Council Members/Voting Questions

I have a couple of questions that weren't addressed in the other thread about this, and I'm sure that there are a few more members that have some questions too. Since the other thread kind of moved on to a campaign area, I feel it might be reasonable to start a thread just for questions about this.

The main thing I'm curious about is the timeline for the nomination and voting periods. How long before the candidates are announced? When does the actual voting begin? If there isn't an actual timeline yet, what exactly is the criteria? I mean, are you waiting for X number of nominations, the next lunar eclipse, ...???

I also would like a little more detail on the responsibilities and capabilities of the new positions. Are they just representatives to the staff? Are they "assistant mods" in any way?

I really like the idea, or at least what I know of it. If nothing else, just getting the membership involved in the organizational process is great.

Every time you split an existing board business topic, another coding elf dies.

And Christmas will never come if we keep killing the coding elves will it?