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I'm not particularly worried about anyone trying stack the votes. I mean, I guess it's possible, but I can't really see why anyone would bother. My own preference for wanting an open vote is merely for my own interest and convenience. The blind totals aren't going to be that interesting to me. But I don't care enough that I would try to hold the voting process to ransom by saying that I won't vote unless it's open.
I can fully appreciate that there are some polls where people may want to have their votes remain anonymous. But, as I said in my earlier post, these polls are not really any different to writing your recommendation in a post. Do you object to doing that? If not, why is a vote different to a post to the same effect? What purpose is served by making it less convenient for those interested in identifying who liked which books?
If it was feasible, it would be interesting to run a study to try and work out how open vs closed votes affected the outcome in such innocuous votes as these. There are lots of possible influences. Are people more honest or less honest when their votes are anonymous? Are a significant number of people put off from participating in open votes? ... But I'm not sure how such a study could be done with any reliability in this context.
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