Comments on: Pollbomb part 2

By: Clive

Clive — Wed, 05 May 2010 23:22:19 +0000

Whenever you follow a HTTP link, it sends a “Referrer” field revealing the location of your link. That’s what gave you away. Next time you do something like this, use one of these workarounds:

1. Highlight the HTTP address, copy to clipboard, open a new tab in your browser, and paste into the address bar.

2. Force your readers to do likewise, with tricks such as using the word “dot” in place of the full-stop.

3. Use a service like http://anonym.to/ — Make their pseudonymous site appear as the referrer, not yours.

By: bellagerens

bellagerens — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 17:48:17 +0000

I have discussed this issue privately with the managers of the site in question and, as far as I know, the matter is resolved.

But thank you so much for reminding me of what I wrote. Obviously I’m too egregious a moron to remember the content of my own bloody blog.

In other words: butt out, narc.

By: dbmaverick

dbmaverick — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 17:06:19 +0000

From your original post: “Can we round up enough ‘Yes’ votes to make them think pubic sector workers are all in favour of paying higher pension contributions? It would save the rest of us money, after all. And they deserve our spiteful little tricks.”

Surely it’s disingenuous to then say “Numerous people took time out of their busy days and evenings to bring traffic to your site and participate in a survey to which you presumably wanted answers”, as you admit in your previous post that the intention is to fool the people conducting the poll.

By: FrancisT

FrancisT — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 08:55:05 +0000

I’ve had an email from the mods telling me, among other things, that I nearly crashed their site because of everybody voting multiple times. This is considered unfair. Be told.

Um err yanno most halfway decent poll scripts set cookies and things so that it is relatively difficult to vote multiple times. The fact that these folks can’t apparently do that seems like a kind of perfect example on why government IT is so shite.

PS Someone should import NJ Governor Chris Christie – http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/NJ-Gov-Christie-on-Morning-Joe-90751484.html

By: john miller

john miller — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 20:52:47 +0000

Tiny privates, the source of all the world’s woes.

Love their debating gifts though – straight out of the Goebbels’ information handbook.

Now I’ve created some sort of comment loop here…

By: bellagerens

bellagerens — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 20:14:25 +0000

*shrug* They’re a private company, actually, so maybe they’re using a tiny server. Who knows.

By: Tim Worstall

Tim Worstall — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 19:44:43 +0000

Err, seriously? A few thousand people crash (or nearly) their site?

Are they using the standard public sector contractors or something?

By: A poll you can influence | Anonymong

A poll you can influence | Anonymong — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 18:49:21 +0000

[...] Seems that publicservice.co.uk don’t appreciate people taking interest in their poll – the poor dears. Bookmark [...]