HarmoKnight wrote:

I predict waltz thinks people like patcher are right?

LZBirdboi wrote:

problem on the internet is how users don't fully read posts and only complain about tidbits.

LZBirdboi wrote:

HarmoKnight wrote:

I predict waltz thinks people like patcher are right?

He doesn't think Pachter is necessarily right, but how fans continue to say he's wrong despite not actually knowing if his predictions will ever come true or not. A rampant problem on the internet is how users don't fully read posts and only complain about tidbits.

the_shpydar wrote:

Re: The nature of predictions.
Schrödinger's cat.
That is all.

skywake wrote:

LZBirdboi wrote:

You can't really call predictions wrong because you don't truly know if they will happen or not.

No but they can certainly be wrong. It's like those crazies predicting that the world will end on Dec 21st because of some planet that NASA is keeping secret for whatever reason is going to crash into Earth. You can't prove they're wrong till after the day but you can say it's a load of bull and list the reasons why you think that.

If Pachter wants to make the prediction that Nintendo will fail with the Wii U because people don't want to play CoD on it then fine. The stats however suggest that a fair chunk of Wii U owners do want to play it though. The stats suggest that people buying the Wii are getting 2.85 games so therefore the average Wii U user got something other than NintendoLand and New SMB U. This isn't proof he's wrong in the long term... but it isn't what you'd expect of a console that's doomed and will never attract a "core audience".

HarmoKnight wrote:

I predict waltz thinks people like patcher are right?

the_shpydar wrote:

Re: The nature of predictions.
Schrödinger's cat.
That is all.

V8_Ninja wrote:

Oh, hey! Michael Pachter is making more predictions! How horribly will they backfire this time? I'm betting a solid $100!

WhiteKnight wrote:

skywake wrote:

LZBirdboi wrote:

You can't really call predictions wrong because you don't truly know if they will happen or not.

No but they can certainly be wrong. It's like those crazies predicting that the world will end on Dec 21st because of some planet that NASA is keeping secret for whatever reason is going to crash into Earth. You can't prove they're wrong till after the day but you can say it's a load of bull and list the reasons why you think that.

If Pachter wants to make the prediction that Nintendo will fail with the Wii U because people don't want to play CoD on it then fine. The stats however suggest that a fair chunk of Wii U owners do want to play it though. The stats suggest that people buying the Wii are getting 2.85 games so therefore the average Wii U user got something other than NintendoLand and New SMB U. This isn't proof he's wrong in the long term... but it isn't what you'd expect of a console that's doomed and will never attract a "core audience".

The problem is that you're assuming that being proven right in the future is Pachter's job.

It's not.

Pachter's job is to explain to his clients what is likely to happen, and therefore what they should do with their investments. He bases this on data that none of us have access to, coupled with readily observable trends in the market.

Sometimes (or often, depending on the market) what is likely to happen doesn't happen. That in no way devalues the information that Pachter had previously supplied to his clients.

tl;dr: An analyst's job is not to be right. It's to do the incredibly expensive research that the clients can't afford to do for themselves and give an idea of whether they should get their money the hell out of the market or not.

The_Fox wrote:

Now look. Patcher has gone and made Mario cry. I hope he's proud of himself.

ShadJV wrote:

WhiteKnight wrote:

skywake wrote:

LZBirdboi wrote:

You can't really call predictions wrong because you don't truly know if they will happen or not.

No but they can certainly be wrong. It's like those crazies predicting that the world will end on Dec 21st because of some planet that NASA is keeping secret for whatever reason is going to crash into Earth. You can't prove they're wrong till after the day but you can say it's a load of bull and list the reasons why you think that.

If Pachter wants to make the prediction that Nintendo will fail with the Wii U because people don't want to play CoD on it then fine. The stats however suggest that a fair chunk of Wii U owners do want to play it though. The stats suggest that people buying the Wii are getting 2.85 games so therefore the average Wii U user got something other than NintendoLand and New SMB U. This isn't proof he's wrong in the long term... but it isn't what you'd expect of a console that's doomed and will never attract a "core audience".

The problem is that you're assuming that being proven right in the future is Pachter's job.

It's not.

Pachter's job is to explain to his clients what is likely to happen, and therefore what they should do with their investments. He bases this on data that none of us have access to, coupled with readily observable trends in the market.

Sometimes (or often, depending on the market) what is likely to happen doesn't happen. That in no way devalues the information that Pachter had previously supplied to his clients.

tl;dr: An analyst's job is not to be right. It's to do the incredibly expensive research that the clients can't afford to do for themselves and give an idea of whether they should get their money the hell out of the market or not.

I think anyone entering this discussion on a serious note should read that last sentence.

If they're posting to make fun of him, I think that's excusable because he has no place speaking to the public like this especially with how he ends up wording things. But if they are being serious, that's a very key point, and why I admitted what I have wrong with him is nothing to do with how good he is at his job because he sees information I can't see, I can't know how good he is at his job, I just can know how poor he is at communication with the public. He could be the best analyst in the world for all I know, and it's for that very reason. His job ISN'T to be right and so to his clients, whether he's been right in the past is almost entirely irrelevant (though I do think if he's never been right that'd be cause for alarm but I am certain he's steered his clients right at least sometimes or he wouldn't still have a job). Like you said (in different wording), he isn't being paid to tell his clients what will happen, he is being paid to tell them what's LIKELY to happen.

The world isn't based off of cold statistics and these "predictions" are just irrelevant outside of his work. Outside of his work, there are designers like Miyamoto who have an intuition for the industry and enough money to take a few risks. Inside of his work, things like intuition and risks hold no value and in fact may be considered negative things. It all comes down to he simply shouldn't be communicating these "predictions" to the public, especially the way he words it.

The_Fox wrote:

Now look. Patcher has gone and made Mario cry. I hope he's proud of himself.