Hi All,
I agree with what Thomas is saying below, with on clarification...
At 7:27 AM -0400 4/7/05, Thomas Narten wrote:
Personally, I'm more in favor of "votes" than just hums, the reason being that a count of hands is unambiguous data. In contrast, the results of a hum are more subject to interpretation, where one's perspective of the results of a hum may well depend on which side of the room one happens to be sitting. And if one reads from the WG minutes that "the hum said x", one really can't challenge what that means, becuase there is no agreed-upon data on which to draw conclusions from. In contrast, with a count of hands, it's much harder to argue that 100 to 20 "vote" is not strong support for a particular direction. Likewise, a "vote" of 5 to 2 says something pretty significant too, i.e., serious lack of participation.
I think that hand-raising or mailing list straw polling is a better technique to get data about the response to a particular question, because it is less ambiguous and less prone to vagaries of interpretation. Getting a somewhat accurate count of the opinions expressed in the room also makes it possible to follow RFC 2418 which says:
In the case where a consensus which has been reached during a face- to-face meeting is being verified on a mailing list the people who were in the meeting and expressed agreement must be taken into account. If there were 100 people in a meeting and only a few people on the mailing list disagree with the consensus of the meeting then the consensus should be seen as being verified.
I, personally, lack the ability to quantify a "hum" and compare it to the number of people who respond to a mailing list poll.
I do not think that the difference between a "straw poll" and "voting" lies in how you count the respondents, I think that the difference lies in what you do with the results.
Voting is used to _make_ the decision. In voting, there is a defined majority (more than half, more than two-thirds, etc.) that is needed to make a specific decision, and difficult decisions may be made by one vote. To be done fairly, voting also requires quorum and eligibility rules.
In the IETF, we use straw polls to get a sense of how many people in the room have an opinion on a particular topic, and whether there is a consensus of opinion among those people. IETF decisions are seldom black-and-white, sometimes there are a spectrum of choices available. After a poll, the chair may ask those who voted in the minority to state their reasons for doing so, in an attempt to find a compromise and/or place on the spectrum that will gain consensus.
This is quite different than making a decision by voting, regardless of how the straw poll is conducted (hand-raising, humming, web "voting" tools).
Margaret
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