Quote:
Originally Posted by pwalker8
No, I am talking the Data Guy, who the source of much of the initial quote.
Shatzkin is a consultant who has been bouncing around for years. He is famous for predicting that Libraries are a thing of the past back in 2011, so its not exactly like his every pronouncement is the word of God. Consultants get ahead by sucking up to their audience and saying provocative stuff, otherwise no one would write about them. If he's reduced to quoting from the Data Guy, then odds are pretty good he doesn't have the inside scoop on what the real numbers are. Garbage in, garbage out.
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The use of scrapers is hardly magic. The data obtained is not a guess. The use of mathematical and statistical techniques to analyse that data is not black magic. The resulting "estimate based on various assumptions and formula", as you put it, is not mere guesswork. If Data Guy is in fact anti big publishing how has it affected his work? The methodology is public and open to criticism. In fact, Data Guy has proved very responsive to valid and constructive criticism. His figures are not perfect, but they are clearly close enough to it to give meaningful results and for businesses to pay for those results. And the trends reported certainly seem to have proved accurate.