LogFAQs > #970923630

ParanoidObsessive posted...

The same thing all poll information is used for. Selling it to advertisers and marketing firms.

Which, in turn, is used to make inferences about our living situations and the circumstances in which we browse GameFAQs. Those selecting 100+ are likely early-year university students visiting from class. Those selecting 10+ are likely browsing from work or from smaller classes. 2-4 are probably at home, either with their families or with multiple roommates and are either using their phone in a common area or don't have their own private room from which to browse (suggesting lower SES). Those picking 1 probably have one roommate or and SO, but not a private room (again, suggesting lower SES). Those picking 0 are either able to live alone or have a room to themselves, suggesting more comfortable SES. Those picking "outside" in areas that currently get winter are likely working outdoor jobs, while regardless of area that indicates some of what they're using their phone's data plan for.

Like most data, the usefulness isn't necessarily immediately apparent for this sort of information, but the whole concept of Big Data operates on the fundamental idea of "collect everything we can now so we're more likely to have what we need when we come up with use cases later." Data is collected knowing that much of it will likely be useless, but when somebody does start looking for a correlation between variables, having a large and varied data set increases the odds that they'll be able to find an answer.