Sorry, I deleted my post containing the graphs.

@jpanhalt: I'm curious why more members (including yourself) didn't vote in the poll? Is it because Assembly wasn't included as an option? If more people had voted, the results wouldn't be quite as meaningless.

As I think I mentioned previously, I refuse to participate in self-selective surveys. You've just given the best reason for doing so -- had I participated it would have led you (and others) to believe that the results weren't quite as meaningless when they would have been every bit as meaningless. Anything that lends itself to the illusion of being anything but meaningless is counterproductive and detrimental -- it generates negative knowledge in that you think you know something when you don't.

 

(tjohnson: Please don't take any of the following as pointed at you directly -- it's meant as a general statement with all the caveats that go along with generalizations.)

There is a strong tendency for people to run with data even if they know the data is meaningless. We don't know how to quantify the validity of the data but we know how to make pretty pictures and how to crank averages and order totals, so we tend to make pretty pictures, crank averages, and order totals while forgetting about the issue of the underlying validity of the data and other pesky issues that we don't know how to deal with. Worse, the pretty pictures, the averages, and the ordered totals then get presented to people that have no basis upon which to even question the fundamental soundness of the underlying data and they perpetuate the "analyses" further up the food chain. The end result is that major decisions at very high levels often get made on the basis of fundamentally flawed data and the meaningless conclusions that grew from it.

I have been in more administrative meetings than I care to remember where the data have been shown to have more holes in it than Swiss cheese, yet while the administrators pay lip service to the errors, they continue to use it, because " it is the only data they have." In reality, they chose to use the data because it agreed with their preexisting biases.

John

 

Sorry, I deleted my post containing the graphs.

Repost your graphs. I don't think a few members writing "meaningless" over and over makes it so. IMO, you could have gotten more participation if not for repeated, redundant and unnecessary reposting of negative comments. And comparing your participation to the total membership is rather dumb, as the membership represents the total number or people who ever joined the site (many who are one and done) So yeah, your participation rate is rather low, but it was a self-fulfilling prophesy. Don't let negative people dissuade you. It's better to let each member decide for himself/herself if the data is meaningful or not.

 

Repost your graphs. I don't think a few members writing "meaningless" over and over makes it so. IMO, you could have gotten more participation if not for repeated, redundant and unnecessary reposting of negative comments. And comparing your participation to the total membership is rather dumb, as the membership represents the total number or people who ever joined the site (many who are one and done) So yeah, your participation rate is rather low, but it was a self-fulfilling prophesy. Don't let negative people dissuade you. It's better to let each member decide for himself/herself if the data is meaningful or not.

Rather than name calling, perhaps you would be so kind as to share with us what you have learned from the data.

John

 

Rather than name calling, perhaps you would be so kind as to share with us what you have learned from the data.

John

Name calling.... you're funny!

 

Repost your graphs. I don't think a few members writing "meaningless" over and over makes it so. IMO, you could have gotten more participation if not for repeated, redundant and unnecessary reposting of negative comments. And comparing your participation to the total membership is rather dumb, as the membership represents the total number or people who ever joined the site (many who are one and done) So yeah, your participation rate is rather low, but it was a self-fulfilling prophesy. Don't let negative people dissuade you. It's better to let each member decide for himself/herself if the data is meaningful or not.

@Brownout: Thanks for the kind words. I don't think I'll bother reposting the graphs, since anyone interested can see the results at the top of this page. If you (or someone else) really want them for some reason, let me know and I can send them via PM.

 

I wanted to see them reposted because I think members should decide for theirselves is the result is meaningful/interesting. And you put in the time to make them, so post it and let the cards lay where they fall. If any member is so tortured by a couple harmless graphs, he or she can use the thread tools to "unsubscribe" to the thread. Gawd knows I've had to do that enough.

 

I wanted to see them reposted because I think members should decide for theirselves is the result is meaningful/interesting. And you put in the time to make them, so post it and let the cards lay where they fall. If any member is so tortured by a couple harmless graphs, he or she can use the thread tools to "unsubscribe" to the thread.

I decided to post them on my blog instead (http://forum.allaboutcircuits.com/blog/results-of-favorite-programming-language-poll.681/), so that members will only see them if they want to.

 

Excellent. Thanks.