Math Indicates Pollster Is Forging Results

An anonymous reader writes "Nate Silver suggests the political pollster Strategic Vision is 'cooking the books. And whoever is doing so is doing a pretty sloppy job.' Silver crunched five years worth of their polling data, and found their reported results followed a suspicious pattern which traditionally suggests fraud. The five-year distribution of the numbers 'is not random. It's not close to random.' The polling firm had already been reprimanded by the American Association for Public Opinion Research for failing to disclose their methodology, though the firm argues they did comply with the organization's request. Their response to Silver's accusation? 'We have a call in to our attorney on this and fully intend to take action that will vindicate us.'"

Horseshit

[Saint Stephen]

I call total, 100%, biased, fuck me up the ass horseshit on this inane accusation. Lies, damn lies, and statistics.

Ah ha!

[NoYob]

"[W]e categorically deny them and will refute them.

So, which category do they deny? The category of truth or the category of lying?

So what?

[msauve]

Polls show that 78.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot.

Re:Evolution in Action

[NoYob]

I've been experiencing weird things too with Slashdot and stories not loading and seeing things that don't make sense. I don't get it.

Anyway, back to the topic of Windows 98 being released today. I wonder if the Clinton Administration will continue with the anti trust investigations into M$.

you can't believe anything anymore

[commodoresloat]

Agreed. Who is this Math guy anyway? Perhaps it's Math who faked the results, and Pollster is beyond reproach!

Re:Why should I care?

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Pretend I know nothing about Pollster (which happens to be true). Why should I care whether they've faked results? By that, I mean: do they research options of favorite flavors of cotton candy, or public support for health care reform, or the best style of car, or...? In other words, do they do stuff that actually matters?

Faked polls = astroturfing.

Need I say more?

Well, you might need to explain what astroturfing is. Most people here think that astroturfing is when you are satisfied with a mass-market product.

Re:Why should I care?

[schon]

I don't think "What do I care" is anything but flamebaiting. Who cares if you don't care?

According to a poll I just saw by Strategic Visions LLC, 68% of Americans care!

Re:Evolution in Action

[Arthur Grumbine]

I know this might be slightly off-topic, but I think that the issues Slashdot has been having are due to an unexpected spike in traffic after they posted the story of how 3D Realms was switching over to Epic's Unreal Engine for the upcoming Duke Nukem Forever. I'm pretty stoked about this and am saving up to be able to afford a Voodoo2 - DNF is gonna be da bomb!!

Re:So what?

[TheGreenNuke]

Source please? Also discuss the sample data and statistical analysis used to arrive at this conclusion. I'd also like to know the 95% confidence interval.