Vote UK Almanac of British Politics?

[Robert Waller]

It is perfectly fine to consult Wikipedia to check facts. For example the constituency entries there usually have the boundaries and election results conveniently in one place.
But of course here we must be adding substantially, either from existing own knowledge or a significant amount of research.
In particular, an assessment of how the various parts of the seat vote, gleaned from experience and/or local election results, was always a significant part of my own efforts.
Also the socio-economic influences on voting patterns. Wikipedia profiles do not, it seems to me, seek to explain why the seats vote the way they do or how this may have changed.

[Deleted]

I'm going to get a first draft for the three Wigan MBC seats.

[Merseymike]

Apr 26, 2020 11:55:58 GMT @pr1berske said:

I'm going to get a first draft for the three Wigan MBC seats.

Sounds good. My in-laws live in one, my partner worked in another, so I know them quite well, I'll watch out for them

[Deleted]

I've finished Bristol and Bedfordshire. I assume someone else will take the remaining Gloucs seats, so I'm going to add to the profiles I've done and then leave it alone

[November_Rain]

I have completed the two North Somerset District Council seats of North Somerset (Liam Fox one not the Mogg one) and Weston-super-Mare. There the only two I am qualified to do, as there's no point of me doing any other as I have limited local knowledge unless it was local council wards.

[Foggy]

One of the seats I tried to 'bagsy' a few pages back has had an entry posted, which is fair enough really. I might still add my own version at some stage, though.

I've found myself busier again the past couple of weeks, but to be honest, having done the background research before that I've struggled to find the motivation to put the constituency profiles into prose. I'll have a bit more free time again from Thursday onwards, so we'll see if the mood takes me.

On a more general point: I also note from reading others' submissions that a massive proofreading session will be needed to make the almanac look in any way professional. With the amount of content produced, the vast majority of unclear sentences or outright errors are understandable, but I have spotted a few mistakes that really shouldn't be creeping in for any serious psephologist (such as "bell-weather [sic]" in the entry mentioned in the post above this one).

[bjornhattan]

Apr 26, 2020 21:21:46 GMT Foggy said:

One of the seats I tried to 'bagsy' a few pages back has had an entry posted, which is fair enough really. I might still add my own version at some stage, though.

I've found myself busier again the past couple of weeks, but to be honest, having done the background research before that I've struggled to find the motivation to put the constituency profiles into prose. I'll have a bit more free time again from Thursday onwards, so we'll see if the mood takes me.

On a more general point: I also note from reading others' submissions that a massive proofreading session will be needed to make the almanac look in any way professional. With the amount of content produced, the vast majority of unclear sentences or outright errors are understandable, but I have spotted a few mistakes that really shouldn't be creeping in for any serious psephologist (such as "bell-weather [sic]" in the entry mentioned in the post above this one).

Another point relating to your last paragraph, which is probably more difficult, is standardising the writing styles in the almanac. This isn't a criticism of any particular approach, but even things as trivial as our preferences for different sentence structures or punctuation could become quite jarring.

[AdminSTB]

Wikipedia's constituency articles always generate scepticism, but let's be honest - they are plainly very useful to double check for historical results, boundaries and information on composite wards past and present all in one place, as long as they are all sourced. In that respect, I make no apology for using them in my profiles.

But I've also used council websites and the Elections Centre website for local election results stretching back to the early Seventies, and the Ordnance Survey's excellent election maps website. Robert Waller's previous editions of the Almanac are obviously the natural guide to get an idea of the kind of information we ought to be including, even if they need to be updated. And if you don't have them in paper form, there are extracts of them available on Google Books. There seems to me to be no reason anyone can't create decent profiles using all these sources alone, as long as they're reasonably good at writing.

Of course local knowledge goes a long way, and it gives the researcher a big advantage - all my profiles have been from Yorkshire seats so far - but the threads would be much more sparse if we didn't venture from the limits of the areas in which we live. I've lived in West Yorkshire for just over half my life, and some of my ancestors have lived here since time out of mind, but I've still not discovered much of the county first hand.

This sort of project is a life's work, rather like a family tree. It requires constant revision as time goes by and more facts and data become available. In about five or ten years' time we will probably be doing this all over again, hopefully without a pandemic!

[andrewteale]

Apr 26, 2020 21:21:46 GMT Foggy said:

One of the seats I tried to 'bagsy' a few pages back has had an entry posted, which is fair enough really. I might still add my own version at some stage, though.

I've found myself busier again the past couple of weeks, but to be honest, having done the background research before that I've struggled to find the motivation to put the constituency profiles into prose. I'll have a bit more free time again from Thursday onwards, so we'll see if the mood takes me.

On a more general point: I also note from reading others' submissions that a massive proofreading session will be needed to make the almanac look in any way professional. With the amount of content produced, the vast majority of unclear sentences or outright errors are understandable, but I have spotted a few mistakes that really shouldn't be creeping in for any serious psephologist (such as "bell-weather [sic]" in the entry mentioned in the post above this one).

I know what you mean by that last paragraph, having just had back the corrections for the first half of the 2019 Previews book.

Personally I've found LEAP updates and working from home to be huge occupiers of my time, which is why I've only done two profiles so far.

[greenchristian]

Apr 26, 2020 22:42:10 GMT andrewteale said:

Apr 26, 2020 21:21:46 GMT Foggy said:

One of the seats I tried to 'bagsy' a few pages back has had an entry posted, which is fair enough really. I might still add my own version at some stage, though.

I've found myself busier again the past couple of weeks, but to be honest, having done the background research before that I've struggled to find the motivation to put the constituency profiles into prose. I'll have a bit more free time again from Thursday onwards, so we'll see if the mood takes me.

On a more general point: I also note from reading others' submissions that a massive proofreading session will be needed to make the almanac look in any way professional. With the amount of content produced, the vast majority of unclear sentences or outright errors are understandable, but I have spotted a few mistakes that really shouldn't be creeping in for any serious psephologist (such as "bell-weather [sic]" in the entry mentioned in the post above this one).

I know what you mean by that last paragraph, having just had back the corrections for the first half of the 2019 Previews book.

Personally I've found LEAP updates and working from home to be huge occupiers of my time, which is why I've only done two profiles so far.

And, of course, LEAP is a major source of information for everyone else, so updating it is a contribution in and of itself. Whilst I have my own spreadsheet for the Coventry seats I've done, there are times it's been easier to check those details on LEAP.

Anyway, now I've done Coventry, I might try a couple of the Warwickshire ones. Though my knowledge of those constituencies is fairly patchy (e.g. I know Leamington reasonably well, but don't know Warwick particularly well).

[Richard Allen]

Since no one has done any of the Shropshire seats I will do Ludlow at some point this week.

[loderingo]

I am going to do Torfaen next and then Islwyn. I wasn't going to do Bath as I know the city centre but not the suburbs.

Quick question - if people put comments below a profile we have written with extra snippets do you then want us to go back and edit the original post to include these?

[jamie]

May 1, 2020 22:39:15 GMT loderingo said:

Quick question - if people put comments below a profile we have written with extra snippets do you then want us to go back and edit the original post to include these?

If there’s a few suggestions for what else to include/corrections then it would be good to do so. I’ve added a few sentences based on what others have said, but I wouldn’t feel too pressured to include stuff you disagree with/do a wholesale rewrite. 

[AdminSTB]

May 1, 2020 22:39:15 GMT loderingo said:

I am going to do Torfaen next and then Islwyn. I wasn't going to do Bath as I know the city centre but not the suburbs.

Quick question - if people put comments below a profile we have written with extra snippets do you then want us to go back and edit the original post to include these?

You shouldn't feel obliged to do that.  Just factor in what has been written underneath further down the line.  Some constituencies have multiple profiles; in fact I wish more of them did. 
When at least one profile has been created for all constituencies, the focus is going to be on filling the gaps, standardisation, formatting, editing, auditing and so on. It makes me appreciate all the more the enormous task Robert Waller must have had in creating his previous editions, without having a forum around like this to help.

[Deleted]

One factor which I hadn't thought of before until recently: word limit. I had writing jobs in the past with strict limits, and I still have a rough idea about how many words are too many depending on the 'client'. Same applies here I guess.

[yellowperil]

May 1, 2020 23:20:28 GMT AdminSTB said:

May 1, 2020 22:39:15 GMT loderingo said:

I am going to do Torfaen next and then Islwyn. I wasn't going to do Bath as I know the city centre but not the suburbs.

Quick question - if people put comments below a profile we have written with extra snippets do you then want us to go back and edit the original post to include these?

You shouldn't feel obliged to do that.  Just factor in what has been written underneath further down the line.  Some constituencies have multiple profiles; in fact I wish more of them did. 
When at least one profile has been created for all constituencies, the focus is going to be on filling the gaps, standardisation, formatting, editing, auditing and so on. It makes me appreciate all the more the enormous task Robert Waller must have had in creating his previous editions, without having a forum around like this to help.

.. or of course hinder. There is a sense in which attempting any sort of standardisation will be immensely more difficult  from multiple inputs than from a single input. There is a new strength but also a huge weakness in what we are attempting here. I think the editing job will be enormous but worthwhile, yet in some ways the process is more important than the finished product, and the whole thing in its raw form, complete with its total irrelevancies, minor bits of off-topic bickering, awful puns, etc, may make a better read than any finished, well polished product. 

I have been attempting to read in toto the Wikipedia collection of constituency profiles, where clearly there are a number of main inputters and some common approaches but in the end no single format universally applied. I'm sure ours can improve on that by a mile, but is that so far from what we finish up with?

[carlton43]

May 2, 2020 7:58:47 GMT yellowperil said:

May 1, 2020 23:20:28 GMT AdminSTB said:

You shouldn't feel obliged to do that.  Just factor in what has been written underneath further down the line.  Some constituencies have multiple profiles; in fact I wish more of them did. 
When at least one profile has been created for all constituencies, the focus is going to be on filling the gaps, standardisation, formatting, editing, auditing and so on. It makes me appreciate all the more the enormous task Robert Waller must have had in creating his previous editions, without having a forum around like this to help.

.. or of course hinder. There is a sense in which attempting any sort of standardisation will be immensely more difficult  from multiple inputs than from a single input. There is a new strength but also a huge weakness in what we are attempting here. I think the editing job will be enormous but worthwhile, yet in some ways the process is more important than the finished product, and the whole thing in its raw form, complete with its total irrelevancies, minor bits of off-topic bickering, awful puns, etc, may make a better read than any finished, well polished product. 

I have been attempting to read in toto the Wikipedia collection of constituency profiles, where clearly there are a number of main inputters and some common approaches but in the end no single format universally applied. I'm sure ours can improve on that by a mile, but is that so far from what we finish up with?

Why should there be a uniform format?  Does there need to be a house style at all?

The constituencies range from Islington to Ross, from the 'formed in 2010' to those reaching back to 1345.  From the routine and boring to the fascinating and complex. 

I would expect some to consist of three paragraphs at most and others to need four pages at least.

[Deleted]

May 2, 2020 10:53:51 GMT carlton43 said:

May 2, 2020 7:58:47 GMT yellowperil said:

.. or of course hinder. There is a sense in which attempting any sort of standardisation will be immensely more difficult  from multiple inputs than from a single input. There is a new strength but also a huge weakness in what we are attempting here. I think the editing job will be enormous but worthwhile, yet in some ways the process is more important than the finished product, and the whole thing in its raw form, complete with its total irrelevancies, minor bits of off-topic bickering, awful puns, etc, may make a better read than any finished, well polished product. 

I have been attempting to read in toto the Wikipedia collection of constituency profiles, where clearly there are a number of main inputters and some common approaches but in the end no single format universally applied. I'm sure ours can improve on that by a mile, but is that so far from what we finish up with?

Why should there be a uniform format?  Does there need to be a house style at all?

The constituencies range from Islington to Ross, from the 'formed in 2010' to those reaching back to 1345.  From the routine and boring to the fascinating and complex. 

I would expect some to consist of three paragraphs at most and others to need four pages at least.

No. 

For it to be credible, we need to agree on a structure. I mean this, it's how I was taught over years of writing for both business and pleasure. 

A house style, a maximum number of words, broad brush where it needs to be, detailed otherwise, all tied up in a fixed number of paragraphs. The Internet has no maximum space, I know, but readers' attention does. Brevity means better, focused writing which sticks to the facts. 

So yes, we need a uniform format. 

[bjornhattan]

May 2, 2020 11:16:38 GMT @pr1berske said:

May 2, 2020 10:53:51 GMT carlton43 said:

Why should there be a uniform format?  Does there need to be a house style at all?

The constituencies range from Islington to Ross, from the 'formed in 2010' to those reaching back to 1345.  From the routine and boring to the fascinating and complex. 

I would expect some to consist of three paragraphs at most and others to need four pages at least.

No. 

For it to be credible, we need to agree on a structure. I mean this, it's how I was taught over years of writing for both business and pleasure. 

A house style, a maximum number of words, broad brush where it needs to be, detailed otherwise, all tied up in a fixed number of paragraphs. The Internet has no maximum space, I know, but readers' attention does. Brevity means better, focused writing which sticks to the facts. 

So yes, we need a uniform format. 

I can't see how a fixed number of paragraphs could work, if we're examining the different areas within each constituency.

Compare Leeds West with Oxford West and Abingdon. The former is a very homogeneous seat, with just four wards, which have very similar characteristics (other than Kirkstall having a significant minority of students). The latter covers parts of three council areas, with wide variations between the Abingdon wards, the rural villages to the west of Oxford, Kidlington, and the immense wealth of North Oxford. You'd struggle to write more than a couple of paragraphs about the former, and less than three about the latter probably wouldn't do the topic justice.

I personally consider having a consistent level of detail more important than a consistent length.

[The Bishop]

In the original Almanacs, some seats had significantly longer entries than others - that's just how it is.