  • Fan'ly feud

    From Gary McGath@21:1/5 to All on Thu Dec 16 06:53:12 2021
    Fannish politics is a game I'm glad to stay clear of. I've chaired some
    small cons and been clerk and president of a local club, but that's enough.

    Kevin Standlee reports he was relieved of his position as Chair of the
    2021 WSFS Business Meeting and removed from the Winnipeg in 2023
    Worldcon bid committee.

    His explanation was just: "My actions yesterday, taken by me without
    any consultation with the management of either DisCon III or of the
    Winnipeg in 2023 Committee, showed a lack of judgment on my part, and I
    ask everyone to not hold either organization responsible for my actions,
    which were my decision and not theirs."

    I have no idea what he may have done, but it sounds as if he exceeded
    his authority on something and doesn't want to discuss the particulars publicly. From a redacted post of his, it may have had to do with site selection ballot validation.

    He's entitled to that choice, though it leaves many of us mystified.

    --
    Gary McGath http://www.mcgath.com

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Torbjorn Lindgren@21:1/5 to garym@REMOVEmcgathREMOVE.com on Sat Dec 18 03:49:53 2021
    Gary McGath <garym@REMOVEmcgathREMOVE.com> wrote:
    [...]
    His explanation was just: "My actions yesterday, taken by me without
    any consultation with the management of either DisCon III or of the
    Winnipeg in 2023 Committee, showed a lack of judgment on my part, and I
    ask everyone to not hold either organization responsible for my actions, >which were my decision and not theirs."

    I have no idea what he may have done, but it sounds as if he exceeded
    his authority on something and doesn't want to discuss the particulars >publicly. From a redacted post of his, it may have had to do with site >selection ballot validation.

    I found this: http://file770.com/standlee-reports-number-of-2023-site-selection-ballots-validated/
    http://file770.com/to-be-fair-i-was-left-unsupervised-a-disjointed-chronicle-of-79th-world-science-fiction-convention-discon-iii/

    If I'm reading it right:

    * He was one of the two representatives for the Winnipeg bid during
    the advance site selection ballot validation during Tuesday.

    * The Winnipeg bid requested information on the country from which
    each advance ballot was cast and was granted this - apparently they
    could have asked for much more than this under the WSFS Constitution
    because they can't see the actual VOTE.

    * Kevin Standlee later published a geographic breakdown of the advance
    ballots origin - including sending to File770 for broader distribution.

    * This break-down suggests one of the sites are likely to win by a
    landslide - while the voting is still in progress! (multiple days)

    Ouch, ouch, OUCH! Even if there's reason to believe it might be quite
    as closed case as the graph might have suggested before it was
    redacted. And it was clearly "privileged information" anyway.

    It might be argued that it was improper of Winnipeg to even ask for
    country but I guess it's one of those "WSFS Constitution didn't
    envision where this would matter" - but here it absolutely can do that
    given the voting options.

    We don't know whether the idea of requesting country came from the
    Winnipeg bid or just from Kevin Standlee - he was there as one of
    their representatives so in theory he could have decided it on the
    spot without consulting.

    In some ways I hope it wasn't Winnipeg's idea, even without the
    publishing I consider it much to far down a very slippery slope!

    I wouldn't be surprised if we see people suggesting WSFS Constitution
    changes to try to close this problem in some way but I suspect it may
    already be too late for this year so I expect the earliest any changes
    related to this could get their second ratification would be in 2023 -
    the WSFS Constitution makes it hard to make any changes to allow
    people to cool down.


    Winnipeg say he was fired as an advisor for "acting without consulting
    the bid’s senior management" - this doesn't narrow down the options,
    it could be either option. So I'll try to assume the best on both -
    even if both can't be true at the same time :-)

    I don't think either Winnipeg or the Business Meeting needed much time
    to conclude that he couldn't remain.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
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