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Trails in the Sky 2nd Chapter launches September 17
Trails in the Sky 2nd Chapter will launch for PlayStation 5, Switch 2, Switch, and PC via Steam on September 17 worldwide, Falcom and GungHo Online Entertainment announced. In the west, Trails in t…
Islanders Pack Board Of Health Meeting On Turf Field, But No Accord…
Nantucket Current is the island's leading online news source. We deliver the news, stories, and people of Nantucket, unbiased and unfiltered.
\'Avengers: Doomsday\' footage, \'Mandalorian\' opening unveiled at CinemaCon
The Walt Disney Co. has staged a major presentation at CinemaCon, showcasing new footage from upcoming films. They revealed the opening of the new Star Wars movie and scenes from
Grand Strand leaders tout new SC development, business & tourism enterprise
Grand Strand leaders say a new organizational structure will cut costs, streamline work & hear residents. Here’s what will change.
Disney shows the opening of \'The Mandalorian and Grogu\' at CinemaCon
Director Jon Favreau has debuted the opening of the first Star Wars movie in seven years at CinemaCon in Las Vegas. The film, “The Mandalorian and Grogu,” opens May 22
New Online Tool to Help People Find Naloxone Launched by the Wyoming Department of Health - Wyoming Department of Health
The Wyoming Department of Health (WDH) is excited to announce the Community Naloxone Resource Map. This new online tool makes it easier for people to find naloxone at no cost in their local communities. Naloxone, often known by the brand name Narcan®, is a life-saving drug that reverses the effects of an opioid overdose. Given […]
Apple's $599 MacBook Neo Sold Out Through April Amid Surging Demand
Apple's MacBook Neo has been a huge hit, and it's still in high demand over a month after it launched. The MacBook Neo is just $599, and with PC makers raising prices because of global RAM shortages, the Neo's low price tag and Apple allure are even more appealing. MacBook Neo orders placed today on the online Apple Store won't reach customers until May, which means that it's sold out for the month of April, as 9to5Mac points out.
Google's AI Mode Update Tries to Kill Tab Hopping in Chrome
Google latest update to AI Mode in its Chrome browser is designed to keep the chatbot-style search tool always around once you start an online search journey.
Packers sign UW Health as official health care partner
A Madison-based health system is the Green Bay Packers' new official health care partner.
Brunswick CC sports success continuing into the spring
After successful seasons for the Brunswick CC basketball teams, both the baseball and softball are adding to a historic year for Dolphins' Athletics.
Rogers Behavioral Health workers to vote on union after NLRB rejects challenge
Rogers Behavioral Health workers in West Allis will vote on unionizing April 22 after the NLRB rejected Rogers' challenge.
Television Q&A: Has future of CBS show 'Watson' been deduced?
You have questions. I have some answers. Q: I am wondering if you have heard anything about the CBS show "Watson" being renewed for next year. My son and I
Study: South Carolina emerges as top state for new business success
South Carolina is emerging as one of the most resilient states for new businesses, supported by steady population growth and a surge of entrepreneurial activity.
Hampton debates whether residents should subsidize business trash pickup
Hampton is once again debating whether Hampton taxpayers should continue paying some of the cost for beach business trash pickup.
White House looking into growing list of ‘missing scientists’
Theories have circulated online after about ten scientists disappeared or died since 2024
Tammy Baldwin targets game blackouts, expensive sports streaming apps
New legislation from Sen. Tammy Baldwin would prohibit league-owned streaming services from blacking out games and require a free option for fans.
Civic belonging in the social media era
Gen Z is politically aware online, but this doesn't always translate to real-world engagement or voting, leading to burnout and fear.
Omnicom Health rebrands FCB Health New York to Olixir New York
The move comes about four months after Omnicom Health rebranded DDB Health to Remedy Edge.
Ohio regulators seek to fine Kalshi $5M for unlicensed sports gambling
COLUMBUS — Online prediction market platform Kalshi is facing a $5 million fine for operating an unlicensed sports gambling business in Ohio. The Ohio ...
Rainier, University of Oklahoma Foundation to Build $1.1B Rock Creek Entertainment District in Norman
NORMAN, OKLA. — Rainier Development Co. has executed a master development agreement with the University of Oklahoma Foundation for the planned Rock Creek Entertainment District, a $1.1 billion project in Norman. Rainier will lead planning, design, coordination and development of the 269-acre district in collaboration with Cleveland County, the City of Norman, the University of Oklahoma, community stakeholders and other development partners. Rock Creek Entertainment District is envisioned as a year-round destination that will include an 8,000-seat performance venue designed to host concerts, conventions and community events, as well as University of Oklahoma men’s and women’s basketball games and women’s gymnastics events. Plans for Phase I of Rock Creek include the performance venue; a central outdoor plaza; approximately 140,000 square feet of retail, dining and entertainment experiences; roughly 250 multifamily units; and a structured parking garage with 1,200 spaces. Phased openings of the venue, restaurants and retail are expected to begin in 2028. Phase II will include approximately 180,000 square feet of office space and a 150-room hotel. Phase III calls for 500 additional multifamily units, as well as townhomes and single-family residences. Future phases are anticipated to include additional expansion, subject to market conditions and planning. The project, located…
OpenTable’s new rules have a Seattle business leader calling foul
A business leader says an online restaurant reservation service is making changes that may violate Washington’s consumer protection laws.
Lowering taxes would help make Wisconsin more competitive
WI tax climate is failing its families and businesses as other states and the nation work to keep more money in the pockets of those who earn it.
Disney an entertainment force. See some of the characters behind it
From the humble beginnings of 'Steamboat Willie' in 1928, Disney now a worldwide brand.
Athens restaurant scores range from perfect to problematic
Health inspections show a mix of perfect scores and notable violations at various Athens restaurants.
Jonathan Groff cast in Lin-Manuel Miranda-directed musical film project
Ronks native Jonathan Groff and award-winning stage and film composer Lin-Manuel Miranda — who shared the Broadway stage in "Hamilton" — are back together again, set to work on a
Pitt to offer online Infant Mental Health certificate
A new University of Pittsburgh academic program aims to address the mental health, growth and development needs of infants and toddlers amid a shortage of qualified, working professionals. Pitt has launched a new, online graduate certificate in Infant Mental Health. The 12-credit program kicks off this fall, said Robert Gallen,
Gambling companies funnel money into ballot measures to legalize online sports betting – and to individual candidates
As popular online gambling platforms funnel millions into the campaign to legalize online sports betting in Nebraska, some companies are also making significant contributions to individual campaigns.
Wisconsin GOP leaders keeping door open to partisan gerrymandering ban
Wisconsin Republicans say they are open to dialogue with Gov. Tony Evers on banning partisan gerrymandering.
Advertisers demand billions of dollars from Google in escalating monopoly battle
Alphabet Inc.’s Google is facing billions of dollars in potential damage claims as part of mass arbitration tied to the company’s online search and advertising technology businesses, which courts have ruled were illegal monopolies.
Ricky Cobb Has Built a Mini-Empire Through ’70s Nostalgia
Ricky Cobb has built a big online following with his irreverent postings about the absurdities of the 1970s.
WATCH: New trailer, release date announced for \'Hershey\' biopic
In a bit of sweet news — there's a new trailer for the upcoming movie, "Hershey."
Student Spotlight: Erin Jones | Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Learn how a working research professional makes the most out of her career and her education by pursuing the MHS online and part-time.
University of Arizona launches BS in Science Law, available on campus and online
The BS in Science Law builds a strong foundation in both disciplines through coursework and labs in biology, chemistry and physics, alongside undergraduate law courses.
Asking Eric: ‘Extremely online’ girlfriend shares too much
My friend sent me some of the links ... it wasn’t bad stuff, per se. Just her talking about going out to dinner with me or complaining about how I sleep ...
Indian American Neurologist Pria Anand wins literary science writing award
Boston-based physician earns PEN/E.O. Wilson prize for exploring the brain, the mind, and the soul.
Here\'s the performance schedule for Marietta\'s Cherry Blossom Benefit Music Festival
Enjoy musical acts under a stretch of 150 cherry trees in full bloom when Marietta’s Cherry Blossom Benefit Music Festival returns Saturday, April 18.
Asking Eric: ‘Very online’ girlfriend shares too much with strangers
Letter writer is weirded out by strangers replying to girlfriend’s posts about them.
How information disorder shapes global politics
In international politics, outcomes are shaped not only by what countries do, but by how those actions are perceived. UC Santa Barbara political scientist Julia Morse studies how information disorder — a media environment where it’s easy to create content and spread false or misleading material — shapes international politics. “At the end of the day, it may or […]
Mark your calendars: Weekly sports schedule for April 14-19
Take a look through the weekly sports schedule for the Central Coast. Read our coverage online or in print.
PS4 Still Leads Xbox Series X in GTA Online Users, PC Ranked Last
A new data leak shows that Grand Theft Auto 5 still has a strong player base on the PlayStation 4, even as PS6 discussions begin
Online Sports Betting Is Fueling Financial Risk in Florida
Experts warn that permissive policies and app-based betting are accelerating addiction, especially among young men.
Thaddeus Stevens College to launch online small business management program
Thaddeus Stevens College of Technology prides itself on integrating its students into central Pennsylvania trade and technical programs, to the point that many are working for local businesses before they
Kansas baseball rises into top 25 of USA TODAY Sports Coaches Poll
Kansas baseball jumped into the top 25 of the USA TODAY Sports Coaches Poll. Take a look to see where the Jayhawks are going to be ranked this week.
Julie’s new AI chatbot aims to fix a major gap in women’s health information
The emergency contraception brand is using a chatbot to answer the questions Gen Z is already asking online.
Careful, huge spoilers are out for James Bond game 007: First Light, following an Indonesian Game Rating leak
IO Interactive's 007: First Light spoilers have surfaced online alongside other upcoming video game leaks.
Breakout Bras Builds Its Business On Personal Service...And A Perfect Fit
Melissa Thomason's 'Breakout Bras' in Greenville offers a rare personal bra fitting experience, helping women find comfort and confidence.
Business Notes: NSU raises $147M; McDonald’s to open in Virginia Beach
Norfolk State University’s Now Is Our Time campaign raised $147 million, exceeding its original $90 million goal. View the latest business news in Hampton Roads.
Stanford HAI 2026 AI Index: AI posts gains in science and medicine while often struggling to read a clock
Stanford HAI’s 2026 AI Index paints a split-screen picture for R&D. In the report’s science chapter, “frontier models outperform human chemists on average on ChemBench,” yet “score below 20% on replication in astrophysics and 33% on Earth observation questions.” In medicine, the report reaches a similarly mixed conclusion, saying AI is transforming clinical care, but…
More Than a Quarter of Americans, 27% Have An Active Online Sports Betting Account; A Third Have Opened an Account At Least Once
Sports Betting Continues to Grow as 60% of Online Sports Bettors Say They Have ‘Chased’ A Bet; 63% Have Bet a Total of at Least $100 in One Day; 31%…
Former Xbox Veteran Says Canceling The Last of Us Online Was the Right Call, Criticizes Naughty Dog and Sony for Green-lighting It in the First Place
Former Xbox Veteran Says Naughty Dog Was Right to Shut Down the Last of Us Online
Grinnell College sports social media teams bring the game online
DJ Damazo, assistant men’s basketball coach, said that about three years ago, the basketball team didn’t have a social media page at all. “I thought we were missing out on a chance to market our program to other students at Grinnell and probably, more importantly, like recruits,” Damazo said. Damazo decided to find students to...
GTA 6 Hackers Say Stolen Data "Will be Published as Their Demands Had Not Been Met"
Hackers have said they will publish data obtained from GTA 6 developer Rockstar Games online because their demands have not been met.
What it takes to build Coachella's most recognizable icon
INDIO, Calif. — Scroll through Instagram any time in April and you'll see a stream of photos that are instantly recognizable as being from the Coachella Valley Music and Arts
How is online abuse putting young people off Manx politics?
A youth parliamentary committee warns online abuse is impacting attitudes towards Manx politics.
Fantasy sports apps see increased usage by college students
In the past decade, the line between fantasy sports and sports betting has been blurred, propelling online sportsbooks and sportsbetting culture into the mainstream. Now, an increasing number of college students are latching on. Since the 1992 passing of the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act, shortened to PASPA, athletic leagues and lawmakers have fought...
He recorded 10,000 concerts on tape, now they’re streaming for free
The music collection of a 59-year-old Chicago man who attended more than 10,000 concerts and recorded each one on cassette tape is slowly being digitized and released online for free. Like many Gen…
AD Chris McIntosh is reportedly leaving Wisconsin for role in Big Ten office
According to two reports, Chris McIntosh, Barry Alvarez's successor as athletic director, is leaving Wisconsin for a job with the Big Ten Conference.
Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream ROM leaked online
It's now been confirmed that the Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream ROM has leaked online just days before launch.
Stein questions whether state’s data center incentives still make sense
Sales tax exemptions could cost N.C. $450 million as new data centers come online, the Democratic governor said.
Sports Roundup: Girls Tennis Wins At Home, Baseball & Boys Lax Win…
Nantucket Current is the island's leading online news source. We deliver the news, stories, and people of Nantucket, unbiased and unfiltered.
Pop culture takes center stage at Shenandoah Comic-Con
Warriors, robots, demons and more came out to play at Shenandoah Comic-Con at the Rockingham County Fairgrounds exhibit hall on Saturday.
Bill calls for mental health assessments be made available for all Virginia 6-12th graders
A proposed law would ask that mental health assessments be made available for all sixth-12th grade public school students in Virginia.
How the Mall of Louisiana survived the retail apocalypse — and how it can continue to stay afloat
Since 1997, the Mall of Louisiana has served as Baton Rouge’s go-to shopping center, surviving a period when many malls suffered from financial pressures and competition with online shopping.
Ken Bridges explores Roger Mills in Texas' Civil War efforts, politics
In his latest Texas history column, Ken Bridges explores the life and impact of Roger Mills - from Civil War battles to conflicts in U.S. politics.
Tribal and Rural Healthcare at Risk in Oklahoma Gov. Stitt’s Attack on Medicaid
Guest Opinion Oklahoma leaders often visit Cherokee Nation’s Health System and celebrate our progress and tout our unmistakable impact on the health and economy of rural communities. Now, Governor Stitt is putting us on a path that will damage that very system. Recently the Oklahoma legislature passed Oklahoma HB 4440 and HJR 1067 to reverse […]
Gary Jackson featured at FMU School of Business for annual Common Author Colloquium
More than 60 students, faculty and community members gathered at Harris Auditorium Thursday for the annual Common Author Colloquium featuring author Gary Jackson, who discussed his new book “Small Lives: Poems,” which reimagines superheroes with new themes. The event, hosted by Shawn Smolen-Morton, chair of Francis Marion University’s Department of Modern Languages and professor of...
10 minutes backstage with David Lee Roth at Coachella
INDIO, Calif. — David Lee Roth popped out at the Coachella Valley and Arts Festival on Friday to sing Van Halen's classic "Jump" with Teddy Swims. After the show, we
April 16 Vallejo-Vacaville Arts/Entertainment Source: Activities
April 16: The Drifting Cowboys, 6:30 p.m., Empress Marquee Club, 324 Virginia St., Vallejo. April 17: Rise Vallejo Ribbon Cutting Ceremony and Family Carnival, 11 a.m., Rise Vallejo Early Learning Center, 1450 Coronel Ave.,…
Dragon Age: Inquisition Servers Going Offline Later This Month
The online features have outlasted many live-service games, including Bioware’s own Anthem
“AI polls” are fake polls
A few weeks after Donald Trump’s second presidential win, I took the train up from London (where I was living at the time) to Oxford to attend a conference on polls and forecasts of the 2024 election. Most of the attendees were pollsters or academics, but I also watched presentations from Aaru and Electric Twin, two companies that do what is interchangeably called synthetic sampling, silicon sampling, or synthetic audiences. Stripped of startup jargon, that means they use large language models (LLMs) to simulate responses to public opinion polls by having AI agents take on the role of survey respondents. I had already heard of Aaru thanks to some articles with eye-catching headlines like “No people, no problem: AI chatbots predict elections better than humans” in the months leading up to Election Day. The founders were making some big, some might even say far-fetched claims, such as: “within two years, we will simulate the entire globe — from the way crops are grown in Ukraine to how that impacts production of oil in Iraq, trade through the strait of Malacca, and elections for the mayor of Baltimore.” When Semafor asked Aaru’s cofounders — Cameron Fink and Ned Koh — about my boss, they said “we respect all those who came before us.” Nate (as he so often does) shared his thoughts on Twitter: Fink and Koh were relatively good-natured about this back-and-forth when we spoke at Oxford. They even offered to mail me one of the t-shirts featuring Nate’s quote they apparently had made. I never took them up on the offer, which I now somewhat regret. These synthetic sampling companies fell off my radar for a while, but they do still exist. In fact, Aaru recently received a $1 billion valuation. Is what they’re doing anywhere close to the most important frontier in AI development? Not by a longshot, especially when Anthropic just developed a model so adept at exploiting software vulnerabilities that it’s only being released to 40 companies. Still, silicon sampling is increasingly finding its way into public polling. Axios reported in March that “a majority of people trust their own doctors and nurses” based on findings from Aaru — without mentioning that the “people” in that sentence were actually LLMs. Around the same time, the Public Sentiment Institute “boosted” their online sample of 373 real survey respondents with 114 AI agents.1 (Spoiler alert: even the co-founder of Electric Twin doesn’t think that’s a particularly defensible approach.) Polling companies like Qualtrics and Ipsos are also developing synthetic data panels. So, what should we make of these … “polls”? Let’s get one thing out of the way: whatever they are, they’re not polls in the way that term is usually defined. Subscribe You can’t replace polls with AI On one hand, using LLMs to essentially make up fake survey respondents sort of sounds like the dumbest idea ever, one that will at best imperfectly replicate real polls while introducing all sorts of biases. On the other hand, with LLMs improving at a remarkable, perhaps even alarming rate, maybe that means I’m a dinosaur at the ripe old age of 24 because I still want to rely on polls that talk to actual people. I’m not going to argue that synthetic samples are completely useless. In fact, as I’ll return to later, there is evidence that some techniques can replicate topline survey results quickly and cheaply. But the marketing from certain companies can be slightly optimistic. “No traditional poll will exist by the time the next general election occurs,” said Fink in 2024. We’re just 206 days away from the midterms, and based on the fact that I still have to collect a bunch of polls every day, I’d say he should have run that prediction by a sample of AI agents before the interview.2 To see why synthetic samples can’t replace polls, here’s a quick primer on how they work. The simplest version of these models involves taking a LLM (like ChatGPT or Claude), giving it a demographic profile (e.g., a white, college-educated woman who lives in Utah and makes $70k a year), and then asking it to respond to a survey question. You repeat that process a few thousand times using different demographic profiles and end up with a sample of synthetic survey responses. The actual models used by private companies are more sophisticated than this, usually because they incorporate more hypothesized demographic characteristics for each agent and provide them with extra information. Aaru, for example, feeds agents a diet of news and information they’d be likely to consume, while Electric Twin incorporates their customers’ proprietary data about the audience they’re trying to replicate. The way Ben Warner, the co-founder of Electric Twin, explained it to me was “we have a large amount of data on […] for instance, 5,000 people. Can we make an accurate prediction of how they would respond to another question?” Still, it should be obvious why synthetic samples can’t replace polls. Polling is fundamentally a data collection process. We might use surveys to make predictions by feeding them into election forecasts, but the main purpose of a poll isn’t prediction, it’s gathering new data about what people think and how they feel. Silicon sampling, on the other hand, produces no new data. It’s simply a model: you input LLM training data, demographic prompts, and a bunch of other information, and it spits out a prediction for what a poll would say. We love models here, but models aren’t polls. That difference is an important philosophical sticking point for most pollsters I talk to. “I think politics should stay away from [synthetic sampling], because we’re trying to […] represent the voice of the people,” said Natalie Jackson, a vice president at GQR Insights. Democratic pollster John Hagner told me: “I think I’m just incredibly skeptical of this idea. I don’t think it’s research. At that point, you’re asking the machine to tell you what you already believe.” Hagner has seen some presentations of early synthetic sampling experiments, but so far, “if it’s being used in a campaign, people are keeping it incredibly quiet.”3 But Eli, I hear you saying, aren’t polls themselves increasingly governed by modeling decisions? Indeed they are: pollsters’ choices on which sampling method to use, how to define their likely voter models, and how to weight their samples can and do lead to dramatic differences in the results they publish. Aaru even referenced these limitations in the methodology statement included with that maternal mortality “poll” — although I’m using the term “methodology statement” loosely here, because it doesn’t really explain how the model works at all. We can ignore the (frankly preposterous) implication that synthetic sampling isn’t subject to a separate set of biases. The important point is that there’s still a meaningful difference between using weighting and other statistical techniques on actual polling data and using a model to predict what a poll would say. The latter is far closer to election forecasts or techniques like MRP — potentially useful models, but not a replacement for polls.4 To be fair, other synthetic sampling companies are perfectly happy with the distinction between polls and models. Warner compared polling and synthetic sampling to different tools in a toolbox. “The mistake I think we make is we think that these new tools should either work in exactly the same way or somehow replace these old tools,” he said. “Rather than thinking of it as, okay, so we’ve always had the hammer, we’ve always had the screwdriver, now we’ve got a saw. But don’t use a saw to try [to] do the job of a hammer.” A quick comment from Nate Eli didn’t ask me for a comment — rather rude of him, don’t you think? But since I’m editing this story, I figured I’d add a few quick thoughts rather than putting words in his mouth. Beyond the frequently misleading marketing, what bothers me about the AI “poll” hype is that as AI tools make statistical inference cheaper and/or better (note that these are not synonyms) that actually increases the comparative value of collecting original data. You might be able to train a model to make a reasonable estimate of what some hard-to-reach poll respondent would say — say, a young Black man who voted for Trump. (Such a person checks a number of boxes for a voter who is usually hard to reach in surveys.) Indeed, this is closely related to what models like the Silver Bulletin forecast already do. They essentially smooth out the kinks in noisy survey data by making inferences based on past voting patterns or national polls or surveys of other states. But you don’t actually know what these voters think unless you’re reaching them directly. If there’s a shift in opinion among this subgroup, you’re not going to detect it. So if I were running a campaign, I’d invest more in going the extra mile to find a representative sample of those voters. And then I’d hire some smart quants — or Claude? — to figure out the implications for campaign strategy based on proprietary data that my competitors didn’t have access to. -Nate Silver Are these models any good? If synthetic surveys are just a new type of model, the next obvious question is whether the models are at least accurate. The answer very much depends on who you ask. On one end of the spectrum, you have the maximalist argument that synthetic sampling is more accurate than actual polls. “It’s an incredibly challenging problem to go to someone and say ‘hey, we’re going to be more accurate at predicting human behavior than you, even when you talk to your customers directly’,” Koh recently told CNBC. In his view, synthetic sampling isn’t a saw to polling’s hammer, it’s “magic.” There’s certainly evidence that synthetic samples can replicate certain survey toplines. But if Aaru does have any examples of their approach outperforming the polls, they’re keeping those to themselves.5 Aaru’s 2024 election model, for example, had Kamala Harris leading in Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin on November 4th. And although they’ve since taken down their forecast page, they gave Harris a 50.5 percent chance of winning the race on November 2nd.6 After the election, Fink told Semafor he was happy enough with those results because they were “within margin of error,” a term that is completely meaningless when applied to a “sample” of AI agents. And of course, Aaru says their models have improved since 2024, so supposedly now they’d be more accurate than the polls? Still, their stronger argument is on cost: “We are significantly faster and cheaper than traditional polling, and still more accurate,” said Fink. The first two claims are undeniably true, but the third brings us to the opposite end of the spectrum. Both Jackson and Hagner are skeptical that these models are reliable for anything beyond replicating common survey toplines. “I just […] don’t think the machines are what we want when we’re looking for nuanced views. My example on this is people in Arizona and Nevada in 2024 who voted for Trump and voted for expanding abortion in their states on ballot initiatives,” said Jackson. Hagner identified another issue. Maybe the synthetic respondents, like sycophantic LLMs, are inhuman in one important way: they’re too nice. “The reports that have come through at the meetings that I’ve been at are that the early experiments on this, they cannot get respondents to be as racist or sexist or, frankly, as negative as human respondents,” he said. Academic research mostly agrees on this point. While there are some papers that show promising results when using LLMs to replicate polling data, most show that LLMs suffer from various quirks like producing too few “don’t know” responses and can seriously overpredict the favorability of politicians like Donald Trump and Kamala Harris. They also seem to struggle with too little variation between demographic subgroups, so the difference in predicted opinion between Democrats and Republicans, for example, is too small. When I asked Warner about these studies, his response to these papers was that just because academics can’t get synthetic sampling to work doesn’t mean that the technique doesn’t work in general. “Actually, the argument is, okay, yours does not [work]. That does not mean […] for this complex set of machinery, which uses a lot of investment, a lot of time, a lot of money, you can’t get it to work.” Cards on the table, I’m somewhat sympathetic to this argument because academics aren’t exactly great at making election forecasts. Usually, the people with skin in the game are the most accurate. Warner’s argument is that the approach Electric Twin takes — which includes, for example, making multiple predictions for each synthetic respondent using different models and prompts and subsequently averaging those to get a final prediction in a sort of ensemble forecast — produces better results than the simpler academic models. Warner shared a comparison between his method and the method from a recent academic paper with me, and Electric Twin was indeed able to get more accurate replication. But even still, he acknowledged that synthetic sampling “is not a crystal ball.” “If you asked me, do I think using other data sources will be more accurate than asking somebody who they will vote for, I would probably say no. But if you asked me ‘would your system be useful for our turnout modeling today?’ I would say yes.” For better or worse, it looks like the method is already getting more popular in the market research world. Most of the clients Aaru touts these days are businesses like EY and McDonald’s. And AI will probably begin to pop up in other parts of the political polling process. Pollsters are already using it to code open-ended survey responses, and some firms, like YouGov, are testing using LLMs to ask survey respondents questions. More worryingly, one danger to actual polls is that AI agents can be used to infiltrate online surveys. Most online polls use various checks to prevent that from happening, but there’s conflicting evidence on how effective those filters are and how prevalent AI agents currently are in online panels. If those agents ever become impossible to detect, it might spell the end of online polling, but the solution isn’t to replace all of your respondents with ChatGPT. Silver Bulletin is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support our work, consider becoming a subscriber. Subscribe 1 That particular poll obviously doesn’t meet Silver Bulletin standards for aggregation. But we exclude all Public Sentiment Institute polls from our averages because we classify them as an amateur polling firm. 2 You could argue that Fink meant the next presidential election, but (a) I’m also confident we’ll still have real polls in 2028 and (b) in that case he should have asked an LLM to define “general election.” 3 Quick caveat: that’s reporting from a Democratic pollster. It’s possible that Republicans are more willing to use AI in political campaigns. 4 Indeed, Silver Bulletin does not include “polls” produced by MRP in our forecasts or averages, and we think it’s extremely misleading when their practitioners describe them in a way that suggests original data had been collected among a large number of states or Congressional districts. 5 A recent report from Aaru and EY did show two examples of a synthetic estimate being closer than a survey to a real-world benchmark — but I’d take those findings with a grain of salt because the report reads more like an ad and didn’t involve any sort of prediction being made ahead of time. 6 For comparison, our odds for Harris on the same day were 48.2 percent.
Social media erupts after Harris introduces 'mob boss' accent to attack Trump: 'Total cringe'
Kamala Harris impersonated Donald Trump as a mob boss while criticizing his foreign policy at a National Action Network event, sparking online backlash.
UMA, UMPI launch online medical laboratory science bachelor's degree to expand Maine’s healthcare workforce
The University of Maine at Presque Isle and the University of Maine at Augusta are launching a bachelor of science in medical laboratory science degree
UMA, UMPI launch online medical laboratory science bachelor's degree to expand Maine’s healthcare workforce
The University of Maine at Presque Isle and the University of Maine at Augusta are launching a bachelor of science in medical laboratory science degree
Skyrim’s massive RP server that replaces NPCs with players just broke a new record
Skyrim’s massive new 750 player roleplay server is transforming the 2011 classic into something entirely unprecedented.
Personal trainer shocked to find health company using his photos
Sion documented his weight loss journey online and was shocked to find a company was using his photos.
Alamo Drafthouse showing 'The Pitt' finale free for health care workers
Ten Alamo Drafthouse locations are hosting free screenings of "The Pitt" Season 2 finale on Monday, April 13. Limited tickets are available online.
What's in Wisconsin's plan for latest round of opioid settlement funds?
The state health department released the plan April 9. State lawmakers have the ultimate say in how opioid settlement funds are spent.
Whole Hog Politics: Vance’s Hungarian gambit
[Watch Whole Hog Politics live: Join us today at 9 a.m. EDT at TheHill.com as Chris Stirewalt and host Bill Sammon break down this week’s political news and answer questions from a live online audi…
Hong Kong animal groups urge HKTVmall boycott over life science experiments
Online retailer facing major backlash after its parent company confirmed tests on pigs’ and sheep’s detached heads and limbs.
EBACE Show Canceled As New Format Fails to Win Support
EBAA trade group said lack of momentum made the show not viable
Gen Z's political alienation drives rise in extremism
Gen Z’s pandemic scars, social-media isolation and disordered home life have eroded trust in the American social contract, increasing disaffection and political extremism.
Flutter Entertainment (FLUT) Stock Trades Down, Here Is Why
Shares of global online betting powerhouse Flutter Entertainment (NASDAQ:FLUT) fell 4.3% in the afternoon session after an analyst from Citizens lowered the price target for the company, citing a cautious outlook for the U.S. online gaming sector.
China\'s K-pop worries: The reasons why a ban on Korean entertainment has lasted a decade
BTS is back after a three-and-a-half year break, but their world tour is skipping China. This comes as no surprise, as China has blocked most South Korean entertainment since 2016.
Hip-hop pioneer Afrika Bambaataa dies at age 68
Afrika Bambaataa, a hip-hop pioneer, has died of prostate cancer in Pennsylvania at age 68, according to his lawyer. Known for tracks like “Planet Rock,” Bambaataa was a key figure
Hackers drain local jewelry business of its Shopify account
A local online jewelry business says hackers drained its Shopify account to 18 cents, leaving sales, restocks and shipping at a standstill.
Penn researchers use AI to surface unreported GLP-1 side effects in Reddit posts
Could mining Reddit with AI help spot drug side effects earlier? A new Penn study suggests it might. Using large language models to map patient posts to standardized medical terms, researchers analyzed more than 400,000 Reddit posts about GLP-1s and found both known side effects and possibly underrecognized symptoms, like menstrual changes. The team says the approach could eventually help generate early safety signals for other drugs and wellness trends discussed online.
Wisconsin becomes 33rd state to legalize online sports betting
Department of Health Services announces $31M investment in opioid settlements
Wisconsin's Department of Health Services announced a plan for its $31 million share of $794 million in opioid settlement funds.
Evers signs bill to allow sports betting in Wisconsin
Gov. Tony Evers signed a measure into law Thursday that will pave the way for people to place bets online in Wisconsin.
New YouTube Report Shows How Online Animators Are Reshaping the Entertainment Industry
YouTube has released a new report on how independent animators creating straight-to-audiences content on YouTube are reshaping the industry.
Evers signs law legalizing tribal run online sports betting in Wisconsin
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers signed a bill into law on April 9 that legalizes online sports betting, making it the 33rd state to allow the practice. ...
Early Punch-Out prototype surfaces, ROM shared online
Nintendo fans can now get their hands on a new and special Punch-Out prototype that just surfaced.
Evers signs measure paving way for online sports betting in Wisconsin
Gov. Tony Evers on Thursday signed a law opening the door to legal online sports betting in Wisconsin.
Wisconsin legalizes online sports betting after Evers signs bill
Gov. Tony Evers signed a bill legalizing online sports betting in Wisconsin on Thursday, April 9, but bettors must wait while the state negotiates agreements with tribal nations.
Flutter Entertainment (FLUT) Stock Trades Down, Here Is Why
What Happened? Shares of global online betting powerhouse Flutter Entertainment (NASDAQ:FLUT) fell 4.3% in the afternoon session after an analyst from Citize...
Oppo Find X9 Ultra full specifications, images emerge via premature listing
The Oppo Find X9 Ultra is expected to go official on April 21 across multiple markets, including China. Ahead of the launch, the device briefly appeared on China Telecom’s database. While the listing has now been removed, it revealed several key specifications and design details, as seen in screenshots circulating online. Oppo Find X9 Ultra […]
How national political analysts see the Wisconsin Supreme Court race
J. Miles Coleman from Sabato's Crystal Ball said far different results in Washington and Ozaukee counties could mark the end of the "WOW" grouping.
New YouTube report shows how online animators are reshaping the entertainment industry
Independent creators on YouTube are redefining the animation landscape as global audiences shift their focus toward original online series. This report explores how a new generation of animators reaches millions of people through digital platforms and cross-language content.
Pitt launches an affordable online graduate Certificate in Infant Mental Health
The new School of Education program, part of the Pitt Online portfolio, will help fill a critical national and statewide workforce gap.