Thanks for the detailed explanation @SvenF, it’s much appreciated. I have some questions if that’s okay.
As you mentioned, there was an example of a single node swap proposed around the same time → Proposal: 131703 - ICP Dashboard (internetcomputer.org). Given that this can occur by shear chance (as you explained) I take it this isn’t a strong requirement (to swap a pair). Presumably a proposer should have the freedom to remove one of the pair from the proposal (if it doesn’t make sense), or in practice do they need to stick with what the tool says?
Presumably the proposer could take it upon themself to modify the proposal text? I wonder if it would be even better to state something like “optimizing for a set of decentralisation coefficients referenced by this Motion proposal → Proposal: 125549 - ICP Dashboard (internetcomputer.org)”. These coefficients don’t appear to include some important information, such as geographical distance and diversity of continents (and/or overarching jurisdictions). It seems it would be possible to optimise for the existing coefficients while actually achieving a worse decentralisation outcome in real terms. I think Proposal: 131704 is an example of this.
Assuming that Proposal: 131704 didn’t feature the MU1 data center issue, can I ask if you think it would have been a good proposal to accept (under the terms of “optimizing decentralization”)?