I'll also point out that the Diebolt-o-tron is used for all sorts of 
code4lib voting. Usually there are many options, as with conference 
proposals and t-shirt design. I will grant that weighted voting may 
seem a bit over-flexible when there are only two options, but it works
quite well as a general solution.

-Tod

On Apr 1, 2013, at 1:45 PM, Erik Hetzner <[log in to unmask]>
 wrote:

> At Mon, 1 Apr 2013 12:01:13 -0400,
> David J. Fiander wrote:
>> 
>> So, I just voted for the Code4Lib 2014 location. There are two possible
>> venues, and I was given three points to apportion however I wish.
>> 
>> While having multiple votes, to spread around at will, makes a lot of
>> sense, shouldn't the number of votes each elector is granted be limited
>> to max(3, count(options)-1)? That is, when voting for a binary, I get
>> one vote, when voting on a choice of three items, I get two votes, and
>> for anything more than three choices, I get three votes?
>> 
>> I mean, realistically, one could give one vote to Austin and two votes
>> to Raleigh, but why bother?
> 
> Hi David,
> 
> You actually can vote 0-3 on any option, for as many total votes as
> you like.
> 
> The optimal strategy, assuming that you actually prefer one option to
> another, is to vote 3 for the option you prefer and 0 for all others.
> 
> To slightly change the subject, systems are a policy decision, not a
> technical problem. In the case of voting for presentations (more
> important to me that conference location), different voting systems
> will generate a different mix of presentations. Think of the
> difference between the American congress and a parliamentary system.
> 
> The question is, does code4lib want conference presentations that are
> more “first past the post” [1] or more representative of the diversity
> of interests of the code4lib crowd (like a parliamentary system). The
> existing system reduces to a first past the post system, which means
> that the presentations which more people prefer win, rather than
> presentations that a smaller group of people might feel strongly
> about.
> 
> This is a question that shouldn’t be decided by the technology; the
> policy should decide the technology. A google form might work, and
> certainly hand-counted emailed votes would, given the relative
> smallness of the c4l community.
> 
> Those who are interested can read more here:
> 
>  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_system
> 
> best, Erik
> 
> 1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-past-the-post_voting
> Sent from my free software system <http://fsf.org/>.