| ▲ | queuebert 25 days ago |
| So Nate & Co sell out to a big corporation then are upset that it does big corporation stuff? I'm more mad at Nate here because 538 was my go-to for political coverage pre-sellout, and because of his greed it went away. |
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| ▲ | alisonatwork 25 days ago | parent | next [-] |
| 538 had some decent years through its various sellout phases and imo hit its peak after Nate Silver left - he'd long since exposed himself more as a contrarian than a serious analyst and had become a real detriment to the brand. It was definitely sad to lose 538 how we did, but G Elliott Morris has really stepped up to continue the spirit on his Strength in Numbers blog. It's the best data-driven US politics reporting out there right now imo. He also contributes to Fifty Plus One with Mary Radcliffe, and that's excellent too, reminiscent of the old 538 polling roundup stuff that went beyond just core US politics. Recently he started a podcast with David Nir of The Downballot, which is another solid resource for lower level races. |
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| ▲ | adjejmxbdjdn 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Whatever you feel about his actions that was at worst it was a win-lose decision. He benefited from it. If his comment is accurate, then ABC’s decision is a clear lose-lose decision driven entirely by personal spite. |
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| ▲ | lesuorac 25 days ago | parent [-] | | Honestly is Nate even wrong here? IIRC, he got to keep all of the models and etc from 538 which is kinda all that mattered about it. Like anybody is really going to lookup the 2016 election in 2030 but they're definitely want the model's output in 2030 for 2030. Management seems to be clearly inept and if somebody wants to give you a wheelbarrow of cash for something worthless you're generally foolish to not accept. | | |
| ▲ | afavour 25 days ago | parent | next [-] | | I don’t think that’s all that mattered. FiveThirtyEight was a strong brand, it was definitely worth something. | | | |
| ▲ | Hamuko 25 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | He never sold the prediction models, and only leased them to ABC/538, so they left with him as he left the company. | | |
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| ▲ | vintermann 24 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| It's petty even for a corporation. It's not exactly maximizing shareholder value. But yeah, it's the sort of stuff corporations (especially media corporations) can be expected to do. I think Nate has become better at this sort of stuff in recent years. But still, he said that Disney "hardly ever" interfered in their editorial process, oblivious to the implication. (What it means is that Disney/ABC were perfectly willing to interfere in their editorial process, but rarely needed to since Nate said what they wanted him to say anyway). |
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| ▲ | ownlife 24 days ago | parent [-] | | How can we jump to that conclusion? Maybe they were only willing to interfere in that process in extreme cases. | | |
| ▲ | vintermann 24 days ago | parent | next [-] | | What would that look like? Can you see a concrete scenario where it was somehow justified by ABC Disney to interfere in 538's editorial process? There's not much extreme about Nate Silver. | |
| ▲ | IAmBroom 22 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Which means they interfered when they really wanted to, which is the point you were responding to. |
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| ▲ | bfung 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Just follow the man, not the brand. He’s still doing his thing: https://www.natesilver.net/ |
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| ▲ | dangus 25 days ago | parent [-] | | But he kind of sucks and isn’t worth following. He’s a sellout at heart, including his recent association with Polymarket. Someone cool would have never sold out a website as good as 538 used to be. Now he’s more interested in profiting off of gamblers. | | |
| ▲ | derektank 25 days ago | parent | next [-] | | 538 has basically always been a licensed product, first with the NYT in 2010, and then with ESPN/ABC/Disney since they left the NYT in 2013. There were only 2 years where it was an independent blog | |
| ▲ | yieldcrv 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | 538 got one election right a decade and a half ago with a contrarian alternative data source, and hooked a bunch of partisan gamblers since now you can actually bet on your beliefs and dont need to debate with anyone on whether the koolaid colored wave of choice will actually happen, or whether you are a slave to an algorithm induced hall of mirrors. note, the senate has been 50-50 for over a decade, its probably the latter so the only intervention necessary here is on yourself, focusing on things you cant control while delusionally thinking this time will be different, over and over and over again extracting value from partisan gullibility and pathetic power struggles is unironically the move | | |
| ▲ | ownlife 24 days ago | parent | next [-] | | There's no "getting elections right"; these models just estimate probability. They gave Trump a 29% change in 2016 -- that's almost 1 in 3! A better way to assess accuracy would be to bin predictions (0-10% chance, 10-20% chance, etc.) and see if the observed frequency aligns with the predictions. | | |
| ▲ | yieldcrv 24 days ago | parent [-] | | I like market based approaches as a signal and opportunity creation, price discovery In parallel your signal could be a data source adding to individuals contribution to price discovery |
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| ▲ | stackghost 25 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Pretty sure the only election that 538 didn't correctly call was 2016. For sure they correctly predicted both Obama wins and Biden. | | |
| ▲ | owisd 25 days ago | parent [-] | | They don't really 'call' elections since they only publish probabilities. If you'd bet on the candidate 538/Silver was more bullish than the bookies, then the only election year you wouldn't have made money would have been 2024. |
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| ▲ | jimbokun 25 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | You do realize the person responsible for 538 is the same person? | | |
| ▲ | fragmede 25 days ago | parent | next [-] | | People change over time. The Nate Silver of 2026 isn't the same Nate Silver of 2010 or 2013. | | |
| ▲ | furyofantares 25 days ago | parent | next [-] | | That's a funny response in the context of "Now he’s more interested in profiting off of gamblers" given I remember posting with him on the 2+2 forums in the early aughts poker boom days where he was a popular poster teaching a lot of people how to profit off gamblers. | | |
| ▲ | matltc 25 days ago | parent [-] | | 2+2 is great. Still go check on casino megathreads if I wanna play somewhere in a new town |
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| ▲ | jazzpush2 25 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | See also his new book versus his old. His new book is nothing but name-dropping. |
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| ▲ | kortilla 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | … yes, that’s why he mentioned that he isn’t cool for selling 538… | |
| ▲ | dangus 24 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Yes that’s literally what I’m talking about. He made a cool site, sold it off to get enshittified, and now his main gig is grifting off of polymarket. |
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| ▲ | fn-mote 24 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| > then are upset that it does big corporation stuff Parent says because they “criticized our management of the brand”. Big corporations don’t give a crap. They are 100% about the bottom line. This isn’t “big corporation” behavior. |
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| ▲ | Hnrobert42 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| I understand your frustration, but greed? He didn't owe you anything. So what if he cashed out? |
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| ▲ | 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| [deleted] |
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| ▲ | returningfory2 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Your annoyance is understandable, but it's worth remembering: he is not your slave. He does not exist to do things for you. His providing you with something good for a time does not obligate him to provide it to you forever. Because he is not your slave. |
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| ▲ | marysol5 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| "Upset" is far from what happened here. |
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| ▲ | 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| [deleted] |
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| ▲ | aaron695 25 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| [dead] |
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| ▲ | jaredhansen 25 days ago | parent | prev [-] |
| [flagged] |