They share just as much as NPD. Besides, do you really need to know which stores VGChartz gets information from? Will it make you actually believe the numbers any more. I can gurantee it isn't Walmart and ToysRus, which are the two biggest retailers for Nintendo videogames. If ioi said he is getting information from 10% of the retail market, would it really make a difference?

I think it's just a matter of general suspicion of "internet sources" myself. I'll relate the attitudes at joystiq (as its my prominent stomping ground) in that, if you reference this site in order to cite sales of a certain title that hasn't been tracked by NPD/Media Create/That European Equivalent, you generally get whited out (as down-voting a post turns it a lighter shade, until it's hard to see). The consensus elsewhere is that vgchartz overtracks everything, and that numbers are "pulled out the ass" as it were

It's really an unfounded fear, kinda like when you try to convince teachers/professors that wikipedia is a reliable source, and not just "something any idiot can change to say whatever they want"

There is a big difference between using VGChartz as a resource for market analysis and using Wikipedia as cold hard facts. Wikipedia is NOT a source for facts. If you want to use Wikipedia, use the sources that wikipedia uses.

VGChartz is used for analysis of something that no one knows the facts for. VGChartz is just as good as NPD for doing some market analysis and determining trends.

 It probably would. If it really was data from 10% of the market it would be huge. But of course it isn't so, because it would require at least 10 guys to do a full time job to gather and analyze such huge amounts of data that 10% of the market is. And as far as I know, ioi is almost alone doing this, and not even full-time.

I'd be extremely happy if ioi had a continous stream of sales data even from just 1% of the market. I doubt it, but even if he had, he never could disclose that fact because most ppl are morons who then always would say "don't trust VGC, they only cover a tiny 1% of the market!" not realizing (because most ppl lack statistics skills) that a 1 % sample actually would be a very solid solid base to estimate sales from.

Exactly.

NPD doesn't need to earn credibility. It is credible already.

@Bitmap Frogs: I don't think NPD credibility has anything to do with the issue here. As far as i know, NPD haven't gained credibility by telling everyone their sources.
The problem is that people don't like the data VGC offers (despite the other trackers telling the same as VGC). The same thing that has made VGC interesting, is the same that makes people want to criticize VGC; the current change in domination in the market and Wiis runaway success. If VGC would have been born at the start of last gen (instead of this), the site would have been more widely accepted by this time in the sites life, but it wouldn't have been so interesting. It's the same thing as it is with the "blue ocean" software on Wii. When games like Singstar and Guitar Hero were introduced last gen and became hugely popular, everyone was just happy and saying "it just cool to have the type of games", for the games being on the platform that continued the success from the previus gen, while today, anything with "Wii" in its title, causes everyone to freak out.

Hey, sorry for not responding sooner. Thanks for explaining to me what is going on. I just found it weird that some sites had this vendetta when the numbers pretty close to what the official sales say. I mean, when VGchartz said that Deca Sports sold half a million Hudson came out and said the game was a hit at around the same number.

Maybe its just me, but I think the site shouldn't get so much crap for basically showing number estimates.

Nah... what hurts VGC is credibility and transparency is one way to fix it. CONSOLE WARZ has no relation to it besides the morans on this forum dissing the numbers whenever they don't like them.

From the outside all you see at the moment is some guy that posts a lot of numbers every week which get retrofitted whenever an stablished tracker (like NPD) publishes data.