Document about Voting

This document should answer your questions about the weekly Internet Entertainment Charts. The document describes the way the charts are compiled and it decribes the way to participate in voting. At the end, a list of frequently asked questions is presented, together with their answers.
The Charts
	The Internet Entertainment Charts are weekly charts, compiled from votes that are sent by e-mail. Everyone who has an e-mail account, is allowed to send his or her votes. The charts are usually published every Monday on Usenet in several different newsgroups. You can also check out http://www.xs4all.nl/~jojo to find the charts in their graphical form. There are several different charts:
	Internet PC Games Top 100 / Download Top 40	most popular commercial and free games
	Internet Video Games Top 100	most popular 32bit and 64bit video games
	Internet Movies Games Top 100	most popular movies and videos
	Internet Singles Games Top 100	most popular music singles
	Internet Albums Games Top 100	most popular CD's, MC's and LP's
The Votes
This description applies to all the charts that you can vote for. Instead of talking about 'games', 'movies', 'albums', etc. we will just refer to the more general term 'titles'.
	When you send us your votes, you are allowed to spread a total number of points over several titles. Different titles may get a different amount of points, but there's a maximum for each title.
	Total number of points:	20 points
	Maximum per title:	5 points
	It is allowed, of course, to use less than the total/maximum number of points. Try to concentrate on the titles that are your favourites right now, and not the ones you liked a long time ago. The Internet Entertainment Charts are not all-time favourites lists. They reflect the popularity of titles and people's taste at this moment in time.
	It is likely that your votes will not change much over the weeks and that it may be tiresome to send a new message every week. Therefore, everyone's votes are used for several weeks in a row. So, when your list of favourite titles does not change, you don't need to send new votes. You will be notified when your votes have expired, if you haven't sent new votes yet. New votes can be sent anytime. Your previous votes will automatically be discarded.
	One set of votes votes is used for:	5 weeks in a row
	The weight is decreased at a rate of:	20% per week
	The weight of your votes decreases over time. Votes that come in for the current week are used at 100%. But every next week, their weights are decreased by 20%, until they are worth 0%. So you see that the longer you wait, the lesser the weight of your votes become. People who send their votes most often, have the most weight in the charts.
This paragraph applies only to the Games Charts.
	Some games will appear two times in the lists, once in the Internet PC Games Top 100 with the full price version, and once in the Download Top 40 with the free distributable versions. (Although those two versions may sometimes be almost the same.) If you have the full retail/registered version of a game, and you want other people to know that it's good, then vote for it in the Top 100. If you downloaded a demo or shareware version and you think other people should do that too, then vote for it in the Top 40. The commercial games and the download games have different ID numbers. Check them out. If you want to vote for games in both charts, then your votes must be in one message, in whatever order you like. Don't send different messages for the two seperate charts, as our computer will assume that the first message must be discarded when you send the second one.
	These are the correct addresses for your votes:
	pcgames@worldcharts.nl	pc games charts
	videogames@worldcharts.nl	video games charts
	movies@worldcharts.nl	movies charts
	singles@worldcharts.nl	singles charts
	albums@worldcharts.nl	albums charts
	Send the correct votes to the correct address. Don't send votes for one chart to one of the other addresses, because behind each address is a different votes database and (possibly) a different maintainer.
The Forms
	To help people send their votes for the charts, a voting form has been designed on the WWW. It makes voting very easy, because you only have to click on the titles you want to vote for, select the number of points, and don't worry about ID numbers. You can find the URL of the homepage of the charts at the bottom of this message. If you cannot use the voting form, or if you don't want to, then you can send your votes with a simple email message.
	http://www.gatech.edu/dgal/pcgames	pc games charts
	http://www.gatech.edu/dgal/videogames	video games charts
	http://www.gatech.edu/dgal/movies	movies charts
	http://www.gatech.edu/dgal/singles	singles charts
	http://www.gatech.edu/dgal/albums	albums charts
The Syntax
This paragraph applies only to people who send their votes through email, and not using one of the voting forms.
	The message holding the votes should have one title on every line. The first thing to appear on the line is the number of points, second the title you vote for. The line has to be ended with the ID (a 4-digit number) of the title, which can be found in the chart between brackets []. This ID is quite important, for it is the number used by the program that compiles the chart. For new titles, that are not yet in the chart, the ID-number can be replaced with []. If you do not include an ID-number or [] then your vote on that line will not be parsed and will not be stored in the database!
	Here's an example of a message:
	> 5 Dark Invader [1435] > 4 Mysterious Forces 2 [1322] > 5 Super Fighter [1502] > 2 Magic of Zuul 4 [] > 4 The Lost Tycoon [] -- Jurgen "Jojo" Appelo - jojo@xs4all.nl
	The same format applies to all the charts.
	Be sure to have the ID-number in square brackets []. A character at the beginning of the line, like >, is allowed. Try to avoid having lines with unnecessary information, like disclaimers, remarks and encoded messages.
	History proves that many people type wrong ID-numbers. Therefore the title itself is also needed on the line. If possible copy the title directly from the charts, so that it is identical to the chart's entry.
	The easiest thing to do is to reply to the message containing the latest chart. Copy the chart and delete all lines, except the ones containing your favourite titles. Put your points right at the start of the line. It is OK to leave the other information on the line. This way you don't have to worry about exact titles and ID-numbers. And don't forget: points must be first on the line, not last.
	If you include the http address address (URL) of your own WWW homepage somewhere in your votes message, a link to your homepage will then automatically be added to the Voters page.
The Restrictions
	It is not allowed to give more than a certain total of points and a maximum number per title. See the table above. Extra points are automatically discarded by the program (at random).
	You may send more than one message a week, but only the latest one will be used. (This can be useful when people change their mind.)
	Try to give more information when you give points to a title that is not already on the chart. There are many titles around that even we have never heard of. Names of labels and/or publishers are appreciated.
This paragraph applies only to the Games Charts.
	Votes for the Commercial Top 100 and the Download Top 40 must be sent in one message only, not in two seperate messages.
The Deadline
	The official deadline for every chart is on Friday night. We might include votes that come in after the deadline, but it cannot be guaranteed. Messages that come in after the deadline will otherwise be used for the next week. New charts are compiled in the weekend and (if all goes well) published on (or before) Monday.
The Tags
	There is a tag for people who've asked if it is possible to vote and not to receive the list by email. Well, it is. Just add a #nolist tag in your message. You will then be excluded from the mailing list. But your votes will still be used. You will however still receive a call for new votes when your votes have expired. If you don't want to receive this call, you can add #nocall in your message.
The Bullets
	In the Internet Charts bullets are earned by titles that climb very fast. Each title earns a bullet if...
	it is on number 1 to 5 and has climbed at least 5 places it is on number 6 to 10 and has climbed at least 6 places it is on number 11 to 15 and has climbed at least 7 places it is on number 16 to 20 and has climbed at least 8 places etc...
	All new entries are considered to be climbing from the first entry below the chart (= chart length + 1).
The Runners Up
	Together with the main charts another small list is published every week. It is called the Runners Up. This list contains titles that people have voted for, but which did not get enough points to enter the main chart. It is useful for detecting new titles that some other voters came up with and that you want to support too, to get them in the charts. Most titles will enter this list first, before entering the main chart. If you vote for a new title, then this doesn't mean that the title will automatically show up in this section. Titles are only put on the list when several different people are voting for it. Otherwise the list would get much too large.
The Publication
	All Internet Entertainment Charts are copyrighted by World Charts, the maker of the lists. Publication of the Internet Charts by others, in electronic and paper magazines, on bulletin boards, CD-ROMs, etc. is allowed, but only after written permission. There is nothing we ask for in return, except that the data is not altered and that we will be asked for permission in advance. You can find a full list of all authorised distributors of the charts on the WWW pages.
The FAQ
	Why aren't the titles sorted by their number of points?
	The points mentioned in the charts are an indication only of the support by votes. When we order the titles according to these numbers, the result would be ridiculous. Only a much larger number of voters can justify the ordering by these points directly. Unfortunately, there is not such a large number of respondents yet, so we have to use a more complex system to build a chart that's fun to watch. For more information we refer to the Compilation description on the WWW pages.
	Can I vote for someone else?
	You can only vote for one person. It doesn't matter who this person is. You may send votes for a friend, but then you cannot vote for yourself, because only one set of votes is allowed for every email address. Of course, two people can use one email address to combine their votes in one message within the restriction of 20 points.
	Can I get the chart every week?
	You only get the chart every week if you send us your votes every week. This is the only way to receive the chart weekly, other than getting it yourself from the newsgroups or WWW pages.
	Can I get a list of ID's for titles that are not in the chart?
	When you can't find your favourite title in the charts, you may leave out the ID when you vote for it. Titles that haven't showed up in the chart have no ID yet. It is possible that a title you want to vote for has been in the chart once, but dropped out some time ago. For these you can leave out the ID too. Therefore you do not need a list of all ID's to be able to vote. Only the latest chart is needed. There is however a list available with all titles that have even been in the chart, with their highest positions, etc. You can find it on the WWW pages.
	Can I vote against titles I dislike?
	We asked the readers if they would support this idea, and the answer was no. If people would be able to vote against titles with negative points, they could vote against titles only because they hate the publisher, or only because they don't like the genre, or only because it's one place above their favourite title in the chart. We don't want such things to happen, so negative voting is not supported.
The Publisher
	World Charts Graaf Balderikstraat 16 3032 HC Rotterdam The Netherlands Tel: +31 10-4668252