> I am beginning to like this idea myself. One could extend thegrades allowed a bit, without leaving what would be well understood by the voters with including the +, - grades as well.
This gives 14 possible bins (A+ A A-, ... , D+ D D-, F, E) in which to place candidates, which should be more then enough.
> Using this method solves the most troublesome user interface issues.
Yes, but this is just Borda, which nobody likes.
No, it is not.
Read the comments again...convert the grades into a ranked ballot which can then be feed into any ranked ballot method, like MAM.
The issue here is merely how to collect the ranked ballots. Any interface which attempts to allow a voter to rank X number of ballots (where X is probably greater then 20 or so) will be quite cumbersome.
With this method, a voter can just go down the list and give each candidate a grade.
Now, what _might_ be confusing for the voter is that these two different gradings would actually be equivalent...
C1: A C1: B- C2: D C2: C C3: F C3: D+
However, I don't think any collection method can be perfect when a large number of candidates are involved...this one just seems to have the fewest disadvantages for the voter.
(One can, of course, still provide an optional feature for the voter to give the explicit rankings for the candidates)
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