Originally Posted by kanisatha
No these are not margins of error. They are ranges. And saying a sales figure falls somewhere between 2 million and 5 million is the equivalent of saying nothing at all. It is completely useless information and does not qualify as data. You cannot input a range into a dataset. It makes no sense. In the case of BG3, is it 2 m? Is it 5 m? Is it something else? Who knows. And it makes a HUGE difference whether it is 2 m versus 5 m. And if Steamspy is saying "we don't know if it is 2 m or 5 m," then they are literally saying there is a margin of error of something like 95% to what they're saying, and anything with that huge a margin of error is useless information.

From Steamspy: About.
Quote
The margin of error is calculated based on 98% confidence (if you know your math). What it means is that around 2% games have wrong stats on Steam Spy that are outside of the stated margin of error.
So its even more accurate than I stated, using a 98% confidence interval rather than a 95% confidence interval. As for how accurate it is exactly, well, here are a few anecdotal testimonies from developers.

Whilst the exact margins of error are not provided to you unless you subscribe to the service, you can be pretty damn absolutely sure the margins of error are within the given ranges they provide there. Ergo, the statistic has some value. How about you actually learn something about Steamspy first before commenting on it?

Last edited by Sharp; 21/06/21 09:03 PM.