ENnies discussion thread

[Nisarg]

Allow me to elaborate further with a specific example.

If an award for artwork had Nobilis on it, I would have to give it an 8 or 9; or Cover Art might even warrant a 10.

If it was an overall award, however, I would give Nobilis a 1. I think its a lousy work, filled with disgusting pretentious drivel, horrible structure making it harder to understand than your typical calculus textbook, sloppy editing, terrible prose, an abhorrent game system, and it may have given my cat syphilis.
Therefore I give it a 1. You, in your infinite wisdom of judging me of "falsely" giving a 1, are really just imposing your opinion that Nobilis "isn't actually all that bad" on my vote.
I KNOW there are people who think Nobilis isn't all that bad; let them give it a 3, or 5, or 10, or whatever they want to. TO ME, for reasons I justify within myself, Nobilis IS that bad, and merits the 1.
I'm not giving it the 1 to help some other item 1, I'm giving it the 1 because I despise it as a work, intellectually and emotionally, and this is my way of defecating on it and all it stands for.
Its hate-based voting at its finest.

Now, you're saying that if I happen to give Nobilis a 1 and some other truly excellent product (let's say Amber) that happened to be in the same category (let's say "best diceless game of all time") a 10, you will annul my vote. Even though I LEGITIMATELY feel Nobilis deserves a 1 and Amber a 10. My giving Nobilis the 1 has nothing to do with my giving Amber the 10, I gave each that because of how I really feel about them.

Now, I know you said you only annulled people gave a single 10 and all the rest 1s, but that could also conceivably happen, particularly in my case it could happen in the example I used, as NONE of the diceless games I know of are any good at all with the exception of Amber, which is excellent. So in that category, I would have all 1s in every other entry I knew. So unless by a stroke of luck there was an item I didn't know and marked N/A, you would have annulled my LEGITIMATE vote because of your perceptions about how I voted the 1.

As soon as you start being the judge of how you imagine people's thought-processes were running when they voted, you enter into slippery-slope territory. What if someone gives a 1 to a product you happen to hate, will you then be as quick to judge their vote "unjustified"? At least to some extent, then, it all turns into being about what you personally believe a product merits or doesn't merit.

Nisarg

 

[Nisarg]

Err.... yeah. Isn't that what this thread is about doing? It's kinda the whole point of the discussion.

And the implication that I want to make this anything but as fair as possible ("tossing out anyone who doesn't vote for the side you want to win") is not appreciated.

It isn't an implication about what you're doing, its a warning about where you could end up leading yourself, maybe even without recognizing it. Hell, unless you think you're incorruptible (and frankly, I'm the only incorruptible person on earth, so you're not in the running on that one), I am just advising you to be damn careful about making yourself an arbitrer in any way that might lead you to unconciously make judgement calls based on your own biases.

Any vote-counting system that allows the vote-counter to make a judgement call where that even MIGHT come into account is inherently flawed.

Nisarg

 

[Morrus]

Now, you're saying that if I happen to give Nobilis a 1 and some other truly excellent product (let's say Amber) that happened to be in the same category (let's say "best diceless game of all time") a 10, you will annul my vote. Even though I LEGITIMATELY feel Nobilis deserves a 1 and Amber a 10. My giving Nobilis the 1 has nothing to do with my giving Amber the 10, I gave each that because of how I really feel about them.

No, I thought it would be a cool idea to allow an ENnies discussion thread; to even host it myself on my website and let everyone hash out which voting system seemed best. Evil, aren't I?

Now, I know you said you only annulled people gave a single 10 and all the rest 1s, but that could also conceivably happen, particularly in my case it could happen in the example I used, as NONE of the diceless games I know of are any good at all with the exception of Amber, which is excellent. So in that category, I would have all 1s in every other entry I knew. So unless by a stroke of luck there was an item I didn't know and marked N/A, you would have annulled my LEGITIMATE vote because of your perceptions about how I voted the 1.

Last year, I did that, yes. I figured I'd play the odds. As you say, it could conceivably happen. Possibly. If you used an Infinite Probability Drive. Maybe, just maybe, one of the many thousands of votes was genuinely like this and got lost because of the system. I very much doubt it, but if it did, I'd rather lose one vote out of thousands than have dozens of non-genuine votes of that type. That's fairer to the publishers.

As soon as you start being the judge of how you imagine people's thought-processes were running when they voted, you enter into slippery-slope territory. What if someone gives a 1 to a product you happen to hate, will you then be as quick to judge their vote "unjustified"? At least to some extent, then, it all turns into being about what you personally believe a product merits or doesn't merit.

No slippery slope. I didn't look at the votes themselves. The system was in place before anyone voted, and automatically rejected that specific voting pattern. Furthermore, people were warned about it beforehand. Let's turn this discussion directly away from any possible perception that anyone is looking at votes and making personal judgements.

Anyway, this discussion is pointless. We're attempting to come up with a fair voting system which works as best it can. There are plenty of ideas above, there may be more ideas.

 

[Morrus]

It isn't an implication about what you're doing, its a warning about where you could end up leading yourself, maybe even without recognizing it. Hell, unless you think you're incorruptible (and frankly, I'm the only incorruptible person on earth, so you're not in the running on that one), I am just advising you to be damn careful about making yourself an arbitrer in any way that might lead you to unconciously make judgement calls based on your own biases.

Any vote-counting system that allows the vote-counter to make a judgement call where that even MIGHT come into account is inherently flawed.

OK, that really is enough of this line of coversation, please, Nisarg. Nobody looked at the votes - not even me. It was a script. The rules applied globally and automatically. This whole administrative bias concept is completely irrelevant to the reality of how the system actually worked that it's not even worth discussing. It's taking valuable attention away from the important issues being discussed above.

 

[BigFreekinGoblinoid]

... But last year, we did discard all "10/1/1/1/1" ballots. I refused to believe that anybody honestly considered 4 out of 5 nominated products, which had been selected for their quality by five judges, to all be worth only a 1, and the other - coincidentally - to be worth a 10. The odds on that being an honest vote are so remote that it's not even worth the effort of debating whether it might be. ...

Scrubbing results data like this ( removal of data anomalies ) is standard practice for online data collection. I used to sell online market research projects for Survey.com, and our average project was over $20K, so you can bet our clients wanted to see the raw data too, but without exception, they approved of our standard data cleansing proceedures. If you vote this way, your vote was wasted. "When in doubt, throw it out!" 10/Don't Know/Don't Know/Don't Know/Don't Know is the way to go if you are only familiar with one product.

I'd like to wish everyone involved with the ENnies process smooth sailing and good luck this year. I'd considered running for judge again this time, but frankly, this year is going to be much busier for me with a baby on the way, an increased workload, and no GenCon possibility, so I wouldn't be able to devote the attention the job deserves even if I did manage to win a seat .

Conail and Fusangite seem to have the technical speak flowing, but if you need any assistance from a salesguy who needs to explain some simple options in laymans terms, let me know!

 

[Morrus]

Scrubbing results data like this ( removal of data anomalies ) is standard practice for online data collection. I used to sell online market research projects for Survey.com, and our average project was over $20K, so you can bet our clients wanted to see the raw data too, but without exception, they approved of our standard data cleansing proceedures. If you vote this way, your vote was wasted. "When in doubt, throw it out!" 10/Don't Know/Don't Know/Don't Know/Don't Know is the way to go if you are only familiar with one product.

Yeah, the system was borrowed wholesale from a company whose job it is to do market research. They have hundreds of thousands of pounds resting on accurate data survey results, and they use data cleansing procedures. If it's good enough for them and their large investments, it's good enough for me.

As you say, it's a standard procedure.

 

[Crothian]

They didn't. I distinctly remember being warned of that in advance; in fact I told all my friends voting for me to make sure to vote honestly and don't down-grade the other products "stragecially."

I wanted every positive vote I could get to count. (Didn't help, but still...)


Wulf

In fact people we warned two years ago as well as last year I believe.

 

[Crothian]

As soon as you start being the judge of how you imagine people's thought-processes were running when they voted, you enter into slippery-slope territory. What if someone gives a 1 to a product you happen to hate, will you then be as quick to judge their vote "unjustified"? At least to some extent, then, it all turns into being about what you personally believe a product merits or doesn't merit.

They don't look at what the vote was for or what category it is in. They only see what the voting pattern is and get rid of votes based on that. THe Products and categories do not enter into it.

 

[Campbell]

In order to frame a worthwile debate of voting systems that goes beyond pure academics, I believe we need to determine exactly what the aim of an Ennies vote is. I would argue that we should be awarding the ENNIES to the best product within the field of choices for a particular award, and indvidual votes should be reflective of this aim. If my assumption is correct, AV doesn't pass muster because with AV there is no distinction between a vote of approval and a vote for the best candidate within a field. Without a measure of quality within the voting system which is used, whether through rankings, ratings, or simply a singular vote for the best candidate, I'd argue that voters would in no way be making worthwhile selections. While AV is great at selecting the least objectable candidate within a field, having an unobjectable candidate is not a worthwhile measure for any award.

In general, I'd prefer if we could turn away from the discourse of the political viability of these voting systems. I don't believe that these forums are the appropriate place for such discussions.

 

[Crothian]

Easy for you to say

But, you are right of course - I just think it is a very steep uphill climb.

It is easy to say because I made the climb. Someone might make it this year, I really don't know. Even if you don't make it, don't fret too much. If you are coming to Gen Con, help out at the booth and get involved in another way.