The great thing about bias …

.. is that you can make practically anything sound true! That was just a thought I had this morning when I came across a post that “Windows Phone bears Android and is top rated at Amazon” It’s always nice to see an underdog succeed and the title gave me the impression that all of a sudden Microsoft’s fledgling phone OS had soared to new heights. So I popped onto Amazon and looked for the most popular phones:

That was strange! Out of the top 24 results there wasn’t a single Windows phone. What was going on?

Well, looking closely at the article on the WpCentral, a website with a Windows Phone bias, I noticed that the title was misleading. The screenshot, captured by one of it’s users was showing cell phones with service plans. Well, any phone could come on top if bundled with a great service plan! And the screenshot doesn’t show what features and other options the list had been filtered with. It doesn’t even show out of how many results the Windows Phone was top ranked.

Just goes to show, with just a spot of ingenuity, you can make just about anything look real!

2 comments

  1. What is misleading about a title that says, “Windows Phone beats Android and is top rated at Amazon” and you go to the “Amazon Top Rated” page (link below) and you see 3 Windows Phones on top? That’s exactly what they stated.

    http://www.amazon.com/gp/top-rated/wireless/2407747011/ref=zg_bs_tab?pf_rd_p=1331612862&pf_rd_s=right-8&pf_rd_t=2101&pf_rd_i=list&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=12W6KSJCV8FMJJKH0FVA

    You just misread “Top Rated” and looked for “Most Popular” instead. Simple mistake anyone could make, but you then criticize others based on your mistake.

    You should at least print a retraction, correction or something.

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