Watch out for outliers

[ffutures]

The blood transfusion service asked me to fill in an on-line survey today, with a chance of winning £100. So I did this, and all went swimmingly until I got to a question near the end; "how many times have you given blood?"

So I entered my guess, which was 106 times (can't actually remember except it's over 100) and it said I was wrong. So I tried again with 104, 105, and so forth, and again got this message. Eventually realised that they probably didn't actually have access to my records, so tried again with 99 - which worked. The twit who designed the survey had assumed that it only needed two figures... Fortunately there was a bit at the end to say what you thought of the survey, and I pointed out the mistake. Willing to bet I don't get any acknowledgement - or win the money!

Comments

[pauldormer.livejournal.com]

There was a story going round - I think I first hear it in the sixties - of a woman aged 106 who received a letter from the local education authority addressed to her parents, asking why she wasn't attending school.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I think that one was in The Beast of Business, a booklet about the evils of computing published in the seventies or eighties, which unfortunately got lost when I did my flat swap in '95. Sounds plausible.