Except the end result is usually the exact same.
A wildly inaccurate model for the sole purpose of impressing advertisers|investors|stakeholders with fancy, meaningless charts.
The conclusions you can draw from these models are either utterly obvious, or false. I'm looking forward to hear about a single example of the opposite.
They were also at pains to mention that you cannot A/B test your way to a great product. You need deep insight and intuition to build a great product. But once you have a great product, you can help it grow faster by being rigorous about optimizing the drivers of growth.
"If, on a graph, the plotted data does not match the
initial hypothesis, make the line fatter."
-- J. Meals
I'm still waiting for an example where such a model predicted something non-obvious.
Did Myspace have growth hackers?
I suggest that we respectfully agree to disagree.