7 days since the AGM still no election results

[Edwin]

In addition to only contacting 800 members, it would be good to know why there are so many members that fail to vote.

2772 members
527 votes

By my maths that's 4/5th of the members who didn't vote which for a special interest member based organisation is a very poor show.

You can only say that if it's a dramatic decline on previous non-exec elections. We have to be realistic - if the usual turnout is sub-20% then the current election is simply more of the same. I've not had a chance to dig out the figures.

Worth remembering too that only 15% of the country voted in the last local elections

 

[Edwin]

We are asking the Electoral Reform Society to go over Popularis's statement, voting system and results. We find most of the Popularis statement very strange indeed. Popularis say they have seen no evidence, strange as we wanted to show them evidence and they declined it. It's a classic Yes Minister answer, not good enough.

Not the first time they have come up with some convoluted phrasing. See this news article from 2006 for instance about, wait for it, controversy during a Nominet non-exec election...
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/10/02/nominet_board_election_results/

 

[PaulGregory]

Some anecdotal evidence from me:

They called my office. I didn't speak to them; I wasn't available, so they left a message with the person who answered. I don't know if that counted as "getting through to a member" or not. The numbers would suggest that it doesn't, also the fact that they called twice.

-

I have forgotten to vote in a few Nominet and building society elections. I have never deliberately not voted, I've just put it off and then when I've remembered it's too late.

I have never forgotten to vote in any 'real' local/general/European/Mayoral election/referendum, nor have I ever deliberately not voted. I have however, since switching to postal votes, often handed in my vote on election day. It helps that it's always a Thursday, and usually the first one in May. And also, if I were to forget, my wife would remind me. I'm not alone in voting at the last minute.

So an unmemorable deadline (and perhaps too much advance warning) is one reason people don't vote, and the second is that people around them aren't voting so they don't remember to do so.

A related issue is that if you're not entirely certain who to vote for, the temptation is to wait a while to come to a decision. Eventually one realises that it's AGM time, and by then it is probably too late and/or the login details may be in a different location.

 

[Retired_member41]

Not a good week for voting. Anyone know the tag MUGABE

 

[monaghan]

You can only say that if it's a dramatic decline on previous non-exec elections. We have to be realistic - if the usual turnout is sub-20% then the current election is simply more of the same. I've not had a chance to dig out the figures.

Worth remembering too that only 15% of the country voted in the last local elections

My comment was not whether this was an expected number of votes, it was surprise as why so few had voted, we are after all basically a large special interest group made up of geeks who have paid for membership and people in the business, so I'd have thought a higher turnout would have been in order.

 

[Sound]

If nominet pushes though the changes to drop catching this will have a big impact on its membership how many members will carry on if there are no names to catch.

This will make electing outsiders much more difficult in the future further strengthening Nominets hand.

 

[monaghan]

I think the numbers who only catch are probably small, yes there will be a dent, but not a huge one. Of course, the catching members do tend to be quite vocal, so it would probably please the board if these members did go away!

 

[foz]

If nominet pushes though the changes to drop catching this will have a big impact on its membership how many members will carry on if there are no names to catch.

This will make electing outsiders much more difficult in the future further strengthening Nominets hand.

Domains on lesser registrars and Tag-less domains will continue to drop. Plus if .uk happens, on release day the catching will be running hot. Plus catchers have portfolios to manage, that makes it logical to maintain a membership.

 

[Edwin]

I think it would be an interesting exercise to take a RANDOM sample of Nominet members (eg all the "B"s and all the "R"s) and try and draw up a list of what each member is so that we have a more representative idea of what the membership base consists of. It's ok to assign multiple categories eg "domain investor", "registrar" & "drop catcher" if applicable. Don't skip any of the target sample unless you really can't find ANY info out about them.

NOTE: happy to do this myself but won't be until middle of next week at the earliest.

 

[Stephen]

what would be the tipping point?

As been said "one member" one vote may not be fair but not many outside the top 20 registrars probably think the current block vote is similar.

If assume that under one member one vote, Lucien and Graeme would have we won and we know they did not under the current system, what would the change be required to how many votes per member cap would be required to change the result?

I wonder if Nominet or the polling company would ever release that information in the name of transparency?

 

[GreyWing]

Popularis won't give us the results regarding one member one vote. Our prediction is that we got around 83%+ of the vote between myself and Lucien on a one member one vote basis.

We also predict that one and one member one vote, Fritchie would be down the job centre campaigning against the bedroom tax

 

[monaghan]

We also predict that one and one member one vote, Fritchie would be down the job centre campaigning against the bedroom tax

That would be a shame