Chapter 1: Nine friends, one dinner

It's Friday night, and nine friends are hungry. There are three places nearby: a taco truck, a pizza place and a sushi bar.

Nobody wants to be the one who decides. So Ana says what people always say:

“Let's just vote. Everybody pick one.”

Four friends want tacos. Three want sushi. Two want pizza.

Tacos wins, four votes to three to two. Ana and the other taco fans cheer.

Everyone else goes quiet.

Here's what the vote never asked. Eli, Fay and Gus love sushi, and tacos is their very last choice. Hal and Ivy love pizza, and they'd rather skip tacos too.

That's five of the nine friends, more than half the group, about to eat the dinner they wanted least.

And pizza, with its two votes? Nobody's dreaming about it. But all nine would happily eat it. It's every single friend's first or second choice.

A pick-one vote can't see any of that. Each friend got to say one thing, their favorite, and nothing else.

So they try again. This time, everyone ranks all three places, best first.

Four friends rank tacos, then pizza, then sushi. Three rank sushi, then pizza, then tacos. And two rank pizza, then sushi, then tacos.

That's ranked voting. Instead of picking one option, you put them all in order. A ranking says what you love, what you'd be fine with and what you'd rather skip.

Now the friends have nine rankings. The only question left is how to count them.

Ben has an idea... Chapter 2: The elimination game→