[conlang_learners] Conlang learners vote: results

[Philip Newton]

Fellow conlangers!

Amanda, Matthew, and I have counted the votes and have come to the
conclusion that the voting is a tie between Kēlen and gjâ-zym-byn.
Both languages have ten first-place votes (after reassigning votes
from other ballots) out of 20 non-exhausted ballots.

Where multiple languages have the same number of first-place votes, we
used the number of total votes for that language as a tie-breaker;
however, even this was not sufficient to give a clear winner; both
Kēlen and gjâ-zym-byn have 14 votes each.

Jim suggested not assigning equal weight to each language, but to use
linear or exponential backoff (so a first-place vote is worth 1, and
subsequent votes are worth 1 - 0.0X*(place-1) or 0.Y^(place-1)), but
even this did not give a clear winner; they both ended up with a near
tie between Kēlen and gjâ-zym-byn, and which came out first depended
on the method and the exact factor used, with the tie-breaker values
typically being within about 1.5% of each other.

So we've decided to declare the vote a tie; of 20 valid
(non-exhausted) ballots at the end of voting, exactly half were for
each language.

We suggest that those who ranked Kēlen over gjâ-zym-byn or only listed
Kēlen learn Kēlen, those who ranked gjâ-zym-byn over Kēlen or only
listed gjâ-zym-byn learn that language, and that those who picked
neither pick whichever one of the two they prefer.

Participation was 28/58, or 48%, of which one ballot was empty.

A breakdown of the results is now at
http://wiki.frath.net/Conlang_learners/Vote_result ; the presentation
may change a bit as I fiddle with the page but the data should not.

If anyone has questions about the election, the results, their ballot,
or anything else, feel free to ask me or one of the other vote
counters (for example, by sending email to
conlang_learners_vote at conlang.org, which will reach all of us).

For the vote counters,
Philip Newton
-- 
Philip Newton <philip.newton at gmail.com>