CSM 11 Elections Begin – Xenuria 2016

It is that time of year again, the long threatened CSM 11 elections are upon us.  Information on how to vote is available from CCP here.

Reactions to the election range from the very earnest attempt by a group of hard working volunteers to collect information for voters over at CSM Watch (all summed up here) to… well… Gevlon’s call for a boycott.  Meanwhile, somewhere out there, a majority of EVE Online players have probably barely noticed that the election is happening, given voter turn out in past elections.

Confusion reigns and, with 53 candidates on the ballot, that seems like a pretty reasonable response.  I certainly couldn’t tell you who to vote for, or much about any of the candidates running.  At least there aren’t 75 of them like last time.

Back in The Imperium, the suggested GSF ballot has been posted.  While the coalition leadership was unhappy with the communications break down between CCP and CSM X, the pragmatic response has been to endorse a slate of candidates so, if communication improves, we won’t be left without a voice on the CSM. The list is:

1. Aryth  GSF
2. Innominate  GSF
3. Xenuria  GSF
4. Sullen Decimus  BASTN
5. The Judge  CO2
6. Annexe  TNT
7. Kyle Aparthos  SMA
8. Chiimera  GSF
9. Wyld  GSF
10. Kane Carnifex LAWN
11. Mining Forman  LAWN
12. commander aze
13. Apothne  PL
14. Tora Bushido

It was interesting to see that, unlike previous years, the official ballot has only a single non-Imperium null sec alliance candidate listed, Apothne of Pandemic Legion, in the 13th slot. In the past there has been some horse trading between null sec groups to support a common front.  Not so much this year I guess.

Of course, as with the full slate of candidates, I can barely tell you anything about people on that ballot.  Aryth is in GSF leadership, Innominate is the new Solo Drakban, Tora Bushido runs the Marmites, who used to take Gevlon’s money to shoot us in high sec before breaking with him, Annexe is in my alliance, and I follow Chiimera on Twitter, but I thought he stopped playing EVE at one point.

Not a very helpful set of descriptions.

And then there is Xenuria.

He might be the candidate I know the most about.

He ran last year and, if I recall right, managed 18th place which, given the rate of removal for CSM X, put him in contention to be a replacement member before the end.  He got that much following without an alliance endorsement.  This year he has the number 3 spot on the GSF ballot.

Of course, that doesn’t make some people happy.  A year ago Xenuria was an object of ridicule in many parts of the coalition, and the punchline for any joke requiring the most unlikely individual for most of us.  And then he appeared on the Meta Show with The Mittani back in August and seemed pretty reasonable. (His segment on YouTube.)

Soon enough he was in KarmaFleet and out on ops with people and posting to the forums and it wasn’t really a big deal any more.  I’ve been on fleets with him.  He aligns, shoots the primary, and shows better coms discipline than the average Goon LAWN ENL-I AM0K SNOO SMA Imperium pilot.

However, some people are pissed off that he has made the list. (Example)  So I will be interested to see how he fares this time.  He is literally the person on the Goon ballot mostly likely to piss off people who make the claim to be “true Goons” or some such.  If he gets support from outside of the coalition he ought to make it in.  And he could be EVE Online’s red shirt guy or something… though Mittens seems to have claimed the red shirt thing for himself.  Make of that what you will.

As for the vote, I suspect that the top five candidates on that ballot are probably pretty safe bets, given the reality of alliance sizes and voter turn out.  Poor voter turn out could up that number.

Top Five Alliances by Member Count

The election runs until March 25, so you have plenty of time to vote… so long as the servers stay up.  The results will be announced at Fanfest on April 21, 2016.

I’m still of the opinion that having players elect a pseudo-focus group is the wrong way to go about things and that the lack of agency or specific mandate or focus is problematic at best.  But if we’re going to have this thing, let’s at least put some effort into it… said the person who put next to no effort into it.