Relying upon voice phones as the now somewhat antiquated technology to conduct polls themselves is flawed IMHO, especially with modern alternative communication technologies like texting, emails, or forums/blogs that many younger folks & some older have begun to favor at the expense of voice communications. Armed with now almost universal caller ID, myself & many others that I know rarely answer a phone anymore for a voice call. Only if the caller ID matches an actual contact or is a person I recognize - else leave a damn voice message if it's important. And, those I do know are aware that I am much more likely to respond in a timely manner if it's a text or email, so I don't get many voice phone calls to begin with. I suspect I'm not alone.
Moreover, with caller ID I think the chance of someone even inclined to answer a phone call at all from someone they either don't know, or that is obviously a telemarketer/money-begger/pollster, is a strong function of personality. I like to be left alone in general, as I suspect many non-collectivists do. IMHO, phone polls are going to be dominated by touchy-feely-talky types that are inclined to answer an out-dated anonymous voice call in the first place. We're not in the 20 century anymore - technology has changed, and poll technology somehow needs to change with it.
You made a lot of good points. I agree with them — especially the parts about the technology changing. Also, I suspect that your use of call display to filter out pollsters is more typical of conservatives than liberals (touchy-feely-talky types).
I didn’t want to post too much, so I focused on phone surveys as a short cut. Some of the new technology can be quite useful — e.g. surveys by Internet, where the sample was pre-selected, and there is follow-up to get an acceptable response rate. Other new technologies vary from less valid to less than useless. Self-selected open Internet polls (the kind we’re often asked to Freep) are useless (except to, e.g., artificially create a bandwagon effect). Robo-calling phone surveys are generally useless; but, could be useful if properly conducted.
Not so long ago, in-person interviews, and mail-out surveys were the established methods; and telephone surveys were the upstart technology. It took quite a while for telephone surveys to be accepted — and they have never been considered as valid as in-person interviews. Even in-person interviews can have plenty of validity problems. For instance, the appearance and demeanour of the interviewer can skew results. Cost was the main factor in favour of telephone surveys — and it is the main driver of the move toward Internet and robo-calling surveys.
If the pollsters are interested in quality, there are ways to address most of the problems. For instance, one of the most effective ways to improve the quality of surveys is the use of pre-selected panels. Survey companies recruit large panels of willing participants; and then survey samples from the panel. That greatly improves the response rate, and helps ensure that, e.g. cell phone users are included in the sample.
The problem is, the political pollsters seem to be more interested in serving whatever agenda their clients have, than in any professional concern about validity and reliability. We’ve only touched on the ways that unscrupulous pollsters can skew results, to suit their clients’ wishes.