[xp84]

“Metrics”

This reminds me of a past job working for an e-commerce company. This wasn’t a store like Amazon that “everyone” uses weekly, it was a specific pricey fashion brand. They had put out a shitty iOS app, which was just a very bare-bones wrapper around the website. But they raved about how much better the conversion rate rates were there. Nobody would listen to me about how the customers that bother downloading a specific app for shopping at a particular retailer are obviously just superfans so of course that self-selected group converts well.

So many people who should be smart based on their job titles and salaries, got the causation completely backwards!

[zephen]

This stupidity might go a long way towards explaining the relentless push towards apps.

[drBonkers]

Hey, I notice this kind of thing all the time. People use "data" to tell the story they want to -- similar to how it seems humans make a decision subconsciously then weave a rational decision to back it up afterwards.

Do you have principles on how to tackle this? I feel stuck between the irrationality of anecdata and the irrationality of lying with numbers. As if the only useful statistic is one I collect and calculate myself. And, even then, I could be lying to myself.

[mmarian]

Review the methodology, if you can, and form your own conclusions. Don't bother trying to change people's minds. It rarely works, and often causes conflict, even in the case of people who say they're data-driven.

[gridder]

Survivorship bias