Everybody Lies: The New York Times Bestseller

In other words, people’s search for information is, in itself, information.

The second lesson is that, when trying to make predictions, you needn’t worry too much about why your models work.

text as data may give us unprecedented insights into what audiences actually want, which may be different from what authors or executives think they want.

But a moment’s reflection shows that the widespread use of porn—and the search and views data that comes with it—is the most important development in our ability to understand human sexuality in, well . . . Actually, it’s probably the most important ever.

Lying to oneself may explain why so many people say they are above average. How big is this problem? More than 40 percent of one company’s engineers said they are in the top 5 percent.

Thiel defines “secrets about people” as “things that people don’t know about themselves or things they hide because they don’t want others to know.” These kinds of businesses, in other words, are built on people’s lies.

The days of structured, clean, simple, survey-based data are over. In this new age, the messy traces we leave as we go through life are becoming the primary source of data.

There is no grand conspiracy. There is just capitalism.

The best way to get the right answer to a question is to combine all available data.