#at the risk of skewing the poll results

[asteroids-and-tractorbeams]

Poll time because I just saw a theory on Instagram that made no sense to me whatsoever

[triplecreature]

actually I'm kind of curious about this because it was a huge debate among my peers in my community

Clarifications under the cut:

The poster is in a public space where it is typical for everyday people to post things. It is not someone's private property or possession. Think piece of paper taped to a telephone pole, not sign in a storefront or in someone's yard.

The poster is not protected by law; you are very unlikely to face legal consequences for vandalizing it. Caveat: some peers have argued that it risks being socially consequential because an organization or demographic that you are a part of may be judged as intolerant/oppressive/disruptive/otherwise unpleasant if people witness your actions, and thus advocated against vandalism for fear of damaging your public image.

The poster is not an expensive or personal piece of artwork; it is a mass produced print on letter paper.

You are vehemently opposed to the message displayed on the poster, but it is an opinion that people are free to have in your country.

The 4th option refers to things like intentionally putting your own poster over top of the bad poster or otherwise making the bad poster harder to view; some people argued that targeting the poster for removal is out of line, but posting your own messages is an innocent action that you are well within your right to do (in this context, posters regularly eclipse each other as new ones are posted over top of outdated ones due to limited space)

The poster is part of a campaign; it's not unique. There are many postings of it across the community.

This is all assuming that the offending poster is not old and would typically not be considered fair game for pruning for quite some time, and that it is being specifically targeted for removal because of its message (rather than petty vandalism or because it's obstructive or damaged). E.g., if a poster is advertising an event happening on April 20th, it's typical to prune it after that date but not before.

Of course the situation that prompted the real life debate did involve a specific offending message, but I'm not going to specify what it was for now because I think it'll skew the results as people will just end up voting based on whether they like or dislike that message, which isn't the point of this. For this poll we are assuming that it IS a message that you are very opposed to; you can substitute in your own opinion that you have strong feelings about.

Please reblog for sample size!

[bedpolls]

Question: how do you feel about introducing a "idk who that is" button for the polls?

No. If you don't know who they are, just don't vote and wait for the results or something. Or do a quick google and/or vote on vibes. I don't want to risk skewing results too heavily to a non answer.

[pruning-the-minds-garden]

Hypnokink Safety Polls, Round One

My first round of poll results were as follows. I will show the results first, then give my breakdown and analysis of what the results mean at the bottom. All of that is under a "Read More" for the sake of brevity.

General Caveats: This is not a scientifically valid or representative polling method. If I were designing a study on this topic this a Tumblr poll is not how I would do it, because of course it isn't. The sample is self-selected, which introduces irresolvable sampling bias, there is a wildly different number of respondents and a different polling sample for each question so each is independent of one another, and there is no way to calibrate the questions against any sort of independent metric or demographic weighting. So, it cannot possibly capture the whole complexity around this and cannot truly be accurate. I will cop to that right at the top of this, so that none of you are under any illusions about it, but I still think that asking questions like this has value in niche communities like ours so it is worth doing and worth breaking down our responses.

That said, lets get on with it.

Analysis: This one is fairly straightforward. Aside from a slight fishhook at "minimal" it is a lightly front-loaded normal curve with a mean value of slightly above "moderate." Doing the math on this by turning "minimal" into 1, "low" into 2, etc all the way up to "very high" as 7, and adding up the weighted percentages then finding where the mean is, the mean value is 4.037, or veeeeeery slightly above "moderately risky." So, the average community perception is that hypnokink is a moderately risky to slightly greater than moderately risky kink activity.

Caveat and Cautionary Statement: This was a question of perception, not truth. That is to say, this is what people perceive to be the case, not what is necessarily true for a given person or what is their experience. 4.5% of (or 19) people perceive hypnokink to be a very high risk activity and 8.1% of (or 34) people perceive it to be a very low risk activity. Those perceptions are each informed by their personal experiences of hypnokink, and are valid insofar as they are themselves concerned. It is not right to discount either of them for deviating from the community "norm," but knowing what the community perceives collectively to be the norm does still have value. That could have been skewed by the specific examples I chose for low, moderate and very high, though, to be fair.

Analysis: It's approximately a coin-toss whether a given respondent has or has not been party to abusive, unsafe or unethical behavior that was seemingly intentional. Specifically, the plurality of respondents have been party to such behavior, but the size of the sample is such that the margin of uncertainty on those percentages would be pretty significant, meaning that I can't say for certain whether that plurality number is genuine or not. Still, that number is pretty darn high. 10% of respondents have been party to such behavior numerous times. FWIW, I think the dip between "few" and "numerous" is probably to do with the fact that I didn't put in a numerical qualifier, and so respondents likely couldn't quantify the difference clearly.

Overally though to me, that says that we have a lot of work still left to do as a community, though I suppose harm already done cannot at this point be erased.

Caveat: It was pointed out to be a couple of times that "party to" may not have been very clear. It was my intention to avoid things like "the victim of" or "subject to" because that sort of language can itself be traumatizing or dehumanizing, but still point in the same general direction, but that lack of clarity might have caused a bias in the poll responses. If so, though, then it probably skewed the responses toward "never" and not "numerous."

Analysis: This question has several moving parts, and each of them is interesting in its own right. I want to look at them all in turn.

First, we have the "not been involved" option, which is the plurality of responses. That is interesting in that it reveals that the hypnokink community is a lot newer to the kink than I thought, and therefore the community is growing at a significant rate. That alters the kinds of things that are useful and necessary to the community as a whole, in my mind. It also recontextualizes the previous question, because if 40% of the community has been involved for less than two years and approximately 50% of the community has not been party to intentionally abusive, unsafe or unethical behavior... then that potentially means that as few as 10% of people who have been involved longer than two years have not been party to those things. Now, that is the absolute statistical floor, and I do not have reason to believe that the true value is that number... but it is still a worrisome figure to even think about.

Next is whether the respondents perceive the norms getting more, less, or staying as stringent. About 30% (28.7%) of respondents said that they saw the norms getting more stringent with time, about 20% (20.8%) said they saw them staying the same, and about 10% (8.9%) said they saw them getting less stringent with time. That only adds up to ~60% because 40% answered that they had been in the community fewer than two years. So, on the whole, the half of the community that has been in the community longer tends to see norms growing more stringent, though with significant exceptions.

Finally, there is the question of whether that's something people want. When asked whether more stringent norms, less stringent norms or as stringent norms are what they want, about a third (33.7%) of respondents said they wanted more stringent norms or that more stringent norms were a needed change. About half that number, or one-sixth (16.8%) said that less stringent norms were desirable or necessary. Lastly, about half that number (7.9%) said that the norms should stay where they are. All that adds up, to me, to a fairly clear preference for the norms growing more stringent from where they are.

That combination of things tells me that the community is divided on the idea of changing norms. While the least popular option is for norms to stay where they are, and the most popular option is for them to grow more stringent, the second most popular option is for them to grow less stringent... and that results in something of an impasse. The community as a whole has less of an appetite for changing norms (16.9% over/under for whether more stringent is good is versus 19.8% over/under for whether they perceive norms as becoming more stringent) than it has a belief in whether norms are changing. I think that might contribute to a feeling that change is being forced upon certain people, who may not otherwise believe they are doing anything to merit having such change forced upon them.

So, what that ultimately tells me is that we need to communicate with one another better. Talk with each other more. Listen to each other better. Understand that having different values doesn't mean that one of us is wrong and the other right, one of us a hero and the other a villain. In other words we need to build community, because we are a community at the end of the day.

Analysis: This one is also fairly straightforward. I know that some of the ideas - especially comprehensive safety suggestions, the controversy around which I've written about before - are controversial, but the responses on the whole speak for themselves. I put this one in there more-or-less for my own edification, to inform the kind of content I make going forward. I was intentionally leaning on the selection bias of the polling format, knowing that the audience of the poll was going to skew to my readers and followers, and took the answer to this question to mean "this is what my followers want to see me give them."

I already have a list of bad actors, so I will keep that updated when I can as well as calling out people when they cross my radar. I have written some material for new subjects, but I can definitely write more. Most of the guides I have written are framed for new hypnotists and I tend to find that most guides are written from that perspective, so it is a decent hole to fill to produce that kind of content.

[worstcharacterpoll]

At risk of sounding bitter because my guy's not winning...the top polls of this round have fewer votes than the smallest poll of last round. I think it's because your posts yesterday didn't show up in the tags, which is Tumblr being Tumblr, but it's skewing the results towards the more recognizable characters. This round really feels like it wasn't given a fair shot

I mean true, but the last few rounds are going to be "skewed" towards more recognizable characters anyway because people are more likely to vote for a character they recognize. I was fully expecting the contenders to be narrowed down to more popular characters because that's how these work. It really fucking sucks that votes are diminishing though - im thinking maybe ill make the final round a week long so people have time to circulate the post or something. (im not gonna make another poll for this, so reply if you think this is a good or bad idea)

[tdp-fandom]

Shipping Poll Update

Click here if you haven't voted yet

Hello friends! As of the writing of this post, I've received 103 responses which is amazing! Thank you all so much! A special thank you goes to those who shared the poll - it is thanks to you guys that I got this many responses and I really appreciate it <3

I would like to share some general statistical data so far (the one that doesn't have an impact on the overall results) and address some feedback that I've received. Some graphs

I'm very happy to see that tumblr users have been the most active! You guys rock! Reddit has also been really active and I'm happy to see discord and twitter catching up!

I don't expect a lot of activity from dreamwidth as it's a different kind of website and I barely have any followers there but I'm curious to see how it goes. I ended up not posting anything on instagram because I would need to make images and I currently don't have the spoons for that :c

The age graph is also really cool! I'm very happy to see so many active 31+ people! Almost a quarter! And I'm very grateful to the young adults, who are the main bulk of the participants! I'm also happy to see teen participants express their votes as well c:

That's its for graphs for now - I can't share the rest just yet without the risk of getting the data skewed.

What I'd like to talk about next is your amazing feedback and how a few early participants saved this poll! Read under cut.

Feedback

People Who Have Saved the Poll

I posted the poll at 2 am my time (I had been working late nights on it the entire week because of real life responsibilities taking most of my free time) but decided to stick around for a bit to check if everything was going smoothly and to finish my conversations with friends on discord.

About 7 votes in, I decided to check on the poll and I saw this message in the feedback field:

"I didn`t see Rayla/Callum anywhere. Am I just blind or?"

This person was a life saver! Because although I know I added Rayllum originally, I must've accidentally deleted it and never noticed T-T it really is super easy to accidentally click on an X and delete a row from a multiple choice grid on google forms. Thanks to that person the crisis was averted. And it really would've been a crisis, because Rayllum is the flagship of TDP and getting lots of answers with no opinion on Rayllum would've really hurt the accuracy of the data.

I had also forgotten to add opinion options for some categories in the controversial ships section, which a friend as well as two poll takers notified me about!

Thank you all for the valuable feedback! I don't know what I would do without you.

Other Feedback

A few people mentioned that they weren't sure if it were ok not to tick every ship and I realized I hadn't been clear on that in my instructions. It is absolutely fine to skip whatever you feel like skipping. If there are ships you don't care about so much you don't even want to choose any option for - that is 100% valid and it tells me important information about the ship - you're not just neutral about it, you really do not care about a ship. And if I want to accurately evaluate our fandom's relationship with various ships, this information is also important.

People also commented that there have been too many ships to go through and that's definitely true. I tried to be as thorough as I could by including every possible ship people would have opinions on but the lists ended up being huge. I am planning to change a few things for the season 5 poll. I will probably exclude certain ships that won't do very well on this poll (unless the events in S5 warrant keeping them) and try to rearrange them in a way that can help people go through them faster.

There was a related comment where a person noted that it's not very convenient to scroll back and forth through the four opinion choices on mobile and suggested using just the numbers 1 to 4. That is a very good idea - I will implement this in the next poll.

One person was asking about Breakfast Guards being included in the canon ships. While I didn't get any official confirmations, they were shown almost kissing in the episode where Zubeia visits Katolis so I think that counts as them having some sort of onscreen not strictly platonic relationship.

While I explained the kinds of ships the poll was dealing with as well as the difference between active and passive shipping, I didn't actually explain what I mean by shipping, as one person rightfully pointed out! It's not an easy thing to define but I will try to come up with something for the season 5 poll! So far we can stick to romantic, queerplatonic or nonromantic sexual dynamics.

I used the wrong ship name for Rex Igneous x Avizandum. It should be Zanrex instead of Rexandum and the wonderful @cometchasr explained to why that particular shipname was chosen! He said that Zan was a nickname for Avizandum used a in few fics featuring the former dragon king and it fit very well with how the nickname Zym works. When I don't know a shipname I often just make one up on the spot as a placeholder but I am always happy to hear feedback from actual shippers and I switch to their preferred shipname.

I got so many nice compliments and words of encouragement too! Thank you guys! It means a lot ;__;

I will try to address feedback roughly once a week and keep you all updated on how things are going!

[philomathresearch]

The Significance of Sampling: Unlocking Insights Through Primary Market Research

In the realm of market research, sampling holds paramount importance. It’s the cornerstone of primary market research, allowing businesses to extract meaningful insights from a subset of the population that represents the larger whole. Whether you’re launching a new product, refining your marketing strategy, or gauging customer satisfaction, understanding the importance of sampling is essential for unlocking valuable insights. Let’s delve deeper into why sampling is crucial in primary market research.

What is Sampling?

Sampling involves selecting a subset of individuals or elements from a larger population to represent and study that population. It’s impractical and often impossible to collect data from every member of a population, so sampling provides a practical way to gather insights efficiently.

Ensuring Representativeness

One of the primary reasons sampling is so important is its ability to ensure representativeness. When done correctly, a sample reflects the characteristics of the larger population, allowing researchers to make accurate inferences. This representativeness is crucial for drawing conclusions and making decisions based on the findings of the research.

Cost and Time Efficiency

Sampling helps in saving resources such as time and money. Conducting research on an entire population can be prohibitively expensive and time-consuming. By using a sample, researchers can achieve similar results with significantly fewer resources, making market research more feasible for businesses of all sizes.

Reducing Bias

Bias is a significant concern in research. Sampling techniques help mitigate bias by ensuring that each member of the population has an equal chance of being selected for the sample. This reduces the risk of skewing results and ensures that findings are more accurate and reliable.

Types of Sampling Techniques

There are various sampling techniques, each suitable for different research scenarios:

Random Sampling: Every member of the population has an equal chance of being selected. This method ensures representativeness and minimizes bias.

Stratified Sampling: The population is divided into homogeneous groups, or strata, and then a random sample is taken from each group. This ensures representation from all segments of the population.

Cluster Sampling: The population is divided into clusters, and then a random sample of clusters is selected. This method is particularly useful when the population is geographically dispersed.

Convenience Sampling: Participants are chosen based on their availability or accessibility. While convenient, this method may not produce representative results and is more prone to bias.

Snowball Sampling: Participants refer others for the study, creating a chain of referrals. This technique is useful when the population is difficult to reach, but it can introduce bias.

Sample Size Matters

Determining the appropriate sample size is crucial. A sample that is too small may not accurately represent the population, while a sample that is too large may waste resources. Statistical methods can help calculate the optimal sample size based on factors such as population size, confidence level, and margin of error.

Statistical Significance

Statistical significance is another key aspect of sampling. It refers to the likelihood that the observed results are not due to chance. By analyzing the data collected from the sample, researchers can determine whether the findings are statistically significant, providing confidence in the conclusions drawn.

Practical Applications of Sampling

Sampling is used across various industries and research areas:

Market Research: Understanding consumer preferences, behavior, and trends.

Healthcare: Studying patient populations to improve treatments and outcomes.

Education: Assessing the effectiveness of teaching methods and educational programs.

Political Polling: Predicting election outcomes and understanding voter opinions.

Environmental Studies: Monitoring environmental factors and their impact on ecosystems.

Challenges and Considerations

While sampling offers numerous benefits, it’s not without challenges:

Sampling Bias: Despite efforts to minimize bias, it can still occur, leading to skewed results.

Sampling Frame Errors: Errors in defining the population can affect the validity of the sample.

Sampling Methodology: Choosing the right sampling technique depends on the research objectives and population characteristics.

Sampling Errors: Random variations in the sample can lead to inaccuracies in the findings.

Conclusion

In conclusion, sampling is a fundamental aspect of primary market research with far-reaching implications for decision-making in business and academia. By selecting a representative subset of the population and applying appropriate sampling techniques, researchers can unlock valuable insights efficiently and cost-effectively. Understanding the importance of sampling and its applications is essential for conducting meaningful research and making informed decisions in today’s dynamic and competitive landscape.

FAQs

1. What is sampling in market research?

Sampling in market research involves selecting a subset of individuals or elements from a larger population to represent and study that population. It allows researchers to gather insights efficiently without having to survey every member of the population.

2. Why is sampling important in market research?

Sampling is crucial in market research because it ensures representativeness, saves resources such as time and money, and helps in reducing bias, thereby leading to more accurate and reliable findings.

3. What are the different types of sampling techniques used in market research?

Random Sampling: Every member of the population has an equal chance of being selected.

Stratified Sampling: The population is divided into homogeneous groups, and a sample is taken from each group.

Cluster Sampling: The population is divided into clusters, and a random sample of clusters is selected.

Convenience Sampling: Participants are chosen based on their availability or accessibility.

Snowball Sampling: Participants refer others for the study, creating a chain of referrals.

4. How is the sample size determined in market research?

The appropriate sample size is determined based on factors such as population size, confidence level, and margin of error. Statistical methods are used to calculate the optimal sample size.

5. What is statistical significance in sampling?

Statistical significance refers to the likelihood that the observed results are not due to chance. It helps researchers determine whether the findings from the sample are reliable and can be generalized to the larger population.

6. What are some practical applications of sampling beyond market research?

Sampling is used in various industries and research areas such as healthcare, education, political polling, and environmental studies to understand populations, behaviors, trends, and impacts.

7. What are the challenges associated with sampling in market research?

Challenges include sampling bias, errors in defining the population, choosing the right sampling methodology, and dealing with sampling errors that can lead to inaccuracies in the findings.

8. How can businesses and researchers ensure the quality of their sampling methods?

Businesses and researchers can ensure quality by carefully designing their sampling strategies, validating the representativeness of their samples, and addressing any potential biases or errors in the sampling process.

[fioras-resolve]

dont get me wrong, im glad i get to see your polls because you've been tagging them as Risk of Rain... but I think you *really* skewed the results because so many people think that the rogue-*lite* that this series is, is a rogue-*like* instead.

hey, i intentionally cast a wide net in the tags, including games that stretch the definition of what a roguelike is. i don't like being a prescriptivist on genre where i tell other people what a genre needs to be. if i had only tagged these posts with the games that fit the typical modern definition of permadeath + procgen, or indeed if i only went with the "classic" style roguelikes like maj'eyal and angband, *that* would have been biasing the results. the idea that any one fandom may skew the results is one i've thought of, but there's also clearly a wide enough spectrum of thought that that isn't *too* much of a problem

[enkisstories]

Let’s Investigate! - Episode 3 results

Nobody scored a point in the Teamwork category this time around. This is regretable, but on the other hand very much in line with how the DPD sims click.

At risk of getting kicked this episode is Amber. Poll in the next post.

- Since episode 3 was spaced out over two days, voting may be skewed towards today’s contestants. I will make episode 4 shorter to prevent this in the future (it’s going to be a simple task anyway, one post per contestant will suffice).

- In case I get no votes, I will use the average likes per contestant in place of audience votes. First vote is in :-)

[youngsaladphilosopher]

Abortion ruling puts spotlight on gerrymandered legislatures

The dynamics have changed for this year’s elections. The GOP’s edge was cut in half under new legislative districts drawn by a voter-approved citizens’ redistricting commission, according to the PlanScore data. That could improve Democrats’ chances of winning a chamber and influencing abortion policy.Michigan’s Republican gubernatorial challengers generally support a 1931 state law — temporarily placed on hold by a judge — that bans abortions unless a woman’s health is at risk. Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, who is running for reelection, wants to repeal that law.Republican state Rep. Steve Carra said lawmakers are looking to replace it with “something that would be enforceable in the 21st century.”“It’s more important to protect life than it is a woman’s right to choose to take that life,” said Carra, who leads a coalition of 321 lawmakers from 35 states that had urged the Supreme Court to return abortion policy to the states.Unsure about their legislative prospects, abortion rights advocates are gathering signatures for a November ballot initiative that would create a state constitutional right to abortion, allowing its regulation only “after fetal viability.”“It’s the best shot that we have at securing abortion access,” Democratic state Rep. Laurie Pohutsky said. “I think if this is put in voters’ hands, they will want to see this ballot measure succeed.”In overturning a half-century of nationwide legal protection for abortion, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Roe v. Wade had been wrongly decided and that it was time to “return the issue of abortion to the people’s elected representatives” in the states.

Whether those elected officials are truly representative of the people is a matter of debate, thanks to another high court decision that has enabled control of state legislatures to be skewed to the right or left.

In June 2019, three years before its momentous abortion ruling, the Supreme Court decided that it has no role in restraining partisan gerrymandering, in which Republicans or Democrats manipulate the boundaries of voting districts to give their candidates an edge.

The result is that many legislatures are more heavily partisan than the state’s population as a whole. Gerrymandering again flourished as politicians used the 2020 census data to redraw districts that could benefit their party both for this year’s elections and the next decade.

In some swing states with Republican-led legislatures, such as Michigan and Wisconsin, “arguably gerrymandering really is the primary reason that abortion is likely to be illegal,” said Chris Warshaw, a political scientist at George Washington University who analyzes redistricting data.

Meanwhile, “in states where Democrats have gerrymandered, it’s going to help probably make abortion laws more liberal than people would like,” he added.

A majority of Americans support abortion access in general, though many say there should be some restrictions, according to public opinion polls.

States have sometimes been viewed as laboratories for democracy — institutions most closely connected to the people where public policies are tested, take root and potentially spread.

Writing for the Supreme Court’s majority in its June 24 abortion decision, Justice Samuel Alito noted that 30 states had prohibited abortion when the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling “short-circuited the democratic process,” usurped lawmakers and imposed abortion rights nationwide.

“Our decision returns the issue of abortion to those legislative bodies, and it allows women on both sides of the abortion issue to seek to affect the legislative process by influencing public opinion, lobbying legislators, voting, and running for office,” Alito wrote.

Abortion already is an issue in Wisconsin’s gubernatorial and legislative elections. A recent Wisconsin poll showed a majority supported legal abortion in most or all cases. But a fight is brewing over an 1849 state law — which had been unenforceable until Roe v. Wade was overruled — that bans abortion except to save the life of the woman.

Democratic Gov. Tony Evers is backing a court challenge to overturn the law, enacted just a year after Wisconsin gained statehood. He also called a special legislative session in June to repeal it. But the Republican-led Assembly and Senate adjourned in a matter of seconds without taking action.

Wisconsin’s legislative chambers had one of the nation’s strongest Republican advantages during the past decade and are projected to continue to do so under new districts in place for the 2022 elections, according to an analysis by PlanScore, a nonprofit that uses election data to rate the partisan tilt of legislative districts.

“Democracy is distorted in Wisconsin because of these maps,” Assembly Minority Leader Greta Neubauer said.

In 2018, Democrats won every major statewide office, including governor and attorney general, races where gerrymandering isn’t in play. But they have not been able to overcome heavily gerrymandered state legislative districts since Republicans won control of the statehouse during the midterm elections in 2010.

“If we had a truly democratic system in Wisconsin, we would be in a different situation,” she said. “We would be overturning this criminal abortion ban right now”

Republican state Rep. Donna Rozar, a former cardiac nurse who backs abortion restrictions, said gerrymandering shouldn’t stop political parties from running good candidates to represent their districts. She expects a robust abortion debate during the campaign to carry into the 2023 legislative session.

“This is an issue that is so critical to come back to the states, because each state then can elect people that will represent their values.” Rozar said.

The 2010 midterms, two years after former President Barack Obama was elected, were a pivot point for control of statehouses across the country. Coming into that election, Democrats fully controlled 27 state legislatures and Republicans 14, with the rest split. But sweeping GOP victories put the party in charge of redistricting in many states. By 2015, after two elections under the new maps, Republicans fully controlled 30 legislatures and Democrats just 11.

That Republican legislative advantage largely persisted through the 2020 elections, including in states that otherwise are narrowly divided between Democrats and Republicans, such as Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

In New Mexico, it’s Republicans who contend the Democratic-led Legislature has pushed beyond the will of many voters on abortion policies. The New Mexico House and Senate districts had a sizable pro-Democratic edge during the past decade that got even more pronounced after districts were redrawn based on the 2020 census, according to the PlanScore data.

Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed legislation last year repealing a dormant 1969 law that banned most abortions. After Roe v. Wade was overruled, she signed an executive order making New Mexico a safe harbor for people seeking abortions. Unlike most states, New Mexico has no restrictions on late-term abortions.

“I don’t think that the majority of New Mexicans support New Mexico’s abortion policy at this time,” Republican state Sen. Gay Kernan said. “New Mexico is the late-term abortion capital of the United States, basically.”

The Republican nominee for governor, Mark Ronchetti, has proposed to ban abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy with exceptions for rape, incest and when a woman’s life is at risk. But the legislative proposal has been described as dead on arrival by Democratic state Senate Whip Linda Lopez.

Michigan could provide one of the biggest tests of representative government in the nation’s new abortion battle.

Republicans drew Michigan legislative districts after the 2010 census and created such a sizable advantage for their party that it may have helped the GOP maintain control of the closely divided House, according to an Associated Press analysis. As in Wisconsin, Democrats in Michigan won the governor’s race and every other major statewide office in 2018 but could not overcome legislative districts tilted toward Republicans.

[catt-nuevenor]

idk if i'm alone in this, but would it be possible to have an option in the poll for "choose RO genders"? (even for non-bi MCs--when my MC is a gay man, i tend to make a couple ROs f or nb just so it's not a bro fest.) no worries if not! this is your game, after all. (and i love it, by the way!)

It's not a bad idea, but I'm not going to add it into the current opinion poll as it will skew the results for the current vote.

I'm not sure how I'd be able to fit that option into the story without breaking the fourth wall tbh. That's kind of the beauty of the randomiser, it does all the fiddly stuff behind the scenes without the player having what is potentially the surprise of the RO's genders spoiled for them.

I suppose I could set up a switch like the panic scene switch in the stats page, that would allow players to tweak the genders while in the opening and chapter 1... Allowing people to change things any later, I think, runs the risk of making the characters a bit too adjustable, and takes away from their individual personalities. It would also be really difficult to code around for certain later events.

I'll set up another poll after this one is finished and put the possibility to the community. We'll see what the general feeling is then.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Pluralistic: 27 Mar 2020 (Mar-a-Lago Virus, plutes cash in on stimulus, postal voting vs USPS collapse, "civility" and the Confederate playbook, Bojo has covid, reasonable covid food-safety advice, SF cocktail delivery, flu pandemic photos, free hi-rez covid stock art, Warren campaign frees its software)

Today's links

The US is now the epicenter of the pandemic: Trump has murdered millions.

Plutes cash in on stimulus: $170B for real-estate tycoons.

States prep for postal voting: But the GOP has all but murdered the USPS.

"Civility" and the Confederate playbook: The right's call for "civility" has a long, dishonorable history.

Boris Johnson has coronavirus: He greenlit national pox-parties, now he has it.

Reasonable covid food-safety advice: Sanitize your hands and your cart, practice social distancing, and…you're done.

San Francisco cocktail delivery: Courtesy of the DNA Lounge.

Flu pandemic photos: Mask-slackers beware!

Free hi-rez covid stock art: Make your pandemic more visually varied.

Warren campaign frees its software: Free, open and universal campaigning tools.

This day in history: 2005, 2010, 2015, 2019

Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming appearances, current writing projects, current reading

The US is now the epicenter of the pandemic (permalink)

The US is now the epicenter of the global coronavirus pandemic, henceforth known as the Mar-a-Lago Virus. It has the highest number of infections of any country in the world.

https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html

There have "only" been 1,000 US deaths so far. The "only" is there because there are so many more to come, when the vast number of incubating cases start manifesting symptoms and begin to die.

Trump wants the country to go back to work by Easter, because in his version of the Trolley Problem, the most important thing is saving the trolley.

https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/25/21193670/trump-easter-coronavirus-isolation-relax-rules-economy-social-distancing

We had so much warning. But the president said it wasn't anything to worry about.

Now, a lot of people are going to die.

Most of the dead will be old – from the demographic most likely to have voted for Trump (which isn't to imply that only Trump voters will die, or that they deserve to die – only that Trump chose to put his base at risk).

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/24/grandparents-optional-party/#turkey-shoot

Many will have contracted their infections by deliberately seeking out crowded public places as the pandemic started spreading, because Fox News told them that doing so was a way to own the libs.

Fox News viewers – who skew elderly, even by the standards of TV watchers – are also disproportionately at risk from coronavirus. Fox News is now a suicide cult.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/19/gb-whatsapp/#fox-cult

But so many people will die because of this. Old people. Young people. People with disabilities. People who just had very bad luck. Kids.

And that's before you get to all the people who have car wrecks or heart attacks or slip-and-falls and can't get treatment in overloaded hospitals.

When Hoover fucked up by giving in to plutes and crashed the economy, he got tent cities, or "Hoovervilles."

Trump's fuckup will end with mass graves. Trump Mausoleums? Mar-a-Plague-Pits?

We will get through this. But Trump will have murdered so many of us before it's over.

https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/26/21196267/coronavirus-usa-cases-covid-19-pandemic-china-number-positive-trump

Plutes cash in on stimulus (permalink)

The stimulus package that the GOP Senate passed has the largest-ever giveaway for real-estate plutes in US tax history: $170 billion in tax-cuts over 10 years for couples with more than $500K in annual capital gains.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/26/business/coronavirus-real-estate-investors-stimulus.html

The President who will sign the bill into law is a real-estate investor who stands to make a fortune from it. His inner circle is packed with similarly situated rentiers.

It's the second-biggest giveaway in the stimulus package, and it will also give windfalls to wealthy oil and gas investors.

The House is expected to vote on it today.

(Image: Rich Brooks, CC BY, modified)

States prep for postal voting (permalink)

States are scrambling to prepare for a postal ballot-based election next November.

https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2020/03/23/states-begin-prep-for-mail-in-voting-in-presidential-election

Postal ballots tend to benefit Democrats, whose voters are disproportionately unable to get off work to vote, and who are more likely to live in regions where GOP statehouses have closed polling places, adding long drives and long queues for in-person voting.

That's why Red States often have state laws that prohibit unrestricted postal voting, insisting that voters must provide a "good reason" for their desire to exercise their franchise to a bureaucrat who gets to decide whether or not they can participate in elections.

Of course, if Trump throws hundreds of thousands – or millions – of (disproportionately GOP-voting) seniors into the coronavirus volcano to appease the market-gods, the survivors may be gunshy about voting in person, even if they continue as fully paid-up Trump cultists.

There are serious challenges to reorienting towards a largely postal election, including mobilizing printing resources during a lockdown.

But even more challenging is the post office itself, which is on the verge of collapse.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/03/23/coronavirus-postal-service-june-145683

The USPS is a miracle of self-funding resilience, a universal, small-d democratic institution that serves the whole nation. But its existence is a thorn in the side of shareholders UPS and Fedex, who donate lavishly to Congressjerks who fuck with the post office.

Requiring the post office to fund pension liabilities for workers who aren't born yet is transparent fuckery. Combine that with a sharp decline in mail usage during the lockdown and the service is now on the brink.

That would be bad news, and not just for elections. The USPS is key to America's emergency preparedness, and has been since the Cold War, when it was projected to serve as a survivor-counting/corpse-hauling service after nuclear armageddon.

It's the only institution that could deliver covid meds to every household in America in a single day.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/25/national-emergency-library/#going-postal

"Civility" and the Confederate playbook (permalink)

You may have heard conservatives insist that the reason they stick up for eugenicists and other cryptofascists is that they're standing up for "civility" against the "social justice mobs."

This rhetoric isn't new: it's literally the same thing that slavery apologists said in the runup to, and aftermath of, the Civil War: "we're not in favor of slavery, we're just opposed to the shaming and social exclusion of slavery advocates.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/08/29/conservatives-say-weve-abandoned-reason-civility-old-south-said-that-too/

When we learn about the antebellum slavery debate, we hear about slavery's defenders – but the mainstream debate over slavery wasn't about its merits, it was about the incivility of abolitionists, and how that compromised the free speech of enslavers.

Slavery advocates were cast as a disfavored minority, shouted down by mobs who refused to hear them out. But discrimination against slavers was a funny kind of discrimination: half the millionaires in America were slavers in a single southern town.

Likewise, the right-wing figures who today claim that they are censored and cast out by the intolerant left are millionaires who fill arenas and appear regularly on Fox News, the most popular cable network in America.

They publish books with Big Five publishers and go on multicity tours. They're courted by "progressive" news outlets as paid on-air commentators to provide "balance." If that's discrimination, sign me up.

John Wilkes Booth, who assassinated Lincoln, professed love of Black people, and claimed he was animated by anger at the suppression of honest debate on racial politics, unable to share "my thoughts or sentiments" about slavery in polite society.

Slavers cast anti-slavery rhetoric as "orthodoxy" and cast themselves as realists who were willing to speak truth to power.

Does that sound familiar?

The abolition movement – including Lincoln – focused on these slavery apologists, understanding that they provided the cover for the continuation of slavery.

Lincoln insisted that Douglas go beyond lamenting the angry rhetoric of abolitionists and instead describe what he stood for – beyond his support of slavers' right to "choose how they wanted to live."

He demanded that Douglas go beyond his campaign speeches against "mob rule" and state plainly whether he wanted an America with or without slavery.

In her Washington Post op-ed, Eve Fairbanks suggests that we do the same for the "reasonable right" – pin them down. Sure, you don't like "cancel culture," but what do you stand for? What kind of world do you want?

(Image: Anthony Crider, CC BY)

Boris Johnson has coronavirus (permalink)

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has coronavirus.

https://twitter.com/borisjohnson/status/1243496858095411200

Under Johnson's leadership, the UK pursued a month-long plan to turn the nation into a giant pox-party, hoping to attain quick "herd immunity."

He was following a promising strategy devised for less-lethal, less-contagious flus, which was manifestly unsuited to coronavirus, as experts argued at the time. As a result, infections now rage out of control in the UK.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Coronavirus/comments/fnl0n6/im_a_critical_care_doctor_working_in_a_uk_high/#fla1iq6

During the planning of this "herd immunity" strategy, Johnson's chief advisor Dominic Cummings acknowledged that it would likely murder elderly people: "if that means some pensioners die, too bad."

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/24/grandparents-optional-party/#death-panels

After Johnson tested positive for coronavirus, Cummings was seen fleeing Number 10 Downing Street at a dead run.

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/dominic-cummings-seen-running-no-114514496.html

(Image: Think London, CC-BY, modified)

Reasonable covid food-safety advice (permalink)

There's a viral (ugh) video going around in which an MD in scrubs (at home!) shows you what you should do when you come back from the grocery store. It's frankly terrifying. It's also wrong.

As Don Schaffner, a food microbiologist, notes in his thread, not only is this advice wrong, it could make you very sick — either because you ate the soap that you washed your food in, or because you left your groceries on your stoop for 3 days.

https://twitter.com/bugcounter/status/1243319180851580929

There's no evidence that washing your food with soap will kill coronavirus, and even less evidence that you can get the virus from eating. There is, however, millennias' worth of evidence that you can die from food poisoning.

Schaffner's advice for groceries boils down to: wash your hands before and after grocery shopping. Wipe down the cart handle. Shop efficiently. Keep your distance from other shoppers.

You know, common sense.

(Image: Lyza, CC BY-SA, modified)

San Francisco cocktail delivery (permalink)

Hey, San Francisco! Craving a cocktail? The DNA Lounge will deliver a mason jar's worth (~3 servings) of Black Manhattan (w/Slow and Low honey & orange infused rye), Sazerac, brown sugar margarita (w/a little orange) or lavender lemonade gin cooler.

https://www.dnalounge.com/backstage/log/2020/03/26.html

The DNA is a San Francisco institution, one that runs on a shoestring and is continuing to pay its employees, even as other SF venues (snapped up by predatory corporate behemoths) shut down.

https://pluralistic.net/2020/03/22/preppers-are-larpers/#help-dna

They've also got a bunch of livestream events coming up, including a benefit for the Gay Gaming Professionals, a Death Guild set, and Hubba Hubba Revue's Burlesquerpiece Theatre.

Flu pandemic photos (permalink)

During the 1918 flu pandemic, California went on lockdown. The governor ordered statewide shutdowns, and "mask slackers" who refused to wear masks faced arrest.

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/f/flu/0030flu.0009.300/1

The California Sun has rounded up an amazing set of images of California life during the 1918 flu from libraries, museums, and other sources," in gorgeous hi-rez.

Free hi-rez covid stock art (permalink)

If this image seems familiar, that's because it's one of the only open-licensed images of the novel coronavirus, courtesy of the CDC. It's been used millions of times in just a few weeks.

https://tinyurl.com/u457y2d

An effects house called Covert has stepped in to fill the visual gap with a collection of gorgeous,crazy hi-rez covid renders: "No licensing, royalties or any credit is required for their use."

https://wearecovert.com/free-covid-19-animations-renders-images/

Warren campaign frees its software (permalink)

Elizabeth Warren's campaign has released seven of its sophisticated campaigning tools as free/open software.

https://medium.com/@teamwarren/open-source-tools-from-the-warren-for-president-tech-team-f1f27d2c7551

The Warren campaign had a large cohort of software developers and created a suite of outstanding tools, as well as making improvements to standard tools, including improvements to the texting tool Spoke that reduces the cost of using it by ~97%!

https://www.wired.com/story/elizabeth-warren-campaign-open-source-tech/

The projects are hosted on Github:

https://github.com/Elizabeth-Warren/

This isn't just an opportunity for campaigns, but also for small shops that provide integration and support to them. Obviously election campaigning is in a mess at the moment, but this is seismic.

This day in history (permalink)

#15yrsago Nepali media crackdown thwarted by bloggers https://web.archive.org/web/20050328204722/http://insn.org/

#10yrsago LibDem MPs won't fight for debate on Digital Economy Bill https://www.openrightsgroup.org/blog/2010/lib-dems-tories-and-labour-pledge-to-ram-disconnection-through

#5yrsago Top homeland security Congressjerk only just heard about crypto, and he doesn't like it https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20150327/07312030462/congressional-rep-john-carter-discovers-encryption-worries-it-may-one-day-be-used-computers-to-protect-your-data.shtml

#5yrsago NSA-proof passwords https://theintercept.com/2015/03/26/passphrases-can-memorize-attackers-cant-guess/

#5yrsago Welfare encourages entrepreneurship https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/03/welfare-makes-america-more-entrepreneurial/388598/

#5yrsago Here's the TSA's stupid, secret list of behavioral terrorism tells https://theintercept.com/2015/03/27/revealed-tsas-closely-held-behavior-checklist-spot-terrorists/

#5yrsago San Francisco Sheriff's Deputy ring accused of pit-fighting inmates https://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/S-F-jail-inmates-forced-to-fight-Adachi-says-6161221.php

#1yrago Elizabeth Warren's latest campaign plank is a national Right-to-Repair law for farm equipment https://medium.com/@teamwarren/leveling-the-playing-field-for-americas-family-farmers-823d1994f067

#1yrago Mystery solved: why has a beach in France been blighted by washed-up parts for toy Garfield phones for more than 30 years? https://www.lemonde.fr/big-browser/article/2019/03/27/l-affaire-des-echouages-de-telephones-garfield-en-bretagne-enfin-resolue_5442290_4832693.html

#1yrago McDonald's will drop opposition to increases in the federal minimum wage https://www.politico.com/story/2019/03/26/mcdonalds-lobbying-minimum-wage-1238284

#1yrago Front-line programmers default to insecure practices unless they are instructed to do otherwise https://net.cs.uni-bonn.de/fileadmin/user_upload/naiakshi/Naiakshina_Password_Study.pdf

#1yrago Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez schools Republicans on the true costs and beneficiaries of the Green New Deal https://twitter.com/briantylercohen/status/1110700996282343424?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Colophon (permalink)

Today's top sources: Naked Capitalism (https://nakedcapitalism.com/), Slate Star Codex (https://slatestarcodex.com/), Kottke (https://kottke.org), Advertising Pics (https://advertisingpics.tumblr.com/), Fipi Lele.

Currently writing: I'm getting geared up to start work my next novel, "The Lost Cause," a post-GND novel about truth and reconciliation.

Currently reading: Just started Lauren Beukes's forthcoming Afterland: it's Y the Last Man plus plus, and two chapters in, it's amazeballs. Last month, I finished Andrea Bernstein's "American Oligarchs"; it's a magnificent history of the Kushner and Trump families, showing how they cheated, stole and lied their way into power. I'm getting really into Anna Weiner's memoir about tech, "Uncanny Valley." I just loaded Matt Stoller's "Goliath" onto my underwater MP3 player and I'm listening to it as I swim laps.

Latest podcast: Data – the new oil, or potential for a toxic oil spill? https://craphound.com/podcast/2020/03/23/data-the-new-oil-or-potential-for-a-toxic-oil-spill/

Upcoming appearances:

Quarantine Book Club, April 1, 3PM Pacific https://www.eventbrite.com/e/quarantine-book-club-cory-doctorow-tickets-100931360416

Museums and the Web, April 2, 12PM-3PM Pacific https://mw20.museweb.net/

Upcoming books: "Poesy the Monster Slayer" (Jul 2020), a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Pre-order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627?utm_source=socialmedia&utm_medium=socialpost&utm_term=na-poesycorypreorder&utm_content=na-preorder-buynow&utm_campaign=9781626723627

(we're having a launch for it in Burbank on July 11 at Dark Delicacies and you can get me AND Poesy to sign it and Dark Del will ship it to the monster kids in your life in time for the release date).

"Attack Surface": The third Little Brother book, Oct 20, 2020. https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250757531

"Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583

This work licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commerically, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net.

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Quotations and images are not included in this license; they are included either under a limitation or exception to copyright, or on the basis of a separate license. Please exercise caution.

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When live gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla -Joey "Accordion Guy" DeVilla

[noerblanc]

Professional Game Boosting Benefits Of Professional Game Boosting

Professional Game Boosting has many advantages beyond the game. Numerous professional associations are committed to certain endeavors and assign specific amounts of support to every one of them. If you're within a reasonable distance of this number you will receive top-quality support for your sport. But, there are some things to think about before you make the decision to sign up and take advantage of this service. Read on to learn more information about Professional Game Boosting.

The cost of boosting services

If you're looking for an affordable, reliable service that's inexpensive but also effective using an expert game-boosting service. There are a few points to be looking for in an expert apex legends boost service. They must offer 24 hour customer service. It will let you quickly reach them with any queries or questions. Another crucial aspect to consider when choosing a professional game boosting service is confidence. It is not advisable to use an anonymous booster who could put your payment details at risk.

You'll need to pay a certain amount to get your game up to speed. This is due to the fact that creating a character and leveling up could take hours of effort. It can be exhausting to stay at your computer. Plus, not everyone is able to commit to spending hours playing video games. Therefore, why not engage a professional fortnite win boosting service to spare yourself the trouble? You'll not only be able to play with top players with no worries about data consumption, but you'll have more power in less time.

Cost of boosting for low-ranked players

Gamers seeking to increase the value of their online gaming account are increasing turning to professional gaming boost services. Boosting services can help you improve your game-related statistics, win position, or even inside-game things. Game boosting is among the most popular services in online gaming. Game boosting is becoming increasingly popular with the advent of online multiplayer role-playing games.

The process of improving an online game can take anything from a few hours up to a week, depending on the provider you choose. However, some services manage several clients simultaneously and therefore waiting times may differ. Each service provider has different ways of executing. Some services require account owners to supply login information, while others allow you and the booster to play together. There are some sites that offer duo-queues, which allow you and the booster to play simultaneously.

Infractions in esports

In a recent poll of League of Legends players found that 13.1 percent admitted making use of professional ow boosting, the overwhelming majority believed that the practice negatively affected the gaming community. In several countries, such as South Korea where a fine up to $18,000 is possible as well as a two-year suspended sentence is feasible, boosting is declared a crime. Although this is a crime however, the IOC has not taken any action against it, which could mean more stringent rules for the sport.

If used to cheat however, boosting could affect tournament play. Low-level esports competitions can be open to everyone and rank is usually the only criteria for qualification. Cheating could result in individuals and teams receiving unfair advantages, which would skew the results of tournaments. This is particularly problematic when cheaters can receive their own boosts free.

[wisepowderposts]

Hampered EUR & GBP on Dovish ECB & BoE

The world-concerned US presidential election is about to be held within less than a week. Before the reveal of the Biden family‘s corruption scandal, I believed that Joe Biden was certain to win with a 17-point lead over Trump. But the situation is different now as Biden’s approval rating remains skewed to the downside with an only 7-point lead.To get more news about WikiFX, you can visit wikifx.com official website.

　　Polls are only acceptable as a reference because the US presidential election adopts the Electoral College system. In October four years ago, the US media reported that the Democratic presidential candidate Hillary was comfortably ahead of Trump with a 12-point lead. Although almost all media at home and abroad predicted that Trump was doomed to failure, the result surprised all. More than the shock victory, Trump even held 306 votes compared to 232 votes for Hillary. Besides, the Republicans also take full control of Congress, which surprised the world. The situation now is more complicated than four years ago, making it hard to predict who will host the White House and which party will control Congress. The rise of risk aversion in financial markets seems inevitable under such uncertainties, as evidenced by the sharp decline of US stocks yesterday. In this case, next weeks DXY and Japanese yen are hopefully to be bullish.

　　In the face of uncertainties over the US election, there will be a few policy-setting meetings of central banks, which are scheduled as October 28 for Canada, October 29 for Japan and Europe, November 3 for Australia, and November 5 for the UK. Besides Japan, all of Canada, Europe, Australia, and the UK are likely to ease monetary policy by taking further actions such as doing more QE and adopting negative rates. Therefore, with the DXY poised for upsides, the Canadian dollar, the euro, the Australian dollar, and the British pound are more likely to be hampered under the monetary easing policy.

　　Moreover, while beleaguered by negatives such as the resurgence of the pandemic in Europe and the uncertainties in EU-UK trade talks, the euro and pound are just in the face of increasing risk aversion. Thus the two currencies are expected to receive more downside pressure in the following week.

[happiness-vs-corruption]

Risks, Monitoring and Control

For our ‘World Happiness’ and ‘Corruption’ data, we detected two key risks that we may face:

Biased Data: The data set does not state whether or not random samples were used for the studies. It may be possible that the researchers targeted a specific group to try and achieve a specific result. For example, nihilistic people may have been specifically targeted/surveyed, which may skew the results (higher perception level for corruption, for example). This is a risk as this sample represents an entire population, therefore allowing the results to be biased and potentially false. The data does not state the age range of people who were surveyed, which can cause some form of bias/skewed outcome, with the sample not representing  the whole population. Lastly, the data set does not state whether the same people are surveyed for each given year. If the same people are surveyed, we face the risk of the data being very similar each year for many reasons such as people submitting the same or fake responses. However, this may be beneficial if the people being surveyed are credible as we are able to see an accurate relationship with people’s level of perception depending on their country and the year. If the survey participants change each year, we may not be able to see a statistical relationship.

Small Sample Size: When making an assumption about the population of an entire country, it is important that the sample size used to illustrate the population is both accurate and statistically representative in size. For our data, the number of people surveyed per country is not disclosed. If a country, such as Canada, has a population of 38,000,000 people, a sample size of 2,000 is likely not an accurate representation of the whole population. Our team may risk making an inaccurate prediction about certain countries due to a small sample size representing the population.

Government Pressure: Because the dataset is used in various policy-making decisions and reflects positively or negatively on the country image, individual survey-takers may feel pressured to change their answers to not seek repercussion from their country government. On a lesser scale, participants may feel inclined to score lower corruption to boost their country ranking out of patriotism.

While the data is secondary, there are still ways to monitor and control these three risks:

Before completing the analysis, we will evaluate the data creator and collector to determine if it is a credible data set. In this case, we can conclude that it is a credible source as the data is peer-reviewed and supported by the UN and procured by the Gallup World Poll.

We will compare our results to other data sets. This allows us to see if the set we used contains credible data. In this case the data is similar to other sets and we may proceed with the project. However, if our analysis resulted in data that is skewed or varies drastically, we will look into potential reasons for that outcome and then make a decision whether to follow through with the analysis or not.

When making conclusions about the data, we will be sure to state all assumptions that we make. For example, we may state that we assume all samples in this data set are random and independent from one another.

To combat government or personal influence on corruption and happiness scoring, scores should be analyzed for outliers and excluded from the dataset if the result is unreliable.