4 ms·
Couldn't this be just fake data that the developer used to test the app ?
by bratao 13y ago
Couldn't this be just fake data that the developer used to test the app ?
- Zikes 13y agoHanlon's Razor in action?
- dragonwriter 13y agoThat would, at least, have been a more plausible cover story than the official one ("The previous elections data was accidentally released" -- even though the candidates were the ones from this election, not the previous one.)
- freehunter 13y agoAt my company, we populate pre-production data with old production data. If an item number has changed, we have a script that converts the old item into a new item number or drops it altogether. If Product A is no longer sold but Product B is now being sold, the script will convert Product A sales and pricing figures into Product B's data. It's just so we have some "real" numbers to test with. Every few months, this data is refreshed with current (old) data. Of course, we also have random number generation to populate the fields with junk if we can't get real data (personally identifiable information). In that case, it's just junk that looks like real numbers. This scenario from the article isn't that far outside of what a normal business might do.
- dragonwriter 13y ago> This scenario from the article isn't that far outside of what a normal business might do. Sure, its something a normal business might do -- but its completely inconsistent with the facts. Neither the numbers nor the candidates matched the previous election. So whatever was released, it wasn't the previous election's data. Had they said it was test data (whether resulting from rather substantial massaging of prior election data or something else) that would have been, if not necessarily the kind of thing anyone would be inclined to accept implicitly given the totality of the circumstances surrounding elections in the country, at least a superficially plausible explanation of the data released. But that's not what they claimed, they claimed it was the previous election's data.
- perssontm 13y agoDeveloper likely said: - Oh crap, its test data, I used the current candidates with past elections data just to make sure it was working. Result in the news after some levels of PR handling people: - No problem, its just past elections data.
- phogster 13y agoI was thinking the same thing, but then why would the numbers be so skewed as to mirror pretty much what corrupt election results would look like?
- Zikes 13y agoBecause it was probably presented to senior politicians prior to being released, and they'd want to see "optimistic" test data.
- icambron 13y agoYeah, it would look subversive on the part the developer. Not a good career move in the best of circumstances, which these are clearly not. I could definitely see this happening with the developer's best intentions, and not as part of a rigging conspiracy. None of that is to say that Azerbaijan's democracy isn't largely fake or that the elections are not, in fact, rigged; it's just that this particular mistake may not an expression of it.
- auctiontheory 13y agoI hope you realize the problems inherent in having the ruling government vet any part of the election software before the election. Makes the whole thing seem less than "independent."
- johnmacintyre 13y agoBecause the developer is afraid to even suggest he wouldn't win by a landslide?
- MichaelGG 13y agoOr an example of why timezones suck?