Click above to download a Power Point poster.
Click above to download a Power Point poster.
The World's Smallest Political Quiz has become a favorite recruiting tool for libertarians. It is compact, quick, and conclusively breaks people out of the left-right dicotomy. Further, it enables recruiters to easily identify the best prospects, by targeting those who wind up in the libertarian quadrant.
However, even the best of tools can use improvement. Consider some of the limitations of the current quiz:
| Manual Tallying | It can be hard to keep up with people taking the test when you are trying to keep a running tally of the days scores. Keeping the scores properly requires an additional volunteer. |
| Too Terse | The card format requires the questions to be very terse. In some ways this is an advantage; it speeds up taking the test. However, this also rules out being able to flesh out questions with some background information. |
| Imprecise | Yes, no, maybe is mighty limiting. Just what does "maybe" mean for "End taxes". Does that mean a 50% tax cut, or does it express uncertainty in the workability of anarcho-capitalism? What about repealing regulations on sex by consenting adults. Does maybe mean repeal sodomy laws but keep prostitution legal? Or what? This lack of precision can produce false positives and false negatives for moderate libertarians. This is not good, since moderate libertarians will be the bulk of our electoral base. |
| Lost Data | It has been my experience that quiz forms tend to get thrown away. The details of the score get lost. This is a shame, since there is useful statistical data to be garnered. To wit: does the drug issue hurt us or help us? And if we combine with enhance precision: just how big a spending cut to people want? |
For those who came directly to the tools directory of this web site, the home page of quiz2d.com consists of an online version of the Enhanced-Precision Political Quiz in 2D. It asks 11 questions, with 4 or more possible answers per question. Each question is assigned a weight, and each answer is assigned a percentage. Your final score is a weighted average, and is plotted to your browser using an applet.
Just as important, statistics are kept for each answer. I want to find out where moderation pays off and where it is just as well to take the all-out extreme position.
This site does more than take total statistics for each answer, however. It is capable of breaking down the statistics by which page was originally linked to the quiz. This way, organizations that link to this site can get a feel for the views of their membership, and I can do a marketing study of which issues to push before which groups.
For this to work, the linking site needs to add "?from='name'" to the url. For example, the Erisian Liberation Front would link to this site as follows:
http://www.quiz2d.com/quiz.php?from=elf
The word "elf" they would get from me after writing me (milsted at quiz2d dot com) that they want to link to this site. The request should contain the following:
In return for providing this information, your users get a link back to your site after they have taken the quiz. Also, I will be able to send you the statistics from your site. How often you get them depends on how busy I am. And there is NO WARRANTY on the thoroughness or validity. This is a free service. TANSTAAFL!
Now available! I now have a form for the purpose of registering your site and providing you with code to produce a popup. click here.
There is also a version that runs locally on PCs running Windows 95 (or better). The idea here is to put the quiz on some old junker machines (486s) and set the machines up at fairs, college campuses, gun shows, and so forth. The features are very similar to the web page, but optimized a bit for a booth environment and the small monitors that come with old PCs.
Quiz2D_v4_1.zip is an archive containing the current (v4.1) version of "The Enhanced-Precision Political Quiz in 2D." It runs under Windows95 and better. Features include automatic scoring, tabulating, address solicitation, and storage of statistical information.
Note: there are some subtleties to running the quiz. Read the directions in the archive. Or at least: remember that F11 is for quitting. Also, install the included font if you want things to look sharp.
The documentation also gives tips on how to set up and run a booth using the computerized quiz. More tips will be provided as feedback comes back from the field. So far, the quiz has only been tested at a limited number of venues, so these tips are a work in progress. Send feedback!
If you are within driving distance to Asheville NC, I have at least two working 486 computers available (with monitors!) for running the quiz. I am especially interested in getting the quiz on campus, but gun shows and fairs are other possible venues. Contact me at address listed on the about page if you wish to borrow.
If you do run the quiz at an event, please let me know how it went! Do you have any tips to pass on to others. If so, I can include them in the documentation.
Also, please send me the statistical results. I want to throw a bit of science at some perennial questions, such as: