I can see a number of possible issues with the ranking system.
First, judging by what I have read here on this site and especially if you add aspect ranking in addition to the overall ranking each plant (as per my earlier suggestion), a lot of people who propose plants would not only vote agree on the plant they propose but would do so on others as well, perhaps including ones already listed prior to their proposal. In which case, to have a vote for one's proposal count as a simultaneous vote against all other proposals is flawed at best. The more transparent your methodology, the more trust it will engender and encourage participation as well as trust in the eventual results reporting. It would be more transparent and more accurate to either (a) only count a person's proposal as their vote for their plant without counting it as a vote against all other plant proposals OR (b) not assign any votes by the person proposing at the time they submit a plant proposal (they could then vote for it, and against others if they so choose, after submission).
The current methodology raises questions: Once a person proposes a plant, could they then vote agree on any of the other pre-existing plant IDs for the same VM plant and, if so, what happens to their implicit votes recorded at the time of proposal? Additionally, should other plant IDs for the same VM plant be added later, does the system implicitly count each previous proposer as a vote against the newer plant ID and would each previous proposer then be able to vote for the new plant ID?
Using bi3mw's plant ID proposal on VM plant f34v-a as an example, as of this post, you can still see 2 votes for and 0 votes against that ID and no votes on any of the other proposed IDs. In your follow-up to bi3mw's ID score question, you noted the 2 votes as being 1 for the proposal and 1 additional vote for, implying that the implicit vote for by the proposer will appear in the vote counts. If that is true, then why isn't there a vote for shown on each of the other 4 plant IDs? Is this because they were part of the original database build and those have no implicit votes? And why aren't bi3mw's implied votes against the other plant IDs shown either? This goes towards the question of transparency.
Using VM plant f31r-a as another example, there are 4 plant IDs, with all appearing to be part of the original database build, with 1 vote for the first ID, no other votes for, and no votes at all against. Yet, the ID scores are 40% for the first one and 25% each for the others and a consensus score of 15%. I'm wondering how, if at all, implied votes affected this and also how the total percentage in the proposal ID scores can exceed 100%. On that last part, I'm guessing that original ID scores don't update unless and until there are votes for or against them shown. Is that true?
In addition to these questions pertaining to a single ID proposal being made, can a person propose multiple plant IDs for a single VM plant? If so, what happens to their implied votes for and against on each of their proposed plant IDs?
Moving on to other votes, can a person who is just voting on, as opposed to proposing, each plant ID of each VM plant vote more than once (i.e. change their opinion)? If so, what happens to their previous votes?
Also, I know this is currently in a beta phase. Presumably, that means eventually the application will be ready for widespread voting once all bugs have been fixed and any other corrections and changes have been made. At that point, will you freeze the plant ID options so no further proposals can be made? If so, will it then still be possible to add more information and references to each ID to further aid in selection? I ask because as long as more can be added, the more likely it will be that people will change their votes multiple times. That is not necessarily a bad thing, depending on how long you can or want to keep the application running and how the application handles re-ranking by voters.
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Login to view. again - it is SO social media focused - but since that site is also crowdsourced opinion ranking and well established (since 2009), they have good examples you can review that address some of the questions I have noted above in case you want to consider some related changes while you're still in the beta phase. Although Ranker simply notes they have an algorithm they use and their explanations about it are rather vague, you may still be able to glean something from both their help info and sample ranking lists. Below are some links you may find useful. Try to ignore the content and focus on the features. All Ranker lists active for voting permit users to change their votes. Note: I have excluded lists from the samples that were articles without voting, or lists whose voting is closed, or lists that are active but were intentionally launched with a set list of items.
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List: International Mysteries We Really Want Solved (June 2022): You are not allowed to view links.
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The only sample list that included the Voynich Manuscript (ranked 4 of 9). 4.0K votes, 984 voters, 32.0K views. Still an active list for voting.
List: The Best Grass for Dogs (March 2019): You are not allowed to view links.
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One of two sample lists that can be added to. 11 items, 842 votes, 453 voters. Still an active list for voting. Option to add a new item is at the bottom of the list. Also, it hasn't been re-ranked yet but does include a button to re-rank the list one's own way, which provides a pop-up so one can drag each item to re-sort it to a new ranking. That ranking would then appear with one's username in a dropdown button on the page. Such a feature, if possible, might not be needed in the Voynich Garden, unless any VM plants eventually contain a large number of plant IDs. Note the demographic filter buttons and search field at the top. These don't appear on all Ranker lists but do on a lot of them. You may not want to consider the demographic filter either, even if possible, but I would imagine even to consider it for results reporting, let alone for user filtering, you would need to capture that data in registered user profiles in Voynich Garden.
List: The Best Plant Nursery Websites (December 2019): You are not allowed to view links.
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The second sample that can be added to, option to add at the bottom of the list. 37 items, 1.3K votes, 560 voters. Still an active list for voting. Not yet re-ranked but button at top along with demographic filter buttons and a search field.
List: The Best Trees in Fiction (July 2019): You are not allowed to view links.
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15 items, 1.4K votes, 371 voters. Still active for voting. Not yet re-ranked but rank your way button and demographic buttons at top, though no search and list can't be added to.
List: Tasty Root Vegetables (June 2023): You are not allowed to view links.
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36 items, 7.9K votes, 1.8K voters, 156.0K views. Still active for voting. Not yet re-ranked but rank your way button, demographic buttons and search at top, though list can't be added to.
List: The Tastiest Vegetables Everyone Loves Eating (June 2023): You are not allowed to view links.
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58 items, 186.1K votes, 13.3K voters, 417.7K views. Still active for voting. Rank your way button, re-ranking dropdown, demographic buttons and search at top but list can't be added to.
On a separate note, it couldn't hurt, may even help participation (and maybe even get you some donations - yes, I noticed that link), if you could add a little background about yourself and your background on the About page. Your primary business site is You are not allowed to view links.
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Login to view., right? Perhaps you could include a link to that on the About page as well. I noticed you have a Voynich project listed there that looks like it contains the base images you used to create the VM plant images in the Voynich Garden site.