4 ms·

Since people don't typically act irrationally, why not assume that if they're still doing it, it's because it's working by some metric that they're measuring?

• jamesbritt 15y ago
  Since people don't typically act irrationally, ... No? I see it all the time. Not with everything, but at least a few things, especially when something is near and dear to the heart. People often believe the things they really want to be true, and rational calculation doesn't figure into it. Not to say that the Earbits wave is or is not based on some measured plan, just that repetition of behavior is no indication that someone has made a rational judgement. In any event, the user 'earbitscom' is clearly interested in one thing: http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=earbitscom http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=earbitscom
  • ericflo 15y ago
    Sorry, I should have specified that I was using the word rational in this way: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_choice_theory http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_choice_theory namely, "that an individual acts as if balancing costs against benefits to arrive at action that maximizes personal advantage"
    • jamesbritt 15y ago
      Right. I'm rejecting that claim. Quite often people do things that clearly do not fit rational choice theory.
      • earbitscom 15y ago
        Okay, let's just stop the speculation. My team is focused on all kinds of marketing. We were just written up in TheNextWeb, were just interviewed by Earwolff, were on Eye On Business in Orange County, have closed two very large marketing partnerships scheduled to launch soon, as well as are launching some great contests designed to draw eyeballs. We've written 29 blog posts in May, 65-75% of them are album reviews, recaps of the week's new music releases and information about festivals and concerts. The other 25 are either about startups, music industry chat, or both. Has it proven beneficial to us to write about our startup experience and post to HN? Yes, it has. And based on the number of votes our posts have received, people find the information valuable. We'll try not to make it so frequent that it's annoying, but the content is relevant for this forum and it has driven some great, very feedback-oriented tech people to our website, which is important for not only early adopter traffic but also getting smart people to tell us what they think of our product. In other words, it's not the core of our marketing plan, but it's not an accident and we'll try not to abuse it. Thanks.