6/30/2024
Star voting is a system that has generated some pockets of enthusiasm. It consists of an initial score election (with six scores and the smallest score taken as the default) to narrow the field of candidates followed by an automatic plurality election (using votes derived from the score ballots) to make the final choice. The article suggests that the benefit of this is that the winner can boast winning a majority of votes in that final runoff; I learned of this explanation in a talk on the topic. Following the publication of this article I was told that the actual motivation was star voting's performance in election simulations using randomized votes. However, that cannot be the original motivation; star voting had to already have been a topic of interest before the simulations of it were performed.
10/1/2024
This presents another election, this time with only three candidates, that suffers from the spoiler effect. In addition to vote splitting, the iterative nature of the IRV vote tallies plays an important role. This example should raise alarm bells for other voting systems that use iterative simulated elections.
3/3/2025
Usually, when we compare outcomes of an election when the voting system changes, we assume the voters remain the same and their attitudes toward the candidates remain unchanged. However, in these comparisons, extra voters are seen to come to the polls when they are offered a way to honestly and accurately express themselves. And of course that can change the outcome of the election.
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