As of today I have permission to make public my somewhat mischievous entry in the year-long world-wide stock and ETF forecasting contest … the sixth major M-competition in a storied history stretching back to 1982.
The intent of my entry was to turn the contest from a “model versus model” into a “market versus model” battle. Or if you like, a battle between the contest community and the community of a different kind that makes options markets efficient. You can call this contest highjacking if you want, or just “exogenous data”.
Hi I'm the author of the Prophet article https://www.microprediction.com/blog/prophet which for better or worse is why many people have recently questioned Prophet as a time-series method. (There are better, and certainly more formal critiques before and after - I referenced several).
I just hope those who push back on your article read all the way to the last paragraph. I'll repeat it below. Very well put.
I'm happy to answer technical questions about Prophet from anyone here but again, this is somewhat beside the point, which is...
The requirement that people come to your company knowing how to use piss easy baby tools is an extremely dumb and lazy hiring practice. It is also, unfortunately, a common practice in data science job postings. The aggregate effect of this practice being widespread is that talented people with unusual backgrounds get gatekept out of good paying jobs that they’d be exceptional at. Making fun of the job posting and using Prophet has been compared to gatekeeping. To be clear, the Prophet prerequisite is an actual form of gatekeeping being undertaken by a major company that has actual material impacts on people’s careers. The job post excludes people not based on aptitude, but based on whether they have previous experience and familiarity with a tool they could be introduced to and then master in under 15 minutes. A tweet making fun of the job posting is not gatekeeping. Get over it, LinkedIn clout chasers
I would add that since posting my own less-well worded version of this astonishment I have received numerous DM's from people at large companies who are aghast at the way Prophet is a favorite of management. So whether or not this was a problem at Zillow beyond, say, 2015, it might well be the case elsewhere.
If claims to have good knowledge in TS, but had not played around with Prophet (which is dead simple, takes a few hours - or 15 minutes for you - to see some problems), how interested/knowledgeable are they in TS? (I assume that they look for candidates knowledgeable in that field, and just playing around with prophet dosnt make you knowledgeable)
Especially in TS is saw many PhDs, really focussed on one specific method, not looking left and right and neither are pragmatic about their choices. Which is essential to solve anything in real life. Filtering candidates out, based on criteria like "played around with different stuff" is a good indicator for open-minded people IMHO.
https://medium.com/geekculture/is-facebooks-prophet-the-time...