Filtered dossier

Hidden Numbers

Quantities that hide a rule you never agreed to.

  • 12 / 12
  • No visual on file
    Market Signals Entry #0408

    The reason a long queue is an advertisement

    An advertisement is a claim by the seller. A queue is a demonstration by people with nothing to gain from making it, which is why it is read differently.

    Adept
    The hidden part #0408

    Credibility depends on who pays for the message. A queue is unpaid testimony about arrivals, not a report on the meal.

    Open file
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    Market Signals Entry #0407

    Why a founder’s own money changes investor behaviour

    Retained personal exposure is readable in a way that a projection is not. It reports what the founder believes, which is separate from whether they are right.

    Novice
    The hidden part #0407

    Exposure reports belief, not correctness. It is costly to fake and silent about whether the belief is right.

    Open file
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    Incentive Design Entry #0377

    The reason a bonus for lines of code produces long code

    Measure what you want and you will get exactly that — the metric, not the quality the metric was supposed to represent.

    Adept
    The hidden part #0377

    Reward defines the output. The metric does not fail because people cheat; it fails because people succeed at optimising exactly what was measured.

    Open file
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    Incentive Design Entry #0382

    Why a referral scheme attracts the wrong customers

    Paying for introductions selects the people most responsive to being paid. Volume rises and average customer quality moves in the other direction.

    Novice
    The hidden part #0382

    An incentive selects who responds to it. A per-head fee replaces the referrer’s judgement with their willingness to be paid.

    Open file
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    Price Psychology Entry #0353

    Why a subscription feels cheaper than the same annual sum

    Twelve payments of ten feel lighter than one payment of a hundred and twenty. The total is identical; the pain is distributed so thinly that it stops registering.

    Novice
    The hidden part #0353

    Small units evade the total. The subscription does not reduce the price; it reduces the number the mind compares against its threshold.

    Open file
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    Price Psychology Entry #0357

    Why anchoring works on the price you never pay

    A struck-through figure that nobody was charged still sets the standard the real price is judged against. Its only function is to be higher.

    Novice
    The hidden part #0357

    The anchor works by being adjacent, not by being true. A number nobody paid still sets the scale for the number you do.

    Open file
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    Scarcity & Queues Entry #0456

    The reason a countdown works even when repeated

    A deadline that resets every week should stop working and largely does not. The response fires before the scepticism arrives, and the two are not in the same channel.

    Adept
    The hidden part #0456

    Urgency moves the timing, not the preference. Recognising the deadline as artificial arrives after the response has already fired.

    Open file
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    Scarcity & Queues Entry #0454

    The reason a queue outside is worth more than an advert

    Advertising is paid for by the seller. A queue is paid for by customers in time, which is why a venue may keep capacity below demand on purpose.

    Adept
    The hidden part #0454

    Waiting is a display of demand paid for by the people waiting. Capacity held back is a budget line that never appears.

    Open file
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    Market Signals Entry #0402

    The reason a degree signals more than it teaches

    Part of a qualification’s value comes from what finishing it proves about the person, rather than from what the person learned inside it.

    Adept
    The hidden part #0402

    A credential can be worth paying for even where the teaching is not, provided it is hard to obtain.

    Open file
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    Statistical Illusions Entry #0429

    The reason two true statistics can contradict each other

    One batter can have a higher average than another in every single season and a lower average across both. Neither figure is wrong; the weighting differs.

    Adept
    The hidden part #0429

    A combined average is weighted by attempt counts. Change the weights and the comparison can reverse without any figure being wrong.

    Open file
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    Market Signals Entry #0401

    Why a costly gesture carries information a cheap one cannot

    A claim anyone could make carries no information. A gesture that would hurt to fake carries some, which is why expense so often stands in for proof.

    Novice
    The hidden part #0401

    Information travels on cost. A signal that is cheap for a liar tells you nothing at all.

    Open file
  • No visual on file
    Price Psychology Entry #0355

    Why a higher price can raise demand

    In some categories a rise in price increases demand, because the price is not only a cost but one of the few available statements about quality.

    Master
    The hidden part #0355

    When quality cannot be inspected, a price stops being only a cost and becomes evidence.

    Open file