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Olympic Medal Ribbon Length Reflects Per Capita Winnings For That Country

Shorter ribbon signifies that winner's country has higher per capita winning record. The higher it hangs, the higher their country ranks.
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A variation of the idea to give a country an award for having the highest per capita win rate, this would be fairly straight forward, cheap, easy and might add an interesting new area of competition to the Olympic games, which country is best per capita.

Winners would all get their medals, but at the final Olympic ceremonies, they'd be given their official ribbons to have pictures taken with, the ribbons would be clearly emblazoned with the country's flag and it's length would reflect how good that country is at winning medals eliminating the size of the population from the equation.

So the US and China with their large populations would have their medals hanging around their navel, while a country like New Zealand would wear them very high right under the neck.

This would add an interesting twist to the medal tally at the end of the games, perhaps to some, even representing sort of the big event. Which country is best? Not biggest, but best?

The best upshot of this is smaller countries getting more into the physical fitness game with their youth which would be a great byproduct of this.

doctorremulac3, Aug 21 2016

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       "Comrade Chen, I have good and bad news."
"Ah so, comrade Chang?"
"The good news is that the glorious athletes of the People's Republic have won a great many medals in this year's olympics."
"That is indeed good news, comrade Chang. Tell their families that executions will not be necessary. And the bad news?"
"Our population is so large that our medal ribbons will be the longest of all."
"In that case, comrade Chang..."
MaxwellBuchanan, Aug 21 2016
  

       No no, his would be the longest being from China.   

       This might afford a bit of a psychological consolation prize as well being able to say "Mine's longer".
doctorremulac3, Aug 21 2016
  

       Ah so.
MaxwellBuchanan, Aug 21 2016
  

       That's not now "per capita" should work. Think, "medals per person, relative to the whole population". So, take national population and divide by medal count. The larger *that* number, the *shorter* the ribbon. If someone from Vatican City won a medal (population of some hundreds; I'll say 400 based on a graph in the Google search-result page), then 1-per-4-hundred is a better per-capita showing than the USA winning (just making up numbers here) 60 medals out of a population of 300 million (1 per 5 million or so, see?). Stated another way, think of each person in Vatican City winning a 4-hundredth of a medal each, while each American only wins a 5-millionth of a medal.
Vernon, Aug 21 2016
  

       Right, I think that's what I said no?   

       The country that wins the most medals with the smallest population gets a higher ranking, therefore a shorter ribbon so the medal hangs higher.   

       Vatican City gets a choker, China gets a waist decoration.
doctorremulac3, Aug 21 2016
  

       You have it backward; you have the countries with the poorest performance getting the longest ribbons. Since when is more of prize equal to a penalty?
Vernon, Aug 21 2016
  

       Right, the countries with the poorest performance get the longest ribbons, so their medals hang lower.   

       The better your country does, the shorter the ribbon and the higher the medal rides on your chest.
doctorremulac3, Aug 21 2016
  

       I like it but sublte. I know atheletes trip on their medals but not to the hospital.
wjt, Aug 22 2016
  

       You didn't answer my question. Since when is more of a prize equal to a penalty?
Vernon, Aug 22 2016
  

       You do understand that the "prize" is wearing a medal at a higher location on your chest right?   

       On the off chance that you're not kidding, forget the ribbon. The medals are pinned on. Countries with a better percentage of winners pin their medals high up on the chest, those with a lower percentage of winners pin in on lower down.   

       I guess I could draw a diagram, but I'll assume you're putting me on pretending to not understand this. I've gotten caught by that trick before.
doctorremulac3, Aug 22 2016
  

       I think we can all agree that much of the Olympics is, for the competitors, about seeing who is the best. I don't think that this is healthy. It's the sort of exaltation of the exceptional that breeds discontent and would, if our respective governments had the vision and the gumption, be banned. The idea as proposed, with only minimal variation, could form a powerful tool against these tall poppies: the ribbon for the medals of the competitors of the most winnignnest nation (either in absolute or relative terms) should have a circumference 30% less than the average neck circumference of individuals in that nation. This may result in celebratory open-top bus tours gradually losing pep but morituri te salutant what.
calum, Aug 22 2016
  

       A healthy competition with good nation ragging is a good thing. Breeds a bit of a thick skin and means people don't flex their arms so quickly. The more an adult nation can take the negatives the better off we all are.
wjt, Aug 23 2016
  
      
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