New DIP73: D Drafting Library

[CraigDillabaugh via Digitalmars-d]

On Thursday, 5 February 2015 at 21:21:22 UTC, Zach the Mystic 
wrote:
> On Thursday, 5 February 2015 at 18:44:06 UTC, CraigDillabaugh
clip
>
> You know, I don't even like the use of voting when it comes to 
> important decisions which last forever. I have no mechanism for 
> determining fairly who has the right to vote and who doesn't. 
> Well, speaking more specifically, who is *competent* to vote 
> and who isn't. D doesn't have a Board of Approved Members, and 
> so putting something up for vote will let any shmoe (such as 
> myself) actually have an equal share in the decision making 
> process.
>
> I believe in leadership. Leadership requires both confidence 
> and humility - confidence to stick up for yourself when you 
> know you're right, and humility to listen to others when you're 
> not sure of yourself. Leadership is really hard... but I think 
> it's necessary in all but the most trivial of cases.
>
> Imagine all the people on the spectrum of competence on a given 
> issue - the most people will be found in the zone of least 
> competence, and the fewest people in the zone of highest 
> competence. The only reason for leadership to put something to 
> a vote is if they can reliably assume that the majority will 
> have a more competent opinion the issue than they will. There 
> are only two reasons to do this:

But what about?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wisdom_of_Crowds

>
> 1. The leadership is able to admit that they know so little 
> about the issue that they wouldn't be able to differentiate the 
> quality of their own opinion from the majority's.
>
> 2. The issue is so trivial that the leadership is willing to 
> sacrifice the best outcome for the social approval gained by 
> giving all people the vote.
>
> I don't see either of these happening very often in the case of 
> D. The first case is lamentable indeed, but I don't think it is 
> improved by just passing the issue to a majority vote. The best 
> solution, IMO, is to be honest about one's level of ignorance, 
> and brace oneself for the onslaught of opinions which follow. 
> Maybe in the ensuing chaos one will obtain at least a modicum 
> of competence on what to do.
>
> Also, it's often best to use one's lack of confidence on an 
> issue to win the favor of the higher ups in the community by 
> deferring to one person's, then another's judgment, than to 
> just try to win the favor of a bunch of strangers by letting 
> them all vote.
>
> Anyway, I guess that's just about 5 cents worth of almost 
> completely unsolicited opinion! :-)