Could be a good idea, also for transnational proposals. But I do think this extra week - if we should have it - would have to be more restricted in number and quality of proposals. Maybe starting from the gaps in the list to see what might have been overlooked. And if it are proposals in well-trodden categories, a discussion about what that site would effecively add to the List or why it would be a necessary inclusion.

During the Addendum period, there should be a course set for Final Voting.


1st Decision: Do we narrow voting down (2nd round), or include all seconded proposals?
- If we do 'trim' our large # of nominations, how? What is the timeframe?
- If we keep all proposals in final voting, how feasible is this from a IT/web design standpoint?

2nd Decision: Final Voting format - 10 sites per region (C/N balance) or alternative format(s) (for example, # of sites based on number of proposals?)
- If we choose to place restrictions on voting (C/N balance & specific number) how challenging is this from an IT/web design standpoint?
- If we choose few or no restrictions (or limited region-free) voting what are the pros/cons (I have my own opinion based on the 2014 results, but it would be useful to hear other voices)

Here are some quotes from users sharing their ideas: Sorry if I missed anyone (I tried to gather some diverse opinions)

Thanks for getting this started winterkjm!

1. I like your initial suggestion that those who have been active in the Top 50 forum topics be the ones to winnow down the list by each selecting their Top 50. I'd prefer that each Top 50 list have an even distribution between regions (say either 8 or 9 per region), with a minimum number of natural sites per region; the remaining sites would be at large sites.

2. Once this list is culled down, I think it would be much easier to consider for the general voting public on this forum. I'd like to have an idea of how many sites would be on the culled list after Step 1, and I'd like to know any technological limitations before making any suggestions on voting options for Step 2.

I'll try to put all the Approved ones in the database today and present them in one nice, readable list on the website.

My vote regarding the 1st decision depends on how long that list is and when I had a second look over it. For now I would not be in favour of trimming it down, as it would be done by all the same people who discussed them first time around.

P.S.: I count 418 distinct ones!

It may sound weird, but even with the high number of seconded sites, I still think we missed some that might be eligible. I think we may have not used the possibilities of this site to look at T sites with a high approval rate from the community. I also think the Unesco Biosphere Reserve programme might uncover some worthy sites.

But if they haven't been proposed during the two week window for every region, I guess they wouldn't make it to the Top 50 Missing. But still, I'd like to be complete to be sure we make a good choice.

I guess you mainly refer to natural sites and I am sure you are right about that. Yet no matter how thorough we may try to be, we will always miss some significant sites unknown to us, both cultural and natural. Since we naturally focus on what we are familiar with, I am sure we miss more natural sites than cultural ones, more African sites than let's say European/North American/Asian sites etc. However, we did dedicate a lot of efforts to compensating for our biases and I think this should suffice for our current endeavour.
This does not exclude starting a new project after the current one, maybe mapping unrepresented ecoregions onto potential WHS candidates for example.

I brought this up here, but the depth of our research has limits and at the time it didn't seem like our users (including myself) had the determination to wade fully into all the UNESCO Biosphere Reserves. I do not see this as a final endeavor regarding identifying Top Missing sites. Perhaps in 5 years and dozens of new inscriptions, we will learn about new sites that we consider "Top Missing" or perhaps in years to come we organize "updates" where /when we see fit.

Our number #1 priority at this point is (hopefully) approaching a final step of voting on the Top 50 missing.