Steve Eppley wrote: >> I agree with Jan Kok's suggestion that IRRV >> ("Instant Round Robin Voting") be used as >> a popular name for Condorcet voting. > -snip- > > Why not drop the 'V'? Three-letter acronyms > are better than 4, I think, and the 'V' is > redundant given the context. > > I do have some concern about the potential for > confusion if we use an acronym like IRRV or IRR > that's so similar to IRV. Will some people > believe that advocates of IRR are really > advocating IRV? Will people believe the > methods have similar properties?
It's really a question of practical rhetoric, and the only way to find out what works best is to experiment with different names and acronyms or ask people which ones they find most helpful. Therefore, nothing like a proof based on logic is possible. Marketers often have found that the most effective language isn't what they thought it would be and that what intuitively seems like it would not work well actually works best (e.g., longer multi-page direct mail letters generally are more effective than short one-page letters). That said, one argument for keeping the V and using a 4-letter acronym is that it would make the acronym for Instant Round Robin Voting structurally consistent with the one for Instant Runoff Voting and therefore might be easier for people to remember (i.e., both terms end with "voting" so both acronyms end with V). As for confusion, mentioning two different acronyms when talking about voting reform as opposed to mentioning only IRV, as now usually happens, would remind people that there are alternatives to IRV, while having the two acronyms similar would help remind people that the two methods are the same except for how ballots are interpreted to decide election winners. So I'm inclined to think that IRRV would work well, But that's only my best guess at the moment. I should add, Steve, that I think it was you who first brought the name Instant Round Robin Voting to my attention back when we were both on the Alliance email list for a while back in 1996. At that time, instant runoff voting was still one of several alternative names being used to describe what nearly everyone now refers to as IRV. -Ralph Suter ---- Election-methods mailing list - see http://electorama.com/em for list info