The MyDD Poll

Innovations in Polling Legacy blog posts Polling & the Blogosphere Pollsters

While we’re on the topic of poll questions commissioned by web sites on the blogosphere’s left wing, here is a truly innovative development:  The blog known as MyDD has decided to go beyond simply placing a few questions on a larger omnibus poll and is now fielding the first of a “semi-annual series of netroots commissioned polls” in collaboration with its readers that seeks to ask questions that mainstream news polls “seem unable to ask themselves.”

Here are the details.  The project is the brainchild of MyDD blogger Chris Bowers, a name that should be familiar to regular MP readers because of his frequent commentary on mainstream media polling.  Bowers was a vocal critic of the Gallup likely voter model during the 2004 campaign, and shared his concerns in a speech (delivered via video) to a roundtable at last summer’s conference of the American Association of Public Opinion Research (AAPOR).  MP may not always agree with Bowers conclusions, but I find his comments to be typically thoughtful, constructive and well intentioned.

Although polls sponsored by partisan groups are nothing new, the MyDD project has taken a unique approach by involving its readers not only as sponsors but as participants in the process of drafting questions.  A little over two weeks ago,  Bowers announced the project along with a rough draft of questions he had in mind (mostly on Iraq, domestic spying and impeachment) and then invited readers to “critique these drafts, and to offer your own questions for possible inclusion.”   That first draft received more than seventy comments.   Three days later, Bowers posted an updated draft of questions and again invited comments and critiques.  This post drew another 50 or so comments, including a critique from occasional MP correspondent “Professor M.”

Meanwhile, Bowers and his colleagues hired a professional pollster – Joel Wright of Wright Consulting – partnered with a non-profit and made several appeals to raise the roughly $16,000 to cover the cost of fielding the survey.  The most recent update, posted on MyDD by Wright himself (blogging under the nom de Internet “Sun Tzu”), indicates that the poll is now in the field, and they expect calling to be completed by Tuesday or Wednesday night. 

MP has been kicking himself for not noticing the MyDD polling project until last week, after they finalized the questionnaire and put the survey into the field.  Had I noticed it earlier, I might have made a few suggestions about the questions, but more importantly, would have invited MP’s knowledgeable readers to do the same.  You may wonder, as I do, what questions (and what language) Bowers and the others at MyDD settled on.  For example, the second draft posted by Bowers included essentially the same Zogby impeachment question I critiqued here last week.  I emailed Bowers last week, and he let me know that the final version differs from Draft Two and the Zogby version of the impeachment question had been dropped. 

Bowers and Wright obviously prefer to hold the final version of their questionnaire until the conclusion of the survey.  That seems fair given that no mainstream media poll I am aware of discloses in advance when it is fielding a new poll, much less the wording of the questions they plan to ask.  Given Bowers’ passionate commitment to greater transparency in polling, I think we can expect an unusual level of disclosure in the days and weeks ahead. 

It will be interesting to watch.  Whatever your views of MyDD’s politics, we should thank them for providing, at very least, a great new opportunity to learn something about the survey process.

PS:  Happy Birthday Chris.

Mark Blumenthal

Mark Blumenthal is political pollster with deep and varied experience across survey research, campaigns, and media. The original "Mystery Pollster" and co-creator of Pollster.com, he explains complex concepts to a multitude of audiences and how data informs politics and decision-making. A researcher and consultant who crafts effective questions and identifies innovative solutions to deliver results. An award winning political journalist who brings insights and crafts compelling narratives from chaotic data.