Both may be true at the same time: “being good may correlate with being popular” and “the more you read the more likely your favorite book is obscure” The math

Both may be true at the same time: “being good may correlate with being popular” and “the more you read the more likely your favorite book is obscure” The math is the same as hot/crazy/marry plots: draw popularity vs. goodness (random correlated dots: more popular more goodness). Define which books may be favorite e.g., above G line goodness a book has a chance to become favorite, define threshold for obscurity e.g., less than P popularity level. Consider what happens to the number of obscure books the more you read the more of them can become popular. If you model it with a single threshold then the math is the same as for «the better at programming competitions the worse at “some other metric for coders” among google hires» (imagine you sum two metrics and hire only those who have the sum above a threshold -> you get the positive traits in reverse relationship).