So a few overall thoughts here.
- I saw your call for a Motion, and mentally thought "I'll come back and
read through the arguments before supporting" then never did. Not so much
Apathy or stigma against filing, but losing track of it, in part because
all the facts weren't immediately at hand. Just a personal data point.
But I have a hypothesis that publishing all the case material together
in one place again finally might help - I remember in the past half the
motions/appeals would arise in response to the CotC's case log while the
initial act of judging itself was ignored. So if I can keep this up for
a bit it would be interesting to see if that helps.
- Part of the real fun of judging, which is work, is role-playing some
of the courtroom drama. The ability to drop a key judgement with
dramatic and immediate effect I think really adds to the flavor of play,
and I think losing that ability with a mandatory delay process (or
adding too many extra steps) would take away from that - and finding
enough volunteer judges for the list is a regular challenge. That said,
I think ENCOURAGING (rather than requiring) drafts is a good thing.
- I really like the idea of obiter dicta, there might be a few good ways
to implement that.
- If you want to lower the bar on motions, since Motions only require
support, have you thought about a Contract? "Lowering the Bar contract:
any player CAN [use clever pun verb] to act on behalf of its members to
support an intent to support a Motion to Reconsider". (if two other
players agree with you, anyone can use it).
- You've left Moots alone, but I've never been super-happy with Moots.
I think the voting drags on, and many people are apathetic to the
voting. The frequency of Moots has dropped way way below the old Court
of Appeals[*] (though some of this is because filing Motions is easier
now). It might be interesting to bring a stronger "appeals voice" back.
[* Description: Instead of moots, appeals went to a 3-member appeals
board with partially fixed membership (varied over time, but e.g.
Speaker, Arbitor, one random). This encouraged an appeals process where
appeals opinions and writing were part of the process and precedence (as
opposed to Moots which add nothing to the record). It also encouraged
more courtroom/election drama: "we'll never get this appeal through
with the current Speaker - better call an election!" to the extent that
you could name some of our game times "eras" (e.g. "under the Lee Court,
don't expect much mercy for criminals!") and more tactical barring (if
you were barred from a case you were replaced on its appeals board).]
On 6/14/2019 8:16 PM, omd wrote:
On Fri, Jun 14, 2019 at 6:56 PM Jason Cobb <jason.e.c...@gmail.com> wrote:
Would such a section become precedent just as the normal part of a
judgment would, or would it be purely informational?
I'd say it shouldn't need to be a separate section at all. If the
comment is unavailing, then sure, tack on an sentence at the end about
why it's wrong. But if it convinces the judge to change eir
reasoning, then e may want to integrate the response to the comment
into a revised version of eir main arguments. So it's simplest to not
legally distinguish the main judgement and responses to
counterarguments, and just say that the revised judgement has to
address the counterarguments. Ergo, responses to counterarguments
would have the same precedential value.
That said, I'd interpret the precedent system (as it exists today) as
having the same concept of "obiter dicta" as in real law: if an
argument made in a judgement is only marginally related to the case at
hand, it should only count as weak precedent, regardless of what
section of the judgement it's in.
