Voting rights and fedi individual members #689

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decentral1se · 2026-03-09T08:04:21Z

decentral1se commented

2026-03-09 08:04:21 +00:00

Just to get this off my personal notes and into the collective brain: @3wordchant and myself were wondering what to do with the fact some fedi members are now "individual members" (like ourselves due to changing circumstances 😛). The conversation about what to do with this never finished.

We discussed the idea that being an invididual member (not representing or affiliated to a co-op or collective) of the fedi should deprioritised. One idea was to write a resolution to remove voting rights from individual members. Individuals can propose things but not vote on them. Then the "mainline" democratic functioning of the federation is "members are co-ops and collectives".

Please share your thoughts.

Just to get this off my personal notes and into the collective brain: @3wordchant and myself were wondering what to do with the fact some fedi members are now "individual members" (like ourselves due to changing circumstances 😛). The conversation about what to do with this never finished. We discussed the idea that being an invididual member (not representing or affiliated to a co-op or collective) of the fedi should deprioritised. One idea was to write a resolution to remove voting rights from individual members. Individuals can propose things but not vote on them. Then the "mainline" democratic functioning of the federation is "members are co-ops and collectives". Please share your thoughts.

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label 2026-03-09 08:04:21 +00:00

mayel commented

2026-03-09 08:49:57 +00:00

I think we first need to ask what individual members are actually doing here? Are they just historical/honorary holdovers (or in a pending state in between projects, as in #690), or are they actively contributing? If the latter (which very much is the case in my opinion!), removing their vote while keeping their labour is the opposite of democratic member control.

This is a timely question, as the federation is hiring a radmin role and proposing to pay a developer for dedicated time on the project (#691). People doing work, whether paid or not, for the federation should have a voice in it, that's a basic co-operative principle.

Rather than a membership purge, maybe this points us towards a multistakeholder model: keep member co-ops and collectives as the primary governance track, but give active contributors/workers a legitimate seat at the table too.

I think we first need to ask what individual members are actually doing here? Are they just historical/honorary holdovers (or in a pending state in between projects, as in #690), or are they actively contributing? If the latter (which very much is the case in my opinion!), removing their vote while keeping their labour is the opposite of democratic member control. This is a timely question, as the federation is hiring a radmin role and proposing to pay a developer for dedicated time on the project (#691). People doing work, whether paid or not, for the federation should have a voice in it, that's a basic co-operative principle. Rather than a membership purge, maybe this points us towards a multistakeholder model: keep member co-ops and collectives as the primary governance track, but give active contributors/workers a legitimate seat at the table too.

fauno commented

2026-03-09 15:40:38 +00:00

agree with mayel!

i'm not sure we're at the state of too many individual memberships can concede control to a hostile shadow member --an org looking to control coopcloud through individual memberships, which is many collectives' nightmare.

agree with mayel! i'm not sure we're at the state of too many individual memberships can concede control to a hostile shadow member --an org looking to control coopcloud through individual memberships, which is many collectives' nightmare.

fauno commented

2026-03-09 15:50:57 +00:00

which is many collectives' nightmare.

not necessarily real i mean

> which is many collectives' nightmare. not necessarily real i mean

3wordchant commented

2026-03-10 17:46:04 +00:00

Thanks for kicking this off @decentral1se 🙏

It seems like there's always / often a bit of weirdness in federated structures, where the expected operations are group-to-group in principle, but in practice there's a (maybe inevitable) set of individual humans who end up working together. I think that dialectic is part of what we're running into here.

I think I would prefer not to have a vote unless / until I join or start a collective, and apply for and get federation membership for it; that doesn't seem like too much to ask, to me.

I agree with fauno that I don't think we should be over worried about a nefarious group juicing the votes by encouraging its members to become individual members.

For me, it's more that I think each vote would end up counting more if it came from an individual vs through a group, which feels unfair – and I don't think our lightweight decision-making process has the tools to handle that.

On that point about tools, I think we'd ideally have a dedicated "resolutions facilitator" who could negotiate with an individual who makes a block vote.

Without one, I think we'd really struggle to navigate moving past a "block" vote – which would leave us in the propaganda-against-consensus situation of "tyranny of the minority" / reification of the status quo.

To put it simply: if I had a vote, and I blocked a resolution, would the rest of the federation feel comfortable in the process of deciding whether to continue on and ask me to leave?

I don't necessarily think that we'd handle this a lot better if it were a group vs an individual who blocked something, but it does seem in my experience that groups are less likely to block than individuals.

Thanks for kicking this off @decentral1se 🙏 It seems like there's always / often a bit of weirdness in federated structures, where the expected operations are group-to-group in principle, but in practice there's a (maybe inevitable) set of individual humans who end up working together. I think that dialectic is part of what we're running into here. I think I would prefer not to have a vote unless / until I join or start a collective, and apply for and get federation membership for it; that doesn't seem like too much to ask, to me. I agree with fauno that I don't think we should be _over_ worried about a nefarious group juicing the votes by encouraging its members to become individual members. For me, it's more that I think each vote would end up counting more if it came from an individual vs through a group, which feels unfair – and I don't think our lightweight decision-making process has the tools to handle that. On that point about tools, I think we'd ideally have a dedicated "resolutions facilitator" who could negotiate with an individual who makes a block vote. Without one, I think we'd really struggle to navigate moving past a "block" vote – which would leave us in the propaganda-against-consensus situation of "tyranny of the minority" / reification of the status quo. To put it simply: if I had a vote, and I blocked a resolution, would the rest of the federation feel comfortable in the process of deciding whether to continue on and ask me to leave? I don't necessarily think that we'd handle this a _lot_ better if it were a group vs an individual who blocked something, but it does seem in my experience that groups are less likely to block than individuals.

mayel commented

2026-03-10 17:54:52 +00:00

I think each vote would end up counting more if it came from an individual vs through a group, which feels unfair

That's assuming individual member votes would carry the same weight as a collective's vote though, which is exactly the problem a multistakeholder model could solve. What if workers and direct contributors formed their own circle(s) (as in sociocracy) to come up with decisions amongst themselves using whatever method suits them (consent-based, ranked voting, etc), and then each circle could vote as a bloc alongside the member co-ops? That way no individual vote outweighs a collective, but active contributors still have a voice.

> I think each vote would end up counting more if it came from an individual vs through a group, which feels unfair That's assuming individual member votes would carry the same weight as a collective's vote though, which is exactly the problem a multistakeholder model could solve. What if workers and direct contributors formed their own circle(s) (as in sociocracy) to come up with decisions amongst themselves using whatever method suits them (consent-based, ranked voting, etc), and then each circle could vote as a bloc alongside the member co-ops? That way no individual vote outweighs a collective, but active contributors still have a voice.

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Reference: toolshed/organising#689