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</style></head><body><div>Hi!</div><div><br></div><div>Thanks for nice article and analysis.</div><div><br></div><div>Few comments:</div><div><br></div><div>>8.5% might sound low, and in fact, that number is only a little below average for a May GM.</div><div><br></div><div></div><div></div><div><div>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.<br><br></div></div><div>>Throughout, we'll refer to the members that registered to vote in the May 2024 GM as <i>members that voted</i> and the rest as <i>members that didn’t vote</i>. In fact, of the members who registered to vote, only 84% went on to cast their votes.</div><div></div><div>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. </div><div>In my opinion, it is high time to cancel it and recover the missing 16% of the votes.</div><div><br></div><div><div>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.</div></div><div><div>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.</div></div><div><br></div><div>So my proposals are quite obvious:<br>1)Cancel registration</div><div>2)Extend voting duration to 1 week</div><div>3)Voting should be more intuitive</div><div><br></div><div>P.S.</div><div></div><div><div>Not exactly related to the article, but I would like to speak separately about IRV.</div></div><div><br></div><div>As mentioned at <a href="https://www.ripe.net/publications/docs/ripe-176/" rel="nofollow">RIPE-176</a>,
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 <a href="https://www.ripe.net/membership/meetings/gm/meetings/october-2009/general-meeting-minutes/" rel="nofollow">RIPE-487</a>, with the following explanation from the meeting minutes:</div>
<blockquote style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div><i>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.</i></div>
</blockquote>
<div>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.<br><div>I also want to note that other RIRs did not need to change their voting systems when switching to online voting.</div></div>
<div><br></div><div><div>Moreover, RIPE uses an IRV configuration that allows 'centrists' to gain 'amplified voices' and leaves little chance even for moderate reformers.<br><div>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.</div><br></div></div><div>As good example, in GM 2003 Fahad AlShirawi had change to win seat by simple majority, but no chances in IRV.<br><div>I've done my own analysis, but it's not polished enough to publish. However, it's not difficult to perform this calculation.</div></div><div><strong></strong></div><div><br></div><div>On Thu, 2024-07-04 at 16:56 +0200, Fergal Cunningham wrote:</div><blockquote type="cite" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex; border-left:2px #729fcf solid;padding-left:1ex"><div dir="ltr">Dear all,<br><br>We just published a RIPE Labs article that takes a closer look at the voter registration data from the recent May General Meeting:<br><a href="https://labs.ripe.net/author/ilke-ilhan/voting-analysis-gm-may-2024-a-first-look-at-voter-make-up/">https://labs.ripe.net/author/ilke-ilhan/voting-analysis-gm-may-2024-a-first-look-at-voter-make-up/</a><br><br>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. <br><br>Best regards,<br><br>Fergal Cunningham<br>Head of Membership Engagement<br>RIPE NCC</div><div>_______________________________________________<br></div><div>members-discuss mailing list<br></div><div><a href="mailto:members-discuss@ripe.net">members-discuss@ripe.net</a><br></div><div><a href="https://mailman.ripe.net/">https://mailman.ripe.net/</a><br></div><div>Unsubscribe: <a href="https://lists.ripe.net/mailman/options/members-discuss/nuclearcat%40nuclearcat.com">https://lists.ripe.net/mailman/options/members-discuss/nuclearcat%40nuclearcat.com</a><br></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div><span></span></div></body></html>