[Wikipedia-l] Re: A simple proposal that will eliminate the problem with strategic voting and cheating

[Björn Lindqvist]

Anytime you have a vote with more than two alternatives you run into 
problems. Any form of approval or average voting is just awful, awful, 
Awful! Condorcet voting is just to complicated. So here is my suggestion:

Split the voting up in multiple yes/no votings.I have been in a 
national's party's congress voting for a new logo and that is how we 
made it; Make a cup out of it. Logo A vs. B, C vs. D, E vs. F, G vs. H. 
(Vinner of A vs. B) vs (vinner of C vs. D), (Vinner of E vs F) vs. 
(Vinner of G vs. H)... you get the point. In sports that system is 
ineffective because placement beyond the first depens on which pairing 
the team gets. But for this voting it is pefect because we only care 
about ONE alternative - the vinner.

One disadvantage is that it takes some more time than other voting 
methods and that is why it is not used for large scale votings. It 
requires 13 separate votings for 16 alternatives. Another is that it 
requires some attention from the voters. A third that someone might 
object to how the alternatives is paired against each other. Should X 
face Y and Z face O, or should O face X and Z face Y? That problem is 
solved by letting a computer randomize the pairings.

But we can run the voting rounds simultaneously. If we have 16 
candidates we can first run the 1/8's voting rounds simultaneously. Then 
the quarter final round, semi final round and the final round. That is 
four rounds and if we let each round take one month we are done in 
January. Yes, that is a long time but a decision that involves so many 
people and seems to be so important should be allowed to take the time 
it needs! But we could instead have each round being two weeks long and 
be done in eight weeks which definitely is not to much time.

We could even have used that method for the first voting stage.

Regardless of which method we use the last voting absolutely, 
positively, definitely needs to be "Should this logo replace the 
existing logo?". Maybe that question should have been the first to vote 
about but it's to late to change that now.

BL