Issue-Boundary

[Thomas von der Elbe]

Mike and I had an off-list conversation quite a while ago, but somehow
it dropped of,  because I couldn´t really find clarity and also
because it didn´t seem so important at that time.

Now, with the delegation-tree to play with, it got much clearer for
me. And I think it has some importance now too.

The question is: Do we really need an “Issue” under which we pool
certain drafts of texts (which then form the specific delegation-tree
for that Issue)?

To avoid misunderstanding: I´m not talking about headlines for drafts,
which would ideally be the same for all the drafts addressing the same
issue. I mean the category “issue" which technically separates one
delegation-tree from the other.
Is that really necessary?

Because soon there will be many thousands of those issues. What to do
then, if two issues were created, which actually are the same? Ask all
the voters to merge the issues?

Why not simply have one single list of all the drafts all the people
have drafted and additionally have a tool to sort it by different
criteria and to filter it.

And every user can give tags to every draft.

So one can easily filter out all the drafts which for example are
tagged with “Canada”, “Toronto”, “environment”, “green roofs”,
“Municipal Code Bylaw 583-2009” and “Chapter 492”. So one will find
Mike´s, Fred´s and Thomas´s “Greener Green Roofs”-drafts.  And
fictional Juanitas, Peter´s and Julia´s “Green Roof – Amendment”-
drafts etc.

Another point which I find very import: How will we otherwise realize
delegation across several issues?

For example: I want to delegate my vote concerning all environment-
related issues in Dresden to Peter.
I want him to do the work for me of finding those issues and drafts,
creating new ones, deciding on them and voting on them.

With the tags it seems easy, doesn´t it?

In all the drafts worldwide which are tagged "Germany", “Dresden” and
“environment” Peter is my delegate.

And then there can be a hierarchy of delegates.

For example in all the drafts tagged “taxes” and “Germany” Anita is my
delegate. But since Peter is first in the hierarchy the issues
concerning environmental taxes in Dresden are decided by him.

(But the hierarchy is not necessary. If they both delegate my vote to
the same end-candidate, it counts just as one. Otherwise two end-
candidates each have one vote from me.)

So one could vote on every draft that one likes, delegate one´s vote
to as many candidates as one likes.

Since at some point a filter-mechanism for issues would be needed
anyway, we could as well abandon the “issue”-boundary and filter the
drafts.


What do you say? Am I missing something?

PS: I summarize the former conversation between Mike and me and post
it below.