statistical advisers inquiry

[acorn54]

i am satisfied with what i am using
just out of boredom i search for other software
has anyone tried this service:

http://statisticaladvisers.squarespace.com/about-us/

[ryesteve]

Posted in their forum by one of the company founders:

"First of all we are not handicappers and do not present ourselves as such."

That's warning bell #1.

Warning bell #2: Another company founder explains, "What we are doing here is giving you an easy to read tool that uses past performance data to rank every horse in every race"

So basically, every horse gets a number, and that's it. Even if you want to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume this power rating (for lack of a better term) of theirs is a good one, I think you know what happens when a good rating starts to get disseminated.

[prank]

Just speaking as a statistician here, and not a handicapper, I'd say that for any handicapper to find these guys useful, then the burden is on this service to speak the language of handicappers. Just saying that they don't present themselves as handicappers is only a caveat, but they need to show that someone can use their service in a reliable and profitable way.

For instance, if they have a statistical background, they should be able to say something additional about their rankings, such as forecasting a win probability. They can do that more easily than any subscriber could. Probabilities for win/place/show, would be better.

Personally, I was a little put off by the 6 Sigma philosophy on several of their pages. I suspect that if their statistical expertise comes from applying 6 Sigma, then they have fairly primitive statistical training. For instance, they mention 6 Sigma and they mention quantitative finance. They're either near one end of that spectrum or the other, and the frequency with which they mention 6 Sigma indicates they're not doing stochastic calculus. But, I'm speaking as a statistician, not a handicapper. :) If my money was on the line, I wouldn't care what they know, just what they can do for me.

Prank