[Ag Meinungsfindungstool] Audio protocol of todays cooperation meeting with Michael Allan from Votorola

[Slash <pirate_slash AT yahoo.com>]

Hey folks,

today Marc had a cooperation meeting with Michael Allan from Votorola;
here is the link to the audio protocol: http://youtu.be/LHwqT4j6sLo

Well, now that you are informed about it, we can use this thread here
as a feedback channel. :)

======================================================

My2cents:

I'm very happy that essentially we're aiming in the same direction and
both want to cooperate. Actually there is just one spot in the cooperation
meeting where I felt the need to pipe up, and that was the spot
where Marc linked Votorola with Liquid Feedback and said that Liquid
Feedback is going to be a plug-in for d!sco.

Well, before coming to my question let me first sum up from my point of
view how I see the spectrum of discussion process:
Having seen many many discussion tools I take the view that one can
distinguish the discussion process in 3 phases.

*phase 1* - dealing with an open question (example 'How fight sexism?'):
This phase is very open minded, maybe even like brain storming, and
mainly consists of adding ideas and ones subjective opinion as a reply
to the open question

*phase 2* - dealing with closed questions (example 'Should we go outside 
tomorrow?')
In this phase we deal with Yes-or-No-questions; in this phase the ideas
of the aforementioned phase are evaluated;
'is idea/core statement/thesis X correct ?' - this is what is evaluated 
with
gathering and exchange of pro and contra arguments to this closed question

*phase 3* - positioning
based on the aforementioned phases in this phase positions to the open
questions are build; this is not so much about arguments, but rather
making the different positions visible, consensus finding, negotiating,
finding majorities (often supported by a voting system), etc.
So, at this spot you form or make decisions in form of building and
optimizing positions which hopefully - thanks to the aforementioned
phases - are outstandingly profound and sophisticated and
principally able to reach much popularity.

*And now comes the point:*
To make a decision - so, "phase 3 - positioning" - is not the same as
to make a resolution.
Both are very similar, no doubt, but there is a decisive difference between
them: Positioning forms and illustrates collective positions within a group
to a certain issue; these positions can change and develop all the time,
they are not cut in stone. This phase - like phase 2 and 1 - is an
open end phase.
Making a resolution, however, is the complete opposite regarding this
aspect; making a resolution means 'you can vote now for the upcoming
thirty days and then the results are standing and one position is 
official'.
Positioning is creating a draft law, which can be a never-ending process,
but making a resolution is making this draft law official on a certain day 
X.

If an edemocracy tool incorporates open-end positioning, it's a discussion 
system,
if an edemocracy tool incorporates... well closed-end positioning - so
with a fix date and then some position is official - it's a resolution 
system.

LQFB is not a discussion system, because it has voting deadlines;
in LQFB you have a 'new phase' for a couple of days, then a
'discussion phase' (which is not worth its name), then a 'frozen phase'
where the positions can't be edited any more, and then a
'voting phase' and after that some position is cut in stone.

Well and now my question to you, Michael Allan :D :
Are there voting time deadlines in Votorola ? Or is this positioning with
all the voting stuff in Votorola a never-ending process, which of course
is becoming more and more consolidated in the course of the time but
theoretically never is fixed?

Well, it's obvious what I'm aiming at with this question; to my
understanding, which can be wrong, Votorola is a discussion system and
LQFB is a resolution system and I just felt the need to sort this out a bit
more extendedly ^^ ...

And the second thing is...
I do see resolution systems as something which needs to be interconnected
with discussion systems - just how I see discussion systems as something
which needs to be interconnected with information systems - but I don't
see resolution systems to be that intensively interconnected with
discussion systems as a plug-in within our basic idea of d!sco 
https://wiki.piratenpartei.de/AG_Meinungsfindungstool/Ergebnisse/DieGrundidee.

2 interesting links to you, Michael :
1. This user case study here 
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1xulOzojrwx-Xcs3rYSwU0kftSgSyDHrWzb0VzGf4BTQ/pub?start=false&loop=false&delayms=60000 
shows, what all the theory of d!sco means
in practice.
Some words as this user case study is in german:
In this user case study you see a certain level of information in form
of some ideas to a certain open question, one of these ideas has started
up an argumentation. And this level of information is viewed through
different discussion methods or lets say plug-ins within d!sco.
So you always see the same discussion contributions, but depending
on the plug-in they always are displayed differently.
So you see this interoperability; the user can easily switch from one
discussion method to another, no data is lost, user has free tool choice,
and the tools are cooperating and so - with joined forces - it comes
much easier to them to build the decisive critical mass of users and data.

2. There is a really wicked wicked tool, which would fabulously go hand
in hand with Votorola within the d!sco sphere; it's called textrapic and
basically it works like this:
Each user contributes his own opinion in form of a blog posting, so that
by the input of lots of users lots of blog postings are gathered.
Then an algorhythm condenses all the blog postings to a summary of
2 to 3 pages, so that one doesn't has to read thousands of pages in
order to see, what the whole group basically thinks of a certain issue.
So, you see actually it just has the same focus like Votorola but
the difference is that the consensus finding within 'phase 3 - positioning'
is done by a machine instead of humans.
If you would pair up you'd eliminate your weaknesses and so would be
a super team ^^ ...
I can imagine this very well; textrapic could contribute an
automatically generated position, and Votorola could give this
position the necessary edge by users reflecting the automatically
generated position and contribution alternative positions, which are
more pointed.

Here's an explanation video to textrapic; it you'd like to have a
translation, we surely can arrange this :) :
http://youtu.be/5TWFINh8rxI

Greetings,
/ aka Oliver