I’ll respond to these because they’re valid concerns, but:
1) Online polls have proven to be as reliable in aggregate than the old school live caller phone polls. In theory lack of representativeness is a concern but in practice they’re fine
2) Sample sizes have been sufficient to get consistently reliable samples, so again, its representativeness holds
But aren’t DAILY Polls as we ‘perceive them’ currently In Canada..
- Actually Integral Too & Part Of The Disinformation ‘seeding’ Misinformation - Problem ?
Just remember the ‘press coverage’ re Controlling Interest of The Coastal GasLink Pipeline purchased by Albertan Taxpayers via The Alberta Teachers Pension Fund that Jason Kenney Legislated via his Secretive Majority Government immune to FOI Request
There was a National Poll & Related PostMedia Article with Exceptions Graphics Lambasting Justin Trudeau by Name & ‘proving that Canadians by far recognized ‘His Incompetance as The Reason why Mohawk’s impeded Rail Traffic, Totally Disrupting Canada’s Economy..’
Can anyone even recall.. last time that BC Pipeline was ‘in the news’ ?
Signatory to That PIPELINE even existing were Kenney, a former BC Premier or Two & Government of Canada..
That was then this is now. Pierre has corrupted QP, media, “campaigning” and now polling. He uses every avenue to spread constant disinformation.
We should break the polling model. Pollsters are making millions from our freely given opinions. We should charge pollsters for our answers to each question. Never give businesses anything for free. They won’t give you anything for free.
Coletto was on all major media, CBC Checkup and in the NYT Canada letter in one weekend. How did that happen? How could one pollster get so much media time? Poll results are not real news. The real news isn’t being covered. That is a real problem for democracy.
I recently completed an Abacus survey. There was a trick or ill-worded set of questions that left no choice but to accept private healthcare as a good choice. Who is examining the questions? Who is regulating pollsters.
I guess I am a conspiracy theorist, but I don’t think our systems are up to the threat to them that right wing politicians pose. MSM are still quoting Pierre as if he is telling the truth. No fact checking. Pierre is paying pollsters and then quoting them. It’s dangerous.
We should be asking for more coverage of real news and less click bait polls.
There’s a Wealth of Real Issues in this comment.. & each is well worth exploring..
At the same time it’s my believe WE the Constituents need to choose our words, phrases & contexts far far higher.. all while Confronting Mainstream Media re THEIRS !
Note how many times WE READ ‘Axe The Tax’ & echo it OURSELVES (i just did !)
But what happened to ‘the WORD - ‘pollution’ in The Actual ACT ? Is it too hard to SPELL ? Too Long a Word ? Doesn’t Rhyme Nicely ? Not ‘Ethical Enuff .. Death & Taxes eh ! 🦎🏴☠️
I agree with your rebuttals. However, I believe that the following two criticisms of polls are valid. They do not destroy the value of the polls, but suggest that we take te results as impressions rather than hard facts.
First, current polls, with some rare exceptions, are not random polls. By a random poll, I mean one where every member of the population being studied has an equal chance of being selected. This was the approach of telephone polls and, before them, door-to-doo polls. Non-responses were subject to follow-up to see whether the non-responders were different from the responders.
Now, pollsters invite people to participate via e-mail o other such tool. We get the opinions of those who participate. We have no idea whether they represent the population at large. Self-selection may work against older people, those less comfortable with technology, those pressed for time, and so on. Do they vote the same way? Who knows?
The second problem is the very low response rate of the typical survey. Indeed, with self-selection, it has become impossible to estimate the response rate. Special studies, combining on-line and telephone queries, suggest that response rates may be as low as an equivalent of 2%. Think about that. You go into a room and ask? "What does everyone want for lunch?" Two people raise their hands and say "chicken sandwich, please." And you conclude that the entire room wants chicken sandwiches.
There are efforts to get around these problems. PEW Research in the United States has been at it for a long time, and their home site has a methodology section discussing the various approaches. What do the Canadian pollsters do? I don't have the faintest idea.
Polls are cheap filler. And when there is a lot change in voting intentions, they make easy articles that will create some interest. After all, nobody will read a weather report that starts with “the weather tomorrow is pretty much the same as today”.
People complaining about polls are just tired of seeing their favourite team being behind. But it is no different than demanding the score board to be turned off because your team conceded 4 goals in the first 10 minutes. Not being confronted by the actual score is not going to make it easier to catch up. The liberals should be reminded weekly that they are behind and need to do better and work harder. Anything else is just making excuses.
I think as newsroom budgets have been slashed polling stories are making up a larger and larger percentage of political reporting. They’re fast and easy to write and don’t require much external research or outreach, and they feel superficially authoritative regardless of the quality of the content. It’s the perfect recipe for a modern newsroom with a tenth the resources of a decade or two ago.
This leads to the perception that polling stories have actively displaced better reporting, rather than being sucked into the vacuum created by cutbacks. Which makes it easy to blame them for our deteriorating media landscape. Easy to say that if the polling stories went away the better reporting would come back.
fast & easy to ‘write’ ? What about ‘repackage - cut & paste’ for Headline Journalism
As a farm lad, cattleman & horseman can tell you all about how easy it is to KEEP The Herd Moving versus Getting It Organized & Pointed In The Desired Direction
They are determined to broadcast (alongside their "snapshots") a particular narrative. Some are so bold as to prognosticate about unscheduled events in a minority. And I don't in the past recall this level of conclusory polling, years out from a vote. Finally, the polls are all Trudeau-centric. When is the poll on the effect of the Ottawa Convoy on the LOO's numbers? And let's confront Angus Reid's curated membership...
Conventional wisdom for decades was that polls only suppressed the vote for the likely winner. You think it's a slam dunk, so you stay home and then the other side pulls out an upset. It's what the Democrats were scrambling to turn out the vote to prevent from happening in 2008 when polling was very favourable for Obama.
Polls are standard practice in virtually every democracy and they're here to stay. If we were to ban actual pollsters from running polls, people would just use shoddy opinion polls or buy into whatever misinformation their preferred party spun about the current state of national opinion.
As an NDP voter, yeah. It's disgusting to see a poll where the Conservatives walk away with 170-200 seats with 40% of the vote where your own party gets 20-30 with 20% of the vote, but that's the reality of first-past-the-post. The information being disheartening doesn't mean it's wrong, biased, or doesn't deserve to be released for public consumption. I don't want to see Poilievre (or anyone, of our current crop of leaders) get a majority government, but that doesn't mean I don't want to know he's primed to get one.
I mean, I don't want to get hit by a hurricane in the summer, but I'd still rather know in advance before it hits my province.
Oh come on. Tell the truth now. You didn't so much poke the bear of anti-polling Twitter as you did nastily insult a woman who many people consider to be smart and informed when you said she was too mentally unbalanced to drive a car. That's what most of your blowback was about.
I’ll respond to these because they’re valid concerns, but:
1) Online polls have proven to be as reliable in aggregate than the old school live caller phone polls. In theory lack of representativeness is a concern but in practice they’re fine
2) Sample sizes have been sufficient to get consistently reliable samples, so again, its representativeness holds
Forgive my Impertinance..
But aren’t DAILY Polls as we ‘perceive them’ currently In Canada..
- Actually Integral Too & Part Of The Disinformation ‘seeding’ Misinformation - Problem ?
Just remember the ‘press coverage’ re Controlling Interest of The Coastal GasLink Pipeline purchased by Albertan Taxpayers via The Alberta Teachers Pension Fund that Jason Kenney Legislated via his Secretive Majority Government immune to FOI Request
There was a National Poll & Related PostMedia Article with Exceptions Graphics Lambasting Justin Trudeau by Name & ‘proving that Canadians by far recognized ‘His Incompetance as The Reason why Mohawk’s impeded Rail Traffic, Totally Disrupting Canada’s Economy..’
Can anyone even recall.. last time that BC Pipeline was ‘in the news’ ?
Signatory to That PIPELINE even existing were Kenney, a former BC Premier or Two & Government of Canada..
That was then this is now. Pierre has corrupted QP, media, “campaigning” and now polling. He uses every avenue to spread constant disinformation.
We should break the polling model. Pollsters are making millions from our freely given opinions. We should charge pollsters for our answers to each question. Never give businesses anything for free. They won’t give you anything for free.
Coletto was on all major media, CBC Checkup and in the NYT Canada letter in one weekend. How did that happen? How could one pollster get so much media time? Poll results are not real news. The real news isn’t being covered. That is a real problem for democracy.
I recently completed an Abacus survey. There was a trick or ill-worded set of questions that left no choice but to accept private healthcare as a good choice. Who is examining the questions? Who is regulating pollsters.
I guess I am a conspiracy theorist, but I don’t think our systems are up to the threat to them that right wing politicians pose. MSM are still quoting Pierre as if he is telling the truth. No fact checking. Pierre is paying pollsters and then quoting them. It’s dangerous.
We should be asking for more coverage of real news and less click bait polls.
There’s a Wealth of Real Issues in this comment.. & each is well worth exploring..
At the same time it’s my believe WE the Constituents need to choose our words, phrases & contexts far far higher.. all while Confronting Mainstream Media re THEIRS !
Note how many times WE READ ‘Axe The Tax’ & echo it OURSELVES (i just did !)
But what happened to ‘the WORD - ‘pollution’ in The Actual ACT ? Is it too hard to SPELL ? Too Long a Word ? Doesn’t Rhyme Nicely ? Not ‘Ethical Enuff .. Death & Taxes eh ! 🦎🏴☠️
Okay conspiracy theorist. You're doing the same thing diehard QAnon Trump supporters do.
I agree with your rebuttals. However, I believe that the following two criticisms of polls are valid. They do not destroy the value of the polls, but suggest that we take te results as impressions rather than hard facts.
First, current polls, with some rare exceptions, are not random polls. By a random poll, I mean one where every member of the population being studied has an equal chance of being selected. This was the approach of telephone polls and, before them, door-to-doo polls. Non-responses were subject to follow-up to see whether the non-responders were different from the responders.
Now, pollsters invite people to participate via e-mail o other such tool. We get the opinions of those who participate. We have no idea whether they represent the population at large. Self-selection may work against older people, those less comfortable with technology, those pressed for time, and so on. Do they vote the same way? Who knows?
The second problem is the very low response rate of the typical survey. Indeed, with self-selection, it has become impossible to estimate the response rate. Special studies, combining on-line and telephone queries, suggest that response rates may be as low as an equivalent of 2%. Think about that. You go into a room and ask? "What does everyone want for lunch?" Two people raise their hands and say "chicken sandwich, please." And you conclude that the entire room wants chicken sandwiches.
There are efforts to get around these problems. PEW Research in the United States has been at it for a long time, and their home site has a methodology section discussing the various approaches. What do the Canadian pollsters do? I don't have the faintest idea.
Polls are cheap filler. And when there is a lot change in voting intentions, they make easy articles that will create some interest. After all, nobody will read a weather report that starts with “the weather tomorrow is pretty much the same as today”.
People complaining about polls are just tired of seeing their favourite team being behind. But it is no different than demanding the score board to be turned off because your team conceded 4 goals in the first 10 minutes. Not being confronted by the actual score is not going to make it easier to catch up. The liberals should be reminded weekly that they are behind and need to do better and work harder. Anything else is just making excuses.
I’ll be glad to examine this factually.. I do not belief your comment is defendable 🦎🏴☠️
will get back to you with an analogy or two ..
As well you barely scratched the surface of many key stimuli
No mention re Personal Data, Influence, Incremental Saturation
Combination Propaganda Strategies, Tactics, Tools, Techniques
Embedded Partisan Media - Yellow Journalism - Steve Bannon’s Mantra
Headline Journalism - Things Do Not Exist In Isolation
There is a One Party Illegal Election Campaign Underway
There is a Concentrated Co-Morbid Media/CPC Perception Attack Underway
that even honest journalists find intimidating to speak to bluntly..
oh me oh my.. Poilievre Lied.. how brave to say.. eh
We all saw the savaging of David Johnston .. 🦎🏴☠️
I think as newsroom budgets have been slashed polling stories are making up a larger and larger percentage of political reporting. They’re fast and easy to write and don’t require much external research or outreach, and they feel superficially authoritative regardless of the quality of the content. It’s the perfect recipe for a modern newsroom with a tenth the resources of a decade or two ago.
This leads to the perception that polling stories have actively displaced better reporting, rather than being sucked into the vacuum created by cutbacks. Which makes it easy to blame them for our deteriorating media landscape. Easy to say that if the polling stories went away the better reporting would come back.
It’s wrong, but understandable.
fast & easy to ‘write’ ? What about ‘repackage - cut & paste’ for Headline Journalism
As a farm lad, cattleman & horseman can tell you all about how easy it is to KEEP The Herd Moving versus Getting It Organized & Pointed In The Desired Direction
I’m in a few polls, they never ask me a political question except for who did you vote for in the last election, once in the blue moon
Why are you in such Polls ?
I have been for years
They are determined to broadcast (alongside their "snapshots") a particular narrative. Some are so bold as to prognosticate about unscheduled events in a minority. And I don't in the past recall this level of conclusory polling, years out from a vote. Finally, the polls are all Trudeau-centric. When is the poll on the effect of the Ottawa Convoy on the LOO's numbers? And let's confront Angus Reid's curated membership...
Conventional wisdom for decades was that polls only suppressed the vote for the likely winner. You think it's a slam dunk, so you stay home and then the other side pulls out an upset. It's what the Democrats were scrambling to turn out the vote to prevent from happening in 2008 when polling was very favourable for Obama.
Polls are standard practice in virtually every democracy and they're here to stay. If we were to ban actual pollsters from running polls, people would just use shoddy opinion polls or buy into whatever misinformation their preferred party spun about the current state of national opinion.
As an NDP voter, yeah. It's disgusting to see a poll where the Conservatives walk away with 170-200 seats with 40% of the vote where your own party gets 20-30 with 20% of the vote, but that's the reality of first-past-the-post. The information being disheartening doesn't mean it's wrong, biased, or doesn't deserve to be released for public consumption. I don't want to see Poilievre (or anyone, of our current crop of leaders) get a majority government, but that doesn't mean I don't want to know he's primed to get one.
I mean, I don't want to get hit by a hurricane in the summer, but I'd still rather know in advance before it hits my province.
Oh come on. Tell the truth now. You didn't so much poke the bear of anti-polling Twitter as you did nastily insult a woman who many people consider to be smart and informed when you said she was too mentally unbalanced to drive a car. That's what most of your blowback was about.
The woman card. If someone says something dumb, they cannot be criticized if they're a woman.
Not at all. I would have said the same thing had it been a man. The insult was not gender specific.