OT Census

[VetLegion]

From my expirience on Usenet, of the people who read a particular group only up to 10% actually post something, and 3% of most prolific posters generate 90% of the traffic.

Forums are different in some ways. First, they are more engaging. So I estimate that maybe 30-50% of regular readers also sometimes post. But I think it still holds that a single-digit percentage generates most traffic.

That was the intro. My estimate:

Regular readers: <200
Active posters: <100
90% of the traffic generated by: <50 people.
50% of the traffic generated by: <20 people.

[alva]

You'll probably find that the old 80-20 rule holds up here aswell.

[Grandpa Troll]

Originally posted by Sava
well, what do you consider to be a regular poster?

some people come and go... some reputable posters might not post very often, but yet, are still pillars of the community

I thought we were talking about OT Posters here

[Grandpa Troll]

Originally posted by Ming


250 is probably closer to reality.

Question asked and Ming The Magnificent has answered us, now go, go and post galore

[SlowwHand]

Just pulling a number out of my ass, i'd say 275 wouldn't be off a lot.

[Ming]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
Just pulling a number out of my ass, i'd say 275 wouldn't be off a lot.

Yeah, I did the same

But I think that's about the right range.

[Skanky Burns]

I would have to agree. 250 is not such a large number.

[Ted Striker]

ROFL @ Gramps graphics

[BeBMan]

I say the number is higher than my average banana consumption per year.

[civman2000]

Originally posted by Winston


Well, it's not necessarily restricted to people who bother to actually read the OP..

civman2000, if you're correct, this means that, already, more than 7% of the entire community has posted to this thread.

I guess my definition of "regular poster" might be a bit strict. I consider myself to be borderline between being a regular poster and not, for example.

[Ecthy]

I feel special.

[OzzyKP]

~100 not counting the DLs

[Solver]

I can't say anything about OTF specifically, but I've been checking the number of total active posters several times upon requests, and the number always is around 1000. Thus, 250-300 seems a fair estimate for the number of OTF posters.

Of course, it also matters whom you consider an OTF poster... is it posting once per month/week/day? For example, I wouldn't count myself as a poster here, I normally post maybe in one thread per month, like football predictions now.

OK, here's the number of currently active posters on the forums (have posted in May): 992. Of those, it would appear that 27 (!) were adbots, thus 965 real people.

[Richelieu]

Some people have weird stuff stored in their ass.

[Winston]

Good job, Solver. I wasn't aware those numbers were available, but you're right, they do seem to point to an OT size of about 300.

Also, for the sceptics out there, in this regard the conservatives among us, consider that for users starting with "A" alone, I can name 12 off the top of my head that are OT regulars:

Asher (might be a bit of a stretch, all things considered ), ajbera, Agathon, aneeshm, Adagio, Apocalypse, Az, Alexander's Horse, alva, atomant, Atahualpa, Adam Smith.

Those are just from a 90 second brainstorm, apologies in advance for obvious omissions..

Of course we can argue back and forth about whether they're all regulars according to our individual standards - I know they fit my definition - and I realise that posters may not be distributed evenly across the alphabet, but just as a rough estimate,

12 x 26 = 312

Give or take, say 10%, I would expect this number to be pretty close to the "truth".