[poll id="51"]

This poll is now closed. The results were:

No - 62.8 percent
Yes - 37.2 percent

It would make more sense if people who think Perfect Duluth Day does too much polling didn't at the same time offer suggestions of other polls that should be done.

PDD has run a total of 49 polls over the past 57 months. Eleven polls regarding restaurants have happened so far -- all in the past three months. Whether that is excessive, of course, is a matter of opinion.

There has been a three-fold process for each restaurant award category: nominations, an elimination round and final voting. We could shorten the process if some focus group picked the top contenders, but that would clearly generate controversy. So in the interest of greater openness and accuracy we have chosen a process that is admittedly a bit more arduous.

In the end, these awards are not statements of fact or even the collective opinion of the average Duluthian. They are the PDD Awards. They reflect the opinions of people who read and contribute to this website. If a restaurant you like doesn't win, it doesn't necessarily mean the poll is rigged, it probably just means you have a different opinion. 

Is cheating possible? Sure, but you'd have to work pretty hard to get away with it. Each vote has a trail. It's much easier to spot shenanigans than it would be with paper ballots.

How many people vote? It's different in every poll, obviously, but it tends to end up around 100, which is a little less than 5 percent of the people who have registered accounts on PDD and a little more than 5 percent of the people who visit the site on a daily basis. So it's not a large percentage, but it's the people who care about the subject enough to log in and click on an answer, and that counts for something.

Personally, while I'm not tired of polling yet, I find myself tired of writing about the subject of polling in just seven paragraphs.