The Wardman Wire

I missed drawing your attention to the Britblog Roundup last week.

It was over at Cabalamat’s place, and Mr Pack was the first entry:

Mark Pack looks forward to the leaders’ debates in next year’s General Election, when “worms” might be deployed. What are worms?:

The “worm” is an instant poll tracker which wriggles across people’s TV screens, showing the net negative or positive reaction of a small group of the public to what is happening on screen. Running a worm across a politician’s speech or a debate between politicians has become a not uncommon feature of political coverage across many democracies. Known in the US as dial groups (because a group of people is each given a dial to twist towards positive or negative), worms have often been the cause of controversy there.