The worm
November 21st, 2011 at 10:00 am by David FarrarThe Herald reports:
Expect even more relentless repetition of upbeat language than usual from Prime Minister John Key and Labour leader Phil Goff as the worm returns for tonight’s leaders’ debate on TV3.
The debate will use the Roy Morgan Reactor, more commonly known as “the worm”, to measure the response of a studio audience of undecided voters selected for a balance of gender and age.
TV3 and Roy Morgan invite viewers who have an iPhone, Android mobile, iPad or tablet device to participate.
You can download the reactor or worm here.
Personally I think such things are gimmicks that distract people from the substance of the debate. My hope (a forlorn one probably) is that the media don’t make the worm the headline the next day, but actually you know listen to the debate themselves and form their own opinions as to the strengths and weaknesses of the the leaders arguments. The result of the worm should be a mention in the story, but not the core focus of it.
The fact that anyone can download the worm, means that the results may have nothing to do with the debate, and everything to do with people’s pre-extsing opinions. I really can’t see a lot of undecided voters caring enough to download the worm – the partisans will.
And even the studio audience of undecided voters can be less than balanced. They may be undecided between Labour and Greens, or between Maori and Mana. In my opinion they would be better to have the studio audience comprised of “swinging voters”, being voters who have voted (for example) for both a CR and a CL party in the last few elections. An undecided voter tends to be anti-Government because the Government is the known quantity, and they are deciding which of the alternatives to vote for.
So my point is, yes the worm may be a lot of fun. But please do not let the results of the worm be represented as a scientific poll, and do not let it replace your own judgement about the debate. Tune into TV3 and watch for yourself, rather than rely on second hand reports.
Tags: Roy Morgan, The Worm, TV3
November 21st, 2011 at 10:11 am
The worm is the final surrender of the media to form over substance.
This election is the worst I’ve experienced in terms of analysis of the issues. Bernard Hickey makes this point well in the NZ Herald: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10767262
The problem is that the journalists themselves are lazy, and they lack skills and knowledge.
The election coverage has therefore become the blind leading the blind. Quite depressing.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 10:15 am
The same gimmicky worm that allowed the reelection of the whorish Peter Dunne.
Vote:Bollocks. It has to be a very lousy mechanism.
November 21st, 2011 at 10:21 am
?
Here’s two questions I think might add substance to the debate, even though it would be directed at John Key alone rather than the ignoramus from Labour:
Mr Key. As a former successful financial trader and manager in Merrill Lynch and a former member of the Foreign Exchange Committee of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, do you think the Eurozone will fail, what will the world-wide effects be if it does, what (if anything) can be done to protect New Zealand, and are you doing those things right now?
And …
Vote:Given the failure of the US and many European governments to truly protect their citizens against such economic disasters do you think it prudent or even ethical to continue to lead people to believe that government will save them and, in any case, what steps are you taking to help people protect themselves?
November 21st, 2011 at 10:25 am
The 2002 election is often referred to as the worm election. I suspect it wasn’t the worm itself that made the difference, it was all the media attention as a result of the worm.
Same for this election, what was said over a cup of tea wasn’t election shattering, but the ensuing furore certainly may have become a defining part of the election, especially for Winston (and detrimental to UF). Our elections can be a major lottery of luck and whim of the media.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 10:26 am
@Manolo: Was the Dunne surge following the leaders debate last time around regarded as because of the worm or because of his performance, or perhaps a combination thereof?
I completely agree that the worm may be leading to voters, however, one presumes that it can lead in both directions (i.e. you can downvote more if you think the worm is heading in the wrong direction, and upvote if you agree with the direction it’s moving in). Can the “undecided in the studio” worm participants see the worm?
Looks like this time around there’ll be 2 worms: One for the “undecided’s” in the studio (I’ve often wondered how these are normally selected?) and one for the masses (or at least the iOS/Android owning masses that bother both watching the debate and downloading the app). The latter will be an interesting experiment to see in action, but I should think very little use in gauging the feeling of the electorate (or even the feeling of the subset it supposedly represents!)
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 10:27 am
I struggle with the point of a sample which is confined to people with smartphones and tablets. No doubt the worm will tell us lots about what tech-savvy, politically partisan folks watching the live and not time delayed (MySky) think about what the leaders say. Could that sample be less representative? What, then, is it’s point? Precisely no lessons can surely be drawn from that pool. Hopefully participation rather than measurement is the point.
More interesting will be if everyone in the studio audience is polled in this way, and the audience is representative. Be sure to fisk the Labour voters for the borrowed smartphones before they leave.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 10:29 am
It will interesting to see if they have ironed the bugs out of the system- which were obvious when they demoed it on Campbell live a few weeks ago, Having this in a studio audience is one thing, but extending it to all viewers who are watching on a variety of platforsm is asking for trouble,
Posit, If you have both Sky/Freeview and terrestrial TV, take the time to watch something on TV1/2/3/4 on Terrestrial TV, and then switch to the same channel on Sky/Freeveiw , you will notice that Sky/Freeview are lagging terrestrial TV by up to a second or two.
This is due to the lag of Geostationary satellites, having both of these type of audience both using the same system to enter “worm data” is going to cause a mess of problems, especially in the rapid cut and thrust of a debate.
Sure it will work well for the monologues, but when they really get stuck in it will fail due to the unsynchronised audiences.
They should use it for the studio audience only, as for the general public it is totally useless
Vote:(and that is even without all the sampling issues)
November 21st, 2011 at 10:54 am
leftyliberal says:- “One for the “undecided’s” in the studio (I’ve often wondered how these are normally selected?)”
Possibly on the basis that they are relatively affluent, hence they own one of the above mentioned devices, and that hopefully the waverers are equally divided between lefties and righties. Many will be wavering twixt Green and Labour, whilst some will be be wavering twixt ACT and National etc, so I hope Roy Morgan has kept the spread even.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 10:55 am
There is only one true worm in this election. It’s about 5’4″ tall and wears Italian suits.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 10:56 am
There are lies, damned lies, bad statistical methods and people who don’t understand statistics.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 10:57 am
@ben: From the article, there’ll be two separate worms: One for the “undecided” audience, and the other for the smartphone participants. The article stats that the undecided audience (i.e. traditional worm) will be shown live on screen.
Whether the second group (smartphone participants)’s worm is shown on screen is not indicated – just that “Their results will be shown separate to the voters group.”
One presumes that the undecided voter group don’t get to see their worm as they vote? It will be interesting to see how the worms differ (eg in the variation about the mean for example).
As per usual they’ve scheduled in media analysis following the debate – everything has to be analysed and packaged for the consumer, er, voter.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 11:00 am
If you are watching the debate tonight and decide to use the worm to cast a vote here is some info you might want to take into account: Why a vote for John Key is a really,really bad idea: http://aotearoaawiderperspective.wordpress.com/2011/11/21/mafia-and-wall-street-you-can-never-leave/
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 11:00 am
@Scott: You miss the point that there’s two separate worms. The first worm in the studio (undecided voters) uses traditional devices.
The second worm is a self-selected sample of smartphone users that watch the debate live, have the app, and use it.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 11:04 am
I think DPF is absolutely right. The headlines will be all about who “won” the debate based on the worm. It will be “Goff trounces Key in debate” or “Voters turn against Key”. Because the wormers will overwhelmingly young people, and overwhelmingly partisans. The reactions will be just like the minor leaders debate last week. And there will be little or no mention of the flaws of the worm as an impartial arbiter. The best to hope for is that the results are so biased that everyone can see they are ridiculous!
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 11:27 am
Giant tin-foil hat woman strikes again! By the way, the moon landing was a hoax.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 11:42 am
“And even the studio audience of undecided voters can be less than balanced”
I am sure John Campbell and Dunky will ensure that the undecided voters are balanced.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 12:09 pm
A new metaphor will be needed, as everyone knows worms don’t live in astro-turf…
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 12:10 pm
“If you are watching the debate tonight and decide to use the worm to cast a vote here is some info you might want to take into account: Why a vote for John Key is a really,really bad idea: ”
A vote for Don Brash is a much better idea.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 12:12 pm
leftyliberal says:- “You miss the point that there’s two separate worms.”
Yes I did. Thanks for clarifying.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 12:13 pm
How does the worm work if watching on Tivo/mysky/Tbox and you’ve timeshifted to avoid the ads in the middle or having gone to make a cup of tea? I could be reacting to an event minutes after the live version. I could be vigorously agreeing with asset sales on my computer but actually voting for WFF for beneficiaries.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 12:18 pm
A vote for Phil Goff is a vote for Hone Harawera.
A vote for Phil Goff is a vote for $32 per dozen.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 1:26 pm
TV3 cancelled in our house so will miss it.
Vote:Herald cancelled also.
Can live without the precious wonders of our country – the media.
November 21st, 2011 at 3:17 pm
If the average mum and dad voter are dumb enough to let a worm influence their opinions then they deserve the shitty governments that they get. The fact that they make up such a large proportion of average voters is the reason we get populist Prime Ministers like John Key and his useless centre-left policies.
Vote:November 21st, 2011 at 3:43 pm
Downloaded the app to have a play (Android) – first cockup is the red “On Air” light that’s supposed to show up only during the show is showing up now. Basically it consists of a few simple questions male/female, age group (<35,35-50,50+) and who you voted for last election (National, Labour, Greens, Other, Did not vote) followed by a slider bar that starts neutral at 50 and has a range of 0-100 (negative and positive sides). It appears to report the slide movement (one presumes via an http POST) as you're sliding the bar. The question is "How strongly do you agree or disagree with the speaker?"
It will be interesting to see how they control for:
1. People joining half way through.
Vote:2. People leaving early.
3. Normalizing each contributor to 50% (i.e. assume everyone is equally for candidate 1 as they are against candidate 2).
4. Offsets in timing of broadcast + feedback (with a spoken debate it's probably OK within the normal broadcasting delays).
5. Enterprising individuals that discover the http POST url/format and have a bit of fun. One presumes it's encrypted with the private key obfuscated in the app…