pjmedia.com By Scott Pinsker
In comic book lore, “The Secret Wars” was a marketing campaign by Marvel to sell more toys to kids. The series itself was published in the mid-80s — and not-so-coincidentally, “Avengers: Secret Wars” will be a Marvel movie in 2027 — but the reason it was named “Secret Wars” was because a Mattel focus group reported that little kids responded favorably to the words “secret” and “wars.”
Its crass commercial beginnings blossomed into a beautiful bouquet of timeless art. (Or something.) Regardless, “The Secret Wars” sold very well: Outperformed all the other superhero comics and moved a ton of toys off the shelves.
Turns out, little kids knew what they wanted better than the adults did. The grownups just needed to shut up and listen.
In a related note, Politico released a story today, “Voters Were Right About the Economy. The Data Was Wrong.” It’s a fascinating article and well worth your time, although you may struggle to suppress your giggles. Here’s the opening paragraph:
Before the presidential election, many Democrats were puzzled by the seeming disconnect between “economic reality” as reflected in various government statistics and the public’s perceptions of the economy on the ground. Many in Washington bristled at the public’s failure to register how strong the economy really was. They charged that right-wing echo chambers were conning voters into believing entirely preposterous narratives about America’s decline.
That’s a tasty setup, ain’t it? Sure, it kind of telegraphs the punchline, but nonetheless, try to enjoy it:
What we uncovered shocked us. The bottom line is that, for 20 years or more, including the months prior to the election, voter perception was more reflective of reality than the incumbent statistics. Our research revealed that the data collected by the various agencies is largely accurate. Moreover, the people staffing those agencies are talented and well-intentioned. But the filters used to compute the headline statistics are flawed. As a result, they paint a much rosier picture of reality than bears out on the ground…
READ FULL ARTICLE HERE… (pjmedia.com)
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