Martin Storsjö via ffmpeg-devel (HE12025-09-16): > No, that is not the point at all. > > The point is having one's voice and vote count, without needing to disclose > it publicly. On potentially contentious matters, people eligible to vote may > wish to do so, without having to publicly state their preference attached to > their name.
“The point of secret voting is that people can vote secretly.” Nice circular reasoning. Historically, the point of secret ballot in democracies was to prevent coercion and corruption. This is why citizen not only can vote secretly: they must. Citizen have to be alone in the voting booth, they cannot take anything with them that proves what they voted so that nobody can force them to with a threat of the promise of a bribe. This principle has been weakened with provisions for remote voting, but it is still the logical justification for vote secrecy as we have in democracies. Note than in other contexts, vote is not secret, because the constraints are different. Michael already mentioned elected officials. We can also mention company shareholders: when the shareholders vote on something, the votes are usually public, at least within the company. The relationship of FFmpeg developers with the project is more akin to the relationship of shareholders to a company than to the relationship of a citizen to their country. Anyway, the project leader who decides, when polling members, whether the poll is public or private is a perfectly normal way of managing the project. -- Nicolas George _______________________________________________ ffmpeg-devel mailing list -- [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected]
