Not pointing fingers here, but I do hope this makes us rethink what we've been measuring all long. Cheers MenO --- ▶ Watch on 3speak.tv
Transcript
One of my first jobs, real jobs in America was working for a McDonald's. I actually started in the kitchen and eventually became a manager. And although there's a lot of very important lessons that I take from those years, and I look back with some sort of nostalgia at times, there's one in particular that I think it's valuable for the rest of my life, and it's very important to remember. I did not know the name of it back then, but I could clearly identify it, and it's called the Campbell's Law. The idea of Campbell's Law is that whatever it is that you're measuring is what you optimize for, and it dictates the behavior of the people. And if you apply that to anything, really, things start to make sense. For example, if you talk about the welfare state, You talk about benefits for people with, you know, less opportunities. What is it that you are measuring, and what ends up happening? You're measuring that people are not doing good. You're measuring that people are poor. So therefore, people are going to try to present themselves even poorer than they are, so that they get more benefits. Obviously, the intention is good, but what are you really enticing? In the case of McDonald's, we optimized for speed. You have to serve food under a minute 30 or something. So instead of getting better at serving food, maybe getting better at, you know, staffing and peak hours, etc., etc., we just got better at cheating. And that is kind of how it happened. In the case of Hive and why I think this video is valuable, is that plenty of times we talk about onboarding, and the one thing that we measure is how many new accounts we make. We also measure, of course, and not with so much emphasis, I guess, how many counts still remain after X amount of time, et cetera, et cetera. But we hardly ever measure the quality of the experience. We talk about it. I talk about it, too. But we don't really know how to measure that. We don't have a system to follow up to see if people actually enjoy what they are doing, if they enjoy the experience, if they enjoy the community, if they enjoy, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And I wonder if we've fallen into the same trap, the same thing that we did in McDonald's. We focus so much on numbers, like how many new accounts we can make. because that's easy to measure. And the rest, we hope, it just sorts itself out.
Comments
@agmoore: I will be contrary here :) I've been poor. So I know about measuring poverty. My recollection is shame at being poor. My mother never tried to appear more poor than she was. As a matter of fact, pride made her hide some of the worst effects of being poor. She used to collect surplus food (from U.S. Agriculture?)in huge packages and she was humiliated when she did this. She would humbly accept whatever they gave her and take it home. I think a lot of poor people are like my mother. All they want to do is not be poor, and they work really hard to get out of that condition. Also, about Hive numbers. I think if we were retailers, we wouldn't want simply get people in the store. We'd work to keep them. I don't think we do that in Hive. I think, once someone stumbles across our threshold we leave them on their own. I think we should all look out for the newbies, for the accounts that are not getting any feedback and upvotes. I think we should all decide to upvote/comment on at least one post that's not getting any rewards, every day. I've said this before and then I slipped and stopped doing it. But one person can't turn the tide. We all have to get out of our comfort mode and look for new accounts that are unnoticed. It is really encouraging to get a comment and/or a vote from an established Hive account if you are just starting out. It means you're not invisible. So there. I'm being contrary. I really like your videos. You have a cool, relaxed manner. You'd make a good teacher :)
@caparadiso: Ah, Campbell's Law — the quiet philosophical landmine hiding in every reward system ever invented. 😄 "Not pointing fingers" is doing a LOT of diplomatic heavy lifting in that caption, MenO, and I respect the restraint. It's funny (and a little uncomfortable) how perfectly this applies to Hive. The moment reputation scores, vote weight, or curation rewards become the goal instead of a rough proxy for "this content/person added value," we've basically invited everyone to optimize for the number instead of the thing the number was supposed to represent. Goodhart's evil twin, showing up right on schedule. I'll admit, this made me quietly audit my own behavior for a second — am I engaging because something is genuinely good, or because the metric rewards engaging? Uncomfortable question, well placed food for thought. Thanks for the gentle nudge to rethink what we're actually measuring here. Cheers back at you. 🍻 🌾 Matteo Ca' Paradiso Cagli (Marche) www.caparadiso.com
@epodcaster: I think the folks who have staying power here on Hive are entrepreneurial in nature. We are 100% in control of our destiny. We will find exactly what we are looking for here IF you are willing to put the work into it. The time and attention go a long way for anything we want to do in the world. Hive is no different. Just like in life, there are no guarantees. However, also like in life, the chances are better when consistent effort is put into action. And not just once. Over and over and over again. Which for some is tiring and for others is exhilarating. Which is why I think Hive is a playground for those who are entrepreneurially minded.
@mondoshawan: You make me think of 'POSIWID', the purpose of a system is what it does<, a heuristic in systems thinking coined by Stafford Beer.
@ahmadmanga: By the way, how do you suggest we measure the quality of people we onboard or how much enjoyment they were getting? replied to 2:29 on 3speak.tv
@ahmadmanga: Interesting... I notice this in my life too. For example, when I'm not careful, I start measuring how many games I finish per month which leads me to play shorter games regardless of how well I'd enjoy them. Or how many videos of gameplay I record which makes me more interested in having everything recorded, as opposed to paying attention to what's happening... We have to be careful at what we're paying attention to. replied to 1:52 on 3speak.tv