2016 Worldbuilding Moderator Election

bilbo_pingouin

06:11

@HDE226868 not sure you'll win your 20 candidates bet :)

bilbo_pingouin

07:04

Somehow in the last days, I couldn't go to the site: elections.stackexchange.com/#worldbuilding.stackexchange is it just me?

bilbo_pingouin

08:16

@MonicaCellio, thanks for the note on the election page :-)

Tim B

10:23

@bilbo_pingouin Err connection refused

bilbo_pingouin

10:36

So if even a mod can't get there... ^^"

Tim B

13:26

I've asked about it on the mod channel

Tim B

14:58

elections.stackexchange.com/#worldbuilding.stackexchange

Try that link (http not https)

bilbo_pingouin

Thanks. Indeed. One of the problem of having https-everywhere plugin...

Tim B

17:48

18 candidates now...last minute entry

Tim B

18:29

had to dumb it down?

1 hour left for any more to get in :)

oh, is the length limit that tight?

Monica Cellio

1200 characters, as I recall.

Tim B

I guess they don't want it too long since they need to display a lot of candidates

Monica Cellio

I bumped into it too and had to tighten up some of my prose.

I also learned that you can't include images.

Tim B

I kept mine short and snappy because we all know what the attention span of the interweb is :D (although worldbuilding readership are probably above average on that)

Monica Cellio

Yeah, for the internet at large I'd keep it to 3-4 bullet points of sentence fragments. But here on WB, people do read longer posts. Still, if something is too long people punt, so you still need to think about the best way to present information.

There's a quote -- I don't know from where -- that circulates in the tech-writing world (or at least the part of it that I've encountered): "I'm sorry this is so long; I didn't have time to make it shorter". This is a real thing, and there are managers out there who want to measure productivity by page-count who don't understand.

Tim B

18:35

yeah, me too. I know from experience that a lot of people don't though

Monica Cellio

Some voters will read everything (including the meta questionnaire and these chat logs). Some will read the blurbs. Some will read the first couple lines of the blurb and look at the candidate score. Some will vote for names they recognize. All of those votes count the same.

Monica Cellio

18:48

Chat is heavily cached; you might not see the change here for a while. Reloading the page sometimes fixes it.

Tim B

19:00

bah, I hit refresh thinking it might be now and it said 59 minutes

the hourly countdown tricked me

it does say a time 1 hour from now though for "election started" so it makes sense I guess

Monica Cellio

Yeah, if you mouse over the fuzzy time values you'll get the actual time.

19 candidates. Wow.

bilbo_pingouin

19:39

one more and HDE was right!

DaaaahWhoosh

one more and we all have a 20% chance of winning!

bilbo_pingouin

well... if we assume we all have the same chance, yes

DaaaahWhoosh

@bilbo_pingouin what are you trying to say?!

bilbo_pingouin

@DaaaahWhoosh I think.... that some have a little bit more chance to be elected than others... not sure though... :)

James

...some people just do not appreciate humor.

Tim B

19:58

one more and all candidates have a 20% chance...rounding to 20%

ArtOfCode

Primary's open, worldbuilders.

James

Wooo

bowlturner

Aren't there supposed to be questions we're supposed to answer?

DaaaahWhoosh

0

Q: 2016 Moderator Election Q&A - Questionnaire

In connection with the moderator elections, we are holding a Q&A thread for the candidates. Questions collected from an earlier thread have been compiled into this one, which shall now serve as the space for the candidates to provide their answers. Not every question was compiled - but there was ...

James

@bowlturner I was wondering that myself...

oh...its apparently up now

ArtOfCode

20:04

It's not automated, the team have to do that manually.

bilbo_pingouin

20:17

I have to say the votes difference in just 15 minutes is already quite impressive... we have already 3 with a step ahead..

ArtOfCode

@bilbo_pingouin Most of the primary votes come in within the first 24 hours.

Q&A answers posted.

Tim B

@ArtOfCode Thanks for the edit, proof reading mine got interrupted by reading yours :D

ArtOfCode

@TimB Heh, nice one :)

Tim B

20:33

Just fixed another mistake as well, (typed question instead of answer) need to go over this a few times I think

Your Q&A is excellent @ArtOfCode - anyone would think you've done this before :p

ArtOfCode

@RileySantos The Q&A is a chance for candidates to explain their philosophies and the community to get to know them.

@TimB No, I just spent far longer than I should have done on them :)

@RileySantos Bear in mind that negative scores aren't shown to avoid the pile-on effect - some people may be in the negatives but you just can't see it because of that.

Tim B

Ahh, that explains why I don't see a -5 for anyone!

ArtOfCode

@RileySantos Yeah, that's a super-secret hidden feature in mod elections to prevent you voting for yourself :)

(yes, I am joking)

@RileySantos It's not compulsory, but there is a high correlation between successful candidates and those who write Q&A answers.

It also doesn't have to be long - look at DaaaahWhoosh's answers.

Serban Tanasa

HDE and Monica are killing it. that's good.

DaaaahWhoosh

@ArtOfCode I'm trying to get the Millennial vote

ArtOfCode

20:40

@SerbanTanasa And Tim, I think. Those three would make an excellent mod team.

Serban Tanasa

wait, how does the Primary work again?

ArtOfCode

@RileySantos He's a stickler for science :)

Serban Tanasa

top 8?

Tim B

up or down vote as many people as you like

the top 10 by votes go through to the election

bilbo_pingouin

@ArtOfCode I would say you're not the only one feeling that way

ArtOfCode

20:41

@SerbanTanasa Votes to determine who goes through to the election

Serban Tanasa

@TimB 's reelection I kinda take for granted

Tim B

@RileySantos while you're keen now you've only been active on the site a couple of months, that's not long enough to prove you can stick with it for a year or longer that's expected of a moderator. It's also not long enough for you to have learnt how the site works or even access the tools that are available to regular users without even adding the moderator ones on top

Serban Tanasa

This is fun to watch, democracy in action

Tim B

So in all honesty I can't vote for you - although I'm not downvoting either :)

ArtOfCode

Good :)

Tim B

20:44

you can ask for the accounts to be merged

I'll give you the same advice I gave to a couple of the other candidates with low Candidate Scores...don't be disappointed by the results this time around - look on it as a learning experience and the problems you face now can be gone by the time of the next election

2

if you get the rep, get into the queues, get active with flagging and reviewing, etc

James

#6 is hard...

DaaaahWhoosh

@RileySantos The answers usually show more effort than the questions, it hurts but it matches how questions are only worth half the rep

bilbo_pingouin

@RileySantos question can be really bad, and the answer really good. It happens.

ArtOfCode

@James A number of those were pretty difficult to get a good answer to. I erased and rewrote a few answers several times...

Tim B

yeah, quite a few of the questions are tricky ones...including ones I asked...I didn't think that through

@RileySantos If it makes you feel better...one of my questions an answer has 132 more upvotes than my question does...

that's not how SE works. Questions are cheap, answers are valuable. It's even a design premise of the site

Serban Tanasa

20:53

@RileySantos, the couple of years in is hilarious, since WB has only existed for 1.4 years

ArtOfCode

@RileySantos There will always be questions. Good answers are harder to come by.

bowlturner

Finally got my answers in.

DaaaahWhoosh

@RileySantos People can be good despite having bad parents, but that doesn't mean you should praise their parents for their bad parenting

Serban Tanasa

@TimB, can we know how many users voted?

DaaaahWhoosh

@RileySantos Some of the best answers I've seen have redeemed the question, saved it from closure even

Serban Tanasa

20:56

The constituent badge is only for the final phase, right?

bowlturner

@SerbanTanasa yep

Well as of right now, there are 3 in the far lead and 3 of us battling for 4th place... It should be interesting to see how the election goes.

Serban Tanasa

@bowlturner Yeah, as I said earlier on this chat, I think HDE, Monica and TimB are sure bets. I saw myself as perhaps competing for the 4th place.

although @ArtOfCode has been very active too, so I would not mind either of us being the 4th moderator.

ArtOfCode

@SerbanTanasa Cheers :)

bowlturner

@SerbanTanasa well when I looked you me and @artofcode were all tied at 22.

Tim B

Is there any way to see a summary of the current votes without all the text?

bowlturner

21:02

I'm happy to say, I feel good about everyone ahead of me and those tied with me

Serban Tanasa

yeah, this is kinda fun

bilbo_pingouin

finally done with the questionnaire. You guys are fast.

Serban Tanasa

10

ArtOfCode

@RileySantos 4.

Tim B

lol

ArtOfCode

21:02

10 in the election, 4 seats.

bilbo_pingouin

10 places to real election round, 4 mods spots

Tim B

19 candidates, 10 go from primary into election

election is to select top 4

I see 5 on zero

bilbo_pingouin

but as far as I can see most have votes...

just more negative ones...

Serban Tanasa

is that how they look when they withdraw?

bowlturner

One person has 11 down 2 up

bilbo_pingouin

21:08

@RileySantos well you have to consider that many people already have an idea for whom they would vote...

James

@ArtOfCode Just finally finished...that took longer than I anticipated.

ArtOfCode

Ooooh, now I want to read them :)

James

@RileySantos ...so you have an issue with including a little humor then?

bilbo_pingouin

@ArtOfCode take a good seat and some pop-corn... :)

DaaaahWhoosh

@RileySantos I think the point was that nominations are just the last step in the process, people should vote based on activity on the site

ArtOfCode

21:18

OK, so high point of my moderation career? Moderating a Russian chat. I don't even speak Russian.

2

James

@RileySantos If you want to write your essay that is what the questionnaire is for. Feel free to read mine. And if I can't include humor...frankly...whats the point.

bilbo_pingouin

I'm surprised that Tim's questionnaire is the only one with an upvote... are we supposed to Up/Down votes those?

Tim B

we can upvote them yeah, I can't upvote my own though so not upvoting the others...well not until mine has some upvotes anyway :D

ArtOfCode

@bilbo_pingouin yeah

Tim B

@RileySantos People making jokes most likely know they have their reputation and history on the site to stand behind them

James

21:29

@TimB Yeah to be honest as much as I would like moderating, considering the competition I don't like my chances, and frankly thats fine because of those likely to get elected I can't pick one that would do a poor job.

Tim B

@bowlturner typo in your Q&A - "to to the brainstorming"

bowlturner

Thanks. If that's the only one, I'll be impressed with myself.

James

@TimB I told you he can't spell.

Tim B

lol

James

@bowlturner Zing.

Tim B

21:32

Now I want to ask a question about Cakes. Damn you @James , damn you!

James

@RileySantos I feel that is tangible useful information for potential voters.

...I may stop and get zingers on my way home from work.

Zingers

Zingers is an American snack cake produced and sold by Dolly Madison and Hostess, snack food brands owned by Hostess Brands and currently owned by private equity firms Apollo Global Management and Metropoulos & Co. == Product lineEdit == Zingers are similar to Twinkies and come in devil's food, vanilla, and raspberry flavors. Chocolate and vanilla Zingers have a thick layer of icing on top with cream (synthetic, not dairy) filling in the middle. Raspberry Zingers do not have icing on top but are instead covered in a mixture of shaved coconut and raspberry flavored syrup. == MarketingEdit == A...

Terrible and amazing

HDE 226868

@bilbo_pingouin Whoops. . . Looks like I owe you Trump Tower.

James

Man I should have included "free zingers for everyone" in my campaign ad.

HDE 226868

@RileySantos No offense taken if you vote against me.

@RileySantos "Quantum world takeover" - Nice name for a book!

@RileySantos Wait 'til I get to be a crotchety 70-year-old. Then things may change. :-)

Monica Cellio

I just dismissed a "too many answers" flag on the questionnaire post. :-)

Tim B

21:37

lol

Monica Cellio

(This is an auto-flag that's raised when a question gets 10 answers. It doesn't really mean too many; that's for a human to judge. But that's what SE calls it.)

bilbo_pingouin

@HDE226868 yeah you do. I expect delivery by the end of the election :)

Tim B

hi 5 Monica o/5\o

Monica Cellio

I declined the flag with "flags should only be used to make moderators aware of things that require their action". :-)

HDE 226868

@James Hey, that can help me get my BMI up!

James

21:38

@MonicaCellio bahahaha

Monica Cellio

@TimB :-)

HDE 226868

Okay, just voted. That was fun.

Tim B

We are both on 55 votes @MonicaCellio

James

@RileySantos I feel your pain. That happened to me when we had the protem mod votes back early in beta.

Monica Cellio

@TimB blink (goes to refresh page)

James

21:40

I quietly exited the contest with my tail between my legs.

Monica Cellio

I guess a lot of people jumped in as soon as they got the notice. Or, you know, the die-hards who were sitting in this room counting down. :-)

HDE 226868

Okay. Now that I've finished reading ~90% of the madness of the past 100 minutes, can I just say that y'all talk a lot?

James

@HDE226868 If you knew me in person you would realize it could be so much worse.

Monica Cellio

@James there is no shame in having tried. And we're not even two hours in, so I wouldn't draw too many conclusions just yet.

HDE 226868

@RileySantos Been there, considered that, pointed it out to both answers.

James

21:41

@MonicaCellio It sure felt like shame but it was late in the day, maybe I was just drunk.

bilbo_pingouin

@HDE226868 try to catch up on the main chat since 15:00 UTC today... ;)

Monica Cellio

Nine candidates are not going to make it to the final round of voting. That doesn't mean there's shame in being one of the nine.

HDE 226868

@bilbo_pingouin . . . .

James

@MonicaCellio See, this is why you will end up being a moderator again.

bowlturner

holy cow, my down votes doubled in the last 10 minutes.

HDE 226868

21:44

Really?

bowlturner

yep, I had 3 now 6.

James

@bowlturner always breaks my stuff. Usually with astute observation but still

bowlturner

they must have read my Q&A

@James but it's fun!

bilbo_pingouin

generally I wasn't expecting so many downvotes...

I mean people barely DV any question or answer on the site...

James

@bowlturner It most certainly is...

Tim B

21:48

I guess people feel they can "double up" on the people they really want by downvoting others

HDE 226868

@bilbo_pingouin I'm surprised at how many people got so many downvotes. I mean, I downvoted at least one user, but that/those user(s) is/are a/ user(s) I think would harm the site if s/he/they became a/ moderator(s).

bowlturner

@HDE226868 thanks for the vote of confidence! :P~~

;)

HDE 226868

@bowlturner Yeah, it was a positive vote!

James

I feel like I know the top ten well enough that I have no worries, if any combination of four from that group comes up we will be just fine on the moderator front.

bilbo_pingouin

@HDE226868 I think there are a few reasons... some users probably feel they had to up/downvote any candidate. Some have a contentious against a candidate. Some would appear harmful (but really not many of the candidates, IMO)...

Tim B

21:51

I've made no downvotes, made a bunch of upvotes, all is good :)

bowlturner

@James yes, I won't feel bad loosing to any in the top 10

HDE 226868

What I also don't understand is why there are so many people that only voted on a couple of the candidates (10/19 candidates have <= 20 upvotes + downvotes total). That, to me, indicates a sheep mentality and just upvoting/downvoting in the ways that people have done as a group so far.

Tim B

Or it means they know who they are giving their 3 votes to and only bothered upvoting those 3

since they don't care who else doesn't make the primary

James

Do they show the vote totals in the final phase of the election? I can't remember

HDE 226868

@bilbo_pingouin That's an interesting point.

Tim B

21:52

I don't think so, not directly...you can go back and check them though

HDE 226868

@TimB . . . which assumes that the people they vote for will get to the election phrase.

Tim B

Ahh, you're assuming people are rational....I thought better of you than that

HDE 226868

You're probably right.

Tim B

goes to downvote HDE

Serban Tanasa

@HDE226868, how did you know I would harm the site? I've been keeping it a secreeeet. Shhh

HDE 226868

21:53

looks over Tim's shoulder

Monica Cellio

@HDE226868 I voted immediately on candidates where I already know how I feel, but for most I won't be voting until I read the questionnaires. And that takes time.

James

@MonicaCellio So you're one of my downvotes then. :P

HDE 226868

@MonicaCellio That's something I hadn't considered. I assumed that people would be familiar with everyone, which is a fallacy.

Monica Cellio

@James no, I haven't read your questionnaire yet.

Serban Tanasa

@James, i thought you were the only one without downvotes

gotta go refresh the page

bilbo_pingouin

21:55

in Worldbuilders' General Chat, 51 secs ago, by Hohmannfan

Monica Cellio

@HDE226868 there's "familiar" as in "seen around the site and know that he really knows his alien biology", and there's "familiar" as in "understand what he'd be like as a mod". They're different.

bilbo_pingouin

in case you're not there

James

@SerbanTanasa That was so 4 minutes ago

Serban Tanasa

oh nice, votes

James

Actually I have no idea when it happened.

HDE 226868

21:55

@MonicaCellio Yeah, I meant that I assumed folks would be familiar with the latter.

James

Its a tight race for 8/9/10

Monica Cellio

@HDE226868 for some candidates who I don't know well otherwise (just from Q&A but not from chat, meta, etc), I don't know enough to be able to evaluate that yet.

Tim B

It says good things for the future of the site that people who would be strong contenders are struggling to get into the top 10, not so much fun for them I'm sure but still...impressive :)

Monica Cellio

@James it's going to change many times over the next four days.

HDE 226868

Yeah, I haven't voted on them all.

bilbo_pingouin

21:57

@James add 11 to that I think

Hohmannfan

Updated:

bilbo_pingouin

if the primary is any indication of the main election, the third post would be between Serban and bowlturner... with AoC as outsider

Tim B

well it's early days yet

ArtOfCode

@bilbo_pingouin sounds about right

James

Alright have fun prognosticating. I have to run play chauffeur for my children...

bilbo_pingouin

22:01

fourth I meant, and not third

Serban Tanasa

wow, it's impressive how many people voted already.

even more impressive, given that aside from the candidates, only 20 or 30 folks have so far visited the Q&A "townhall" on Meta

Hohmannfan

Latest top 10

bilbo_pingouin

@SerbanTanasa they probably won't read it

HDE 226868

@Hohmannfan Thanks for the updates.

Tim B

also view numbers are cached

Hohmannfan

22:16

The following graph shows upvotes divided by downvotes:

Tim B

interesting that many people don't move but some jump quite a bit

Hohmannfan

Most noticeable bilbo

Serban Tanasa

@Hohmannfan, thanks for all the graph updates. Very handy.

bilbo_pingouin

@Hohmannfan except that I have managed to lose one upvote... it is as effective as a downvote. But thanks for keeping us up to date :)

Hohmannfan

It was just so messy with that random sort

Serban Tanasa

22:21

Yeah. it seems voting and the candidate score have a high correlation, could you add the candidate scores in the chart, or somesuch wizardry?

Except for the current mods, of course, who were denied moderation badges

by the fact of being moderators

HDE 226868

@SerbanTanasa True, with exception of Monica.

Tim B

32

A: How might I better prepare myself for the next moderator election?

There is one obvious step: Try and get a candidate score of 40/40 or as close to it as you can (if you haven't already). To pick an example at random, here's one from the recent election: candidate score 33/40 reputation >= 20k moderation badges: 4/8 editing badges: 4/6 participation badges: 5/...

bilbo_pingouin

@SerbanTanasa it makes sense, because people who aren't too active here, don't necessarily know the people... and the score guides their hand... er mouse.

Serban Tanasa

@TimB good thing we don't have anyone running with 40/40...

Hohmannfan

top 10 with candidate score:

bilbo_pingouin

22:28

@SerbanTanasa yeah on older sites (I have seen elections on SO and SFF), if you don't have at least 38, forget about it

Monica Cellio

Isn't one of the badges for candidate score Constituent? Nobody here has that until Friday. :-)

Hohmannfan

Tim B

@SerbanTanasa Yeah, that was specifically for Stack Overflow where it's insane

Ironically I'd be on at least 37/40 if I wasn't a pro tem mod

Serban Tanasa

yeah, i was just saying that above

@MonicaCellio, good point!

bilbo_pingouin

@Hohmannfan nice. So if there is a connection, I don't think we could talk about correlation

Serban Tanasa

22:31

@bilbo_pingouin, that's like a 80% correlation

Samuel

@SerbanTanasa Yeah, I was just going to say it's max 80

@SerbanTanasa But you corrected

Serban Tanasa

@Samuel, haha, wanted to put 70

Samuel

Can I get a mod to fix that? I'm in the wrong place according to candidate score.

bilbo_pingouin

the problem is that we have only 7 points if you remove the pro-tem...

Serban Tanasa

finger slip

feeling @bowlturner's hot breath coming up from behind, hehe

he actually has more upvotes, if it weren't for the downvotes he'd be ahead

bowlturner

22:35

@SerbanTanasa Ha! I know you paid those extra 3 leg breakers to down vote me!

;)

Serban Tanasa

@bowlturner What, I resent the accusation. Why, I'm saving my sock-puppet army for the main election!

:)

bilbo_pingouin

is it me or the voting slowed down? At least for those not at the top?

Serban Tanasa

people have left work on the east coast.

there's another snowstorm coming up in DC

bilbo_pingouin

again?

HDE 226868

@SerbanTanasa It'll hit us in the Northeast, too, but not as badly as we originally thought. Are you guys going to get it as bad as last time?

bilbo_pingouin

22:37

and people from continental Europe are probably going to bed.

Hohmannfan

Serban Tanasa

hmm, surprised Michael Kjorling is not further ahead

bilbo_pingouin

@Hohmannfan it seems that slowly things are setting themselves...

Tim B

The problem Michael has is a lot of the things he did aren't high profile, like he wrote a lot of very good meta posts when the site was starting up etc

bilbo_pingouin

though the 10th place will be very disputed at the end I think

Tim B

22:39

Monica and I are higher profile, more visible

Hohmannfan

#10 contenders, bilbo_pingouin currently number 10:

Tim B

So it's between bilbo, DW and MW basically

bilbo_pingouin

I would say so, yes...

Serban Tanasa

Haha, wished the votes counted for rep, this would already be my 6th highest answer, lol

Tim B

I think the gap above and below those 3 is fairly bigf

HDE 226868

22:41

That's going to be exciting.

@SerbanTanasa This would be my second-highest post, network-wide.

Serban Tanasa

@HDE226868, well, you have almost twice my vote total, so hardly surprising

HDE 226868

@SerbanTanasa More that I'm terrible at answering popular questions. :P

You've done pretty well in the past - same with asking.

Tim B

goodnight all

gonna look forwards to checking the scores in the morning :)

Serban Tanasa

@HDE226868, love crafting questions, I've only had 2 or so ever closed

@TimB, heading to the gym myself in a bit. gnite all!

Hohmannfan

Is score times upvotes/downvotes a usable metric?

Serban Tanasa

22:46

@HDE226868, still hoping against hope for more upvotes on the "Subtle magic" question. So close

HDE 226868

Sleep tight, don't let the ~~bedbugs bite~~ Valkyries choose you from the field of battle.

Serban Tanasa

Upload, we prefer the more modern term

HDE 226868

@SerbanTanasa Oh, right, you're pretty close there. I need . . . 45 upvotes to get a great question badge.

Serban Tanasa

@HDE226868, you got that edit badge, gotta hand it to you, you got patience.

Hohmannfan

Here is the score*upvotes/downvotes if that makes any sense in terms of popularity:

HDE 226868

22:50

@SerbanTanasa ~100 of those edits came from a weekend of tag wiki cleanup.

Serban Tanasa

@Hohmannfan, nice gold color there

again, thanks for all the effort you've been putting into keeping us all informed

bilbo_pingouin

@Hohmannfan just to know, by score, you mean the xx/40 thing, not upvote-downvote..?

Serban Tanasa

I wish we could give out voting commissioner badges

Hohmannfan

@bilbo_pingouin No, I mean upvote-downvote. Interested in that other one?

bilbo_pingouin

no, no... one that could be interesting would be (up-dn)/(score out of 40)

to see the correlation we mentioned before

Hohmannfan

22:56

Ok

@bilbo_pingouin Here is the one you requested: (up-dn)/(score out of 40)

HDE 226868

That's incredible!

Hohmannfan

Low candidate score but very popular

bilbo_pingouin

thanks @Hohmannfan, it is interesting...

If we remove the pro-tem, we could have a $up-dn \propto (score)^2$

Hohmannfan

What exactly is "remove the pro-term"?

bilbo_pingouin

well the current moderators

Hohmannfan

23:04

From the results?

HDE 226868

@Hohmannfan "Moderator pro tempore"

bilbo_pingouin

pro-tempore, or something like that... have a score which is not necessarily realistic, because they are busy with other things

and can't collect the badges like the other users

but don't change your plot, I was just thinking out loud :)

anyway... good night all :)

HDE 226868

@bilbo_pingouin Good night.

Hohmannfan

@bilbo_pingouin Good night

yawn, this is the last update for tonight, the next one 05.15 UTC

Samuel

Cheers @Hohmannfan, Thanks for the updates

Transcript for

2016 Worldbuilding Moderator Election