Charles Cooper at CNET thinks that a blogger might be the first to leak the predicted winner of Tuesday's election. Charles writes...
Pure speculation on my part, of course, but is it so crazy a guess? News organizations now abide by an agreement not to project a winner until after the polls close on the West Coast. The folks who conduct exit polling usually have a pretty good idea which candidate is going to come out on top.That information is closely held. Four years ago, blogging had yet to burst upon the mainstream. Even if an insider wanted to spill the goods, the blogosphere did not figure on the Official Leaker's short list.
I disagree. For one, bloggers have a 50-50 chance of calling the election. So anyone can say they have the polling data, take a guess and still have a 50% chance of being right. Second, they don't have access to the same data resources that the pros have. If, however, a large group of bloggers across the country were to organize, conduct state-by-state exit polls then I think they would have a chance to. This is something we will see in 2008, but not in 2004.
