In reply to Matt.

People seem to be arguing with the straw man that we’re developing core blind, or that I don’t know how to use data, or that I don’t care about data, none of which is remotely true. What I see a lot more is that they disagree with a decision and want a number they can point at and argue about.

First of all, thank you Matt for providing a detailed response to the discussion. Secondly, this assertion you make is not an accurate representation of the conversation. If this is truly how you've interpreted the discussion thus far I wish you would have reached out for clarification. The argument was never "we're developing core blind" or that anyone in the project "doesn't know how to use data" or "doesn't care about data". My assertion, and that of many others was always that lack of data in a project this big gives us a significant blind spot, and the efforts that are currently in place to remedy this problem are too focussed on the active contributors to the project, not the people out there in the world using the application. Not "we're developing core blind", rather "we may be inadvertently working in an echo chamber, and we have no way of knowing if that's the case so we should make every effort to find out." This is an issue that comes up repeatedly, especially around the 80/20 conversation which you yourself have argued is becoming problematic due to a lack of data.

You have legitimate arguments against telemetry, and those arguments belong in an open discussion about the feature. Others have legitimate arguments for telemetry that even if you disagree with them deserve that discussion.

This is a debate we need to have, together, on even ground. Otherwise it gets stuck in endless circular arguments and assumptions about the intentions of the other side.

We all have the same goal: To make WordPress better for the people who use WordPress. We need to come together and discuss how we make decisions that meet those goals in the best possible way. That starts with open conversation.