2006 ENnies Judge Voting Poll/Thread

[Keeper of Secrets]

I'm sure that the winners will be great judges. A bunch of people don't win such a prestigious honor (and it IS prestigious) without the rest of us maintaining trust in them.

 

[Eva of Sirrion]

This is my first time voting for ENnies judges. I think it's important for us as gamers to express our opinions for voting in this for who we think is the most qualified and knowledgable on the game design and rules. Looks like it's gonna be a good dogfight down the stretch for the 3rd and 6th spots. Good luck to everyone!

 

[Umbran]

I don't really like the idea of a single thread for each candidate that's simply a "Vote for me!" thread. That seems a bit...well...just seems a bit wrong.

Okay, let's come up with some constructive alternatives:

1) The Nominees Discussion Thread - a single thread in which some Power That Is Posts some topic for discussion, and the nominees get to strut their stuff discussing the topic for a bit. The thread could run through a topic each day or two during the nomination and voting period, covering everything from artwork and book design to game balance and mechanics to playstyle...

2)Above I mention the Standard Review - it isn't a campaign thread, but it is a way for nominees to get some even comparisons out there. Upon reflection, perhaps relaxing it to "the PTB announce a product before the nomination period, turn in reviews by the end of the nomination period, post 'em all during voting" would be better.

Anyone else have an idea?

 

[Crothian]

What about a public questioaire for the would be judges? I say public so everyone will know the questions and see each persons answers.

 

[MavrickWeirdo]

No offence taken, I assure you. I have never come even come close to winning, so I didn't expect to this time either

Well at least you are more popular this year.

 

[MavrickWeirdo]

Well, you know, you have to have someone trustworthy at the back of the party, so you don't get jumped by a group of sneaky ninjas.

Looks like it's shaping up to be another excellent judges' pool this year. I'm honored that I've gotten more than two votes (mine and the missus') with this kind of company!

Can you handle the excitement of being in 16th place?

 

[fusangite]

Now, I have to take an odd position - though we've been told campaigning is allowed, I for one think that's only because we haven't seen it in action.

My argument is not that campaigning is a thing we have not been doing up to now but should start. My argument is that campaigning already happens and helps to explain why elections go the way they do. I think one of the problems in this debate is that people are used to national and state elections in cities. ENWorld's elections, with their smaller number of voters and narrower range of issues look a great deal more like elections for school board and municipal council in villages and small towns.

Negative advertizing and the like are extremely rare in such elections. Often spending lots of money on advertizing or promotion tends to turn voters off because a small community often resents depersonalized and manipulative mass advertising strategies. Candidates, therefore, focus their activities as follows:
- highlighting their past and ongoing contributions to the community
- mobilizing individual voters with whom they are acquainted to (a) vote and (b) encourage their friends to do so
- working in the community as volunteers to demonstrate that their service to the community is not contingent on being elected
- avoiding public controversy and the appearance of undermining or insulting other members of the community

It is my view that this form of campaigning has been highly successful and widespread on ENWorld since the inception of the ENNies. The reason we have not seen negative advertising or naked self-promotion is the same reason these things are rare in harmonious rural communities. Not because they are proscribed but because they are ineffective.

Even if it remains entirely civil - imagine 15 candidates each with their own camapaign thread, which they have a vested interest in keeping on the front page. Even a small number of supporters can keep the thread there without being mere "bumping".

We start seeing complaints when there's even four threads on a given topic on the front page of General at one time. Imagine 7, or 15 of them! This is going to make exactly zero of the apathetic folks more interested in voting, and probably turn off some of the people who are still interested enough to vote.

Again, you are skirting the reality: people campaign effectively without doing this. I gave an inventory of all the ways to campaign that have already been effective. You are deliberately conflating "campaigning" with a bunch of annoying online behaviour that we have yet to see here.

If the phenomenon you have described became a problem, I think two things would happen: (1) candidates who engaged in it would become less popular and (2) a sub-forum would be created to handle the traffic. Frankly, I think this behaviour would be self-limiting; most candidates would quickly realize that this behaviour was not helping them.

I don't see the current style of campaigning changing much. Popular people will use their personal networks; voters will take notice of candidates' service to the community; new members will be signed up; infrequent posters will be reminded to vote; successful candidates' posting frequency will increase in the lead-up to election time. That's the particular kind of campaign that's evolved on ENWorld and I think it meets our needs just fine.

But I also want to see more than one seat change hands from year to year -- both for selfish reasons, and to gauge how this affects the entire process.

Clearly most voters agree with you because that keeps happening every year.

There is every reason to expect that rookie judges wil perform admirably given their track record to date, and no reason to suspect that they will embarass or poorly represent EN World. Furthermore, this is the only circumstance that increases the likelihood that new/formerly involved publishers will submit their products IMO.

While it might encourage some publishers. Others might be put off the awards or find their legitimacy reduced if judges with a proven track record were systematically disqualified from serving. In my view, there is actually a pretty small pool of people with the credibility in our peculiar little community that the successful candidates have. While others might do a good job, I don't automatically assume that candidates getting 40 votes will be as good at their job as those getting 400. Sorry but I don't think that we voters are stupid; I actually think we elect people, in large part, on merit. I don't accept that we're just flailing around randomly selecting people; I think that, broadly, we have criteria for what we think will make someone a good judge and we apply them rationally.

This sort of "passive/unintentional campaigning" is, of course, the source of the dependance upon postcount.

What evidence do you have of this? What about voters who vote mainly based on product reviews? What about voters because they are associated with the candidate in real life? Also, I don't see a direct correlation between posts per month and votes. I see that Crothian has a lot of reviews, a lot of posts and a lot of votes. I also see candidates every year who have a higher posting rate than the winners but score significantly fewer votes. I think a lot depends on other contributions and a lot depends on post quality.

But I'm certainly not saying posting practices should not matter. The more actively engaged you are in a community, the more likely said community is to elect you as its representative. How have we come to seeing this as a defect of the system.

People who become judges work hard to keep their jobs. Sometimes, they moderate forums, answer rules questions or give advice on days they're not in the mood to do so because they have situated themselves as community leaders. Basically, you guys are complaining that it's unfair that people who contribute less to the community get fewer votes than those who contribute more. Make posts. Write reviews. This will cause you to earn the support of your community.

I believe strongly in candidates earning their votes through service and respectful engagement with their community. What I hear in this thread is a lament from people who don't want to invest the time, consideration and impulse control necessary to earn their community's trust and respect.

It is an unfortunate linkage, I think - there may be candidates who would be fine judges who are excluded because they don't think a year in advence that they have to post incessantly to get noticed enough to win an election.

Well, then, they'll know better next year, won't they? Why should people be able to walk in their first year they join and win an election with an unproven track record and limited relationship to their community. Why should elections in the gaming world not care about having a clear track record in one's community. How are voters supposed to learn from such a limited pool of data how closely a candidate's opinions on a wide range of gaming issues accord with their own? I don't buy that your suggestion of an essay-writing contest being an adequate substitute for a real track record.

And again - you guys keep harping on the greater assurance of election of competent judges. But you've not yet shown a single case where a new judge has been shown to be incompetent!

That's because it proves our point. It shows that when there is a non-incumbent who is perceived to be of the same quality as the incumbent judges, he wins. It disproves (a) your idea that the system doesn't let new blood in (b) your idea that the voters are not educating themselves and just voting based on name recognition (c) your continuing false assertion that we're pro-incumbent. We're pro-democracy. If this year's election swept out every incumbent, I'd still support ENWorlders having the unfettered right to select the candidate of their choice. What matters to me is the chance to vote for whom I choose.

You keep saying we need insurance, but you've not shown there's a high enough level of risk to require it.

I'm not talking about assurance. I'm talking about quality.

Let me offer an example: I am a teacher of a grade 9 class of gifted kids. The class is asked to elect from its number five students to represent it in a debating contest. They elect a team of five candidates whom they believe to be the best debaters in the class. But after the election, I disqualify four of them because they got to go on the debate field trip last year and it's not fair that they should enjoy that privilege. So, the kids elect four replacements.

Is the new debate team gifted? Yes. Can the new debate team debate? Yes. Is the new debate team as good as the first team the kids elected? Probably not. In a contest between the two teams, the one the kids voted for initially would probably win.

That's essentially what I'm saying about our judges. If you eliminated the incumbents, you would probably get good judges. Would they be as good? Probably not. Why should we compromise both democracy and quality so that a handful of people who can't earn the support they need to get elected fairly "get a turn?"

I fully trust the voters to elect a panel of competent judges. They have never failed to do so. If anything, I'm trusting them more than you and TB - I trust them to find good judges with fewer incumbents as a crutch

Umbran, that's just you moving the word "trust" around meaninglessly. You either trust their judgement enough to think they can pick the best panel unfettered by rules limiting their choices or you don't.

I'm apparently not making myself clear - this isn't about who does the better job of judging.

That must be the confusion. It is for me. I just want the best possible judges. I really don't care about the feelings of a handful of perennially defeated candidates.

I am instead trying to get people to consider that we might get better results in other areas,

Why don't you clearly enumerate these areas again?

This is not something that an uncoordinated voter base could be expected to handle on their own, especially when their non-presence is perhaps the most troubling issue.

You see, this sentence seems indicative of the level of respect for the voters your posts seem to indicate.

I think that there are other reasons other than a potential increase in voter turnout for making sure that we have at least once new judge every year. My main concern is publisher participation.

Okay. Let's suppose we need one new judge per year and this is a business requirement of the awards. First of all, we need to ask: has there been a year we haven't met this objective. If not, why are we proposing to change the system when it is already consistently delivering this outcome?

If not, then, in my view, we should interfere with voter choice to the minimum possible degree to deliver this objective.

One solution might be to move to a more proportional voting system; such systems allow small movements (let's say 10-20% in a 5-candidate pool) to band together and concentrate their votes around one candidate. That way, anti-incumbent activists could all but guarantee electing at least one of their number. CV and STV would be good for this; LV and SNTV might be improvements but much less effective.

Another solution, a small modification of our current system, would be to grant the top four judging positions to the four candidates winning the most votes and, if all of these are incumbents, awarding the fifth spot to the non-incumbent with the highest vote total, regardless of whether he placed 5th or 6th. This would constitute minimal interference with voter choice and would guarantee the presence of one non-incumbent every year. In my estimation, if we instituted such a rule, it probably wouldn't even be noticeable.

I suspect that opening up the voting to everyone and not just EN World members via a voting booth on the ENnies site might help- that way all gamers, not those who haunt ENW could feel more a part of the process.

I think this is worth considering and should perhaps be proposed in a separate thread. Alternately, you could go halfway and partner with the other gaming boards out there.

The increased tension of the secret ballot could also be an enticement.

I think you mean hidden results. Regardless of what else you do this year, this measure, at a minimum needs to be implemented to professionalize the ENNies' image.

I also want to figure out a mechanic by which at least one new judge would be selected every year. Perhaps this could be accomplished by having three categories:
1. Incumbents: 3 positions.
2. n00b: 1 position
3. Wild Car: 1 position: can be a n00b, can be someone with judge experience
BUT, this assumes that in the future that current voter trends will hold true.

I vehemently disagree with such a system. The idea of guaranteeing the incumbents' positions, even if they get fewer votes than new candidates strikes me as cliquey and anti-democratic. I would hope that incumbents who are re-elected earn re-election and don't just coast. Plus, I would hate to give the handful of people who have served such a permanent position of privilege. ENWorld doesn't need a Canadian Senate.

However, I suspect that part of what you are getting at there is the idea of guaranteeing stability in the event that you dramatically enlarge the pool of voters as you just proposed above. I think a better way to deal with this is to elect hald the panel each year to two-year terms. That way, the panel can retain a memory in the event of dramatic changes in voting.

BTW, I'm also interested to hear what you have to say about voting systems. If we've got a field of candidates of 15-25 peeps and we only want to choose five, how do we pull it off? Would the same system we have in place for the product selection work? If so, should we limit each person to how many judges they can choose (say, 7?), or does that mess with the system?

This is a big question and it's late. If you could think more carefully about your needs from a judging panel and write a follow-up post, I would appreciate it. I think the issue I most need you to wrap your head around is this: "Is it more important for the panel to reflect the consensus of the ENWorld community or to reflect the diversity of the community?" Alternatively, you can send me an e-mail privately and we can hash this over in more detail off the thread.

 

[Painfully]

I haven't voted for the ENnies judges last year or this year for pretty much one reason: I'm not interested in the same judges calling the shots every year. When the judges can post, "been there, done that" and get a pile of votes, that tells me things need to change. It is essentially what some of the judges did in years past. Meanwhile, many new candidates put together much better campaign speeches out there, and barely got votes.

For myself, I know that not having a cap on how many times a person can serve is reducing my interest in voting. When it all feels like a fix anyway, who cares? Two or three years of that can make a voter just shrug it off as meaningless.

I think what we need here are some polls asking if people would like to see more new judges. I'm willing to bet that most people are interested in seeing new judges.

How about all the candidates just qualify for judge status (i.e., 18 yrs of age, not a publisher, etc), and if they nominate themselves, they can get their name pulled out of a hat like a raffle. Fair? I think it's the only way to be fair to everyone from the repeat judges, to the newest candidates at the same time.

But, the final selection is very random, and that's something I'd feel a lot better about, rather than the popularity contest that keeps the same judges returning for what might be the rest of their lifetimes if the process doesn't change, or the judges don't lose interest.

 

[Conaill]

I haven't voted for the ENnies judges last year or this year for pretty much one reason: I'm not interested in the same judges calling the shots every year. When the judges can post, "been there, done that" and get a pile of votes, that tells me things need to change. It is essentially what some of the judges did in years past. Meanwhile, many new candidates put together much better campaign speeches out there, and barely got votes.

For myself, I know that not having a cap on how many times a person can serve is reducing my interest in voting. When it all feels like a fix anyway, who cares? Two or three years of that can make a voter just shrug it off as meaningless.

I think you are not the only one thinking like this. Personally, I *don't* - I think the Ennies judges overall have done a great job in the past, and have put a lot of effort and integrity into the process.

But REGARDLESS of whether or not this feeling is actually justified, the fact that some significant fraction of the public do feel that way is in my opinion sufficient reason to impose some sort of term limits. A similar problem comes up on the publishers side: if one of the frequent Ennies judges has ever spoken out against some small publisher, said publisher may feel tha the entire process is biased and not even bother submitting their latest product.

As Umbran already stated, the goal is *not* just to find the most qualified judges. The final goal is to have the best Ennies award process! Getting good judges is essential for that, but other factors must play a role as well. Things like the transparency of the process, assurances against unjustified fears that the whole thing may be run by some secret cabal, diversity of viewpoints represented, etc.

 

[Psion]

I haven't voted for the ENnies judges last year or this year for pretty much one reason: I'm not interested in the same judges calling the shots every year.

That doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. It seems if you don't want the same judges, you vote for other judges, not not vote at all.