Fun With Stats, Or Damn, That's A Lot Of Lost Phones

from the doesn't-add-up dept

Fri, Jul 14th 2006 10:29am — Carlo Longino

Statistics can be tricky, no doubt about that. They've tripped up many a journalist, and given that, you'd imagine that writers would be pretty careful to thoroughly check out the numbers they cite, but no. A column today from an "award-winning" UPI columnist makes the bold claim that 65 percent of Americans lost their mobile phones last year, and it cost $600 million to replace them. Wow, that's pretty amazing -- if only it were true. You see, only about 70% of Americans own cell phones, according to trade-body statistics. So if the author's figures were right, that would mean more than 90 percent of cell-phone users, or 187 million people, lost and had to replace their phones in 2005. That sounds great, except when you consider that just 105 million or so cell phones were sold in the country during the year. And if that $600 million figure were accurate, it would mean the "cost" of replacing all those handsets would be an average of $3.20 each, which doesn't make too much sense. To make it even better, while trying to do some mobile virus scare-mongering (when there's really nothing to worry about), he mentions "the 45 percent of mobile phone owners who don't lose their phones on an annual basis" -- a figure that doesn't jibe with anything else he cites at all. So while wild claims and bogus statistics might make for an exciting lead, readers probably deserve a little more fact-checking.

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36 Comments

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WirelessGuy, 14 Jul 2006 @ 10:24am

As my father would say
This falls in the "Who gives a crap" category.... Do they claim they are lost so that they can then get a new one? Left on a bus at the airport? I think that math might work for those people who lose multiple units per year. Just like some European countries who report 180% penetration.
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telecom rep, 14 Jul 2006 @ 10:24am

brewing hostility over replacement phone costs
I work for a major telecom, and i don't use a cellphone cuz the services and devices are way overpriced for the services you get. Replacement phones are a bitter subject for customers. They don't realize those handsets are expensive with their little chipsets and screens, and their cost is subsidized by the contract length. Lose your phone and you'll pay full retail price for a replacement (read: hundreds of dollars). Or pay the insurance rate of about $5 monthly, if you lose your phone you still have to pay a $35-50 deductible, and guess what: you don't get a new handset anyways, you get a REFURBISHED handset. http://www.telecommer.com
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Anonymous Coward, 14 Jul 2006 @ 10:47am

Thats pretty funny, Gene Koprosky is a piece of work. He is one lazy writer.
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NSMike, 14 Jul 2006 @ 10:49am

OR...
Or perhaps the writer assumed that readers would guess that if you don't have a mobile phone, you can't lose it, so that 65% would automatically include only OWNERS of mobile phones.
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Andrew, 14 Jul 2006 @ 10:54am

Lost is not always lost?
Perhaps the figures include those (like me) who mis-lay their phone somewhere for a short period of time, then get it back. No replacement cost at least. Still, the piece does seem rather un-researched, and unsupported by figures. Simply dividing replacement cost by cost of an average phone can tell you something is off by one or two decimal places pretty quickly.
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Anonymous Coward, 14 Jul 2006 @ 11:17am

Does this number include the people that "lose" their phone when its becomes old, and their cell phone insurance buys them a new one?
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VoicesInMyHead, 14 Jul 2006 @ 11:21am

Stats...
83.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot......
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ehrichweiss, 14 Jul 2006 @ 11:24am

BS
Ever seen the Penn and Teller show, Bullshit! ? This past season they did an episode on how statistics can be manipulated to trick you. It was quite informative, especially when you see the guy who generates the questions for polls that many of these statistics are based on. By changing a simple question he could make someone contradict themselves who had previously stated, for example, that they hated Bush or whatever.

On that note, there was a study done a few years ago where people were shown a video of a car hitting another. Two groups were then asked two different questions that only varied ever so slightly. "How fast was the car going when they collided into one another?" and "How fast was the car going when they smashed into one another?" Without fail the second question got 10-20mph faster speeds reported. Think about that next time you are in a courtroom....
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Jedi Wannabe, 14 Jul 2006 @ 11:31am

More useless stats
As the Tee-Shirt says:

5 / 4 people have trouble with fractions
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Gabriel Tane (profile), 14 Jul 2006 @ 11:37am

Where the cellphones went.
All the lost Left Socks stole the phones to help communicate their plan for world domination.

FIREBOMB YOUR SOCK DRAWER BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE!!!
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VoicesInMyHead, 14 Jul 2006 @ 11:46am

Re: More useless stats
Ya know, there are only 3 kinds of people: Those who can count, and those who can't.
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I. P. Freely, 14 Jul 2006 @ 11:49am

statistics
Did you know 35% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
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Anonymous Coward, 14 Jul 2006 @ 11:54am

or my fav:

There are 10 kinds of people in the world. Those who understand binary, and those who don't.
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His Boss, 14 Jul 2006 @ 12:01pm

Re:
I fired him right after reading this. Fucking moron.
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hehe, 14 Jul 2006 @ 12:13pm

I emailed the author
Your article about lost cell phones has...well...lost me.

Wireless World: A looming 'cell hell'

http://www.upi.com/Hi-Tech/view.php?StoryID=20060714-095151-4783r

So I'm reading this article and the first thing that jumps out at me is "Research shows that 65 percent of Americans lost their cell phones last year -- and it cost $600 million to replace them".

Ok theres roughly 300million people in the US...65% of that is 195,000,000...$600m spread out over them equally is roughly $3 a cell phone.

then I said "wait thats not right because not everyone in the US owns a cell phone!"

And of course they don't cost $3. Although, maybe everyone signed up for a new calling plan each time they replaced their phone and the provider gave them a discount..but usually providers make you wait until your contract is almost up before they give you another discount.

So lets try and increase that $3 figure so our statistics look better. Pretend 70% of 300m americans own a cell phone. thats still 210m people but maybe your meant to say 65% of cell phone owners lost their cell phones..thats only 136.5m phones...er people...

so then each phone would cost about...$4.40??? no that can't be...

How many phones were even sold in the US in 2005?

Please remove your article from the website.

Thanks,
Brad
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Mikester, 14 Jul 2006 @ 12:14pm

There's lies, damn lies, and then there's statistics.
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Mikester, 14 Jul 2006 @ 12:15pm

Re: I emailed the author
On the remote chance you get a response, I'm sure the rest of us here would be interested in reading it.
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Anonymous Coward, 14 Jul 2006 @ 12:22pm

If you understood Binary number 11 you would know that the statement is true.
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Anonymous Coward, 14 Jul 2006 @ 12:30pm

Re: Re: I emailed the author
The address the author provided, hitech@upi.com failed but I CC'd it to 7 other addresses at UPI. I'll post if anything comes of it.
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Daniel Bjorndahl, 14 Jul 2006 @ 12:30pm

Nice :D
Thanks Carlo!
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Anonymous Bum, 14 Jul 2006 @ 12:42pm

Thanks Carlo
Just another example of the "I can't prove it, but I can say it" crowd.
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Anonymous Coward, 14 Jul 2006 @ 12:44pm

Here is the lazy bastards email address.

journalist3@aol.com

I once pitched him a story with an expert, and 30 mins. later I saw a ProfNet Query on that subject from him.

Lazy bastard.
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Anonymous Coward, 14 Jul 2006 @ 1:01pm

Re: Stats...
>>83.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot......

That number gets bigger every time I see it.
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drkkgt, 14 Jul 2006 @ 1:13pm

Re:
There are 10 types of people. Those who can count in trinary, those that don't, and those that confuse it with binary.
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Anonymous Coward, 14 Jul 2006 @ 1:33pm

Re: I emailed the author
I think you are forgetting about handset insurance claims being included in this...That fun little fee that people sometimes pay per month so that they can lose, destroy their device at a whim.
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Ponderer, 14 Jul 2006 @ 2:06pm

More interesting statistics
87% of all murders committed in the US last year were by persons who own refrigerators! Hmmmm....
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paul westenkirchner, 14 Jul 2006 @ 2:34pm

where's that remote
i think i'm going to write an article saying that 10,000% of americans lost their remote last year.
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Cat, 14 Jul 2006 @ 2:44pm

95% of all statistics.... are made up.

Make that 96%.
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jeff, 14 Jul 2006 @ 7:34pm

hahahah
way to spread 3 posts across 26
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Stats Suck, But, 14 Jul 2006 @ 11:51pm

Reading the stats in context
You gotta read the stats in the article in context:

(1) "65 percent of Americans lost their cell phones last year" -- this isn't 65% of all Americans (you can't lose a cell phone if you don't own one) Nearly two-thirds of us lose a cell phone every year?! I've heard of only a single cell phone lost in our IT department in the past three years.

(2) Yes, the math for cost per user to replace them is horribly wrong.

(3) "if you are among the 45 percent of mobile phone owners who don't lose their phones on an annual basis" -- this statistic has nothing to do with the first one (this is of repeat losers -- probably making up for a lot of stat #1)
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2006 @ 11:36am

Re: Reading the stats in context
You gotta read the stats in the article in context:
Oh, I see, it's like Enron accounting.
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Anonymous Nerd, 16 Jul 2006 @ 7:28pm

Counters
There are 10 types of people in the world - those who can understand binary, and those who can't.
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Anonymous Nerd, 16 Jul 2006 @ 7:32pm

Oops...
I just noticed a little issue with the posting box - look again at "save me a cookie". Think about it...

"Save me a cookie before those kids finish them off".
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Tyshaun, 17 Jul 2006 @ 7:30am

Re: More interesting statistics
87% of all murders committed in the US last year were by persons who own refrigerators! Hmmmm

So that means 13% of all murderrs don't have modern refrigeration? What are they using ice-boxes? If they were a Jeffrey Dahmer type, where are they putting the body parts?
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bob, 17 Jul 2006 @ 8:54am

Re:
there are 10 kinds of people in the world. Those who understand binary, and those who have friends.
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Quangaroo, 21 Jul 2006 @ 12:59pm

Save me two cookies, please.....and some milk.
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