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Algorithm Glitch Voids Outcome of US Green Card Lottery
jayminer writes "Results for the United States Diversity Visa Lottery for 2012 were declared void due to a programming glitch in the random selection algorithm. At first, the results were published as promised on May, 1st. Then, on May, 6th, the results were withdrawn with the web site claiming to experience 'technical difficulties.' Today (May, 13th), it is declared that the results are invalid due to an algorithm glitch; the computer program has been fixed and the lottery will be re-run. The final results are expected to be published July 15th."
Wait, what! The visa lottery is real?? I thought it was just SPAM. This raises so many questions.
1. Why?
2. What is purpose of that? Larry Niven style luck evolution?
3. And why are you spamming people about it?
4. Really, why is the US sending out thousands of SPAM emails about it.
5. And last, but not least: WTF?
Bob Slydell: So we just went ahead and fixed the glitch.
Bill Lumbergh: Great.
Dom Portwood: So, uh, Milton has been let go?
Bob Slydell: Well, just a second there, professor. We, uh, we fixed the *glitch*. So he won't be receiving a paycheck anymore, so it'll just work itself out naturally.
Bob Porter: We always like to avoid confrontation, whenever possible. Problem is solved from your end.
Unexpected results are not neccessarily random. You may just have missed some bug that generates very predictable results which were just unexpected because you didn't knew about that bug.
Still, true randomness is hard. While I don't think this applies here, randomness also includes random clusters. People accept these if the process that generates the randomness is very obvious random, but do the same with a computer or by sieving through large amounts of data and they see patterns and don't accept these as random anymore.
Example: There have been discussions about clusters of cases of certain kinds of cancer around nuclear reactors. Can't be random, you think. Well, if you look at many different kinds of cancer and check the distribution of those you'll find random clusters for one or more of them. One of those clusters may be found around a reactor. May still be random, but nobody will ever believe you. In fact, if you sieve the data fine enough and have enough reactors and NONE of these clusters coincide with a reactor, the conclusion would be that nuclear reactors PROTECT against cancer. But explain that to people.
Other example: Apple introduced random playlists on iPods years ago. Now people noticed that some songs got played more than once before all others were played. Can't be random! There's a bug! Well, no. Still, Apple had to modify their software to make the choice actually LESS random (by have no song being played twice) to make it appear "really" random to the users.
Randomness is hard and can be spooky.
My girlfriend was one of the initial winners. I don't have to tell you how furious/disappointed we both are.
The incompetence demonstrated by the State Department is fucking mind boggling. They have 6 months to draw winners, sample the results -make sure everything is OK. They don't. Instead of drawing 100,000 applicants they draw 22,000 most of which were no randomly drawn, but were among the first to apply. They post the results and after a week shut down the website with no explanation. People email the Kentucky Consular Center to make sure everything is OK before they send in their documents (It can be very expensive for internationally tracked packages, especially from people all around the world-many of whom are not well off.) The KCC emails people telling them everything is fine and to continue sending in documents, even they know at this point that the whole lottery is a clusterfuck. Then they announce that the first drawing was not random and has been disqualified.
Why wouldn't the State Department at least try to request permission from congress to increase the number of VISAs awarded to 75,000 up from 50,000 or randomly draw another 78,000 names to that 78,000 would be random and the initial 22,000 would be less random.
It just seems so unfair to announce winners and then revoke that announcement two weeks later, all the while telling people everything is OK.
Saved the best for last: The State Dept has announced that they will not be taking disciplinary action against anyone involved in the "Incorrect results" being posted. I would like to know of any other job on the planet where you can fuck up 15 million visa applications, blame a computer for what clearly is a persons job to ensure the results are accurate before posting them, and not even receive disciplinary action.
David Donahue should resign in shame and Hillary Clinton should make a public apology at the very minimum
Technically, the results were indeed random.
No, technically your conflating two different things, the random glitch, and the non-random output caused by the glitch.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
Random numbers should not be generated with a method chosen at random The Art of Computer Programming, Vol 2 (emphasis in original)