Board Thread:Naruto Discussions/@comment-25878478-20141216093804/@comment-25878478-20141216104631

Hisana456 wrote: It's not about adding them, it's only for each poll that the character's rank matters (in a way).

Each poll has a seperate popularity difference, adding them won't change anything :/

If you average up Hinata's rankings from polls 1 - 10, the databook poll, and the English Shonen Jump poll, you get that Hinata ranks at 9.7.

This doesn't make sense because 1) rankings are supposed to be discrete numbers 2) this is like adding apples to oranges and bananas and then averaging this out 3) one vote can make the difference between rankings (there is a loss of information when you use rankings while ignoring the context)

If you average out Sakura's rankings she has a whole number: 9.

So Sakura still outranks Hinata if you want to ignore the total vote counts.

EDIT: Also, if you average out ranks you're much more likely to get multiple characters with the same rank.