Google Will Display Election Results As Soon As Polls Close (techcrunch.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: Google has been highly involved with connecting U.S. voters to timely information throughout this election cycle, by offering everything from voter registration assistance to polling place information in its search result pages. Today, the company announced plans to display the results of the U.S. election directly in search, in over 30 languages, as soon as the polls close. Web searchers who query for "election results" will be able to view detailed information on the Presidential, Senatorial, Congressional, Gubernatorial races as well as state-level referenda and ballot propositions, says Google. The results will be updated continuously -- every 30 seconds, as indicated by a screenshot shared by the company on its official blog post detailing the new features. Tabs across the top will let you switch to between the various races, like President, House, and Senate, for example. The results will also include information like how many more electoral votes a presidential candidate needs to win, how many seats are up for grabs in the House and Senate, and how many Gubernatorial races are underway, among other things. This data is presented in an easy-to-read format, with Democrats in blue, Republicans in red, and simple graphs, alongside the key numbers.

Comments

Re:Google very helpful

[mrchaotica]

Often times certain parts of a state report earlier than others, different sorts of people vote early in the day and late in the day, and this can cause states' results to fluctuate a lot during the night. It could look like Candidate A is winning all day long, only for B to overtake at the end.

Even worse, the differences in reporting times aren't necessarily random, but can be determined by things like actual vs. expected turnout or urban vs. rural precincts, which can correlate with party. It's entirely possible for, say, a bunch of rural Republican precincts to report early while a bunch of urban Democratic ones don't have their votes tallied until well into the night (or vice-versa).

Re:Curiously

[PopeRatzo]

Curiously, the total money bet favors Clinton, while the total number of bets favors Trump.

As something of a gambler myself, I think I can explain.

The payout on the Trump bet is greater because he's going off at long odds due to his underdog status. People who bet long-shots tend to do so with smaller amounts, whereas people making big bets are more likely to play the chalk. Hedges are always smaller than the primary wager.

In a situation where everyone has exactly one vote, it's not clear which measure has predictive power.

Given the small number of people who bet on elections, I would caution against reading anything into the total number of wagers on either candidate. It would be like picking a winner based on the number of people at their rallies.

Re:Google very helpful

[tsqr]

What happens is that the media are conducting exit polling (asking people as they leave the polls who they voted for) and are reporting that before the polls close.

Maybe a decade and a half ago, but not anymore; at least not legally. The Representation of the People Act of 2002 made it a crime to report exit poll results before a state's polls have closed.

All the polls in a state have the same closing time, but polling places stay open until all the people in line at closing time have had a chance to vote. So, some votes get cast after "official" closing time, and after some precincts begin reporting results.

(2) Each individual precinct reports results when the count in that precinct is complete. This, not exit polling, is why the election night news coverage always goes like "In Florida, with 30% of the vote counted ..."