Nate Silver on politics, baseball, journalism and more
The celebrated election forecaster presented his work as an antidote to ‘terrible’ political pundits at an MIT event on Feb. 28.
Just about to begin "A Conversation w/ Nate Silver" #MITNateSilver #MIT http://pic.twitter.com/nU6TIxYk9F
MT @zaccuardi: Overflow room for @fivethirtyeight at @medialab is ALSO standing room only. #MITnatesilver http://pic.twitter.com/Ax42lRnSpa
Getting ready for the festivities at #mitnatesilver. @sethmnookin opens the question by asking what NS did before baseball and politics- Got his entrepeneural start, sez #mitnatesilver was through playing poker and working on system that became PECOTA system.
- So, #mitnatesilver says he started analyzing politics under Poblano pseudonym at DKos, partly because he didn't want to mix b-ball, politics
#mitnatesilver--former pen name was poblano "because i've always loved mexican food." #love
"News media tend to have an overly simplistic view of how people think about elections." #MITNateSilver
Silver: I think it would be dangerous if 538 influenced voting behavior. #mitnatesilver
"Prediction is actually putting your opinion on the line" -Nate Silver. Absolutely. #mitnatesilver
More interest in big data, but @fivethirtyeight points out that we must remain weary of stats models' predictive capacities. #mitnatesilver- Silver: Some models, such as tides, sunrise/sunset, become institutionalized. We don't even think of them as models anymore. #mitnatesilver
Audience Q&A begins at packed #MITNateSilver event. http://pic.twitter.com/gLgaQ08WqX- Audience Q: "What are the chief impediments to open-sourcing your model? People want to play." #MITNateSilver
Ah MIT! The inevitable open source question....Nate doesnt rule it out but points out his model is his livelihood! #mitnatesilver- "I like the confrontation with the mainstream pundits who are just *terrible* at what they do." #MITNateSilver
- "if you link to somethign stupid. hurt brand in long run, and its easy to compete w. stupid." says #mitnatesilver how to differentiate?
*sound of iPhones being unlocked as everyone rushes to tweet* @fivethirtyeight: "it's easy to compete with stupid" #mitnatesilver- #mitnatesilver says he gets bored every four years or so and goes off in a new direction. So what's next?
- Attn @newurbanmechs: @fivethirtyeight says city/urban data "might be fun" for his next challenge #mitnatesilver
- Question re Snowfall story in NYT. #mitnatesilver discusses the issues of craft in marrying multimedia elements into a valuable user exp.
