[MG] The laconic rule of thumb: scaling the wall of text

[Michael Allan]

> On Sun, 01 May 2011 1:02, Michael Allan wrote:
> > The laconic rule of thumb states:
> >
> >    Limit the consensus draft to 10 words per voter.
> >
> > So if the end-candidate's draft has a single voter, then it should
> > not exceed 10 words.  If 2 voters, then 20 words.  And so on.
> >
> > What do you think?

Alexander Praetorius wrote:
> No, I think this is a bad idea.
> If someone created a draft and has 1000 followers, but most of them are
> still unhappy with some details or maybe they think a general aspect is not
> taken into account yet... How can they create an alternative version of the
> draft when they are limited to so few words?

Just by saying it.  "We are unhappy with these particular details."
Or, "We think *this* general aspect ought to be taken into account."
If that's what people agree to, then why not say it?

> Let them use as many words as they want, in the end they have to convince
> other voters and maybe they will come up with a draft with only a few words,
> because they think few words is important to attract enough attention, or
> maybe they will find other ways, like using pictures or videos :) ...so
> maybe you could also give your vote for a draft that includes a video?

A rule of thumb is not enforced, however.  It is only an guideline for
those who find it useful.  Others are free to ignore it.

Thomas von der Elbe wrote:
> I think, this rule is good for a poll with high participation. But if 
> participation is low, why shouldnt 4 people draft a solution together, 
> which has 100 words? Why should we wait for others until we really get 
> something done?
> 
> Ofc, I understand now, it is good, to first find out how participation 
> is going to be and not overwhelm the first participants with a wall of 
> text already. But at some point, longer waiting makes no sense, does it?

We might define the "wall shattering impact" of a consensus draft as
the number of votes divided by the number of words.  Recently I've
been wondering if something might be made of this hypothesis:

  The speed of growth of a consensus is proportional to the wall
  shattering impact of its draft.  Impact affects voter recruitment
  more than attrition, so the net rate of growth for high impact
  drafts generally exceeds that for low impact ones, mutatis mutandis.

I don't know if that's true, but it's interesting to consider.  One
mechanism that might contribute to it is illustrated by these 3
drafts:

     Let's build a sandbox     Let's build a sandbox
       and paint it red.         and paint it blue.

                  Let's build a sandbox
                      and paint it.

Call this "consensus by erasure".  Erasure here produces a draft that
is not only smaller than the others but also more general and
therefore potentially more accomodating to a larger consensus.  How
exactly that potential would be realized, I don't know.  It only seems
that if people actually do agree - as obviously they do here - then
there ought to be a draft to give that agreement expression and form.
If people don't vote for it, then something's wrong, especially as we
allow them to cascade their votes into consensus like this:

     Let's build a sandbox     Let's build a sandbox
       and paint it red.         and paint it blue.

                   \                /
                    \              /

                  Let's build a sandbox
                      and paint it.

We sometimes say "build consensus", but maybe consensus is not a thing
that can be built by piling material on material.  Maybe it's quite
the opposite - something that must literally be discovered by removing
material that overburdens and obscures it.  If agreement is the place
where our understandings and intentions overlap, then won't it always
be a smaller place than the one occupied by our disagreements?
Disagreement is so cheap and easy to manufacture that it can be piled
up to any height; wheras agreement is tightly constrained by reason
and rationality, and can never be forced or fabricated.

Thoughts like these lead me to suspect that smaller is better.

-- 
Michael Allan

Toronto, +1 416-699-9528
http://zelea.com/



Originally posted to the mailing list of the Metagovernment Project:
http://metagovernment.org/mailman/listinfo/start_metagovernment.org