On crowdsourcing

I've previously pointed out the problem with framing electoral outcomes solely in terms of which party wins the most seats. And EKOS' polling about which single party is most likely to form government thoroughly misses that point in previewing the federal campaign in 2015.

But that omission aside, EKOS' results do offer an interesting contrast to the media narrative of a two-party race:

We asked the panel to rate the percentage likelihood of each of the three contending parties winning the next election; it gave us an interesting insight into how Canadians view the next election. While the election is still quite distant — and we’re ignoring for now the question of majority versus minority — the accompanying chart shows a tie between the Conservatives and Liberals in terms of their perceived likelihood of winning.

This public wisdom election forecast doesn’t preclude an NDP victory — a sizable 23 per cent minority think that’s a plausible outcome — and there is no clear winner here.

And we'll want to pay particularly close attention to how the numbers change with time - as well as whether the absence of a majority choice is matched by the lack of any one party approaching a majority government.