andrew_gelman_stats andrew_gelman_stats-2013 andrew_gelman_stats-2013-2148 knowledge-graph by maker-knowledge-mining
Source: html
Introduction: This one totally faked me out at first. It was an email from “Nick Bagnall” that began: Dear Dr. Gelman, I made contact last year regarding your work in the CMG: Reconstructing Climate from Tree Ring Data project. We are about to start producing the 2014 edition and I wanted to discuss this with you as we still remain keen to feature your work. Research Media are producing a special publication in February of 2014, within this report we will be working with a small selected number of PI’s with a focus on geosciences, atmospheric and geospace sciences and earth Sciences.. At this point, I’m thinking: Hmmm, I don’t remember this guy, is this some sort of collaborative project that I’d forgotten about? The message then continues: The publication is called International Innovation . . . Huh? This doesn’t sound so good. The email then goes on with some very long lists, and then finally the kicker: The total cost for each article produced in this report is fixed a
sentIndex sentText sentNum sentScore
1 It was an email from “Nick Bagnall” that began: Dear Dr. [sent-2, score-0.188]
2 Gelman, I made contact last year regarding your work in the CMG: Reconstructing Climate from Tree Ring Data project. [sent-3, score-0.098]
3 We are about to start producing the 2014 edition and I wanted to discuss this with you as we still remain keen to feature your work. [sent-4, score-0.335]
4 Research Media are producing a special publication in February of 2014, within this report we will be working with a small selected number of PI’s with a focus on geosciences, atmospheric and geospace sciences and earth Sciences. [sent-5, score-0.516]
5 At this point, I’m thinking: Hmmm, I don’t remember this guy, is this some sort of collaborative project that I’d forgotten about? [sent-7, score-0.165]
6 The message then continues: The publication is called International Innovation . [sent-8, score-0.1]
7 The email then goes on with some very long lists, and then finally the kicker: The total cost for each article produced in this report is fixed at a tax free amount of $ 2,980 USD for the full three page development, this is a required contribution. [sent-13, score-0.443]
8 But there’s more: By publishing open access, researchers benefit from a higher visibility and increased cross pollination of their article. [sent-15, score-0.185]
9 Luckily, I can publish open-access for free whenever I want! [sent-16, score-0.083]
10 Finally: Could you please drop me a mail and advise when would be a good time to discuss further? [sent-17, score-0.257]
11 This happened last month; I scheduled it on a day when just about nobody should be reading this blog, that way I’m not wasting too many people’s time with it. [sent-21, score-0.258]
12 So it hurts when people like this guy come along and think of me as nothing more than a mark. [sent-24, score-0.252]
13 A few weeks later, “Bagnall” emailed me again: Dear Dr. [sent-28, score-0.194]
14 Gelman, I sent you an email some weeks ago concerning the CMG: Reconstructing Climate from Tree Ring Data project. [sent-29, score-0.392]
15 I understand how busy you are at present and may not have seen my email so I thought I would try one last time. [sent-30, score-0.286]
16 Still with that juicy charge of $8940 $2980 per article. [sent-34, score-0.099]
17 I wonder, does this guy get any takers at all, or is there some other game they are playing. [sent-35, score-0.252]
18 Although I guess this is better than mugging old ladies for spare change or selling Herbalife dealerships. [sent-37, score-0.387]
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same-blog 1 0.99999982 2148 andrew gelman stats-2013-12-25-Spam!
Introduction: This one totally faked me out at first. It was an email from “Nick Bagnall” that began: Dear Dr. Gelman, I made contact last year regarding your work in the CMG: Reconstructing Climate from Tree Ring Data project. We are about to start producing the 2014 edition and I wanted to discuss this with you as we still remain keen to feature your work. Research Media are producing a special publication in February of 2014, within this report we will be working with a small selected number of PI’s with a focus on geosciences, atmospheric and geospace sciences and earth Sciences.. At this point, I’m thinking: Hmmm, I don’t remember this guy, is this some sort of collaborative project that I’d forgotten about? The message then continues: The publication is called International Innovation . . . Huh? This doesn’t sound so good. The email then goes on with some very long lists, and then finally the kicker: The total cost for each article produced in this report is fixed a
2 0.14934662 2160 andrew gelman stats-2014-01-06-Spam names
Introduction: There was this thing going around awhile ago, the “porn star name,” which you create by taking the name of your childhood pet, followed by the name of the street where you grew up (for example, Blitz Clifton). But recently I’ve been thinking about spam names. Just in the last two days, I’ve received emails from “Blair Williams” (“I’m sorry to have to tell you this. Tomorrow is the last day that the 40% discount will be available.”), “Audrey Woods” (“I wanted to reach out to you to let you know that we just launched an infographic . . .”), “Steven Harris” (“Part-Time Job – Earn $600/day in your spare-time”), and “Nick Bagnall” (“I sent you an email some weeks ago concerning . . .”). Actually, I think “Nick Bagnall” is probably a real person who’s just spamming me. But the first three names above look fake fake fake. And then there were “George Stoneriver,” Scott Wolfe,” and just plain “Paul,” who were sockpuppeting our discussion on compressed sensing a couple months ago. And do
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Introduction: I never read email before 4. That doesn’t mean I never send email before 4.
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Introduction: A few days ago I reported on the spam email that I received from two business school professors (one at Columbia)! As noted on the blog, I sent an email directly to the study’s authors at the time of reading the email, but they have yet to respond. This surprises me a bit. Certainly if 6300 faculty each have time to respond to one email on this study, the two faculty have time to respond to 6300 email replies, no? I was actually polite enough to respond to both of their emails! If I do hear back, I’ll let youall know! P.S. Paul Basken interviewed me briefly for a story in the Chronicle of Higher Education on the now-notorious spam email study. Basken’s article is reasonable–he points out that (a) the study irritated a lot of people, but (b) is ultimately no big deal. One interesting thing about the article is that, although some people felt that the spam email study was ethical, nobody came forth with an argument that the study was actually worth doing. P.P.S. In
Introduction: As someone who relies strongly on survey research, it’s good for me to be reminded that some surveys are useful, some are useless, but one thing they almost all have in common is . . . they waste the respondents’ time. I thought of this after receiving the following email, which I shall reproduce here. My own comments appear after. Recently, you received an email from a student asking for 10 minutes of your time to discuss your Ph.D. program (the body of the email appears below). We are emailing you today to debrief you on the actual purpose of that email, as it was part of a research study. We sincerely hope our study did not cause you any disruption and we apologize if you were at all inconvenienced. Our hope is that this letter will provide a sufficient explanation of the purpose and design of our study to alleviate any concerns you may have about your involvement. We want to thank you for your time and for reading further if you are interested in understanding why you rece
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Introduction: This one totally faked me out at first. It was an email from “Nick Bagnall” that began: Dear Dr. Gelman, I made contact last year regarding your work in the CMG: Reconstructing Climate from Tree Ring Data project. We are about to start producing the 2014 edition and I wanted to discuss this with you as we still remain keen to feature your work. Research Media are producing a special publication in February of 2014, within this report we will be working with a small selected number of PI’s with a focus on geosciences, atmospheric and geospace sciences and earth Sciences.. At this point, I’m thinking: Hmmm, I don’t remember this guy, is this some sort of collaborative project that I’d forgotten about? The message then continues: The publication is called International Innovation . . . Huh? This doesn’t sound so good. The email then goes on with some very long lists, and then finally the kicker: The total cost for each article produced in this report is fixed a
Introduction: This is hilarious ( link from a completely deadpan Tyler Cowen). I’d call it “unintentionally hilarious” but I’m pretty sure that rms knew this was funny when he was writing it. It’s sort of like when you write a top 10 list—it’s hard to resist getting silly and going over the top. It’s only near the end that we get to the bit about the parrots. All joking aside, the most interesting part of the email was this: I [rms] have to spend 6 to 8 hours *every day* doing my usual work, which is responding to email about the GNU Project and the Free Software Movement. I’d wondered for awhile what is it that Richard Stallman actually does, that is how does he spend his time (aside from giving lectures to promote his ideas and pay the bills). Emailing –> Blogging I too spend a lot of time on email, but a few years ago I consciously tried to shift a bunch of my email exchanges to the blog. I found that I was sending out a lot of information to an audience of one, information
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Introduction: How am I supposed to handle this sort of thing? (See below.) I just stuck it one of my email folders without responding, but then I wondered . . . what’s it all about? Is there some sort of Glengarry Glen Ross-like parallel world where down-on-their-luck Jack Lemmons of public relations world send out electronic cold calls? More than anything else, this sort of thing makes me glad I have a steady job. Here’s the (unsolicited) email, which came with the subject line “Please help a reporter do his job”: Dear Andrew, As an Editor for the Bulldog Reporter (www.bulldogreporter.com/dailydog), a media relations trade publication, my job is to help ensure that my readers have accurate info about you and send you the best quality pitches. By taking five minutes or less to answer my questions (pasted below), you’ll receive targeted PR pitches from our client base that will match your beat and interests. Any help or direction is appreciated. Here are my questions. We have you listed
4 0.78932911 1589 andrew gelman stats-2012-11-25-Life as a blogger: the emails just get weirder and weirder
Introduction: In the email the other day, subject line “Casting blogger, writer, journalist to host cable series”: Hi there Andrew, I’m casting a male journalist, writer, blogger, documentary filmmaker or comedian with a certain type personality for a television pilot along with production company, Pipeline39. See below: A certain type of character – no cockiness, no ego, a person who is smart, savvy, dry humor, but someone who isn’t imposing, who can infiltrate these organizations. This person will be hosting his own show and covering alternative lifestyles and secret societies around the world. If you’re interested in hearing more or would like to be considered for this project, please email me a photo and a bio of yourself, along with contact information. I’ll respond to you ASAP. I’m looking forward to hearing from you. *** Casting Producer (646) ***.**** ***@gmail.com I was with them until I got to the “no ego” part. . . . Also, I don’t think I could infiltrate any org
5 0.78860289 1618 andrew gelman stats-2012-12-11-The consulting biz
Introduction: I received the following (unsolicited) email: Hello, *** LLC, a ***-based market research company, has a financial client who is interested in speaking with a statistician who has done research in the field of Alzheimer’s Disease and preferably familiar with the SOLA and BAPI trials. We offer an honorarium of $200 for a 30 minute telephone interview. Please advise us if you have an employment or consulting agreement with any organization or operate professionally pursuant to an organization’s code of conduct or employee manual that may control activities by you outside of your regular present and former employment, such as participating in this consulting project for MedPanel. If there are such contracts or other documents that do apply to you, please forward MedPanel a copy of each such document asap as we are obligated to review such documents to determine if you are permitted to participate as a consultant for MedPanel on a project with this particular client. If you are
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Introduction: This one totally faked me out at first. It was an email from “Nick Bagnall” that began: Dear Dr. Gelman, I made contact last year regarding your work in the CMG: Reconstructing Climate from Tree Ring Data project. We are about to start producing the 2014 edition and I wanted to discuss this with you as we still remain keen to feature your work. Research Media are producing a special publication in February of 2014, within this report we will be working with a small selected number of PI’s with a focus on geosciences, atmospheric and geospace sciences and earth Sciences.. At this point, I’m thinking: Hmmm, I don’t remember this guy, is this some sort of collaborative project that I’d forgotten about? The message then continues: The publication is called International Innovation . . . Huh? This doesn’t sound so good. The email then goes on with some very long lists, and then finally the kicker: The total cost for each article produced in this report is fixed a
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Introduction: After our discussion of the sad case of Darrell Huff, the celebrated “How to Lie with Statistics” guy who had a lucrative side career disparaging the link between smoking and cancer, I was motivated to follow John Mashey’s recommendation and read the book, Golden Holocaust: Origins of the Cigarette Catastrophe and the Case for Abolition, by historian Robert Proctor. My first stop upon receiving the book was the index, in particular the entry for Rubin, Donald B. I followed the reference to pages 440-442 and found the description of Don’s activities to be accurate, neither diminished nor overstated, to the best of my knowledge. Rubin is the second-most-famous statistician to have been paid by the cigarette industry, but several other big and small names have been on the payroll at one time or another. Here’s a partial list . Just including the people I know or have heard of: Herbert Solomon, Stanford Richard Tweedie, Bond U Arnold Zellner, U of Chicago Paul Switzer, S
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Introduction: I have a great idea for a movie. Actually two movies based on two variants of a similar idea. It all started when I saw this story: Dr. Anil Potti, the controversial cancer researcher whose work at Duke University led to lawsuits from patients, is now a medical oncologist at the Cancer Center of North Dakota in Grand Forks. When asked about Dr. Potti’s controversial appointment, his new boss said : If a guy can’t get a second chance here in North Dakota, where he trained, man, you can’t get a second chance anywhere. (Link from Retraction Watch , of course.) Potti’s boss is also quoted as saying, “Most, if not all, his patients have loved him.” On the other hand, the news article reports: “The North Carolina medical board’s website lists settlements against Potti of at least $75,000.” I guess there’s no reason you can’t love a guy and still want a juicy malpractice settlement. Second Chance U I don’t give two poops about Dr. Anil Potti. But seeing the above s
4 0.96681595 1621 andrew gelman stats-2012-12-13-Puzzles of criminal justice
Introduction: Four recent news stories about crime and punishment made me realize, yet again, how little I understand all this. 1. “HSBC to Pay $1.92 Billion to Settle Charges of Money Laundering” : State and federal authorities decided against indicting HSBC in a money-laundering case over concerns that criminal charges could jeopardize one of the world’s largest banks and ultimately destabilize the global financial system. Instead, HSBC announced on Tuesday that it had agreed to a record $1.92 billion settlement with authorities. . . . I don’t understand this idea of punishing the institution. I have the same problem when the NCAA punishes a college football program. These are individual people breaking the law (or the rules), right? So why not punish them directly? Giving 40 lashes to a bunch of HSBC executives and garnisheeing their salaries for life, say, that wouldn’t destabilize the global financial system would it? From the article: “A money-laundering indictment, or a guilt
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