@YannisRizos Don't base your opinion on people from their rep. I was a total SE noob for the longest time, even though I had a few thousand rep. It's all just a fun game to me :) I don't even think I noticed the list of stuff you get from rep until it told me I had access to moderator tools, and even then I only looked because I didn't want to break anything
user20683
2:33 AM
@Rachel I think if you've a specific question for a nominee, ask it in the election comments. More general questions go in meta I think.
user20683
@YannisRizos now that I look at it, that is a tad on the CW answer
Only noticed cause I'm a nerd with nothing better to do than browse election candidates on a Friday night and saw some replies to him using @ZaphodBeebleBrox. I guess I should get off and actually do something with my evening.... like play video games :)
user20683
@Rachel I should sleep, I've work in the morning, alas insomnia
@Rachel Oh, it's not about opinion... I fished that post from the review page, and I was just curious... I guess if I really wanted to know I'd left OP a comment... I was just making chat small talk :P
@Ubermensch During the election phase you can vote for up to three candidates, in order of preference. There are some minimum requirements for candidates, 300 rep and to be in "good standing" which mostly translates in that they shouldn't have a history of abusing the system (spam / offensive posts, etc)...
On the trilogy sites, there are some badge requirements as well, but we aren't yet big enough and badge requirements would be too restrictive here. For example only two users would be eligible if the badge requirements for SO were applied on Programmers...
@Ubermensch The minimum requirements are at the sidebar of the election page. For the badge requirements you'll have to visit the election pages for each site...
@Ubermensch All requirements are set by Stack Exchange, at their own discretion... And will change over time as the site grows...
@Ubermensch A while after the election, all election data will be available... You can find collected statistics on completed elections here, and there are also some interesting statistics on current elections too.
@Ubermensch You can also download the election statistics for completed elections and use OpenSTV to look through them. And elections are held when Stack Exchange feels there is need for additional moderators, or a moderator steps down. In our case, Anna becoming a Community Manager is what triggered the election...
@Ubermensch And moderators serve for life :) Unless they step down voluntarily or are asked to by Stack Exchange Inc...
In the Stack Exchange Podcast #06 (at the end) they talk about the role of a new SE "community evangelism team". Is this what a "community manager" does?
Adding to what Thomas said, if you are certain that you can't make it (as it's late at night for us Europeans), you can always post your questions as comments on our nomination stumps during the nomination phase, or even ask Meta questions (make sure you use the election tag)
The election page sidebar states that Stack Exchange elections use the Meek STV vote-counting method:
After 4 days, the final voting results will be freely downloadable from this page forever, and we will calculate the 3 winners using OpenSTV with the Meek STV method.
How does it work? I su...
@YannisRizos Have you gone through the election model. Political science is one of my key areas of interest. So I would be asking more question. Hope you aren't too bothered
@Ubermensch I found out Meek STV was the algorithm used on Stack Overflow elections, last November when the latest election took place. I did some minimal research on the model, out of pure curiosity, as a voter. I have no idea if the other candidates knew about it, but I'm pretty sure every candidate did some research on the model before posting their nominations.
@Ubermensch Well I'm only active on Code Review, and the site is still in beta so it's too early to tell. I've had some minimal interaction with SO mods on Meta Stack Overflow, and I'm pretty satisfied from their work (from a voter's perspective).
The single transferable vote (STV) is a voting system based on proportional representation and preferential voting. Under STV, an elector's vote is initially allocated to his or her most-preferred candidate. After candidates have been either elected (winners) by reaching quota or eliminated (losers), surplus votes are transferred from winners to remaining candidates (hopefuls) according to the surplus ballots' ordered preferences.
The system minimizes "wasted" votes, provides approximately proportional representation, and enables votes to be explicitly cast for individual candidates rath...
@Ubermensch As for our current moderators on Programmers, you should read my answer on a related Meta question.
@YannisRizos It would take me a couple of days to get used to it.
@YannisRizos You provided me a link to download SO election results. Is it downloaded from stackoverflow.com/election. I can't find a download link there
@Ubermensch Click on one of the two elections, and look for the "Download the election data" link. The data are per election, so they are linked to from each election page.
@ChrisF : Will do. wasn't sure it was as effective, and didn't had any comment about that so far. And honestly was going after the marshall badge (29 flags left) too =)
@YannisRizos I believe 10 haven't voted for anybody. They might have thought that all were imbecile
@YannisRizos That's why the message "Ballot file contains 4994 non-empty ballots." I amn't using OpenSTV. The download is just a text file and I working on a spreadsheet. Want some more stats
@Ubermensch But the election page says 5004 voted, I don't think it's that. One guess would be that 10 people did actually vote, but during the election phase they either deleted their accounts or were put in temporary suspension for abusing the system, so although they did vote, their ballots where nullified (automatically).
Anyways I have to go now, be back tomorrow for more :) bye, always nice chatting with you
@YannisRizos Yes you are right. That would have been the case. But vote is still a vote and it is considered at the time of voting
@YannisRizos Great chat Yannis. would be available on Monday. Ping me back with a message to have stats about Anna Lear if you are interested (I amn't sure whether I am fully right, must check with SO guys still it would be worth watching)
@YannisRizos Also thanks for intriguing me into this concept
@YannisRizos Anna Lear got the most number of votes, 1806 in the Stack Overflow Moderator elections
@AnnaLear Hi . Going by the ballot data for SO Moderator elections, I deduced that 1806 voted for you with 756 voters selecting you as a first choice. Is my deduction right? Kindly reply so that I could understand the voting system better
@YannisRizos This is what I have made. Would come back on Monday
@Ubermensch I think so, but I've never really looked into the specific details of the voting process.
3 hours later…
user2334
7:53 PM
@Ubermensch 771 people voted for Anna as their first choice: you can see it in Open STV in group 1. After round two, the lowest scoring candidate (ircmaxwell) was eliminated, and 25 people who had him as their first choice had Anna as their second choice, which brought her total up to 796. Round 3, Jeremy Banks eliminated, 26 had Anna as their next choice
user2334
Round 4, 35 transferred from Stu Thompson; round 5, 34 transferred from George Stocker; round 6, 43 transferred from adwoodland; round 7, 94 transferred from Brad Larson, which put Anna over the threshold
user2334
At Round 7, Anna had 1028 votes; it peaked in round 8 with 1149 votes, then was refactored down to 903 in round 9 (the threshold at that time being 882) by transferring surplus votes to the other candidates
user2334
In Round 10, when the election completed, she had 887 votes after surplus votes were transferred, with 876 being the threshold