The three sins of context

- [Instructor] It's very tempting to manipulate context…changing the way we present data…to tell a more favorable story.…When you commit the sin of context manipulation…you mange your data and you make it harder to interpret…or ensure it gets interpreted the wrong way.…You may be understood but you're no longer right.…Here's the most common ways we manipulate context…intentionally or accidentally, and how to avoid them.…The most common sin of context manipulation is trimming,…adjusting the scope of your data to make it look better.…

Here I've had a huge drop between January and February.…So I trimmed off the first couple of months,…that's not okay because I've changed the story…instead of explaining what happened.…The next common sin of context is adjustment,…changing axes or proportions to increase…and decrease the appearance of trends.…Here's an example, for Beets Inc,…a 4% change in cost per click isn't that important.…So this graph is not very exciting,…but I still want to show off…and try to prove I'm worth their money.…