Blog: News & Views

Online voting boosted Oscars voter turnout

By Gold Derby News Desk

Jan 23 2013 03:30 am

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Despite the technical snafus that came with the first year of online voting, the academy announced Tuesday that the number of members taking part in the nominations process was up.

To ensure that all 5,856 voting members (73 more than last year) had a chance to have their voice heard, the academy sent paper ballots to everyone who had not registered to vote online.

Now, the academy is giving those members who did vote online till Feb. 1 to ask for a paper ballot for the final round. 

As academy exec Ric Robertson noted in the accompanying press release, “One of our basic goals at the Academy is to increase member engagement. Despite some challenges, more members voted for this year’s nominations than they have in the past several years. We are looking forward to a continuation of that trend in the final voting.”

Online voting for Oscar nominations kicks off on Feb. 8 at 8 a.m. PT and runs till Feb. 19 at 5 p.m. PT. Either way, the ballot covers 22 of the 24 competitive categories. The exceptions are Foreign-Language Film and Documentary Short Subject which require attendanace at special screenings. 

Winners of all the races but Best Picture are those nominees that receive the most #1 votes. Best Picture uses a preferential ballot -- voters rank up to five of the nine nominees in order -- with the winner being the last film standing after the complicated counting.