AOL dataset fallout
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Interesting consequence[^] of AOL's release of search data:
So the CIO downloaded that giant dataset of raw search data, sorted by user id, that recently escaped from aol. He searched through it for all keywords relevant to our new product, and collated the results. They show pretty conclusively that there is absolutely no interest for the problem domain in our new product (under development for 1 yr) ... So, the project I am overseeing has been cancelled and I've been told to select one or two employees to keep and the rest will be laid off on Friday.
A year's worth of work dumped because of it. Bizarre :omg: :wtf: The poor guy also had to lie to one of his devs who saw him starting to clear out his desk :rolleyes:
0 bottles of beer on the wall, 0 bottles of beer, you take 1 down, pass it around, 4294967295 bottles of beer on the wall. Awasu 2.2.3 [^]: A free RSS/Atom feed reader with support for Code Project.
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Interesting consequence[^] of AOL's release of search data:
So the CIO downloaded that giant dataset of raw search data, sorted by user id, that recently escaped from aol. He searched through it for all keywords relevant to our new product, and collated the results. They show pretty conclusively that there is absolutely no interest for the problem domain in our new product (under development for 1 yr) ... So, the project I am overseeing has been cancelled and I've been told to select one or two employees to keep and the rest will be laid off on Friday.
A year's worth of work dumped because of it. Bizarre :omg: :wtf: The poor guy also had to lie to one of his devs who saw him starting to clear out his desk :rolleyes:
0 bottles of beer on the wall, 0 bottles of beer, you take 1 down, pass it around, 4294967295 bottles of beer on the wall. Awasu 2.2.3 [^]: A free RSS/Atom feed reader with support for Code Project.
Sounds like the kind of company you probably don't want to be working for anyway...
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Interesting consequence[^] of AOL's release of search data:
So the CIO downloaded that giant dataset of raw search data, sorted by user id, that recently escaped from aol. He searched through it for all keywords relevant to our new product, and collated the results. They show pretty conclusively that there is absolutely no interest for the problem domain in our new product (under development for 1 yr) ... So, the project I am overseeing has been cancelled and I've been told to select one or two employees to keep and the rest will be laid off on Friday.
A year's worth of work dumped because of it. Bizarre :omg: :wtf: The poor guy also had to lie to one of his devs who saw him starting to clear out his desk :rolleyes:
0 bottles of beer on the wall, 0 bottles of beer, you take 1 down, pass it around, 4294967295 bottles of beer on the wall. Awasu 2.2.3 [^]: A free RSS/Atom feed reader with support for Code Project.
Lessee here... Searching the dataset for
C#yields no results, and 6 hits forarchitecture. I guess that means that there is no future for software architecture with C# either, right? Someone needs to take that CIO for his/her yearly ass-kicking-for-acting-stupid for making such a sweeping decision based on such a relatively small amount of data. Not to mention that we are talking about AOL users here, too, which generally not considered to be the most technically savvy group of users...! :) I have to wonder what qualifications are required to be a CIO these days... Knowing how to boot a machine and do a Google search? Peace!-=- James
If you think it costs a lot to do it right, just wait until you find out how much it costs to do it wrong!
Avoid driving a vehicle taller than you and remember that Professional Driver on Closed Course does not mean your Dumb Ass on a Public Road!
DeleteFXPFiles & CheckFavorites (Please rate this post!) -
Lessee here... Searching the dataset for
C#yields no results, and 6 hits forarchitecture. I guess that means that there is no future for software architecture with C# either, right? Someone needs to take that CIO for his/her yearly ass-kicking-for-acting-stupid for making such a sweeping decision based on such a relatively small amount of data. Not to mention that we are talking about AOL users here, too, which generally not considered to be the most technically savvy group of users...! :) I have to wonder what qualifications are required to be a CIO these days... Knowing how to boot a machine and do a Google search? Peace!-=- James
If you think it costs a lot to do it right, just wait until you find out how much it costs to do it wrong!
Avoid driving a vehicle taller than you and remember that Professional Driver on Closed Course does not mean your Dumb Ass on a Public Road!
DeleteFXPFiles & CheckFavorites (Please rate this post!)The secretary boots tha machine for them.
A man said to the universe: "Sir I exist!" "However," replied the Universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation." -- Stephen Crane
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Lessee here... Searching the dataset for
C#yields no results, and 6 hits forarchitecture. I guess that means that there is no future for software architecture with C# either, right? Someone needs to take that CIO for his/her yearly ass-kicking-for-acting-stupid for making such a sweeping decision based on such a relatively small amount of data. Not to mention that we are talking about AOL users here, too, which generally not considered to be the most technically savvy group of users...! :) I have to wonder what qualifications are required to be a CIO these days... Knowing how to boot a machine and do a Google search? Peace!-=- James
If you think it costs a lot to do it right, just wait until you find out how much it costs to do it wrong!
Avoid driving a vehicle taller than you and remember that Professional Driver on Closed Course does not mean your Dumb Ass on a Public Road!
DeleteFXPFiles & CheckFavorites (Please rate this post!)The thread reveals that: - it was a mass market product (for Walmart/CostCo shelves) - It seems like the CxO used the data to rationalizate a round of cuting costs
We are a big screwed up dysfunctional psychotic happy family - some more screwed up, others more happy, but everybody's psychotic joint venture definition of CP
Tree in C# || Fold With Us! || sighist -
Lessee here... Searching the dataset for
C#yields no results, and 6 hits forarchitecture. I guess that means that there is no future for software architecture with C# either, right? Someone needs to take that CIO for his/her yearly ass-kicking-for-acting-stupid for making such a sweeping decision based on such a relatively small amount of data. Not to mention that we are talking about AOL users here, too, which generally not considered to be the most technically savvy group of users...! :) I have to wonder what qualifications are required to be a CIO these days... Knowing how to boot a machine and do a Google search? Peace!-=- James
If you think it costs a lot to do it right, just wait until you find out how much it costs to do it wrong!
Avoid driving a vehicle taller than you and remember that Professional Driver on Closed Course does not mean your Dumb Ass on a Public Road!
DeleteFXPFiles & CheckFavorites (Please rate this post!)As the developer made very clear, this was a consumer product aimed at the exact same demographic as the AOL user base. He also made clear that he really wanted to prove the CIO wrong, but couldn't do so no matter how wide he made the searches. I've been there, done that more than once. Years ago I worked for a place that hired a big shot marketing firm to do a study of their projected demographic. The report cost tens of thousands of dollars. Many of use were quite skeptical of it at the time. We have since been proved right--every last bit of research that company did was dead wrong (the market segment not only failed to mature, it's completely collapsed since then--this isn't merely hindsight, many of us saw this coming.) A better parallel would be if you got the full search history on Code Project. While you couldn't predict which products aimed at that demographic would be successful, you could sure as hell predict which wouldn't.
Anyone who thinks he has a better idea of what's good for people than people do is a swine. - P.J. O'Rourke