JIB Awards – Voting Method

Meryl has suggested (well, actually implored) that I only allow everyone to vote only once in the finals voting round, rather than one vote per 24 hours. This suggestion has merits – for a start, it will be easier to identify any cheating.

 

I am torn. I understand where she is coming from, but one vote per 24 hours enables one person to vote for a few blogs in any one category (in case someone has more than one preference). Also, I thought that it may add to the excitement if you can vote a number of times.

 

I am opening up this thread to your comments and suggestions. What do you think is the better option, and why?

16 thoughts on “JIB Awards – Voting Method”

  1. I would suggest that you can vote for any blog once, and you can vote in each category say 3 times. That way you can vote for several candidates if you wish.

    I don’t know if your software will do this, but can you rank each vote?

  2. Well its too bad your limited by the software you are using, and I don’t suggest you look for different software becuase well think about how much the FBI wasted.

    I would probibly say go with the one vote each, becuase of all the cheating that leads to skewed results online, and it looks like people already tried here. Blocking IPs and giving one vote each won’t solve all the problems, but its a step in the right direction. Just think about the indelible ink they are using in elections, imagine having it insead wipe off every 24 hours and having another day of voting, that would be like asking for cheating.

    yah, just my random two cents

  3. My preference from a competetion standpoint would be for the 1 vote per 24 hours. And I believe that most lesser known blogs would prefer that too. But that’s from a standpoint of what constitutes my best chance of possibly competing with the big boys – or in the case of Meryl, girls.

    I really think you should do what is easiest for you.

  4. As to the ‘why’… the categories are pretty will defined. Having people voting every 24 hours encourages an endless litanly of ‘vote for me… vote for me’ blog entries for the entire time the polls are open. Having only one vote to cast per category might make people think more carefully about how they use it and (here’s the good part) they actually go investigate some of the less familiar blogs to see if they are worthy. Isn’t that really the point.

  5. Your software can support multiple votes by having a yes/no question (which would really be just a yes) for each blog.

    Since the REAL purpose is not to win, but to generate publicity, I would propose a condition for the candidates to post links to all competitors on their blog. (Just give us some time to do this, say before the END of the voting, and send email notification before voting starts.)

    How does ISP blocking work for dialups?

  6. Hmm. It would be interesting if there were a way to use a rank system voting. I mean to let folks number their preferences. That is, place a 1 next to the one you think deserves first place, 2 for second, etc. If there are 12 options in the category the “1” gets 12 points, “2” gets 11 points etc. Then see how many points each one gets. (Or just add up the ranks straight and the lowest one wins.) Then only let people vote once. There must be some application out there that can do this and it would solve the problem. Plus this form of voting makes sense for the Gold, Silver, Bronze format – they often use this type of rank system in the Olympics for example.

  7. I think one vote, one person, and have the contest on one day. That won’t leave huge numbers under the categories, but it will be exciting to have it all in one day, and you will have all of the blogs posting about you for that day.

    Plus, what does it matter if people can vote for one or multiple blogs? The point is to pick who you think is the BEST in each category. I know its tough for some of them, but thats the point of a contest!

  8. I agree with SKZebulon about having the polls open for one day… if all votes have to be in within 24 hours it will make the contest more fair and exciting.

    I suggest you make it a democracy – one person, one vote.

  9. I think one vote is good – though I am not clear exactly how it affects cheating since the system blocked my IP from voting in the same category for 24 hours anyways. People should vote for the one they think is best.

    Don’t do it for just one day though as some people only check in to our blogs every few days and that would limit their ability to vote. Give it at least 4/5 days.

    Thanks.

  10. I agree with one vote for each person, but voting should be longer than just one day. After all, I have heard rumors that there are really people out there who are not on the internet every day.

  11. I think you should go with the one person=one vote ruling, for most of the reasons already enumerated…encourages people to think about their choices, and prevents the “Vote for me” blog entries.

  12. Actually, the one vote wasn’t to make it easier for the bigger blogs to win. It’s just to make it easier overall. I thought keep the same time period–a week–but let people have one vote for each category, period. Frankly, most of my readers don’t vote, no matter how plaintive I get. It’s the same people voting every day who make a difference. I simply don’t think voting once every 24 hours does anything but draw the voting out and result in interminable pleas to vote for us.

    And SoccerDad, I’d be happy to withdraw my blog from any category where I don’t think it belongs, like in humor or personal (don’t think it made the cut in the latter, though). The only categories I’d have suggested myself for were Overall and Israel Advocacy. And Best Post.

  13. I realize this is late to the party, but here’s an idea (maybe for next time.)

    I don’t know if your software can do this, but how about giving each voter a set number of votes to distribute as they will. The number should be more than the number of categories (14?), say by a factor of 1.5 or 2.

    Then we could “spend” them any way we wanted… all 21 votes on one blog in “best mega blog” and nothing anywhere else; one vote in each of the categories and then 7 votes to spread around, etc.

    This would essentially give us the ability to weight our votes. “I not only like FrumDad for Best Blog Ever, but I like him so much I’m going to vote for him to the exclusion of being able to vote in any of the other categories.” Or, “FrumDad is the best out of this list, but he’s not so hot. Here’s a vote for him, but I’ll spend my attention elsewhere.” Or, “FrumDad and SomeOtherBlog are better than these others listed, but about even with each other, so I can vote for each of them twice and move along.” And so on.

    Just an idea.

    –FD

    [Google Wangle: Orthodox Jewish Father]

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