These are all interesting and valid points you bring up.
For the exact reason you specified (Most people can't be trusted with any power), the power of elected staff members is actually very low. Illustrating this requires explaining how I have changed the election system since I originally posted this.
Every three weeks hold elections. The ballot consists of anybody who meets the requirements, signed up to be on the ballot, and has no serious* history of punishment on the server.
The requirements to be put on the ballot are:
- You must have played on the server for at least 3 weeks
- You must have never received any punishment more than a warning
- Winning must not put you above the term limit (More on this later)
- You must be independently approved by 50% of the permanent staff members
The people elected in weekly elections receive a "Helper" rank as helper, they can:
- Directly contact permanent staff
- Vote on punishments for certain users
- Act as 1/2 of a vote on ballots regular users aren't trusted with
- Directly request questions be placed on next weeks ballot
- Jail users for up to 1 hour
- Mute users for up to 1 hour
- Kick users
- Join during whitelisted maintenance
Every other election (Once every 6 weeks), users can run for a moderator position. The requirements for this position are more stringent.
- Must have played on the server for at least 1 month
- Must have been elected for Helper position at least 1 time
- Being elected must not cause you to exceed any term limits.
- Must be approved by 60% of permanent staff members
The three top voted people in the election will be put on a staff only ballot. The current permanent staff members vote, and the winner becomes moderator after a briefing and short test on the rules, plus a stress test with a fake griefer and some fake rule breakers.
Term limits are as follows:
- You can't be Helper more than 3 elections in a row
- You can't be a Moderator more than 2 elections in a row
- If you have reached a term limit, a 3 election cool down is required before you can run for that cycle again (if you were Helper for 3 terms, you need to wait 3 elections before you can run again, if you were moderator, you need to wait 3 MODERATOR elections before you can run again (3*2 = 6 total elections))
This complex set is in place to prevent any one user from becoming vastly more powerful than any other good-standing community member.
Your second point: People don't actually know what they want
For decisions deemed too dangerous to give to the public (Anything that could drastically alter essentials parts of the game play (Economy, Valuable items, Game-Altering plugins, etc.) Is put on a ballot only accessible by permanent staff.
And for your third point, that favoritism is a serious problem.
That's really the purpose of the elections. Get the input of the people staff otherwise don't take the input of, and do something with that. It's not to put people in power, it's to find what the members of the community want, and do that, to keep as many people as possible interested and playing on the server.
