I saw interesting discussion on this forum and created an account a few months ago. However, I'm not able to comment on existing posts/topics.

I also see that my account has 0 reputation. Perhaps that is why? I think it would be helpful if there was an explanation of how reputation was accumulated and what privileges are granted as reputation is earned. And also what one needs to do to be able to comment on existing posts.

@cfrank I initially created an account on this forum after I stumbled upon a thread about "A tweak to IRV to make it a Condorcet method".

It could perhaps generate more lively discussion if new users can comment. Sometimes new people will be more comfortable with a small comment contributing to an ongoing discussion rather than start a whole new topic. Of course though there is a trade-off with potentially more spam. Just a thought to consider.

@wolftune Oh I see, the link is just from someone's website not something you wrote up. Got it, sorry.

I guess where I had seen the description of a "simplified variant" was on the ElectoWiki site, at the bottom of the page. https://electowiki.org/wiki/Bottom-Two-Runoff_IRV

Simplified Variant
If you remove the redistribution step, leaving the candidates in the initial 1st choice sort order for the entire process, BTR-IRV becomes precinct summable. Vote counting only requires the 1st choice vote counts and the pairwise preference matrix from each precinct, not the complete ranking counts.

I think it's an interesting difference. Using your paper ballot example, this would mean putting the ballots into piles based on first choices only, and never redistributing them for the purposes of selecting the bottom two candidates in any round. This is what I understood from that write-up that is linked, as it does not mention any redistribution. It's "simpler" in the sense that you can skip the redistribution process at each step. It is also "simpler" in the compilation complexity sense, that it is precinct summable.

It raises an interesting question- if someone were to go to an IRV advocate and pitch them on a tweak, which variant to propose? BTR-IRV with distribution is closer to traditional IRV, so perhaps that is a reason to propose it, as it is more similar to traditional IRV. But on the other hand, BTR-IRV without distribution is simpler in some ways, which can be viewed as a virtue as well.

It's also worth thinking about how much the distinction matters in practice. Curious if anyone has thoughts on that.

@wolftune My understanding is there are two variations of BTR-IRV. One simpler variant in which the bottom two candidates are only ever determined based on first choice votes, and a second variant in which the eliminated candidates have votes transferred to remaining candidates for determining the next round's bottom two.

In your write-up, you describe the simpler variant that is only ever based on first-choice votes. I like that variant better because it is simpler. Was that an intentional decision on your part? Is it important to you that votes not be transferred, or would you be okay with either method?

As an aside, in your write-up on the website the description of IRV does not mention the step where votes are transferred from eliminated candidates.

@toby-pereira Ah yes this was it. Confirmed an email address and now I can comment on posts.

It could be worth clarifying this somewhere. Right now on the profile page, in the email section it says:

Please enter your email address below. This forum uses your email address for scheduled digest and notifications, as well as for account recovery in the event of a lost password.

This field is optional. You are not obligated to provide your email address, but without a validated email, you will not be able to recover your account.

I would have figured this out earlier if this page also said something about not being able to comment on other's posts until a user has a validated email.

@cfrank I initially created an account on this forum after I stumbled upon a thread about "A tweak to IRV to make it a Condorcet method".

It could perhaps generate more lively discussion if new users can comment. Sometimes new people will be more comfortable with a small comment contributing to an ongoing discussion rather than start a whole new topic. Of course though there is a trade-off with potentially more spam. Just a thought to consider.

I saw interesting discussion on this forum and created an account a few months ago. However, I'm not able to comment on existing posts/topics.

I also see that my account has 0 reputation. Perhaps that is why? I think it would be helpful if there was an explanation of how reputation was accumulated and what privileges are granted as reputation is earned. And also what one needs to do to be able to comment on existing posts.