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Wednesday, April 9, 2014

Low Turnout Means Bad Candidates Win

When I'm not tired and sore from having to make an unscheduled stop at the orthodontist to have some work done, I'm often amused by people like Dinsdale who think that null sec domination of the CSM is bad, but then go around the EVE community stating there is no one to vote for and basically drive down voter turnout.  If someone truly cannot find a candidate to vote for and doesn't vote, I fully understand.  I only voted for 5 people for that same reason.  But if you are a "Grr Goons" type of person, the only way to vote against the null sec voting line is to vote for other candidates.

The lower the turnout, the greater the power of the voting organizations like the CFC election machine.  That's not an EVE thing, by the way.  In the U.S., we see the same thing in our off-year Congressional elections.  The activists in both parties have greater sway than when the general public comes out to vote for president in years divisible by 4.

If you don't believe me, then would you believe The Mittani?  Here's what he recently told Goonswarm in a CEO update:
"It's CSM season again, and voting has opened. Thankfully CCP has made it very easy to vote with multiple accounts; once you enter your roster of 14 aspiring spaceship politicians the first time, for each account you log in those same selections remain. Vote early, vote often - and vote the appropriate ballot which we have carefully selected for you.

"We've got a very strong roster this year including a number of independent candidates, as well as GSF heavyweights Sion Kumitomo and Mynnna, not to mention favored ALOD-writer Angry Mustache. Given how poor a job CCP did with getting the CSM8 minutes out the door, my personal take on this election is that turnout will be at an all-time low. If I'm right, that's hilarious news for the CFC, because there's nothing this coalition does quite like marching and voting in lockstep. In a low turnout situation, the impact of organization, unity and force is magnified. Even if you don't care about the CSM, vote the way we tell you to, simply because it'll make a gaggle of shitlords who hate us very, very angry should we succeed."
In a low turnout election, I see two bloc candidates who should not win possibly get seats.  The first is Angry Mustache.  He makes me ... angry.  From what I can tell, between ratting and his writing for TheMittani.com, rivals the ISK Sugar Kyle makes in profits from The Cougar Store.  Yet, he claims space poverty and even claims that null sec is the worst place for a pilot to earn ISK.  That's why one of the reasons that Angry Mustache is running is to get the free year subscription that all CSM members get.  Given how many AFK Ishtars Xander Phoena manages to lose and still come out ahead, I find that claim hard to believe.  Of course, Angry Mustache, at least to me, sounds pretty clueless about a lot of things related to EVE.  Judging by the reactions of other members on the Declarations of War panel on Sov, Power Projection, and PvP Balance, particularly Psianh Auvyander, I'm not the only one.

The other bloc candidate who I feel is a bad candidate who could win a seat due to low turnout is RvB's Azami Nevinyrall.  The reason he is running is that he made a $50 bet with a real life friend that he could win a seat on the CSM.  With that type of motivation, the odds of him winning a seat and then disappearing are high.  I also didn't like the pandering I saw when I actually paid attention to him at the start of the race.  I could tell he was just taking positions to make people happy so he can win his bet.  In his Cap Stable interview, I think he was a little surprised that people took a negative view of his bet.  Well, as one of those people, I hope he loses.  With the price of PLEX today, Azami made a 2 billion ISK bet.  Who doesn't like making someone lose 2 billion ISK?  But a low turnout gives Azami a better chance to win.

So while I understand people not wanting to vote because they have no one to vote "for", I don't understand those who don't vote who are "against" someone, especially a bloc candidate.  The average player voting (assuming for non-bloc candidates) dilutes the power of the organized blocs.  If enough high sec players vote for non-bloc candidates, the blocs won't have as great of representation on the CSM.  Too bad the complainers don't understand that.

9 comments:

  1. I completely agree with you that voting matters!

    About Azami: it bears to mention that he is *not* an "RvB candidate". He's a CSM candidate who happens to be in RvB

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  2. I've been saying it for months, and this pretty much confirms it.

    Dinsdale is a goon false-flag activist. Everything he does is tuned to make the grr-goons folks look mad, bad or just plain stupid.

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  3. 100% agreement. In fact this is exactly why I do vote. I don't care for the excessive power and influence the null blocs have so I vote all 12 of my accounts for the best non bloc candidates and encourage others to do the same to counteract that power and influence.

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    1. Hisec, low sec, wormhole and NPC null players all need to band together and support each other to counteract the bloc voting machine.

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  4. You are correct about driving down the voter turnout is precisely what the special interest groups want. In my country , the current "government" is ramming through the thoroughly Orwellian "Fair Elections Act" which will dis-enfranchise close to half a million voters, all who would not vote for the fascists.

    And yes, I should be beating the drum to get as many people as possible to vote. But I could not even field a group of 14 people who I could confirm were not part of the cartels, or plants. I ended up voting for 8 people.

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    1. Glad to hear that. Unless you're in one of the null sec blocs, it usually doesn't matter who you put down below #7 anyway.

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    2. If you found one that you can confirm is not part of the cartels it is worth voting for them. The idea that you need 14 people before it's worth voting seems really odd to me.

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  5. Not planning to vote because I still feel it's a waste of time. A CSM composed of all highsec carebear noobs vs one composed of 100% nullsec RMT'ers would not change a thing. CCP does what they want and puts any meaningful decisions under NDA'ed discussion constraints. Any effect the CSM has on their plans is marginal at best. The only thing CCP responds to is a downward trend in subs (and maybe PLEX sales).

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  6. when will people realise the true function of the CSM election is to drive PLEX usage. each PLEX consumed is a vote gained. CCP maximises subscriber count for 2nd quarter financial reporting.

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