Finally, the authors got it right. The latest printing of the Avaluator comes with a disclaimer:

Do you find the fine print rather too fine and difficult to read? Let's pull out the magnifying glass and zoom in on the important stuff:

Well, there you have it. The authors (Drs. Ian McCammon and Pascal Haegeli) have finaly concluded what we have known since the Avaluator was first published:
The Avaluator is not suitable for any particular purpose. In simpler words,

This is not entirely true. When neatly folded, it can prop a leg of a wobbly table in your favorite pub after a day of skiing!  The list of Obvious Clues can be used as a handy checklist of some of the things to watch out for and evaluate. Simply adding the points and making the go/no-go decision on the sum is absurd, and will likely kill you in few seasons.

The controversy has raged since 2006...

• The authors repeatedly refused access to their data for independent verification of their claims

• ISSW 2006, Dr. McCammon says "... this is an experiment. This is an experiment with people's lives..." The video of his lecture was available at http://www.avalanche-research.com/site/search.asp?Title=avaluator, but appears to have been recently disabled. Short clip from the video is here: ExperimentWithPeoplesLivesIssw2006McCammon.avi
  

• Independent analysis of the same accident set revealed that the Avaluator claims are grossly inflated.

• To get the incredible accident prevention ratios (77% at 4 Clues), the authors deleted 82% of the dataset! If the whole dataset is used, the accident prevention ratio is closer to 4%.
  

• Based on the critique the CAA commisioned "independent" report by Dr. Floyer, who concluded the accident prevention values are indeed inflated, and recommended removal of the accident prevention values.

• Since the Avaluator was first published, the number of avalanche related deaths in Canada is rising!

• The Floyer Report nothwistanding, Avaluator was printed again in 2009, this time with a disclaimer.

• The experiment on human subjects thus continues. The Avaluator users have no clue they are the guinea pigs in this experiment though. They are led to believe that if they restrict their travel to 4 or less Obvious Clues, they will prevent 77% of historical accidents (in reality, they might prevent about 4%).

If you believe experiments on humans are unethical without participants full informed consent, write to Honourable Minister Jim Prentice, prentice.j@parl.gc.ca (MP for Calgary Centre-North) or your  MP! Lot more avalanche death prevention could be done with million bucks, for example hiring more forecasters and making the forecast areas smaller...

 All papers and links to other pertinent information can be found at http://www.docbob.ca and http://www.avadata.ca