seeing another n o e s t i m a t e s conversation where the people involved basically don't understand the type of estimates that NE is talking about

I've seen people estimating how long a bug they know nothing about will take to "fix" (not live, just "fixed") - it's insane

I've seen people guessing how long each of n arbitrary things that we are *definitely doing all of next*, *won't be changing*, and *have already had folk working on them for significant time*

I've even seen an individual (I tend to call them "estimators*" these days) criticise me because my (insane, pointless micro estimates) weren't accurate (this was in a company/team I'd just joined)

*estimators inevitablt have, ime, a bunch of problematic characteristics

the thing where people have already been working on something in complete isolation from anyone who might be capable of actually doing it is the one that always gets me - it's the only thing you can have certainty on: whatever it is takes that amount of time

estimates are *always* about decision authority going to whoever consumes the estimates (frequently people who ought not to even be there)

something I frequently do is to get "estimate consumers" to visualise what they're doing - and it's hilarious how they (1) can't estimate any of it, because (2) they really aren't applying any kind of rigour to what any of it is

> you have 6 emails in your inbox, can you estimate them?

"well no, I don't know from the summary"

*reads emails*

> what's your estimate on your response to them?

"well I can't say because I need to read this document, look something up, talk to x..."

> getting it yet?