I suspect this issue is endemic to any situation where the judging is timeconsuming and occurs in private. Typically an organization giving out awards doesn't have much leverage over the judges. This is a very rare case where the judges were 'observed' unknowingly in a way that was perfectly legal and only implicated their judging behavior.<p>Now if only we could get this kind of telemetry from reviewers of academic papers...or politicians voting on legislation.
This story, in general, deserves some love. I'd love to see telemetry results from other judges--I've heard mutterings that this is pretty endemic, IGF and otherwise.