5 ms·

>I've been dipping my toes into the JS ecosystem, and I keep bumping into the fact that using mentally cheap signals of quality (such as stars or DL counts) alm

by rvrs 2y ago

>I've been dipping my toes into the JS ecosystem, and I keep bumping into the fact that using mentally cheap signals of quality (such as stars or DL counts) almost never indicates the quality of the thing itself. Winners seem to be randomly chosen, almost! The only way to assess is to read the code and try integrating it in. I wish morep people understood the "Kardashian effect" as I like to call it -- the most popular thing is only most popular because it was already popular. I think in almost everything in my life and in every domain, #2 or #3 is better-suited (for my preferences and needs). A year or two ago on HN I read a short blog post about omitting the word "best" from internet searches and being more specific in your criteria (e.g. "car with best resale value" instead of "best car"), and it has made my life and way of thinking a lot better

chias 2y ago
> I think in almost everything in my life and in every domain, #2 or #3 is better-suited (for my preferences and needs). Depending on the domain, there's a good chance #1 may also be a sponsored result.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
Aurornis 2y ago
> I think in almost everything in my life and in every domain, #2 or #3 is better-suited (for my preferences and needs). I like to explore alternatives to the most popular choice, but more often than not I end up back at the #1 consensus choice. I have some friends who simply must pick the #2 or #3 choice in every domain. They always have an elaborate justification for why it’s better. From my point of view it seems driven by contrarianism. Some times they pick some interesting alternatives that I explore. Most of the time they end up with also-ran purchases that die off. I joke that my one friend is the best predictor of impending product line cancellation that I know. He used a Zune when everyone went iPod. He went Windows Phone when iPhone and Android were front runners. He event eschewed Instagram for some other platform that he was sure was going to win the social media wars, but was actually so unnoteworthy that I can’t even remember the name right now.
- webmaven 2y ago
  See also "Harbingers of Failure": https://news.mit.edu/2015/harbinger-failure-consumers-unpopular-products-1223 https://news.mit.edu/2015/harbinger-failure-consumers-unpopu...
- karmakaze 2y ago
  I might be one of these people. I don't have to pick #2 or #3, but I will give them a thorough reviewing as I will critically for #1. Sometimes I just want something different for the sake of it, but I want it to at least do the job reasonably well. Something about a fork in the road and taking the one less travelled by... Since that can often mean extra effort/support, I won't recommend such things to others. I'll try to pick something that will be the least trouble for them.
- ptmcc 2y ago
  Fascinating observation, and now that you point it out I know several people like this. It's like they are pathologically contrarian consumers. Then they often complain about the suboptimal situations they get themselves into. Not to say that every #1 popular item is always the best, but definitely a lot more than never.
- PittleyDunkin 2y ago
  > I like to explore alternatives to the most popular choice, but more often than not I end up back at the #1 consensus choice. Popularity is only a decent proxy for consensus if people actually look at the other options. I've been burned by trusting this metric more times than I can count.
- thechao 2y ago
  My life, growing up, was: lockblox (v legos), construx (v meccano), vectrex (v nintendo), macintosh (in 1985!), etc. My dad is epically contrarian.
  - bloopernova 2y ago
    Oh lord. My father also always seemed to pick gifts that appealed more to him and his impulsivity. I got the vectrex too, and an Atari STM I think, it wasn't quite the same as an Atari STFM. When I wanted to learn piano/keyboard, he bought me a frickin keytar, a Yamaha SHS-10, instead of lessons or a simple full size like I asked for. Instead of a gift certificate to get some clothes, he got me a gimmicky Canon SLR that ate batteries and that I couldn't afford to develop the film. He was a very strange person. Sometimes incredibly funny and generous, other times hateful and selfish. Edited to add: sorry for the trauma dump. I have no idea what point, if any, that I was originally trying to make.
dehrmann 2y ago
> "Kardashian effect" as I like to call it Alternatively, the Mickey Mouse effect.
ashoeafoot 2y ago
The stars is the issues solved to issues open ratio.
fhe 2y ago
I have friends who routinely go for #2 or #3 (occasionally even further down). The typical justification they gave is that one's paying a lot of price premium/marketing cost for #1, whereas with #2/3 one gets comparable or slightly worse quality for a lot cheaper.
IgorPartola 2y ago
This really depends. Some examples where the number one choice is IMO justified: - ZFS. There are other filesystems that provide checksumming, CoW, etc. but ZFS is a proven solution in this space. I am happy work on BRTFS and bcache continues but they are not yet there. - Debian. There are distros that do things better and differently but nobody has quite as smooth an experience, hardware support, security, and software availability all in one package. Alternatives are really good so it really says something about Debian that it is as popular as it is. - ssh. There are some alternatives but when was the last time you heard an argument made in their favor? I could go on but hopefully I’ve made my point. Sometimes the standard choice is the right now. And yes I know me picking Debian as a good distro can start a flame war :)
int_19h 2y ago
Part of the problem, though, is that winners of the popularity contest get more support from the rest of the ecosystem, which doesn't take that long to turn into a moat.

by rvrs 2y ago

chias 2y ago

> I think in almost everything in my life and in every domain, #2 or #3 is better-suited (for my preferences and needs). Depending on the domain, there's a good chance #1 may also be a sponsored result.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

Aurornis 2y ago

> I think in almost everything in my life and in every domain, #2 or #3 is better-suited (for my preferences and needs). I like to explore alternatives to the most popular choice, but more often than not I end up back at the #1 consensus choice. I have some friends who simply must pick the #2 or #3 choice in every domain. They always have an elaborate justification for why it’s better. From my point of view it seems driven by contrarianism. Some times they pick some interesting alternatives that I explore. Most of the time they end up with also-ran purchases that die off. I joke that my one friend is the best predictor of impending product line cancellation that I know. He used a Zune when everyone went iPod. He went Windows Phone when iPhone and Android were front runners. He event eschewed Instagram for some other platform that he was sure was going to win the social media wars, but was actually so unnoteworthy that I can’t even remember the name right now.

webmaven 2y ago
See also "Harbingers of Failure": https://news.mit.edu/2015/harbinger-failure-consumers-unpopular-products-1223 https://news.mit.edu/2015/harbinger-failure-consumers-unpopu...
karmakaze 2y ago
I might be one of these people. I don't have to pick #2 or #3, but I will give them a thorough reviewing as I will critically for #1. Sometimes I just want something different for the sake of it, but I want it to at least do the job reasonably well. Something about a fork in the road and taking the one less travelled by... Since that can often mean extra effort/support, I won't recommend such things to others. I'll try to pick something that will be the least trouble for them.
ptmcc 2y ago
Fascinating observation, and now that you point it out I know several people like this. It's like they are pathologically contrarian consumers. Then they often complain about the suboptimal situations they get themselves into. Not to say that every #1 popular item is always the best, but definitely a lot more than never.
PittleyDunkin 2y ago
> I like to explore alternatives to the most popular choice, but more often than not I end up back at the #1 consensus choice. Popularity is only a decent proxy for consensus if people actually look at the other options. I've been burned by trusting this metric more times than I can count.
thechao 2y ago
My life, growing up, was: lockblox (v legos), construx (v meccano), vectrex (v nintendo), macintosh (in 1985!), etc. My dad is epically contrarian.
- bloopernova 2y ago
  Oh lord. My father also always seemed to pick gifts that appealed more to him and his impulsivity. I got the vectrex too, and an Atari STM I think, it wasn't quite the same as an Atari STFM. When I wanted to learn piano/keyboard, he bought me a frickin keytar, a Yamaha SHS-10, instead of lessons or a simple full size like I asked for. Instead of a gift certificate to get some clothes, he got me a gimmicky Canon SLR that ate batteries and that I couldn't afford to develop the film. He was a very strange person. Sometimes incredibly funny and generous, other times hateful and selfish. Edited to add: sorry for the trauma dump. I have no idea what point, if any, that I was originally trying to make.

dehrmann 2y ago

> "Kardashian effect" as I like to call it Alternatively, the Mickey Mouse effect.

ashoeafoot 2y ago

The stars is the issues solved to issues open ratio.

fhe 2y ago

I have friends who routinely go for #2 or #3 (occasionally even further down). The typical justification they gave is that one's paying a lot of price premium/marketing cost for #1, whereas with #2/3 one gets comparable or slightly worse quality for a lot cheaper.

IgorPartola 2y ago

This really depends. Some examples where the number one choice is IMO justified: - ZFS. There are other filesystems that provide checksumming, CoW, etc. but ZFS is a proven solution in this space. I am happy work on BRTFS and bcache continues but they are not yet there. - Debian. There are distros that do things better and differently but nobody has quite as smooth an experience, hardware support, security, and software availability all in one package. Alternatives are really good so it really says something about Debian that it is as popular as it is. - ssh. There are some alternatives but when was the last time you heard an argument made in their favor? I could go on but hopefully I’ve made my point. Sometimes the standard choice is the right now. And yes I know me picking Debian as a good distro can start a flame war :)

int_19h 2y ago

Part of the problem, though, is that winners of the popularity contest get more support from the rest of the ecosystem, which doesn't take that long to turn into a moat.