How Superscore works
Here's a question nobody can answer well: what's the best taco spot in San Diego?
Star ratings can't tell you. A 4.5 on Yelp could mean a thousand people thought it was pretty good, or ten people thought it was amazing. Everyone grades on a different curve. Your four stars and my four stars aren't the same four stars.
So we don't ask people to rate anything. We ask a simpler question: which of these two spots do you prefer? You pick one. Enough people do that enough times, and a ranking starts to take shape. Not one that anyone designed, but one that reflects what the whole community actually thinks.
The math behind it
Superscore uses the Elo rating system, the same math that ranks chess players worldwide. What makes Elo work is that it pays attention to surprises.
Every spot starts at the same score. When you pick one spot over another, the winner's score rises and the loser's falls. How far depends on whether anyone expected the outcome. If the top-ranked spot in San Diego beats a newcomer, barely anything changes. But if the newcomer wins? The scores swing hard.
New spots find their level fast
New spots move through the rankings quickly. A single vote can shift a new spot's score significantly. But as a spot accumulates votes, it becomes harder to move. A place with five votes is still finding its level. A place with a hundred has been tested by the city. It takes something real to change it.
Your list and the city's list
The Super 25 is the city's ranking, the collective voice. Your list on My Aisle uses a different method called Bradley-Terry, which is tuned for individual taste. It looks at all your votes together and finds the ranking that best explains your choices. The city's opinions stay out of it.
Both come from the same votes. Every time you pick between two spots, you're building your list and shaping San Diego's.