Warren Smith wrote: > It's very hard to get people to sign statements, and the difficulty > increases with the length.
My own experience points to a similar conclusion. I once formulated a "laconic rule of thumb" (ten words per signature/vote) and a process of "consensus by erasure". http://mail.zelea.com/list/votorola/2011-May/001068.html We could always try again. The initial focus should be less on building up a text and more on uncovering agreement over the content. -- Michael Allan Toronto, +1 416-699-9528 http://zelea.com/ Warren Smith wrote: > this "declaration" is suffering from exactly what everybody > most-complains about re the rangevoting.org website. > > I.e. it tried to cover everything and got large. In fact, enormous. > > That for a website is a flaw that is not necessarily an > insurmountable obstacle > since one can put short "summary" pages (or try...) and use of lots > of hyperlinks, so it isn't just a flat document, it's > easier to get to information. > > But for a "consensus statement" it is a major problem since (a) nobody > is going to sign it and (b) nobody is going to read it. > > Well, "nobody" is an exaggeration. But not by much. > > This statement (4328 words) is now over 3 times the length of the > USA's "Declaration of Independence" (1315 words) and also longer than > the entire USA constitution (as un-amended) at 4318 words. > > Have you seen my attempt to study what election experts and/or Joe > Public actually agree on? The total amount of true consensus out > there, is extremely small. So you could have an extremely short > statement, if you wished to summarize what is the current consensus. > If you have the more ambitious goal of creating consensus by actually > changing minds... well, I doubt you can do it with one single > document. > > It's very hard to get people to sign statements, and the difficulty > increases with the length. ---- Election-Methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info