A few times I’ve had the privilege of speaking with Chinese business and government officials about publishing. It’s very interesting to hear their perspectives, and what they worry about.

The experience reminds me of something I read from C.S. Lewis about the virtue of reading old books. It’s a way to get your mind outside of the prejudices you live and breathe every day, he says. A fish doesn’t know that he’s wet, right?

The same is true with other cultures. Sometimes it might be helpful to try to view an issue from the perspective of another country, or another age group.

I’m no expert on the differences between American and Chinese culture, but it seems to me that Americans are far more likely to jump on trends, while the Chinese are more cautious. Many of the questions I get when I speak with the Chinese about publishing show this. They read disturbing articles about “disruption” and changes in the industry, and they want to know what’s really going on.

I try to emphasize skepticism towards articles about trends in publishing. There are too many people trying to make a point, or push an agenda. They believe some slogan and then they go out to find statistics to support it so they can make their point.

This is hardly unique to publishing. We all look for things that confirm our biases and we tend to ignore or downplay things that contradict them. Confirmation bias affects how we view the shift from print to digital, or the effect of social media, or the future of mobile, just as surely as it affects our views of politics or social issues.

To combat this, you need to make an effort to find evidence that contradicts your pet theory, but you also need to be very careful interpreting what you think you’re reading — not only because of bias, but because of general sloppiness.

For example, statistics about the shift from desktop to mobile often use worldwide figures and trends, which are quite misleading for the American market. Traffic on mobile is increasing dramatically in the third world because they don’t have desktops.

The point is not to deny the substantial shift to mobile, but to point out that we have to pay attention to the details.

I was reading up on book publishing this week and came across this very interesting review of the ebook market. This piece really grabbed me.

… the media reporting on the industry almost always confuses the sales of only 1,200 traditional AAP publishers with those of the entire US ebook market. And as we’ve also seen, those 1,200 AAP publishers now represent less than half of the broader US ebook market ….

What gets measured is often not a reflection of reality but a reflection of what’s easy to measure. Keep that in mind as you read statistics about your market.