[members-discuss] Analysis of Voting Registrations at the GM

Hi!

Thanks for nice article and analysis.

Few comments:

>8.5% might sound low, and in fact, that number is only a little below
average for a May GM.

Actually, it always has the lowest turnout among RIRs (except for the
last voting at LACNIC), and IMHO this is something that has to be
fixed. And I believe some of the reasons are trivial, and it is not
lack of your community efforts, but more fundamental reasons.

>Throughout, we'll refer to the members that registered to vote in the
May 2024 GM as members that voted and the rest as members that didn’t
vote. In fact, of the members who registered to vote, only 84% went on
to cast their votes.
I would like to ask a separate question - why is registration
necessary? Based on what I see in other RIRs (no registration) and
voting history, registration was required when voting took place on-
site. This was because, due to the number of registered people, it was
necessary to rent a venue, etc. 
In my opinion, it is high time to cancel it and recover the missing 16%
of the votes.

Additionally, I would like to note that other RIRs conduct voting over
a week, rather than within 24 hours. It's not clear why RIPE NCC limit
people to 24 hours (again, on-site voting legacy?). In my experience,
its not enough.
Also, subjectively, voting in other RIRs is made much easier; there are
short instructions right in the voting interface. The fact that the
voting process in RIPE requires much longer instructions only indicates
that it is overcomplicated.

So my proposals are quite obvious:
1)Cancel registration
2)Extend voting duration to 1 week
3)Voting should be more intuitive

P.S.
Not exactly related to the article, but I would like to speak
separately about IRV.

As mentioned at RIPE-176, the initial version of the RIPE NCC bylaws
used a simple majority voting system, where the number of votes
depended on the size of the membership. This is similar to the systems
used by ARIN and APNIC. The voting system was changed to IRV at the
October 2009 General Meeting in RIPE-487, with the following
explanation from the meeting minutes:
> 
> Jochem explained that changes to the Articles of Association would be
> needed to support e-voting and also that this was a good time to
> introduce any housekeeping changes that were necessary.

It is interesting to highlight that the voting system was changed to
support e-voting, but it is not clear why IRV was chosen or if there
was any public discussion or consultation about the voting system. In
my personal opinion, under the pretext of e-voting, the system was
changed to IRV, which is HUGE change, to more complex and less
transparent to the average voter and introduces unfairness into the
system.
I also want to note that other RIRs did not need to change their voting
systems when switching to online voting.

Moreover, RIPE uses an IRV configuration that allows 'centrists' to
gain 'amplified voices' and leaves little chance even for moderate
reformers.
While IRV voting may initially foster political stability and moderate
policies, it ultimately risks stifling innovation and reform,
potentially leading to long-term stagnation and a failure to address
emerging challenges.

As good example, in GM 2003 Fahad AlShirawi had change to win seat by
simple majority, but no chances in IRV.
I've done my own analysis, but it's not polished enough to publish.
However, it's not difficult to perform this calculation.

On Thu, 2024-07-04 at 16:56 +0200, Fergal Cunningham wrote:
> Dear all,
> 
> We just published a RIPE Labs article that takes a closer look at the
> voter registration data from the recent May General Meeting:
> https://labs.ripe.net/author/ilke-ilhan/voting-analysis-gm-may-2024-a-first-look-at-voter-make-up/
> 
> If you have thoughts on the article, or suggestions on other aspects
> you'd like to see covered in future analyses, we'd love to hear them.
> 
> Best regards,
> 
> Fergal Cunningham
> Head of Membership Engagement
> RIPE NCC
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