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Excerpts from Edward Leafe's message of 2016-10-03 11:46:41 -0500:
> So the period of self-nominations for the Technical Committee seats has ended, and the voting has begun. I've been a very close observer of this process for several cycles, and I have some ideas I'd like to share. Full disclosure: I am a current candidate for the TC, and have been a candidate several times in the past, all of which were unsuccessful.
> 
> When deciding to run, candidates write a long, thoughtful essay on their reasons for wanting to serve on the TC, and those essays are typically the last you hear from them until the election. It has been rare for anyone to ask follow-up questions, or to challenge the candidates to explain their positions more definitively. I have spoken with many people at the Summits, which always closely followed the TC election (warning: unscientific samples ahead!), and what their selection process mostly boils down to is: they pick the names they are most familiar with. Many people don't read those long candidacy posts, and nearly all couldn't remember a single point that any of the candidates had put forth.
> 
> We are fortunate in that all of the candidates are exceptionally well-qualified, and those elected have put in excellent service while on the TC. But one thing I'm afraid of is that we tend to get into a situation where groupthink [0] is very likely. There are many excellent candidates running in every election, but it is rare for someone who hasn't been a PTL of a large project, and thus very visible, has been selected. Is this really the best approach?
> 

I think you're right, that groupthink is very likely. In so much as, I am
more likely to select people from my own closer peer group who thinks like
me, because I agree with their general way of working and thinking, and
thus, the TC will end up thinking like the largest, most moderate group
of people in OpenStack.

> I wrote a blog post about implicit bias [1], and in that post used the example of blind auditions for musical orchestras radically changing the selection results. Before the introduction of blind auditions, men overwhelmingly comprised orchestras, but once the people judging the auditions had no clue as to whether the musician was male or female, women began to be selected much more in proportion to their numbers in the audition pools. So I'd like to propose something for the next election: have candidates self-nominate as in the past, but instead of writing a big candidacy letter, just state their interest in serving. After the nominations close, the election officials will assign each candidate a non-identifying label, such as a random number, and those officials will be the only ones who know which candidate is associated with which number. The nomination period can be much, much shorter, and then followed by a week of campaigning (the part that's really missing in the cur
>  rent process). Candidates will post their thoughts and positions, and respond to questions from people, and this is how the voters will know who best represents what they want to see in their TC.
> 
> The current candidacy essay would now be posted in the campaign period, rather than at the time of nomination, and should exclude the sort of biographical information that is currently the most important piece for many people. Keeping anonymity will be difficult, and will preclude the use of email for posting positions and responses, since email identifies the sender. So perhaps candidates could forward their posts to the election officials, who will post them for the candidates, identifying them by number only. The voting form will only list the candidate numbers, so the end result will be people casting votes for the candidates whose platform most matches what they want to see in the TC, and who have best answered any questions raised by others.
> 

Character is a massive factor in choosing representatives. The position
essay is just a small reflection to introduce one self to those who
do not know them. But really, I'm going to weigh Josh Harlow's value
as a TC member against Jeremy Stanley's value as a TC member based on
the various conversations we've had at summits, on the ML, and on IRC,
far more heavily than I can using a quick position essay.

Of course, I read the essays of those who I don't know more carefully, and
I often go searching through my ML archives to see if we've interacted on
threads in the past. Still, I'm very unlikely to rank somebody higher than
a personal acquaintance unless I don't have many personal acquaintances
that I agree with that are nominated.

So I get where you're going, but I don't think that can be "the
election". In addition to not allowing me to judge peoples' character,
it also introduces a _massive_ fraud incentive. If you are a candidate,
and you write a paper that is equal to all others, you can gain votes just
by secretly telling your friends which one is yours, and their implicit
bias will 1) make many think this is morally ok, because they know you're
a good candidate, and 2) make them more likely to vote for you.

So, while I don't like that it's a popularity contest, that is the very
nature of democracy, and as far as I know, nobody has come up with a
better system of representative government.

One way to counter the problems associated with the popularity contest
is to have some appointed members. We can admonish the TC to appoint a
nominee who did not win the most votes, but who is more likely to break
a groupthink cycle. This would only work if people paid attention to TC
voting records, which AFAIK, nobody really does.