On consensus decision-making (was Re: Alternative decorator syntax - POLL RESULTS SO FAR - ARE WEDONE?)

[Peter Hansen]

Robert Brewer wrote:

> Doug Holton wrote:
>>Just make a poll with J2 vs. C1 and see what you find.
> 
> I don't see the point at this stage. I've put 20 hours into a document
> for J2 this weekend, and would really like to start working on consensus
> for it now. If you want to write a similar document for C1, feel free.
> The time for voting is over, IMO.

The voting was merely to narrow down the choices.  It seems
pretty clear there are now only three candidates in the running,
the @pie syntax plus J2 and C1.  The latter doesn't yet have
an implementation, which is almost certainly its biggest
disadvantage (and not that more people voted for J2 than for
it).

I suspect many of the J2 and C1 people would actually not "block"
a decision to go with either one versus @pie.  I'm not sure
how many people would like to block @pie or either or both of
the other two options.  In the end, we already know that the
final decision is (thankfully) made by the BDFL based on his
own good judgement, so voting becomes less and less valuable
at this stage.  (In consensus building, a "block" basically says
that someone would refuse to support the community decision,
while 100% consensus means no one blocks the decision even
though some people may not feel it reflects their first choice.)

By the way, I found a page that appears nicely to sum up the
ideas behind consensus decision-making.  It's interesting that
it says "don't vote" near the end, but I believe that ignores
the utility of a choice-narrowing vote as we have had.  It
does suggest nobody should be considering this vote to have
any weight in terms of directly determining the final decision.

   http://www.coreroi.com/consensus.htm

-Peter