Year: 2022

I tested the best ways to mail people

January 6, 2022 / Experiments / Leave a Comment

I emailed My Year in 2021 to ~2,700 people. It had 3 experiments.

Do friends open my mail more than strangers?

I split the list into 2 groups:

  1. My contacts: ~1,000 people I knew (I’ve mailed them)
  2. Strangers: ~1,700 people I didn’t know (I’ve never mailed them)

My guess: strangers would open the mail 30% less often.

Reality: They opened it 40% less. 50% of my contacts opened the mail, vs only 28% of strangers.

Are the first and last links most clicked?

I sent 2 versions of the email to my contacts. The order of links was different.

My guess: the first and last links would be clicked 20% more often than those in the middle.

Reality: The links higher up were clicked more often 5/6 times. Click rates drop but don’t climb up at the end.

Do provocative subject lines increase open rates?

I sent 2 versions of the email to my contacts. The subject lines were different.

  1. Bland: “My year in 2021”
  2. Provocative: “Where I failed in 2021”

My guess: the provocative title will have 2X the open rate of the bland one.

Reality: The open rates were about the same (49% for provocative, 51% for bland). Either the second title was not provocative enough, or the bland was interesting enough. I need to re-run this experiment.

Learnings

I learned 3 things.

  1. Strangers open my mails less than I thought. Make more friends 🙂
  2. People scan emails top-down (not top-down, then bottom-up – like I do) and click on top links. Move the main link first.
  3. I’m no good at creating high-contrast variations in content. Take help.

How isolated is Bollywood from world cinema?

January 24, 2022 / Data, Visualisation / 2 Comments

These are the major group actors based on who they act with most.

Actors mostly act with other actors in the same…
  1. Language. Not country. For example, the Spanish / Mexican group is across countries. But Indian actors divide into North Indian and South Indian. It’s language, not country.
  2. Time period. Old American actors are a separate group from Hollywood. (Naturally. Brad Pitt was born after Humphrey Bogart died. They couldn’t have acted together.)
  3. Genre. Hollywood Porn actors don’t act with mainstream Hollywood. Same with Japanese Porn, Hollywood TV, and Hollywood Horror actors.

How are these groups themselves connected? Do Chinese actors act with Hollywood often? How isolated is Bollywood from world cinema?

Hollywood is the core group

Take groups that act with other groups at least 5% of the time. Mainstream Hollywood acts with British and Hollywood TV/Horror actors. All other clusters are isolated.

Indian & Japanese clusters emerge

Let’s go more liberal. Take groups that act with other groups at least 2% of the time. Hollywood forms a big connected cluster. It includes most of Europe — British, German, French, Czech, Yugoslavian & Italian actors.

North & South Indian actors form the first non-Hollywood cross-language cluster.

The Japanese and Japanese porn actors form a cluster too. (Interestingly, it’s easy for a Japanese porn actor to act with mainstream Japanese actors. Hollywood porn actors find it far harder to act with Hollywood.)

Among groups that act with other groups at least 1% of the time, we have:

Chinese & Korean cluster emerges

Chinese & South Korean actors form the first cross-country cross-language cluster.

Hollywood expands to act with Scandinavian, Spanish, Polish, Brazilian & Nigerian films.

Other film industries (Russian, Greek, Egyptian — even Hollywood Porn — are still isolated.)

World Cinema vs the rest

Among groups that act with other groups at least 0.5% of the time, we have:

  1. Turkish & Iranian groups coming together
  2. Indonesian actors acting with the Chinese
  3. Hollywood expanding to cover Russian, Greek, Egyptian, and finally, Hollywood Porn. (It’s easier for Brazilian / Nigerian to act with Hollywood than to be a Hollywood Porn actor.)

At this point, there are 6 actor groups that act with each other at least 1 out of 200 times (0.5%).

  1. World Cinema (Hollywood & friends)
  2. Japanese (mainstream & porn)
  3. Indian (North & South)
  4. Chinese, South Korean & Indonesian
  5. Turkish & Iranian
  6. Filipino

One world of cinema

If we look at groups that act with other groups at least 0.5% of the time, we have a far more unified picture. Almost every actor group acts with another group at least 1 out of 400 times.

But even here, there’s an exception. Filipino actors — the most insular major actor group in the world.

So, how isolated is Bollywood from World Cinema? For its size, it’s one of the most isolated actor groups. (But not as much as Iranian/Turkish or Filipino.)

My Year in 2021

December 31, 2022 / How I do things / 4 Comments

In 2021, I made 3 resolutions.

  1. Lose 10 kgs. I lost 5 kg in 3 months. But gained it back by the year-end.
  2. Fail big. I practiced confronting people – and failed. I still run from fights. Even when important.
  3. Calendar integrity. I stuck to my calendar 90% of the time. But personal commitments slipped.

On learning, I discovered network clusters. My PyCon talk on movie networks is the start of a fascinating exploration of actors that I’ll write more about.

On training, I designed a Tools for Data Science Course for IITM’s Bachelor’s in Data Science. I’m now a “faculty” at my alma mater, and no longer scared of it.

On self-improvement, I completed a Landmark course and continued Pranayama. Both helped my resolutions.

I also continued 2 habits from last year.

  1. Walk 10,000 steps daily. I averaged 10,200.
  2. Read 50 books. I read 52. Here are my reviews. (Which did you like? What would you recommend?)

In 2022, I plan to:

  1. Run 50 experiments. I’ll learn by disproving my beliefs with measurable tests.
  2. Speak at 10 global forums on data stories, and spread the beauty of data.
  3. Be 10X more effective. I’ll measure the impact and stop low-impact work.

I’m curious — what’s ONE thing you’d like to do in 2022?