39% Of Gamers Who Plan To Buy GT5 Do Not Yet Own A PS3

[saicho]

theprof00 said:

saicho said:

thismeintiel said:

After looking at their site, I have no reason to not believe this survey they have conducted.  In 8 years they have become one of the top 25 trackers in the world (#24 to be exact). In fact, their weekly surveys remind me of the weekly political polls conducted here in the US. Everyone seems to qoute them all the time without questioning their exact methods. In fact, I know of no tracking site/service that releases their exact sources and methods. What would be the point? Then anyone could do it themselves. They always just release a general, one sentence explanation about their survey. Oh, something like "OXT’s GamePlan weekly tracking study surveys 1,000 U.S. gamers and buyers including hardcore gamers, casual gamers and everyone in between."

I find it ridiculous that people on a tracking site that does the exact same thing wish to criticize another tracking site. Maybe the survey is saying something people don't like. Something makes me believe that if PS3 was switched with 360 or Wii, and the game was Halo Reach or SMG2, there would be a different response. More in the line of "Awesome, that game is going to sell tons of 360's/Wii's!"

I think you might have missed the point. We are not doubting the "39%" of gamers who plan to buy GT5 do not yet own a PS3. What we have question about is how many gamers out of the 1000 sruveyed plan to buy GT5.

NiKKoM put it nicely in perpective in his post

It looks a lot different if he just post "22 gamers were surveyed and 50% of the gamers who plan to buy Halo Reach do not yet own a XBox360" than "22 gamers were surveyed and 2 plan to buy Halo Reach. 50% of the gamers who plan to buy Halo Reach do not yet own a XBox360."

it doesn't make one lick of difference how many out of the 1000 plan to buy gt5 and a ps3. It's called extrapolation, and through it, you can tell the buying potential of millions upon millions of people. It's not the most accurate thing in the world. Surveying every single person would be the most exact, and even then, not guaranteed. However, there is no survey based firm that does such a thing because it is very very costly and takes a long time. Just look at the US Census to get a good idea of how difficult such a thing is.

I'm sorry that the three of you don't understand statistics. But point after point you have no reason to doubt this. Statistics is very methodical and intricate, and there are many levels of analysis that it goes through.

What I'd like you all to think about, as another set of infered evidence, is that for a company that is 24th in the US in stat tracking, do you really think they would say something if it could be easily proved wrong by any number of 15 year olds on a forum.

Wake up guys.

let me use one extreme example. 1000 gamers surveyed. 3 gamers plan to buy GT5. 1 out of those 3 does not have a PS3 yet.

so I can say "1000 gamers surveyed. 33% of gamers who plan to buy GT5 do not have a PS3 yet." You are telling me you can extrapolate meaningful data from that and tell the buying potential of millions upon millions of people?

I already stated that we are not doubting the number "39%" (or 33% or whatever % it is). We just don't know how meaningful it is based on how it is presented now.