The_root_of_all_evil said:
Baresark said:
It is possible that the overall trend has nothing to do with Brian Farrell, therefore they do not lose anything by keeping him on, especially since he has decided to redirect the company. If they fired him and got a new guy, they would be paying someone at least what Brian Farrell was making and they would be just as likely or unlikely to regress upwards.
Possible isn't a likely outcome.
You have stated it's impossible for them to create a 1000% rise.
That would raise their stock to $7.
You stated the mean of the stock would be $18.
That means you are directly stating it would be impossible for Brian Farrell, or anyone, to raise the stock to 40% of it's mean value. The lower 20% of it's deviation.
That is why I am questioning your mathematics.
This is getting nowhere fast. I never said it was impossible for the stock to rise 1000%. You are twisting my words. I simply said that there is not plan that you can say will definitely raise the stock 1000%. It's because foresight is not possible to any degree near absolute certainty because we do not live in a predetermined world. I didn't speak as if anything was a likely outcome at all. I could direct you to the original comments on this debate where you said Brian Farrell should be fired and I disagreed.
Any meteorologist can look at the weather the last 5 days and tell you exactly why things happened the way they did. But when they speculate towards the future, the failure rate is somewhat legendary (as the common joke implies(it's not really but people remember the failures because they are more extraordinary than the times they were right)).
Your analogies are very pretty, but if a meteorologist made a 5000% loss on the isobars, well...
Yeah, that didn't go down well.
Your words are needlessly condescending. You actually proved my point beautifully. I said meteorologist have a known record of being wrong and you proved that. They are wrong because they, like anyone else, do not have foresight to a degree necessary to see all the patterns and how it will all happen. I only put my double parentheses in there to show that people have a tendency to remember the odd things, and forget that a part of the time they are correct for some areas (not all of course). You see, you also proved to me that I was right when I said that. Why? Because you picked out a time when they had it wrong. Why did they have it wrong? Because they don't actually have the super power of 100% accurate foresight (like all of us).
I think you and I have a different idea of what hindsight is.
Indeed.
noun
recognition of the realities, possibilities, or requirements of a situation, event, decision etc., after its occurrence.
You don't seem to be recognising anything. Including a 5000% drop in share prices that's the direct responsibility of the CEO.
Well, I see you are every bit as talented a "googler" as myself. You have put the dictionary definition of the word down, but then you said this: "Hindsight would be saying I can stop the reversal that's already happened" (in the interest of fewer quotes I just quoted you the old fashioned way). Which is the wrong idea of what hindsight is. You can see exactly why things happened the way they did, but you seemed to imply that meant trying to change what had already happened, which I'm sure I don't need to point out the impossibilities of that to you.
You also seem to get quite a kick out trying to say that I am not seeing the whole picture. But I am. I know he failed the company. But you don't seem to remember that he was the CEO of the company for 12 very successful years prior to the last 5. I never said he didn't make mistakes, as a matter of fact I pointed out some of his mistakes. But your awesomely accurate hindsight tells you he is a hack because of the last 5 years and the first 12 years were mere luck only (totally possible, but that would mean he also had some skill too).
I'm simply speculating that Brian Farrell is just as good as any potential candidate to prevent THQ from being delisted. Why? Because there is a greater likely hood that tomorrow the stock will regress towards the means.
OK. Can you provide ANY evidence for that, or your definition of the mean, because all you seem to be doing is trying to pull a fast one. For a start you're talking about an index that has a fixed assymptote at 0, so standard deviation cannot work. For another thing, you're taking a mean based on only recent activity, ignoring past work, market forces and resource acquisition. And finally, you're applying a binomial distribution to a growth point.
That's statistically BS.
I'm literally doing none of those things. It doesn't matter what the index is based on. Why? Because we are not talking about the entirety of the NASDAQ, we are talking about THQ and their personal record of growth and recession. I'm simply stating the statistical fact worked out by Francis Galton and a group of mathematicians. He specifically stated it as "Regression towards mediocrity", now known as regression towards the means. We are talking about the means of the stock value of THQ and how it will land somewhere in the area of $18. Unfortunately, this is not definitive because it's hard to find stock records prior to 2002. The only way to be 100% sure would be to look at the stock records since he was CEO. I can safely say that me was responsible for the rise of the stock from $17.70 (February 6, 2002) to $36.76 (April 13, 2007). I can also say he is responsible for the stock going from $36.76 (previously dated amount) to .53c it closed at this very day. The way I see it, that is more years of growth than decline. But I'm using some weird math that only exists in my own little universe when counting years I suppose. But, I digress. If we take $18 as the mean (with the records I can find it would actually be higher than that, so we will safely say that 1/2 of $36 is $18 (more weird math, I know). The rules state that you are going to have a greater likelihood of moving back towards the means. And the more extreme it gets away from the means, the more likely it is to regress towards mediocrity.
I'm speculating this is a good idea for the business.
But that's all your doing. You're speculating based on an optimistic appraisal of a man you have no idea on, whose track record is of crashing something into the ground, while being dragged across the mud by a former employee.
Just as your basing your speculation on a mere 4 years of an otherwise successful career. You simply love to forget about the first very successful 12 years of his career. You should read
The Drunkards Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives by Leonard Mlodinow (A physicist which is a highly mathematical field of study). It would show you just how random it all really is. And there is a direct example in there talking about company CEO's directly(and record company CEO's and movie studio CEO's and coaches of professional sports teams, etc). I digress again. So, because so much of it is random, we then only play the odds. And in this case, the odds favor a regression towards the means, only the thing we still do not know is the time frame. Give the opportunity it would regress towards the means, but if the company goes under before then, then we have run out of time. Remember, we are dealing with probability here, so just because there is a percentage, that doesn't mean it will go that way. Even if that percentage is 99.9%. Why? Because probability relies on large pools of data.
Not to mention a CEO change is a ridiculously stressful time for a company and replacing Brian Farrell at this point would not prevent the company from being delisted.
Rubbish. We've swapped CEOs quite a few times. Usually to get rid of the money-grabbing idiots.
I guess we should all be grateful your company was not on the verge of potential financial ruin when it happened. It's not the solitary stress of the CEO change, it's the addition of the CEO change on top of the already gargantuan stressors.
My foresight tells me that Brian Farrell is probably the only hope the company has.
That doesn't even make sense. If you mean "your analysis of statistical growth", provide evidence. If you mean "your blind optimism", state that. If you mean, as the definition states, "the act or power of foreseeing; prevision; prescience" , then sign yourself up as Sally Morgan's lawyer.
No, I stated it correctly. My foresight, which cannot be accurate anywhere near 100% (just like your foresight that he should be fired or the company face ruin which cannot be anywhere near 100%). I am speculating, just as you are speculating. I'm simply speculating based on his entire career, where you're speculating on the last 4 years of his career.
Also, I had used the figure .79c yesterday because of what the company closed on yesterday. Regrettably it opened at a paltry .56c and closed today at a whopping .53c.
Because there is a greater likely hood that tomorrow the stock will regress towards the means.
It's not. It's going down. WAY down.
It will definitely fluctuate. And I don't think it will go way down, it's already way down. If it goes way down there will be a net loss of one decent publisher/developer to the industry. It may go down though, as I explained, it's all about the time frame at this point and applying a probability that comes from a large portion of data and is applied to a very small portion of time.
TL;DR -
means regression is only dependent on a the mean activity a person or company does.
Neither are being measured.
False. To say the activity of the companies stock is not be measured is just plain wrong. The stock of the company is being measured, which is being used to measure the worth of the man to the company. They board of directors (who know a lot more about what is going on than either you or I) seem to think he is worth giving another chance to. I just don't see a problem with their choice. You seem to think you know better than they do.
To say there is not a likelihood of increase or decrease at this point is just not true.
Wasn't said.
You got me there, my mind must have wandered at some point.
Also, you almost have it right: success is based on skill and mostly luck.
It also requires work. That hasn't been happening.
Skill doesn't develop without work, so work is implied. And it has been happening. Perhaps you didn't read about "THQ's $100Million Mistake". Lots of work has been happening, just not beneficial work. As I have previously stated, we all know he has made mistakes in the last 5 or so years of his career. No one is disputing mistakes have been made.
A psychologist, not an economist. Or a business man.
If you did some investigating besides the random Google search, you would see that he won his Nobel Prize because of his work on intuitive statistics and what came of that. He used actual statistics in his data to show the errors that are made following the logic of intuitive statistics. He also used it to show how accurate intuitive statistics can be in a given situation. Also, the gentleman he worked directly with in his research was named Amos Tversky, who was a mathematical and cognitive psychologist. His name is mostly bereft of references in Kahneman's work because Kahneman received a Nobel Prize for after Amos Tversky's death.
Likelihood of deviation is just mathematical fact.
Deviation downwards within a Depression is a significant force. Deviation upwards while keeping the same structure that cause the downwards depression is a significant force against. There are no significant forces upwards.
That is true. The force of a depression is a major stressor on any business. But, since some businesses are still highly profitable, I can only take that as it is a force capable of being overcome with intelligent business sense and a healthy understanding of the business cycle. There is of course a significant force upwards that you just want to ignore. The proposed idea of the new direction of THQ could be a significant for upwards. But only time will tell if it is or not. Once again, we can only speculate in our speculative ways.
Regression towards the means states that deviation is most likely to be towards the mean and less likely to be away from the mean.
Regression only takes place when in a set bi/tri/polynomial outcomes. This isn't one of them. Were it one of them, there would be no difference in firing or keeping Brian, as the trend would still be towards the mean.
The problem you have is that you have not defined the deviation, or the mean, or the specific curve it travels.
You are wrong on all accounts. The means I have defined is $18. And I don't need to define the deviation because Francis Galton defined the deviation for everyone who will ever use this concept. If the deviation if less or more than 1 (1 representing the mean value of $18(in this case)) Then there is a greater likelihood of regressing towards the mean (or 1 if you will). The greater deviation from 1 there is, the more probably it becomes that it will regress towards the means. But, we are talking about probability, not plausibility in this case. Which is more than likely a term you (like many other people) employ as a stand in for the term probability. You simply feel it is more plausible Brian is a mistake, I feel it is more plausible that he is not a mistake to keep around. The difference is that regression towards the mean is simply working in my favor. But, that is still not a definitive movement towards what I'm saying will happen at this point. But absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
The only thing that is completely uncertain is the time frame.
The one thing that's certain is the time frame. It's when the share prices can no longer support the company.
Let's just say you're right though. This is a purely polynomial path that depends entirely on the cohesion of the company. The Standard Deviation points are at 0 and the high point of $35, giving a mean of $18 per share.
What effect would the loss of 240 people do to this cohesion, when you're unprepared to lose 1?
What you have stated is not a definitive time frame or stop date. You have stated a definitive situation, which is not nearly the same thing.
You are asking me to speculate further, which is what got us here. I have told you what my speculation is based on
ad nauseum .
I have done my best to explain my stand point and provided you information on how exactly I have arrived at my conclusion. I did not state my conclusion as definitive, I have only tried to point out that your definitive statement is false up until it is proven true or false(as is mine(almost our very own Schrodinger's Cat)). I have enjoyed this back and forth but I have no interest in pursuing this simply because I have seen this more than enough times on the Mises.org forums. It can only degrade further to quoting single sentences and trying to dispute them. And then there will be big fights over semantics and it just gets uglier and uglier. Some of that has already started. I respect your standpoint and I look forward to seeing who is right. I hope I'm right because I enjoy a great number of their games (and to a significantly lesser degree because who doesn't enjoy being right). And if I'm wrong, I'm the first guy to say I'm wrong.
