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transparency? August 3, 2012

Posted by Bradley in : transparency , add a comment

Transparency is complicated.. Two recent reports illustrate this.

An IMF paper on Key Trends in Implementation of the Fund’s Transparency Policy shows some disparities in publication of IMF documents. A smaller percentage of ROSCs are published than of other documents (61% in 2011), though a note explains that the ROSC category

Includes initial ROSC assessments and reassessments produced by the IMF, as well as the World Bank and, in the case of AML/CFT ROSCs, by FATF and FSRB, issued on a stand-alone basis or in FSSAs. Does not include assessments done under detailed standards assessments.

This isn’t terrbly clear. The document is not drafted to make it easy for readers to understand the data. This note implies that the initial assessments included in the total have an impact on the percentage publication rate. But is that a good or a bad thing from the perspective of transparency? There’s a table which shows the percentage of Article IV/UFR Staff Reports which are published with deletions (but there’s no information on how extensive the deletions are). The document lists those IMF Members which did not publish any Article IV/UFR Staff Reports in 2011 (Antigua and Barbuda, Brazil, Brunei Darussalam, Djibouti, Dominican Republic, Equatorial Guinea, Ethiopia, Libya, Myanmar, Oman, Sri Lanka, Turkmenistan and Vietnam).

The UK Parliament’s House of Commons Public Accounts Committee published a report on Implementing the Transparency Agenda which states that more needs to be done to realize transparency. But the report notes that the Government does not understand the costs and benefits of transparency. And there are other criticisms:

It does not help government to meet the objectives of the transparency agenda when large quantities of raw data are released without ensuring that the data are fit for purpose. Some data are very difficult to interpret, such as on local government spending, and there are important gaps in information, such as incomplete price and performance information on adult social care. We are also concerned about some information not being presented on a consistent basis, again for example in local government.
Poor or incomplete data hinders the ability of users to exercise effective choice, for example on care providers. It also undermines the ability of service deliverers and policy makers to focus on improving quality.

The committee also suggests that there should be more information available about contracts whereby private entities agree to provide public services. And especially in the light of recent problems with GS4’s underprovision of security personnel for the Olympics, and questions about ATOS’ administration of disability assessments this seems like a good idea.

more on facebook accounts required for voting August 2, 2012

Posted by Bradley in : life , add a comment

I complained recently about two awards schemes where people who have facebook accounts are invited to vote on the allocation of awards to non-profits(here and here). One advantage using facebook accounts might be thought to have would derive from the policy that users are only supposed to have one facebook account each, and thus facebook voting should not allow a person to cast multiple votes. But that does not appear to be the case. The facebook 10Q (reported in the Guardian here) states:

there are inherent challenges in measuring usage of our products across large online and mobile populations around the world. For example, there may be individuals who maintain one or more Facebook accounts in violation of our terms of service, despite our efforts to detect and suppress such behavior. We estimate that “duplicate”accounts (an account that a user maintains in addition to his or her principal account) may have represented approximately 4.8% of our worldwide MAUs as of June 30, 2012. We also seek to identify “false”accounts, which we divide into two categories: (1) user-misclassified accounts, where users have created personal profiles for a business, organization, or non-human entity such as a pet (such entities are permitted on Facebook using a Page rather than a personal profile under our terms of service); and (2) undesirable accounts, which represent user profiles that we determine are intended to be used for purposes that violate our terms of service, such as spamming. As of June 30, 2012, we estimate user-misclassified accounts may have represented approximately 2.4% of our worldwide MAUs and undesirable accounts may have represented approximately 1.5% of our worldwide MAUs. We believe the percentage of accounts that are duplicate or false is meaningfully lower in developed markets such as the United States or Australia and higher in developing markets such as Indonesia and Turkey. However, these estimates are based on an internal review of a limited sample of accounts and we apply significant judgment in making this determination, such as identifying names that appear to be fake or other behavior that appears inauthentic to the reviewers. As such, our estimation of duplicate or false accounts may not accurately represent the actual number of such accounts. We are continually seeking to improve our ability to identify duplicate or false accounts and estimate the total number of such accounts, and such estimates may be affected by improvements or changes in our methodology.

misleading advertising? August 1, 2012

Posted by Bradley in : consumers, truth , 4comments

I haven’t seen one 5 hour energy advert that isn’t really irritating. The latest I have seen begins with the statement that they asked over 3000 doctors to review 5 hour energy. It then goes on to say “and what they said is amazing” (seems to imply the over 3000 said something amazing). The ad then says that over 73% of those who reviewed 5 hour energy said they would recommend a low calorie energy supplement to their healthy patients who use energy supplements (note that the script refers to “a” supplement, not to the 5 hour energy product itself). The ad emphasizes the 73% figure (which appears prominently on the screen) but carefully doesn’t state that the 73% is a percentage of the (over) 3000 doctors. And the ad does not state how many doctors actually reviewed the product. And what the reviewing doctors were prepared to sign on to is pretty lame. But the ad then goes on to use the 3000 number again at the end (ask your doctor, we already asked 3000), reinforcing the impression that lots of doctors approved of the product. This sort of carefully constructed message, designed to give a very different impression from the one that the actual words used, carefully parsed, give should, I think, be treated as problematic in law.