I'm republishing this for the new judge assignment in case 1711a, and I intend to cause the panel of BobTHJ, Wooble, and myself to judge REMAND with these arguments, with the consent of BobTHJ and Wooble.
-root On 8/27/07, Ian Kelly <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Appellant Zefram's Arguments: > > > > We have commonly accepted a published correction to a prior report as > > constituting a new report that incorporates the bulk of the prior report > > by reference. In the present case, Murphy's second message applies a > > correction in the form of an additional set of votes to insert into the > > prior message; it is clear how adding these votes affects the totals, > > so I see no need for the revised totals to be included explicitly. > > A correct tally is, however, required by R208. > > > We have considerable history of accepting parts of these messages to > > be implicit. Indeed, the assessor's present practice, extending back > > past the time that this CFJ is concerned with, is to not explicitly > > indicate "ADOPTED", "FAILED QUORUM", and so on, for each proposal, but > > to leave that implicit. It can be easily determined by examining the > > "AI", "VI", "Quorum", and "Voters" rows, but a strict reading of rule > > 208 would require it to be stated on a row of its own. Such a strict > > reading is contrary to game custom. The lack of an explicit "ADOPTED" > > has not been questioned, neither in the resolution notice that this case > > is concerned with nor in the surrounding months. > > This argument actually sways me toward AFFIRM. I find the present > practice of omitting the final outcome to be quite exasperating, > especially as Gmail makes it a bit painful to view a message in a > fixed-width font. Using the regular view, the columns do not line up, > which makes the manual calculation difficult. If I haven't questioned > the practice before now, it is only because it hadn't occurred to me > that it might be questionable. > > > Judge Eris objects that the correcting notice did not give any firm > > identification of the original notice which it augmented. That is > > incorrect. The correcting message includes a "References:" header, > > in which the first item is the message ID of the original notice. > > This is a normal place to expect such a reference to be found; it is > > not obfuscated in any way. The original message could also be following > > the "In-Reply-To:" chain, which also works by message ID; the chain is > > of length two in this case, the middle link being Wooble's DF message > > which points out the error and quotes the body of the original notice > > in its entirety. > > If we can't expect a player to look as far as the Subject header for > context, I think it's totally out of the question to expect em to look > in the References or In-Reply-To headers, which are automatically > hidden by most email clients. > > > Judge Eris's point about message IDs was in support of eir claim that the > > correcting notice failed to clearly identify the matters to be resolved. > > Even ignoring the reference to the preceding message, the notice stated > > that it was concerned with proposals, and identified the proposals > > by number. This is precisely the same manner in which the original > > (incorrect) notice, and all resolution notices regarding proposals, > > identify the matters to be resolved. The judge appears to be mistaken > > on a matter of law regarding what it is that must be clearly identified. > > Judge Eris was not specific about what it was that was not "clearly > identified". R208 refers to two things that must be "clearly > identified": the matter to be resolved and the options available. > Since, as you point out, the former is clearly identified in both > messages, I think it likely that Judge Eris was referring to the > latter. > > One potential argument pertaining to message continuity that was not > brought up is the precedent of CFJs 1451 and 1452. However, those > both pertain to a single message broken up over multiple emails, > whereas this case pertains to a single message in a single email with > a subsequent correction, so it is not clear to me whether the > precedent should apply. It would be nice to see the argument > considered, though. > > > Finally, the judge argues that for the interests of the game we should > > not permit a resolution notice that does not explicitly list vote totals. > > To be explicit there is something that assessors should no doubt consider > > good advice, but I suggest that invalidating the notice for the lack is > > contrary to the interests of the game. > > I find this argument to be persuasive. However, it only rebuts half > of Judge Eris's argument, so I do not think it is by itself sufficient > to merit reversal judgement. Overall, I'm leaning toward a judgement > of REMAND, as I would like for Judge Eris to consider the precedent of > CFJs 1451 and 1452 in eir arguments.
