GitHub's Fake Star Economy

Re:GitHub's Fake Star Economy by bombcar on Monday April 20, 2026 @08:11AM (#47833150)

This has happened in multiple industries a number of times - publishers discover that people with large twitter followings sell a decent number of books, so they start selecting new authors who only have large twitter followings, and discover is was correlation and not causation.

And once it gets out that it’s a selection criteria it gets gamed to hell and back.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:GitHub's Fake Star Economy by mauvehaus on Monday April 20, 2026 @08:21AM (#47833235)

I appreciate this, but the stakes have to be a lot lower bringing a book to market than making a $1,000,000 to $10,000,000 seed investment. I'd sort of expect that when you're dealing with sums of money that size there would be some grown-ups in the room.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:GitHub's Fake Star Economy by consp on Monday April 20, 2026 @09:10AM (#47833780)

You just stated Goodharts law in effect.*

[*] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:GitHub's Fake Star Economy by ngruhn on Monday April 20, 2026 @09:11AM (#47833802)

Also known as Goodharts law.

[ Parent | on HN ]