[R] popular R packages

[Duncan Murdoch]

On 08/03/2009 10:49 AM, hadley wickham wrote:
>> More seriously : I don't think relative numbers of package downloads can
>> be interpreted in any reasonable way, because reasons for package
>> download have a very wide range from curiosity ("what's this ?"), fun
>> (think "fortunes"...), to vital need tthink lme4 if/when a consensus on
>> denominator DFs can be reached :-)...). What can you infer in good faith
>> from such a mess ?
> 
> So when we have messy data with measurement error, we should just give
> up?  Doesn't sound very statistical! ;)

I think the situation is worse than messy.  If a client comes in with 
data that doesn't address the question they're interested in, I think 
they are better served to be told that, than to be given an answer that 
is not actually valid.  They should also be told how to design a study 
that actually does address their question.

You (and others) have mentioned Google Analytics as a possible way to 
address the quality of data; that's helpful.  But analyzing bad data 
will just give bad conclusions.

Duncan Murdoch