request for discussion on improving voting

[David Lang]

I have been saying for a bit that I think the current voting rules allow
significant decisions to be made by too small a group of people. I think it
would be good for HSL if we had more people voting on significant issues.

as a strawman for what a significant issue is, I would say an expense >$1000 or
a change to the bylaws

arguments against changing voting seem to boil down to

1. we've done it this way for a long time

2. if we don't require people to vote in person at a HYH, we won't have people
to clean the lab

3. if someone doesn't rearrange their life to attend the HYH, they don't care
enough about HSL so should have no say in what happens (no matter how much
time/money they spend on the lab outside of the HSL meetings)

I obviously disagree with these three arguments. Improvements always change
things, I don't think we will fail to clean the lab without requring votes to
happen at HYH (most HYH meetings don't have a vote take place anyway), and I
think that work/family/religious obligations should take priority over HSL
obligations.



A few months ago, I threw out three proposals (that were intended to be
discussion starters) earlier, and was told to withdraw them as proposals until
everything was hammered out and there was no 'we could do this or that' type
language in them.

my thoughts are:

1. require that significant proposals get approved by two consecutive HYH
meetings (one thursday, one saturday)

we have different people attending these meetings. When there was a discussion
of cancelling a HYH scheduled for after Christmas, at the thursday meeting the
vote was something like 12-1 to cancel, while at the saturday meeting there was
far more discussion and the vote was something like 5-4.

2. allow in-person voting over a week

objections were that the host would have to check people off a list

3. allow electronic voting

objections were that people who are paying memberships, but not showing up in
the lab would be able to vote, and such people should have no say (because
paying membership is not contributing to the lab)


In my earlier proposals, I went into detail for how I proposed to decide if
enough people had voted to satisfy quorum and other technical details. In this
discussion I'm hoping to first see if enough people agree that it would be
better to have more people vote or not, and if so, talk about options (not just
the three that I listed above), and only later to dive into the details of how
to implement the options.

Thoughts?

David Lang

[Moheeb Zara]

No. 

Decisions should be made by people who come to the space. This is a lesson learned by hackerspace after hackerspace after hackerspace. 

It also shouldn't be a complex process or an overly policed process. Simple process. Show up, we discuss, we decide as a community. If you didn't show up then your voice wasnt heard, that means show up and be part of the community. Otherwise you get into endless armchair debates and nothing ever gets done and people who never show up or dont know anything about the space end up making decisions that affect people that do. 

I'd concede only in that allowing people to attend remotely wouldnt be terrible, and possibly even voting remotely for certain things. But that gets complicated in figuring out the specifics. So best to "Keep It Simple Stupid"

The problem is that we aren't making an effort to make HYH something people feel comfortable attending. There was a time where HYH was an enjoyable experience that brought us closer as a community. Its become to beauricratic. 

[David Lang]

Moheeb Zara wrote:

> No.
>
> Decisions should be made by people who come to the space. This is a lesson
> learned by hackerspace after hackerspace after hackerspace.

People come to the space other than on HYH times. If they have
work/family/religious conflicts on the HYH times, why should they have no say if
they spend time at the space otherwise?

David Lang

[Eric Wood]

I support the idea of online voting. As an inactive-paying member, I think the ability of online voting would keep me more engaged and likely to remain a paying member. The ability to cast a vote would raise the bar, for me, in staying engaged in the discussion and understanding the arguments for and against. If a particular issue captures my interest, I would be more likely to attend the meeting in-person, if possible, so that they can engage in the discussion.

[Jay McGavren]

I see two possibilities with remote voting:

1. We get more "moderates" voting. We finally hear from the people who aren't willing to sit through the more dramatic/tedious aspects of Hack Your Hackerspace.

2. We start seeing the voter manipulation we've been afraid of. People privately and secretly message select portions of our membership encouraging them to vote a certain way. With no knowledge or opportunity for rebuttal by the other side.

Or maybe both, or maybe neither.

-Jay

[Luis Montes]

I'm 100% opposed to online voting for heatsync.  It completely changes the dynamic into something I'm not at all interested in.

There's historically been plenty of armchair quarterbacking on this list by people that dont show up.  No reason to let people that don't physically participate in the space have a say in what the makers actually do.

I've been seeing way too many cool things happen lately at heatsync to ruin it by making it virtual.  Doing that during covid might have been a necessity, but we were worse off for it.

Heatysnc is a physical space, not just an online community.   Use reddit for that.

-Luis

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[Brett Neese]

I’m also not sure why HYH needs to be tedious or dramatic. The best parts of HYH are when we’re showcasing the work the community is doing and putting into the space and the cool things we’re building.

I don’t know how we move past the bureaucracy and focus on the joy, but introducing extra processes (when we barely understand current process) ain’t it.

If we can make HYH more celebratory and less bureaucratic then I think having some way of participating remotely wouldn’t be a bad thing. We’re not there, though, we have to focus on the culture first. 

Brett

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[Rick Blake]

I agree with Luis, and for the same reasons. I'm working on accepting change, but changes should be solving problems or improving the Lab. 

Yet, I'm now looking at how I can help members participate in HYH. If it's transportation, speak up. I may be able to help with that. If it's availability, I understand - my availability is limited, and has been crafted around HYH. It is a struggle for me, but I would not expect the membership to accommodate my schedule alone. My opinion is not fixed yet, but I'm currently not in favor. We are walking the line between apparent non-representative participation and the reality of many organizations and the limited participation that is often the norm, not the exception. And, perhaps, understanding the differences between interest, investment, and participation. If we had 30+ showing up at HYH regularly, this would not be so much of an issue, but would that be enough?

On Mon, Feb 16, 2026 at 1:17 PM Luis Montes <mont...@gmail.com> wrote:

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[Rick Blake]

That may be, Brett, but that's only part of what HYH is and was intended to be. 

[David Lang]

Jay McGavren wrote:

> I see two possibilities with remote voting:
>
> 1. We get more "moderates" voting. We finally hear from the people who
> aren't willing to sit through the more dramatic/tedious aspects of Hack
> Your Hackerspace.
>
> 2. We start seeing the voter manipulation we've been afraid of. People
> privately and secretly message select portions of our membership
> encouraging them to vote a certain way. With no knowledge or opportunity
> for rebuttal by the other side.

we already have seen some of this out of sight contact/discussion with in-person
voting

David Lang

[David Lang]

For those who are so utterly opposed to online voting, there are now three other
possibilities for you to consider and weigh in on

1. requireing significant things to pass at both a thursday and saturday HYH
2. in-person voting over a week so that everyone has a chance to vote no matter
their normal schedule
3. (listed by others here) remote participation and voting during a HYH

My purpose isn't to disenfranchise anyone, just get more people voting on
significant things.

Luis says

> There's historically been plenty of armchair quarterbacking on this list by
> people that dont show up. No reason to let people that don't physically
> participate in the space have a say in what the makers actually do.

do they not show up at the Lab at all? or just not show up at the right HYH
meetings? I see many people at the lab on a regular basis that I do not see at
HYH meetings.

David Lang

[Rick Blake]

Define 'significant', please. 

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[David Lang]

Rick Blake wrote:

> Define 'significant', please.

as a strawman, I've proposed soemthing like $1k-$3k in expense or a bylaw change

David Lang