As the law is currently written the Election Commission can just use their own discord account or server for secret ballots. They probably can even make their own election forum and use that, if they wanted to.

Elections Act
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2. Electoral System

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(3). Voters will have the option to cast their vote using a secret ballot. The method of private voting will be selected by the Election Commission. The method must utilize an unaffiliated official South Pafician forum account or server, with the method and all votes remaining available for audit. Named ballots are not to be released under any circumstances.

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I don't really see a point to this? The intention was to allow flexibility of alternate methods. Also the "unaffiliated" part specifically forbids using personal accounts to collect the private votes. And it also forbids any gameside private voting options, for the relevant elections.

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I don't really see a point to this? The intention was to allow flexibility of alternate methods. Also the "unaffiliated" part specifically forbids using personal accounts to collect the private votes. And it also forbids any gameside private voting options, for the relevant elections.

But, they could create their own discord server or something. They could use a platform which they control.

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No. More likely, a new channel is created on the existing Discord server for voting purposes.

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No. More likely, a new channel is created on the existing Discord server for voting purposes.

But they could create their own server? It says "server" not "channel".

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No. More likely, a new channel is created on the existing Discord server for voting purposes.

But they could create their own server? It says "server" not "channel".

Even if we did explore an alternate method... what's the problem?

It can't be under something they personally own. It has to preserve all of the ballots. The votes have to be accessible for audit.

Where's the issue?

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No. More likely, a new channel is created on the existing Discord server for voting purposes.

But they could create their own server? It says "server" not "channel".

Even if we did explore an alternate method... what's the problem?

It can't be under something they personally own. It has to preserve all of the ballots. The votes have to be accessible for audit.

Where's the issue?

If they can use a server that they own, how can one trust any audit that happens? They could just delete ballots. I know on Discord there is an Audit Log but they could claim that the Auditors don't need to see the Log, just the voting channel. How is this not a problem? They don't even have to use a platform where you can 100% trust the Audit Log.
But it can be something they own, "unaffiliated" is vague and could be reasonably interpreted to mean not owned by any candidate.

(This post was last modified: 10-27-2020, 04:34 PM by Domais.)

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No. More likely, a new channel is created on the existing Discord server for voting purposes.

But they could create their own server? It says "server" not "channel".

Even if we did explore an alternate method... what's the problem?

It can't be under something they personally own. It has to preserve all of the ballots. The votes have to be accessible for audit.

Where's the issue?

If they can use a server that they own, how can one trust any audit that happens? They could just delete ballots. I know on Discord there is an Audit Log but they could claim that the Auditors don't need to see the Log, just the voting channel. How is this not a problem? They don't even have to use a platform where you can 100% trust the Audit Log.
But it can be something they own, "unaffiliated" is vague and could be reasonably interpreted to mean not owned by any candidate.

If they're not doing those things, then they're already violating multiple parts of the clause.

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If they're not doing those things, then they're already violating multiple parts of the clause.

Election Commission says we are going to do private voting on some website we created. Person A says "You can't do that", Election Commission replies with, "it says 'server' and a website uses a web server". Person A responds with "But it says unaffiliated", Election Commission claims "Well our website is not affiliated with any candidate". Person A says "well it has to be audible" and the Election Commission says "well we are keeping a voting log".

Election Commission quietly deletes a vote and removes it from the log to stop a person winning and making the resulting election a tie. Or they add a vote to change the result or change a vote. Yes, they have broken the law but there is no way to prove that they deleted a vote.

Am I reading it wrong? They could do that and get away with it.

(This post was last modified: 10-27-2020, 07:48 PM by Domais.)

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I'll use this as an opportunity to point out that if there are any confusions about the meaning of a law, anyone can submit a legal question and, if necessary, request that a temporary injunction be issued until the core issue is solved.

Former Delegate of the South Pacific
Posts outside High Court venues should be taken as those of any other legislator.
I do not participate in the regional server, but I am happy to talk through instant messaging or on the forum.

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