue shall have a distinct discussion page.
3. Voting Structure [in voting section?]

Working Group Procedures / Adaptation

Working groups must establish their primary meeting space within the wiki.
Tent City must move to provide internet/computer access to all residents, or else establish a physical archive supported by daily/weekly updates.

Discussions

1. All topics shall have their own sections
2. Groups shall post topics and summaries on their main pages, with links to detailed discussions

Meetings

1. Meetings must be responsive to online discussions. Organizers must provide a summary of relevant online-generated discussion points.
2. Summaries of meetings must be posted online in a timely manner. Summaries should be supported with as much detail as possible, with unabridged scripts and audio/video recordings.
3. All important discussion points from meetings should also be posted within their overall discussion sections.

Voting and Consensus

1. When discussion reaches a decision making point, there may be a Motion for Decision
   • A Motion must detail the voting options. This includes references to discussions and the consequences of voting.
   • A Motion must be seconded to reach Voting Space
2. When a document reaches Voting, its relevant effectiveness must be determined:
   • Transparency is absolute; 'relevant effectiveness' is used to determine the minimum size of a quorum - this is a determination of the polis affected by passing

Related Pages

1. WG/Philosophy
2. Online Forum - Demo
3. Prop - Forum Hierarchy

Functional Basics of a Forum

To maintain a fully open and equal-opportunity forum, please follow these basic guidelines.

• Most importantly, anyone can become a content creator/author, but no one is ever a content owner, as everything exists within the 'Public Domain' (see the link at the bottom of every page).
• Etiquette should require no more mention than this.
• Research is key to proper communication. One should always make an effort to learn more than is already known about a given topic before criticizing or suggesting alternatives.

Pages and Nested Discussion

Every topic page should represent a 'professional face' regarding its topic. The related discussion page (tab in top left) is the place for clarifying questions and development of the ideas described on that topic page.

Insert four tildes (~~~~) to post a 'signature' with a time-stamp on your comments so that others know how to contact you if your questions are answered. The wiki automatically inserts a link to your user-page when you click 'Save page'.

Frequently Used Pages

To save from 'editing wars' on discussion pages where a number of collaborators may be attempting to write simultaneously, authors should be re-directed to a live-updating document such as https://pad.riseup.net.

To ensure that your work is not lost in the case of simultaneous editing,

• open a .txt document on your computer (Microsoft has a program called 'Notepad' with which some may already be familiar) to write an update.
• Go to the Edit tab, then select all (ctrl+a on Microsoft) and paste it into your .txt document.
• Then click 'Cancel' (to the right of 'Save page', 'Show preview', and 'Show changes' buttons at the bottom) or just leave the page.
• Perform all your editing in the .txt document (don't forget to save!),
• then go back to the Editing tab and replace the 'old' version with your update.

It may also be helpful to check the History of that page if you have been working for a while. Others may have updated it while you were working on your .txt. In this case you may have to track the differences between the version you were editing and the version created during your working period. It is likely that this will never be the case, but it is good practice to back-up all your personal work with document files on your personal computer whenever possible.

Formatting

Every page (both topics and discussions) should follow a few basic formatting guidelines. Visit User:OneKarma/Help or http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Formatting for the basics.

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User:OneKarma/Forum Table of Contents

• User:OneKarma/Forum - an introduction to the concept of an open forum, and utilizing this wiki as such
• User:OneKarma/Forum/Functions - the functions that an open forum should perform in order to be successful
• User:OneKarma/Forum/Demo - a 'prototype' for how working pages can be organized in an open forum