Quadratic voting vs cumulative voting

Cumulative voting gives each voter multiple votes that can be spread across options or concentrated on one option, which can reveal more intensity than a single binary vote.

The cost of concentrating votes is usually linear, so moving another vote to the same option is not progressively harder.

Quadratic voting makes intensity convex. A vote vector costs the sum of squared intensities, which lets participants express strong conviction while making concentration increasingly costly.

Nicolas applies that rule to positive and negative vote intensities, then reports aggregate support, quadratic costs, and outcome probabilities.

Use cumulative voting when a simple fixed-point allocation method is enough and the group does not need a convex cost rule.

Use Nicolas when intensity must be measurable, costly, and tied to a transparent decision record.