Special Bets: 2006-08-13

Friday, August 18, 2006

Final Poll Update - 7 P.M. Final Night

Welcome to our final update for this series of Big Brother. A sincere thank you goes out to all those that have participated in our surveys this series, we hope you have enjoyed being part of correctly predicting each eviction so far.

Let's see if we can do it just one more time..

As you are all probably aware, we have been running three polls to gauge how you have been voting during the week, and how you intend to vote tonight.

The first survey began on saturday morning and has had nearly 1,300 responses. This is how you told us you would be voting:

Details of how this poll has evolved during the week have been well documented on previous posts.

On Wednesday afternoon we began a new midweek poll in order to gauge more recent trends in voting behaviour. This survey has been running for two days and has had 332 responses, which reflected the growing support for Aisleyne that we were seeing in the cumulative poll.

Today, we launched our Finals Night survey, which aimed to capture not only overall voting trends, but multi-voting and tactical voting trends as well. The headline figures showed that Aisleyne's strength has continued to improve into today.

Of the 199 responses we have had today, 44.6% had already voted, and this is how:

In Big Brother 5, 60.5% of the total votes cast had been placed at the time of the first eviction the final evening. This ties in broadly with what we are seeing, as 25% of respondents intend voting this evening, along with 33% who said they had already voted, but will be voting again tonight.

Multi-Voting.

In terms of multi-voting, we asked you to tell us exactly how many times you intended to vote for your favourite housemate. Using this data, after removing outliers, we can calculate an "average number of votes per fan" for each housemate:

Nikki 9.8
Glyn 6.1
Aisleyne 5.5
Pete 4.4
Richard 3.8

Tactical Voting.

We asked you if you would switch allegences should your first choice housemate be evicted this evening. This is what you told us:

Looking at the overall voting data, it would appear that the final three will be Aisleyne, Glyn and Pete. In order to see where the tactical voting would go in this situation, we asked exactly that question:

The viewing figures of tonights show will be double that of a normal eviction friday. We have been asked a lot of questions about how these extra viewers will affect voting behaviour on the final night. Our track record shows that our polling group has a high degree of accuracy when it comes to Friday night evictions. We have less experience in running final night polls than we do in eviction night polls. There is a risk that our polling methods do not capture the effect of the more casual viewer tuning in tonight and deciding to vote for the first time, and this should be noted by those that follow our analysis.

And so there you have it. In the overall vote, incorporating both multi-voting and tactical voting (and not even factoring in the "complacency" effect that is 72% of respondents thinking that Pete will win tonight), our polls comtinue to tell us the Aisleyne will be crowned this evening.

Good Luck!

The Special Bets Team

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Thursday, August 17, 2006

Winners Poll Update - 10.00 P.M. Finals Night Eve

Poll Hacking, accusations of poll hacking. red-top media campaigns. rumoured voting leaks, conspiracy theories about smear campaigns from the producers. Don't you know, Phil Collins would say this is a Land of Confusion.

To avoid becoming confused ourselves, we are remaining totally focussed upon the responses to our two surveys that we have running this week. This is what we see:

The first poll we are conducting began at the start of the week and now has 1,185 responses. This is how you tell us you will vote: (click to enlarge)

Aisleyne took the lead in the overall poll on Tuesday night and has maintained her lead since then. This is how she did it, on both an absolute and rolling 60-vote percentage basis:

The above shows that there was a huge dip in support for Pete which occured around the 1000-vote mark of which Aisleyne took full advantage.

Let's pay more attention to more recent voting behaviour. We began our midweek poll on Wednesday afternoon, and this is how things stand after 314 responses:

This is broadly in line with the more recent responses of the poll that has been running all week, which is reassuring.

In terms of multi-voting, this is where the loyalty lies for people who intend to vote more than once:

We thought it would be interesting to gauge voting behaviour towards the most likely final trio; Aisleyne, Glyn and Pete, and this is what you told us:

So, at the risk of making what to some might seem an outrageous conclusion, and incurring the wrath of the vast army of (single voting) Pete fans out there, looking at the above I would suggest that Aisleyne is going to win Big Brother 7.

In order to keep our finger on the pulse, and gauge your views on the highlights show tonight, we will launch our final final winner's poll later on this evening.

Best

Statman

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Aisleyne Pushes Ahead As The Week Draws To A Close;

Good evening poll watchers!

Some of you have upset Statman it seems. He asked me to post tonight's update after the hostile reaction from some quarters to his pronouncements yesterday that concluded Aisleyne and Pete's Betfair prices were statistically incorrect.

Stat is new to being the "face" of anything and we know that there's a lot of money at stake for some people but please try to be nice - geeks aren't used to criticism, especially when they've shown their working.

OK so let's move on.

For context, here's a look at our existing cumulative poll that started on Saturday morning and will continue all week. Here's the current vote total after 1105 of you responded.

Aisleyne has pushed ahead of Pete in the cummulative poll, so we were keen to do a "spot check" today on your views as we know that most votes for the winner of Big Brother occur on the final day - so later results are therefore more relevant.

Today from 2pm until 10pm, 77.% of you told us you thought Pete will win Big Brother, while 16% of you now think Aisleyne will win - wishful thinking?

Well who would you vote for?

A "whopping" 39.7% of you (41.74% ex non voters) told us today that you will text or phone vote for Aisleyne to win - vs just 31.2% (or 32.8% ex non-voters) that would vote for Pete with Richard and Glyn battling it out for 3rd place;

We know that multiple voting can be a factor, so these are the people that told us they would vote for their favourite "as many times as possible"

And below, the responders that said they would vote for their favourite "a few times".
- It seems that Aisleyne fans are more apt to multi-vote.

What about tactical voting? -Who would you vote for to "stop"?

We've removed those that said they would not vote to stop anyone.

There's no clear beneficiary - although Pete and Glyn fair slightly better than Richard or Aisleyne;

To try to address the "tactical" vote question another way - (by the way if you aren't aware what we're driving at here - "tactical" voting is voting for someone other than your favourite to change an outcome - in this case the order of Big Brother evictees) we asked if you might vote for another HM if your favourite HM was evicted;

And then asked those responders who they would vote for in that case;

We then asked this question another way using the popular scenario of Pete, Glyn and Aisleyne making the final cut;

Here's who you dislike the most today; Nikki's unpopularity has picked up since we asked you last. You seem to dislike Aisleyne less than when we last asked you, although she is still the second most disliked HM.

So there you have it. Aisleyne is not only ahead in the cummulative poll, she seems to be showing tremendous current momentum - 8.5% ahead of Pete in today's "who will you vote for" poll.

Please ask any follow-up question you would like to see here on the blog. Statman will hopefully be back tonight or tomorrow. Please direct any statistical questions to him, but please don't be cross if Stat does not provide you with the answers that you were hoping for

Both polls remain LIVE - as this contest also seems to be...

Best as ever,

SpecialBets.

Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Winner's Poll Update - 10.30 P.M. Tuesday 15th August

On Sunday morning I predicted that Aisleyne would be ahead in our poll overall by 7 pm that evening. As it turns out, I was two days too early.

Aisleyne moved into the lead in our poll this evening. As it currently stands, after 1,023 responses, Aisleyne has 28.9% of the vote, Pete 28%, Glyn 14.4%, Nikki 9.3%, Richard 8.8% and Jennie 1.6%

I mentioned in the last update that the theoretical "fair value" odds for Pete and Aisleyne based on their Probability of Leading were 1.26 and 4.9 respectively, and over the last day the market has moved to reflect this.

However, given the change in leadership in the poll, the theoretical odds have also changed. Pete's Probability of Leading has been reduced to 35.1%, and Aisleyne's has risen to 64.9%.

This would suggest that the "fair value" odds for Pete are now 2.8, and for Aisleyne 1.54.

Our chart shows that it has been a collapse in Pete's rolling percentage vote that has seen Aisleyne take the lead, whilst her voting percentage has remained steady. (Click to enlarge).

Can she hold on?

Stay tuned.

Statman

Speed Dating - Not That Different To An X-Factor Audition?

We're going to be using lots of DivX video as we launch our X-Factor coverage - so download the plugin now and test your system with Statman's favourite indie film. (Statto speed-dated in the good old days before his Carol Vorderman obsession really took hold..)

About Last Night... Nikki testing even Endemol's Patience while the Red Tops Get "Behind" Aisleyne;

We don't usually comment on overnight events as they are not often relevant to betting but a few things are worth commenting on.

Pete

Pete talked of a "visitor from Heaven who told him he was going to win BB7, and if he doesn't win BB7 then Pete will lose faith in the existence of Heaven" and also that he "was told to come on Big Brother" (by the vision of a dead friend ) "and by myself and to win" - a comment that could have impact depending if/how it is shown/edited - you can see for yourself here;

Does this also mean that God is in danger of not existing if we don't vote for Pete to win Big Brother? A scary thought. Has The Pope been informed?

The Pope, yesterday;

Nikki

A "drunk" Nikki from midnight through to 3am;

*Upset Glyn by calling him a "simpleton" over and over again
*Berated Glyn for "drinking all the water"
*Complained (again) about the air con (yawn)
*Stuck chewing gum in Glyn's bed to "punish" him
*Decided to "steal" souvenirs from the house
Then was called to the diary room in an attempt to discipline her and to have a banned item confiscated.

The other HMs seem to be growing very tired of Nikki's amateur dramatics, and keen watchers of the live feed have suggested that Pete's body language is now indicating the same thing. How can Pete extract himself from this awful little Rumpelstiltskin? She really can't be doing his popularity any favours as we've see from our own polls.

Aisleyne's Price Shortens Further

Aisleyne traded on the Betfair exchange at prices as low as 6.6 as gamblers digested;

*The Mirror's front-page referenced, 10 point manifesto on why she "deserves to win"

*The Sun's online edition acknowleging her momentum in a short "could she win" article and

*The Special Bets poll update showing Aisleyne within spitting distance of Pete over the lifetime of the poll and actually AHEAD in recent days.

Aisleyne's turnaround - from 140 to 6.8;

This looks like being a VERY interesting week ahead and far from the "Pete first, Glyn Second" consensus of just 5 short days ago... stay tuned.

SpecialBets

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Monday, August 14, 2006

Winner's Poll Update - 9.30 P.M. Monday 14th August

After 889 responses, Pete's lead has now been eroded to just 2.1% over the life of the poll, which was started first thing Saturday morning.

Aisleyne continues to poll slightly better than Pete in more recent voting, which is summed up quite nicely in the table below:

Can Aisleyne close the gap before Friday? The last time I made a prediction it failed to come true, hence I will simply say that it is obviously possible so long as she maintains these sorts of voting levels from here on in.

I also personally find it useful to look at the Probability of Leading. This is a statistic which aims to measure how likely is it that Pete is actually leading the voting in the general population, given the results of our poll.

The Probability of Pete Leading right now turns out to be 80%, with Aisleyne making up the complimentary 20%. Hence the theoretical "fair price" odds for Pete winning the actual vote right now is 1.26, and Aisleyne 4.9.

Of course, the Probability of Leading will change should the underlying data trends change.

For consistency, here is the updated chart showing Rolling 60-vote percentages (clicky for bigger)

Stay tuned.

Sunday, August 13, 2006

Winner's Poll Update - 7 P.M. Sunday 13th August

It remains very close indeed. Throughout this series of Big Brother, Pete has always enjoyed at least a 15% margin over his closest rival, however over the last two days Aisleyne has managed to cut this down to just 3%.

I made an observation this morning that if the trend at that time continued Aisleyne would be leading overall by 7 p.m. this evening. As you can see from the updated chart below, the trend did reverse somewhat, hence this has not been the case. However, the difference between Pete and Aisleyne has remained fairly constant.

After 685 responses, Pete has 29.6% of the vote, Aisleyne 26.1%, Glyn 13.1%, Nikki 11.2%, Richard 9.5% and Jennie 1.9% (the balance not voting).

There is still a long way to go. Keep it here for updates.

Statman.

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Winner's Poll Update - Midday Sunday 13th August

This is going to be a long week. In order to help us see "inside" the poll data to identify any shorter-term trends that may be occurring I would like to introduce the "Rolling 60 - Vote Percentage".

The Rolling 60-Vote Percentage displays the percentage vote for a particular housemate based on the most recent 60 votes alone, across the life of the poll. We can see from the chart below that based on the last 60 votes, Aisleyne is currently polling 43.3% which is dwarfing Pete's rolling 60-vote percentage of 23.3%.

So whilst the overall result shown by the darker blue and red lines shows that Pete remains ahead of Aisleyne, the lighter coloured lines show that on a most recent 60-votes basis she has been closing the gap for a while now.

Of course, this could always swing back the other way and Pete could do what nearly 80% of people expect him to do, namely win Big Brother 2006.

However, if the trend does not change, I calculate that our poll will show Aisleyne ahead in overall percentages for the first time this evening at approximatley 7pm.

Keep it here

Statman