Election-methods mailing list
This is the official homepage for the election-methods mailing list.
On "election-methods-list", we discuss the nitty-gritty details of single-winner election reform, the relative merits of different proportional representation systems, and the technical underpinnings of all election methods. "election-methods-list" discussions tend to be technical in nature (or at least, very laden with jargon), with the ultimate goal of providing recommendations and educational material to the electoral reform movement.
Those that want to have in-depth discussions about the technical subtleties of election methods can use "election-methods-list" to discuss those things without fear of reprisal from those who aren't interested.
Code of Conduct
Please come prepared to defend the statements that you make, and to directly answer the questions that others ask of you. This list was set up to increase communication between people interested in new forms of election methodology, not as a sounding board for those who wish to drown out opposing views with prolific repetition of statements already made. When conflicts arise, please use this list to understand fully why the other side feels the way they do by honest intellectual inquiry. And when those who feel differently than you are trying to understand why you feel the way you do, please answer as honestly and directly as possible.
Hopefully this is all common sense, but sadly not common enough (hence the reason for this message). In summary, please ask, answer, and be humble.
Frequently Asked Questions List
Most things discussed on this list should be documented on Electowiki.
Additionally, there are a number of unofficial sources which define many of the terms used on the list:
- The Wikipedia project is working on Wikipedia:WikiProject Voting Systems
- Phil Hunt once maintained the Voting Systems FAQ, which he posted periodically to the alt.politics.elections newsgroup, among others. It hasn't been updated in quite a while, though.
- ElectionMethods.org has an overview of election methods and the definitions associated with them, along with a number of interesting opinion/analysis articles.
- Blake Cretney has set up an election methods resource page provides useful definitions of methods, criteria, and related concepts.
- Mike Ossipoff composed an explanation of single winner methods.
- The Netscape Open Directory Project Voting Systems page has a pretty complete list of alternate voting systems. Google also carries Open Directory with page rankings (very cool feature), so you can see the ranked version of the Voting Systems Category.
- James Green-Armytage's voting methods resource page provides a detailed methods survey as well as original proposals and argument essays.
- Rob LeGrand's ranked ballot voting methods page describes and evaluates several ranked ballot methods, including a very wide variety of Condorcet completion methods.
Email free subscription
If you really don't want to receive mail directly from the list, but still want to post, you should still subscribe, but change your subscription by visiting the subscription options page. You will then be given the option to "Disable Email Delivery"
Archive
There are several archives available for this list:
- Electorama.com archive - This is the official archive for this list, which has all postings back to the starting of the list in 1996.
- The VA Linux Mail Archive service (mail-archive.com) carries everything back to 2000, archived here. Messages from March 2003 and later can be found here.
- GMane maintains a great archive of the election-methods list. They have a great web interface, and additionally have an NNTP feed which can be read using standard Usenet news reader software.
Additionally, mail-archive.com also carries an RDF/RSS feed of the mailing list, used by syndication sites like My Netscape and My Userland.
Speaking of My Userland, they now provide an election-methods-list "channel" which allows you to read this list off of My Userland.
Real-time Chat
An experimental real-time, web-based chat is available. It's not clear as of this writing (2005-Aug-13) if anyone who frequents the mailing list plans to use it, but it will be available for the forseeable future. See also election-methods chat
The election-methods list is maintained by Rob Lanphier.