[EC-NCSG] Concerns about the voting process

[Milton L Mueller]

Marie-Laure
I had many of the same concerns. I voted immediately and yet continued to receive multiple courtesy reminders.
Can we talk to ICANN about this and ensure that the system prevented duplicate voting?

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From: ec-ncsg-bounces at ipjustice.org [ec-ncsg-bounces at ipjustice.org] on behalf of marie-laure Lemineur [mllemineur at gmail.com]
Sent: Saturday, October 12, 2013 1:05 PM
To: Robin Gross; Excom NPOC; gnso.secretariat at gnso.icann.org; Glen de Saint G?ry; ec-ncsg at ipjustice.org
Subject: [EC-NCSG] Concerns about the voting process

Dear Robin, GNSO Secretariat staff and NCSG colleagues,

I am writing this email to express our concerns about the voting process since as NPOC Executive Committee, we have noticed "behaviours" of the system that might provoke a certain level of confusion in some NCSG voting members. Our concern is that  as a result, this might deter some members from voting, which of course would be counterproductive. The specific features that we have identified as problematic are the following:

1/ As most of us are aware of, in some cases it has been necessary to resend several times the ballots and we finally received it. Our  understanding, based on the explanations we have already received,  is that this happens sometimes with this voting system. Nevertheless, we came to the conclusion that this is not at all convenient and that we should find a way to overcome this problem since this may cause not only some voting members  -who are absorbed attending their regular activity, or who simply neglect to oversee these kinds of details- to miss the fact that they have not received the ballot, but also, it may discourage them from actively taking the  time to look for the ballot in the spam folder and, if needed,  take the time to email you and/or the GNSO secretariat to request the resending of the ballot.
Even if it is impossible to measure the impact that this technical problem could have on the voters? behaviours,  in our opinion, a "friendly-user" voting system should not impose such a burden on any voters and as such should avoid have some of us going through all these steps since it encompasses the risk that we might end loosing votes.

2/ When the voting members receive the "courtesy email" as indicated below in the snapshot -the reminder that if we have not voted yet, we should do it- the email  includes an active link to vote again is needed. If for example, in my case, I had already voted and I receive this reminder email, I was wondering what would prevent me, the receiver, from abusing the system, click once again and vote again?
And let?s assume it is possible to do it and I did it, the other question than would be,  does the system realise that I am trying to abuse it since I would be voting twice when my organisation has the right to vote only one time for being  a small organisation ?
Another similar example would be the case of Rudi Vansnick who is the representative of ISOC Belgium, which qualifies as a large organisation (two votes) and who is also an individual member of NCUC (one vote). This means that he has received 3 ballots in total and 6 courtesy emails (since it looks like we each receive double courtesy emails as indicated in item number 3 that follows). Therefore, if he had wanted to abuse the system, it looks like he could have voted nine times instead of three times.  Could someone please clarify if our understanding is correct or not? Or is the system able to detect these kind of abuses as we  would hope so ? Since of course, we have not tried to abuse the system, we are unable to answer this question.
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[Inline image 1]
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3/ As illustrated in the above snapshot, all emails received (whether the actual ballot or the courtesy email) mention the following sentence at bottom of the email "The URL below will take you directly to your individual ballot". Once again, this can lead to confusion since in the NCSG we have  two categories of voters: individual members and organisational members. A voter who has a dual condition as an individual member and a representative of an organisation, while reading this sentence, might wonder if the received ballot corresponds to his vote as an "individual member". And than he realises that all emails mentioned this sentence.
Another issues is that, this particular voter, has no way of differentiating the organisational ballot from the individual ballot since, if we are not mistaken, the text of the ballot is the same for all ballots and as a consequence does not allow to distinguish one category of vote from the other.

4/ The other feature that is really confusing,  is that as illustrated in the snapshot below and above  in the courtesy email, where it reads "voter: EMAIL ADDRESS...." there is a number indicated. In my case, I received two courtesy emails and one indicated number 1 and the end of my email address and the other number 2. Is this number, the actual number of courtesy email sends in sequence ?  In the case of a voting member who is individual and an large organizational  representative, like in the case of Rudi Vansnick, this is also confusing since he received a double courtesy email for each ballot i.e. he has received 6 courtesy emails each with either 1 or 2 indicated.
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SAMPLE # 2

[Inline image 2]
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5/ Finally, we were wondering if  we are sure that each organisational members voter has a clear idea that he/she is identified either as a large or as a small organisation in other words,   are we certain that each member is aware that if labelled as a large organisation they will have the right to vote twice -and as a consequence should expect to receive two ballots- and if labelled as a small organisation they will be able to vote one time -and should expect to receive on ballot-

Most importantly, we should not forget that many voting members are newcomers to NCSG which means that this is the first time they go through this election process. If those of us who have some experience with the tally system are puzzled by the mentioned features, it is highly possible that some new NCSG members got  even more confused. And we would want to avoid this and its possible negative impact.

In conclusion, in light of all the concerns raised and the questions asked, we would greatly appreciate if on one hand, a clarifying email   was send to all NCSG voting members since the voting period closes next Monday 14 October at 24 UTC and if on the other hand, a meeting was scheduled in Buenos Aires with the parties involved - pertinent NCSG-EC members and  ICANN GNSO staff- so that we discuss possible ways to improve the system for future elections.

Best regards,

Marie-laure



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