MacRumors membership statistics (oh boy, trivia!)

[Doctor Q]

I didn't want my CPU to get cold, so I gave it some number crunching to do this weekend. I collected statistics about MacRumors members, to see what useful or useless charts I could make. Here's the first one, based on registration dates. It shows how many members joined each month. Not what I expected!

[makisushi]

I didn't want my CPU to get cold, so I gave it some number crunching to do this weekend. I collected statistics about MacRumors members, to see what useful or useless charts I could make. Here's the first one, based on registration dates. It shows how many members joined each month. Not what I expected!

Can you do a break down of how many members actually post? I am interested in that.

[Abstract]

Wow, what made that one month in the chart so special?

[virividox]

summer lots of bored people hehe

[munkle]

Wow, what made that one month in the chart so special?

I'm trying to figure out what was released then. The iMac came out at the beginning of the year I think but I can't remember what else, apart from .mac and surely that couldn't have caused the surge!

[SilentPanda]

Nice... I've been around almost 2 years... Oct 2002 for me... the 8th to be more specific... I bought my first Mac (iMac G4 800 15") in February of 2002 and joined up a few months later... now I only have an iBook G4 800 12" (same computing power really... but just portable). Hopefully I'll be able to hold off for the rev B. iMac G5 but I'm... just one person!

And today I finally paid up the $20... :)

[Rower_CPU]

I'm pretty sure that spike coincides with arn requiring registration for forum access during/after the MWNY 2002 keynote and the site getting mentioned on TechTV (see: Traffic and Server Load).

[Mr. Anderson]

I'm pretty sure that spike coincides with arn requiring registration for forum access during/after the MWNY 2002 keynote and the site getting mentioned on TechTV (see: Traffic and Server Load).

yep, that was it. I remember the membership numbers going up 100s in one day, it was quite bizarre....

Funny, though, I thought that when the new forums went into effect way back when, there were a whole bunch of members who all joined on the same day (just because of the data base transfer) Guess there weren't that many members back then...

D

[Savage Henry]

Wow, what made that one month in the chart so special?


Jaguar ? iChat beta ?

I reckons it was when the iPod started to get REALLY big in the conciousness of the self-appointed cool.

[edesignuk]

Jaguar ? iChat beta ?

I reckons it was when the iPod started to get REALLY big in the conciousness of the self-appointed cool.Nope.
I'm pretty sure that spike coincides with arn requiring registration for forum access during/after the MWNY 2002 keynote and the site getting mentioned on TechTV (see: Traffic and Server Load).
;)

[Doctor Q]

The two specific events matching the spikes are:

MacWorld Expo July 02
rumor summary: http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2002/07/20020714223731.shtml
keynote report: http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2002/07/20020717115700.shtml

MacWorld Expo January 04
rumor summary: http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2004/01/20040101213714.shtml
keynote coverage: http://www.macrumors.com/events/mwsf2004.html
rumor wrapup: http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2004/01/20040109013227.shtml

The first spike is explained both by the need to register and by interest in MacWorld Expo. The second spike is presumably based only interest in that month's show.

[munkle]

Can you do a break down of how many members actually post? I am interested in that.

It would be nice to know the percentage of members that actually post, you can't go wrong with more trivia! :p

[Doctor Q]

It would be nice to know the percentage of members that actually post, you can't go wrong with more trivia! :pGot it!

56.9% of members have at least one post. So 43.1% of members are lurkers.

[emw]

Got it!

56.9% of members have at least one post. So 43.1% of members are lurkers.

Okay. Next challenge. Now that you have posting information, is there any way to break it down:

1. Percentage of members in each sub-category (newbie, 6502, 68020, etc.)

2. Percentage of members in "buckets" based on posts per day:
- PPD < 2
- 2 <= PPD < 4
- 4 <= PPD < 6
- 6 <= PPD < 8
...

[Mr. Anderson]

If he's doing this by hand, that's a ton of work.

It would be interesting to know if it could be automated....

D

[wdlove]

Great work Doctor Q, you computer skills and CPU power certainly aren't going to waste.

Congratulations SilentPanda on becoming a Contributor, welcome aboard. It's important to support that awesome site.

[emw]

If he's doing this by hand, that's a ton of work.

It would be interesting to know if it could be automated....

D

Ouch, you're right. I am assuming he has a spreadsheet of some kind that he can sort the data. From there, it's cake to make these sorts.

[Doctor Q]

I'm using pebbles to count, and stone tablets and a chisel to record the results, but I'm thinking of upgrading to an abacus and a slide rule next. :D

Here's the same chart as in the first post, but with the lurkers removed, so we can see how many members who have posted joined each month. This time January 04 is the winner.

[zelmo]

...And today I finally paid up the $20... :)

OK, I've searched the FAQ trying to find out the deal with becoming a contributor, to no avail. HELP!

[emw]

I'm using pebbles to count, and stone tablets and a chisel to record the results, but I'm thinking of upgrading to an abacus and a slide rule next. :D

Yes, the charts are a dead giveaway... Thanks for putting all this together; being a data guy, I love to see the statistics on things.

[munkle]

Got it!

56.9% of members have at least one post. So 43.1% of members are lurkers.

Thanks Doctor Q, very impressed with your work!

Isn't that a pretty high percentage of registered lurkers? I was a lurker for a long time but never bothered to register, why register just to lurk? Unless a heck of a lot of people only registered for the WWDC events etc. Other explanation is that people who were prepared to post suddenly became too frightened, fearing that they might commit the ultimate Macrumors sin and inadvertantly refer to their computers as MAC's and thus be forever consigned to Macrumors hell! :eek: :p

[Doctor Q]

OK, I've searched the FAQ trying to find out the deal with becoming a contributor, to no avail. HELP!See here (http://www.macrumors.com/contrib.html) and here (http://www.macrumors.com/site.php?mode=about). Basically, you send $20 via PayPal or Amazon and then e-mail contributor@macrumors.com to report the payment information and your forum member name so they can be linked together.

[munkle]

OK, I've searched the FAQ trying to find out the deal with becoming a contributor, to no avail. HELP!

From the Macrumors About Page (http://www.macrumors.com/site.php?mode=about).

Edit: beaten to it!

[zelmo]

See here (http://www.macrumors.com/contrib.html) and here (http://www.macrumors.com/site.php?mode=about). Basically, you send $20 via PayPal or Amazon and then e-mail contributor@macrumors.com to report the payment information and your forum member name so they can be linked together.

Thanks for the info.

[PlaceofDis]

the breakdown of members by percentage would be interesting to see, by ones who post and who don't because obviously all the registered users who do not post are newbies

but, here is my challenge for you, along the same lines as what you have already done, can you figure out and show the number of posts by month? that way we can see where the spikes fall in terms of general activity on the site, i guess its pretty obvious that it occurs around large events, but it would be cool to know for sure

[emw]

How 'bout you just post the data, and we can make our own charts? :D

[realityisterror]

::banging utensils on table::
AGE! AGE! AGE! AGE!
:cool:

reality
AGE!!

[Doctor Q]

Counts by member rank? Yes, I'll do that one next.

Posts by month? Hmmm. Yes, I think I could figure that out. I might need to upgrade to one of these (http://www.hpmuseum.org/americ.jpg).

By age? Yes, it'll be really fun to figure that out and see those results, but that'll take even more time. Consider it on my list. I'll never run out of ways to waste my weekends!

[Doctor Q]

I just ran into this Penn State University research summary: Giving Computers The Jitters Helps Explain Human Behavior (http://www.psu.edu/ur/2004/pretaskanxiety.html), which reports that math anxiety reduces your computation speed more than your accuracy.
In this study, we used our program to mimic the results achieved by people who can be seen as having a type of math anxiety. However, the program could also be used to study the effects of feeling threatened or worried before driving a car, using a computer or other stressful task -- and to help develop remedial strategies. ... In general, when people appraise a task as threatening, they have greater difficulty processing information. On the other hand, people who appraise a task as challenging perceive themselves as having more than enough resources to perform the task, don't respond with stress and perform well on the task. ... [It] matched fairly well the published data on humans threatened by the task: performance accuracy remained the same but performance speed decreased about 25 percent.
Of course, we Mac users can laugh at the phrase "using a computer or other stressful task". Our Macs make us feel relaxed, not stressed! :)

[baby duck monge]

but, here is my challenge for you, along the same lines as what you have already done, can you figure out and show the number of posts by month? that way we can see where the spikes fall in terms of general activity on the site, i guess its pretty obvious that it occurs around large events, but it would be cool to know for sure

and if you broke down the last six months into posts per day, i'm sure you could get some interesting results there, too. lots of weekend posts of "powerbook g5 on tuesday" and lots of tuesday posts of sadness. hahaha :D :rolleyes:

[makisushi]

Counts by member rank? Yes, I'll do that one next.

Posts by month? Hmmm. Yes, I think I could figure that out. I might need to upgrade to one of these (http://www.hpmuseum.org/americ.jpg).

By age? Yes, it'll be really fun to figure that out and see those results, but that'll take even more time. Consider it on my list. I'll never run out of ways to waste my weekends!

Ok, then next give us the statistics on posts word counts, letter counts, most common used letter...lol :D

[cb911]

wow, nice work Doctor Q. :D i hope you're taking regular 15 minute breaks between calculating these stats, wouldnt' want you getting blisters on your fingertips. :p

it would also be interesting to see what percentage of posts were actaully Mac related, how many were just humorous, etc. but i guess that's not even possible... soemone would have to read all the posts and categorize them. :eek:

[Doctor Q]

Here's the distribution of membership by rank.

Technically, members with 0 to 29 posts are Newbies, and Newbies constitute 92% of all members. In the graph, I divided them into two categories: those with 1-29 posts ("Newbie") and those with 0 posts ("No posts").

[Doctor Q]

And of course we need a version that shows the relative populations of members who post. Since I omitted the no-posters from this chart, the absolute counts are the same as the pervious chart, but the percentages change to reflect the balance of ranks among the members who have ever posted. As you can see, Newbies still dominate the counts, even though they don't dominate the conversations!

[Mr. Anderson]

Ah, but for a truly geeky analysis, since you have the means....

plot number of posts per grouping - so there are only 33 in the top bracket, my guess is they have a larger percentage of posts than the newbies who come in with the largest group :D

D

[Mr. Anderson]

Also, maybe break out the 601s as well, there are quite a few in that range and put in the range that is missing :D

D

[Doctor Q]

it would also be interesting to see what percentage of posts were actaully Mac related, how many were just humorous, etc. but i guess that's not even possible... soemone would have to read all the posts and categorize them. :eek:Impossible to get an exact count, but anybody could create an estimate based on a sample of posts. The more posts you sample, the more accurate the estimate. Wanna volunteer to count a hundred posts with random post#s and see what you get?

Of course, it would be a matter of opinion whether a given post was considered humorous. In fact, I'm not sure whether your post (the one I'm quoting from) would be considered Mac related or not!

[Doctor Q]

Ah, but for a truly geeky analysis...You mean I haven't been geeky yet? :(
plot number of posts per grouping - so there are only 33 in the top bracket, my guess is they have a larger percentage of posts than the newbies who come in with the largest groupHmmm... thinking...

For the top ranks, I can get an actual count from the Top Posters display, since there are only dozens of them to sum. For Newbies, I could count the number with 1 post, 2 posts, etc., and get an accurate count. For the ranks in the middle (Members, Regulars, ...), I could use the midpoint of their post range as the assumed average post count. That would give a pretty good estimate of the number of posts for each rank. So yes, I'll do that. But I'm going to need longer weekends. Please arrange for a constitutional amendment to make the weekend 4 days long every week.

[Royal Pineapple]

Please arrange for a constitutional amendment to make the weekend 4 days long every week.
i have friends that only have class on tues and thurs and dont have a job :D
they get that every week

[Wyvernspirit]

I joined during the peak month, I joined during the peak month. Although that was over 2 years ago I only have 63 posts, including this one. :cool:

Edit: How many more post do I need to get to the next level?

[Doctor Q]

I only have 63 posts. How many more post do I need to get to the next level?You'll be a "Regular" at 100 posts. Let's see, 100 minus 63, ummm, sorry, too hard for me to compute. Here is the official list.

[me_94501]

Isn't that a pretty high percentage of registered lurkers?
I am an admin on the XvsXP.com fourms (http://bbs.xvsxp.com/index.html) and 200 of our 612 members are postless (32.68%). Out of those who have posted, there are all of maybe 30 (4.9% of members) regular posters.

[Mr. Anderson]

I am an admin on the XvsXP.com fourms (http://bbs.xvsxp.com/index.html) and 200 of our 612 members are postless (32.68%). Out of those who have posted, there are all of maybe 30 (4.9% of members) regular posters.

yes, but you don't require registration to view the forums, do you? That was required a couple times before MacExpos.....

D

[Wyvernspirit]

You'll be a "Regular" at 100 posts. Let's see, 100 minus 63, ummm, sorry, too hard for me to compute. Here is the official list.

At my current .08 per day posting speed, I have 437.5 days till I make a hundred posts, and 5437.5 days (14.8 years +/- .3) till I can have an avatar. :eek:

I guess I might want to keep posting and see if I can bring that number up.

While we are on this topic, whats the fastest someone made 100, 500, 1000 posts. what's the average post per day for the site, for members, regulars, etc.

[dross]

I too just poneyed up the $20 via Amazon and was wondering what percentage of users do this? or what is the total number of contributers?

[Mr. Anderson]

While we are on this topic, whats the fastest someone made 100, 500, 1000 posts. what's the average post per day for the site, for members, regulars, etc.

The 24 hour record is 200 posts (yes, that's right :D)

I'm thinking the 7 day record is well over 700 posts, probably closer to 1000.

I don't think there's an easy way to find out though...although I do know the general time these things happened.....

D

[Wyvernspirit]

The 24 hour record is 200 posts (yes, that's right :D)




Thats cool, when did that happen?



I'm thinking the 7 day record is well over 700 posts, probably closer to 1000.

I don't think there's an easy way to find out though...although I do know the general time these things happened.....

D

I find statistics like this interesting for some reason, I guess its my math mind at work, which, unfortunately doesn't get fully utilized at my current ocupation.

[SilentPanda]

See here (http://www.macrumors.com/contrib.html) and here (http://www.macrumors.com/site.php?mode=about). Basically, you send $20 via PayPal or Amazon and then e-mail contributor@macrumors.com to report the payment information and your forum member name so they can be linked together.

Does anybody check that e-mail address though? I e-mailed that address about a month ago asking how I could be a contributor and nobody ever responded... at present I still haven't been upgraded (not that I care that much anyhow... I figure I owe MacRumors more than $20 anyhow for all my pointless rambling)...

edit: Ohhhhh... looks like I've been upgraded... although I still have ads... which are blocked anyhow...

[dross]

Does anybody check that e-mail address though? I e-mailed that address about a month ago asking how I could be a contributor and nobody ever responded... at present I still haven't been upgraded (not that I care that much anyhow... I figure I owe MacRumors more than $20 anyhow for all my pointless rambling)...

I also have not heard back.

Maybe it is so uncomon for people to contrubuite that they do not check it regulary?

[Wyvernspirit]

I think I might contribute when I reach 100 posts. :confused:

Which, at my current rate of .09 posts per day, would be in 322.2 days (I'm also at 71 posts after this one).

Woohoo! I'm gaining ground now. Only 13 years till I get to have a nice little pic under my name. :D

[Doctor Q]

Thats cool, when did that happen?It behooves me to say (what an odd expression that is) that the posting records mentioned by Mr. Anderson won't be beaten, because such posting sprees are no longer permitted.


I find statistics like this interesting for some reason, I guess its my math mind at work, which, unfortunately doesn't get fully utilized at my current ocupation.How many seconds will it be until you get a better job? :)

It sounds like you are like me - finding it fun to count and measure and look for anything interesting that pops out. Sometimes statistics are useless, and sometimes downright misleading (did you know that over 99% of career criminals drank milk when they were children?), but once in a while you find something profound in those numbers.

[Wyvernspirit]

How many seconds will it be until you get a better job? :)


Unfortunately its not an easy prospect for me. Although I would like to consider myself a smart person, I do not have the education nor the money to get the education to get the jobs that I would enjoy. The reasons for that are many and not that important so I won't get into it right now.

but once in a while you find something profound in those numbers.

Exactly.

[Mr. Anderson]

It behooves me to say (what an odd expression that is) that the posting records mentioned by Mr. Anderson won't be beaten, because such posting sprees are no longer permitted.

I wouldn't say never.....it is possible, but very, very, very, very, incredibly unlikely. ;)

As for when those happened, I'm thinking summer of 2002.... MacRumors got to be a lot more fun that year and all sorts of things happened....

D

[dross]

I also have not heard back.

Maybe it is so uncomon for people to contrubuite that they do not check it regulary?

I guess some one did. It looks like SP and I have been updated.

Thanks a bunch.

[Doctor Q]

I'm working on more trivia. Does anybody want to guess which letters of the alphabet are the most common and least common in member names? And what the most common length of a member name is? Any speculation on the longest and shortest member names? I'm putting those facts together next.

[Mr. Anderson]

least frequent letters- q, z, v (x maybe)

most frequent - e, t, s, r

longest user name - KnightWhoSaysNi and any other 15 char name (seems to be the forum maximum).

shortest - .a

don't know if you can have a single letter as a name - and .a might be .a(space) since all the other short names are 3 letters

Oh, and I'd include numbers and characters in your stats - there are quite a few of them.

D

[Doctor Q]

Oh, and I'd include numbers and characters in your stats - there are quite a few of them.OK, what do you think are the most used digits and punctuation characters?

[aus_dave]

My guesses...

Most common punctuation: underscore (space doesn't count but that's common too)

Most common length: 7 characters

I would be interested in seeing the stats on ages. There are so many school/dorm/college threads here, I feel old just reading them :D.

[rdowns]

OK, what do you think are the most used digits and punctuation characters?

Hey Doc,

While you're at it, how about:

The ratio of thatwendingo posts to his use of the :rolleyes:

The # of times wdlove has replied seriously to a sarcastic comment

How often edesignuk changes his 'tar

Why you drive on parkways and park on driveways

[Macmaniac]

I'm so proud to be in the top 99.76% of MR. Its also interesting to see that when I registered only 160 people did in the same month! Wow there were not a lot of people back then!

[Doctor Q]

Why you drive on parkways and park on drivewaysAdd to the list: What is the sum of one and the largest number that has ever been written, calculated, described, or spoken of by any human?

How often edesignuk changes his 'tar? Answer: Never. The moderators keep changing it to play tricks on him. He really wanted this one all along:

[aswitcher]

Maybe this is around here somewhere but do we have any stats on posts themselves, like records of how many a day; top ten threads to get to 100, 500 etc posts; average number of new threads started per day; average length of thread?

[MacNut]

Can you make a stat of who has started the most threads and what are the most read threads.

[Doctor Q]

Wow! The ideas for statistics are coming in fast and furious. I will do my best to accommodate at least some of you.

Here's what I computed tonite. This shows how many member names contain each of the letters of the ASCII alphabet, ignoring case.

In the chart, "sp" means "space" and the underbar character is included too. I included underbar because it is used as a word separator (like space) and is the only punctuation character that is in over 500 member names.

They are sorted from the letter that is in the most member names (A) to the letter that is in the least member names (Q). Some people might say that letter Q is the most unpopular letter in member names, but I prefer to think of it as the most exclusive! :)

The distribution is similar to the distribution of letters in English, although letter T is further down than I'd expect. Notice that the five vowels came out in alphabetical order.

Note that I counted members, not characters. So Doctor Q counts for letter D once, letter O once (not twice), letter C once, letter T once, letter R once, space once, and letter Q once.

Next up... similar charts for digits and punctuation characters. I will count letters with diacritic marks separately, so übergeek won't feel left out. Maybe I'll be able to cover member names like C4!™ too. However, I'm not sure I can handle 昨日の女の子!

[vniow]

what are the most read threads.

That's simple enough, just go to a subforum and click on "Views" on the left side. It'll sort by how many times the thread has been viewed, click on it again to reverse the order.

[MacNut]

True, but does that list go all the way to the beginning of the site.

[Mr. Anderson]

True, but does that list go all the way to the beginning of the site.

that list includes all registered members...

so I was pretty close on the least used letters - but farther off on the most used...

Sort of surprised there isn't a member named aerion :D

D

[Doctor Q]

Here are the numbers of members with digits in their member names and the same for ASCII punctuation. Low-valued digits are favored over high-valued digits, with 1 edging out 2 and 0. Period and minus sign (used as a word separator, hyphen, or short dash) clearly lead the symbol parade, but remember that underbar beats them all. Poor semicolon!

[Doctor Q]

plot number of posts per groupingYour wish is my command, Mr. Anderson. Here is a delicious pie chart showing the percentage of posts by members of the various ranks, with the four members who have over 1% individually counted separately.

[munkle]

Your wish is my command, Mr. Anderson. Here is a delicious pie chart showing the percentage of posts by members of the various ranks, with the four members who have over 1% individually counted separately.

Delicious pie chart indeed! My hat goes off to the four members but nice to know that 'regular' folk like me are an important part of the Macrumors community!

[Diatribe]

Thanks Doctor Q for all those nice statistics. Very interesting indeed. To say it with your words... very "charming" :D :p
Although I thought the newbies would make out a higher percentage, it was nice to see that more than half of the posts come really frequent posters. Shows that we have a nice community and not just people who drop by occasionally.

[Mr. Anderson]

Your wish is my command, Mr. Anderson. Here is a delicious pie chart showing the percentage of posts by members of the various ranks, with the four members who have over 1% individually counted separately.

ha! 1.8% damn....so how many of the top members does it take to equal all the newbies in posts?

I especially like to see that Rower got the pink pie slice :D

D

[Rower_CPU]

ha! 1.8% damn....so how many of the top members does it take to equal all the newbies in posts?

I especially like to see that Rower got the pink pie slice :D

D

:p

Q knows I'm secure enough in my manhood to wear pink comfortably. :D

[Doctor Q]

Important Q stats:

Number of member names containing Q: 539
Number starting with Q: 154
Number ending with Q: 61

Q names with avatars:

Doctor Q http://forums.macrumors.com/image.php?u=12149

QCassidy352 http://forums.macrumors.com/image.php?u=15733

question fear http://forums.macrumors.com/image.php?u= 16160

Squire http://forums.macrumors.com/image.php?u= 14023

Best Q names:
BodaciousBBQ
filequit
PickledSquirrel
QueenoftheAbyss
question fear
quixotic
Qunchuy
StuPid QPid
Tequila Grandma
The "best" names were determined completely mathematically. Namely, I gave 100 points to the ones I liked best and no points to the others, and then sorted them by points to see which came out on top!

Extra credit: Two member names contain the homonym "cue":
cuelife
ecuervo

[Mr. Anderson]

Q, run a query on member name length....I was playing around this morning and found some really long ones, much more than 15 chars - from a previous incarnation of the forums that got transfered over.

You might need to include banned members as well....

And do a distribution on them while you're at it :D

D

[Doctor Q]

I suspected that the member name length was previously 25 and is now 15, but I ran across these two members (probably the same person) who registered this year in January:

zzzz---ajurilot--- (length 18)
zzzz---aabebee-- (length 16)

So what is the current maximum length?

[Mr. Anderson]

15 is the current maximum...

but I found this (http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=22#post22) today:

Anton Szandor LaVey - 19 chars

and this (http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=12#post12)

DaveTrappedInWindowsWorld - 25 chars!!!

D

[Doctor Q]

Anton Szandor LaVey and DaveTrappedInWindowsWorld are both from 2001, as are all but two of the names longer than 15 that I've found, but the zzzz members are recently registered, which is why I'm confused about the currently allowed maximum length.

The longest name I have come across is newtonshop lausanne (RIP) (length 25).

The shortest I've found is a member named 5.

So yes, I will do a distribution of lengths of member names. Anybody want to guess which name length will be the most common?

[dross]

Anton Szandor LaVey and DaveTrappedInWindowsWorld are both from 2001, as are all but two of the names longer than 15 that I've found, but the zzzz members are recently registered, which is why I'm confused about the currently allowed maximum length.

The longest name I have come across is newtonshop lausanne (RIP) (length 25).

The shortest I've found is a member named 5.

So yes, I will do a distribution of lengths of member names. Anybody want to guess which name length will be the most common?
8

[themadchemist]

Important Q stats:

[...]

Extra credit: Two member names contain the homonym "cue":
cuelife
ecuervo

The second one probably doesn't count. I'd wager that ecuervo is pronounced 'ee kwervo' and not 'ee cyoorvo.'

[Doctor Q]

The second one probably doesn't count. I'd wager that ecuervo is pronounced 'ee kwervo' and not 'ee cyoorvo.'I have no doubt that you are correct. They only got extra credit by luck, for containing the substring C U E. I also looked for QUEUE and KEW (as in kewpie) but didn't find any.

[wdlove]

Nice work Doctor Q. You have been quite the busy fellow. Hope that you are finding quality time for your wife. I like the pie chart also. :D

[themadchemist]

Nice work Doctor Q. You have been quite the busy fellow. Hope that you are finding quality time for your wife. I like the pie chart also. :D

His "wife?" Is that what he calls his computer these days? ;) But seriously, great job Q.

[dross]

I would be curious in knowing what the higest and averge daily post count is for the regular users.

[Doctor Q]

8I didn't know the answer myself until I finished tallying this morning. The most common length of a member name is indeed 8, just as dross predicted. dross, you deserve a prize for "Most accurate 1-character post".

This graph shows the number of members whose member name is 1 character long, 2 characters long, etc., up to 25. As we've been discussing, the forum maximum seems to be 15, but at some points in time up to 25 was allowed.

The scale of the graph makes it too hard to see the distribution from 16 to 25, so I zoomed that section in the inset graph. Guest accounts like DaveTrappedInWindowsWorld aren't included, but all registered members are.

[Doctor Q]

There are 66 members with names longer than 15, but only two of them, zzzz---ajurilot--- and zzzz---aabebee--, have registered since January 2001. Those two somehow registered in January 2004.

Longest registered member name (length 25):
newtonshop lausanne (RIP)

Runners up (length 24):
Alexandre de Silva Cunha
Bjarni Ingimar Juliusson
(The 3rd one is an e-mail address, so I'll omit showing it.)

Shortest registered member name (length 1):
5

Highest poster with a 2-letter name (197 posts):
.a

Most of the other long names are people's full names or their e-mail addresses, so I'll just report the exceptions.

Length 22:
NEED HELP URGENTLY!!!! (apparently too desperate to have ever posted)
Phineas O. Monkeypants (apparently too ashamed to have ever posted)

Length 21:
The Gods of MacRumors (apparently too important to have ever posted)

And now, we limit ourselves to members with avatars and see what we get.

Longest name among avatar members (length 19, and the only one over length 15):
ShaolinMiddleFinger

Runners up (length 15, 5-way tie):
baby duck monge
Capt Underpants
michaelrjohnson
realityisterror
Royal Pineapple

Length 15, eligible for an avatar:
DreaminDirector

Shortest names among avatar members (length 3, 11-way tie):
arn
big
emw
Gus
job
jsw
Sol
SPG
TEG
Wes
7on

[dross]

I didn't know the answer myself until I finished tallying this morning. The most common length of a member name is indeed 8, just as dross predicted. dross, you deserve a prize for "Most accurate 1-character post".

This graph shows the number of members whose member name is 1 character long, 2 characters long, etc., up to 25. As we've been discussing, the forum maximum seems to be 15, but at some points in time up to 25 was allowed.

The scale of the graph makes it too hard to see the distribution from 16 to 25, so I zoomed that section in the inset graph. Guest accounts like DaveTrappedInWindowsWorld aren't included, but all registered members are.

I think I was the only one to guess. I should go to Vegas!!!!

[aus_dave]

I think I was the only one to guess. I should go to Vegas!!!!I guessed 7 back on page 3, but there's no prizes for coming second :D.

[Wyvernspirit]

Here's a really silly one:

How many user names have the letters in alphabetical order (min 3 letters)?

Extra Credit: Reverse Order?

[Wyvernspirit]

Ooooo, Ooooo

Here's another:

For those who comment on location,

How many different countries are represented here (Extra Credit, How many list a location that does not fit with this criteria, How many don't list a location)?

[dross]

Ooooo, Ooooo

Here's another:

For those who comment on location,

How many different countries are represented here (Extra Credit, How many list a location that does not fit with this criteria, How many don't list a location)?

28
6

[Wyvernspirit]

Wooo Hooo, I am finaly to .1 posts per day, thats right point one posts per day.

That means: 200 days till I reach 100 post total.

4200 days, or 11.5 years, till I reach 500 posts and can have an Avatar.

things are really moving along now.

How many other people are on my pace. OR any pace 1.8 through .0001 or some other numer. Do A Pie, yum, Pie, chart.

[Mr. Anderson]

Wooo Hooo, I am finaly to .1 posts per day, thats right point one posts per day.

That means: 200 days till I reach 100 post total.


you just had 3 posts today.... that statistic is not all that useful in projection of post count.

If you looked at my post count rate you'd see it fluctuate daily from 0 to over 100 (not recently though). And there are plenty of people who have not posted for months - I'm one of them as well....

D

[Wyvernspirit]

you just had 3 posts today.... that statistic is not all that useful in projection of post count.

If you looked at my post count rate you'd see it fluctuate daily from 0 to over 100 (not recently though). And there are plenty of people who have not posted for months - I'm one of them as well....

D

:) I know, I just find it fun to figure this stuff out. I go weeks, maybe months at a time with out a single post, then do 5 to 10 in a sigle day. It means little, but so does most of this thread. :D

[Doctor Q]

Cross reference: Ages of MacRumors members revealed at last.

I put my results about member ages in another thread because more people are interested in that topic than in the random stats I've dug up for this thread. This thread is probably putting people to sleep, but I'll still try to dig up some more miscellaneous stats here for the die-hards. :)

[Doctor Q]

I'm sure there are important lessons we can learn about ourselves based on these facts about substrings in member names. These are counts of the number of member names that contain the given string somewhere within the member name.

Member names containing...

gurl (10) vs. grrl (12) vs. gal (76) vs. girl (58) vs. woman (2) vs. lady (20) vs. chick (3) [excluding chicken]

dude (100) vs. guy (216) vs. boi (39) vs. boy (331) vs. man (1096) vs. gentleman (0)

baby (39) vs. child (19) vs. kid (95) vs. junior (9) vs. teen (12) vs. adult (1) vs. senior (0) vs. geezer (3)

king (102) vs. queen (11) vs. jester (7) vs. prince (4) vs. princess (4) [excluding prince]

plain (3) vs. fancy (2)

alien (10) vs. human (9)

1984 (11) vs. 2004 (33)

good (41) vs. bad (68) vs. evil (71)

emac (96) vs. imac (60) vs. ibook (50) vs. powerbook (30) vs. powermac (10)

claris (1) vs. clarus (2)

ipod (44) vs. airport (1) vs. isight (0)

geek (51) vs. nerd (25) vs. dweeb (3) vs. dork (9) vs. Doctor Q (1)

cheetah (3) vs. puma (5) vs. jaguar (4) vs. panther (13) vs. tiger (30) vs. leopard (0)

cat (131) vs. dog (184) vs. mouse (10) vs. wolf (48) vs. cow (52) vs. monkey (78) vs. fish (84) vs. dogcow (4)

like (23) vs. love (62) vs. hate (22)

macos (14) vs. windows (7)

apple (210) vs. microsoft (2)

jobs (10) vs. amelio (1) vs. sculley (0)

rumor (26) vs. rumour (1)

serious (2) vs. silly (7)

dumb (8) vs. idiot (8) vs. moron (3) vs. stupid (4) vs. smart (11) vs. genius (9) vs. einstein (4)

work (32) vs. play (25)

guitar (16) vs. tuba (5)

crt (1) vs. lcd (0)

dying (1) vs. dead (36) vs. alive (1) vs. living (2)

hot (93) vs. cold (14) vs. cool (61) vs. frozen (2)

nuts (4) vs. crzy (3) vs. crazy (29) vs. insane (8) [excluding sane] vs. sane (5)

signal (1) vs. noise (7) -- a signal to noise ratio of of .14 :)


Member names beginning with...

miss (13) vs. ms. (2) vs. mrs (17)

mr. (55) vs. mister (20) vs. master (24)

doctor (9) vs. dr. (21) vs. dj (106)

tiny (6) vs. lil (23) vs. itsy (1) vs. little (18) vs. small (7) vs. large (1) vs. huge (3) vs. fat (10) vs. big (150)

old (28) vs. new (82)

[Mr. Anderson]

I'm sure there are important lessons we can learn about ourselves based on these facts about substrings in member names.

I'm at a loss to find any lessons - that was a ton of work, though.

What sort of stuff do you plan for next?

D

[Doctor Q]

I'm at a loss to find any lessonsHow 'bout these?

There are more boys than girls, but more ladies than gentlemen.

There are aliens among us.

Good does not triumph over evil.

Monkeys and fish are cool.

It's not OK to call somebody else in the forums a moron, but it's fine to call yourself one.

The preferred word is "geek".

[Wyvernspirit]

How about there is more work than play. ;)

[Doctor Q]

Off-topic in my own thread, but at least related to numbers...

Here's evidence that the world is made out of binary digits. X stands for "ten", or 10 in decimal, so this line in my forum display just now reads 10 10 00 01 100 10101 10!

(There are even a few more in there, but I got tired of drawing circles.)

[Mr. Anderson]

Here's evidence that the world is made out of binary digits. X stands for "ten", or 10 in decimal, so this line in my forum display just now reads 10 10 00 01 100 10101 10!


Now that's stretching it, even for you....:D

In ascii, dropping the last '10' it stands for "¡•" - not sure what you're going for there....

D

[Doctor Q]

I'm honored that Scott Adams wrote yesterday's Dilbert strip with me in mind.

[Doctor Q]

Two new graphs for your enjoyment.

They show the distribution of membership by month of birth, in calendar order and in descending order of member count. Many members state their month and day of birth without the year, so there was more data to work with here than there was for member ages.

[Mr. Anderson]

January is a bit suspicious....:D

Can you break down the month of January and see how many have the default of 01/01?

Good stuff Q...

D

[Doctor Q]

January is a bit suspicious...I agree. There are too many members who left it set to January 1st, maybe as a way of indicating "not specified". So I reduced the count for January 1st (172) to the average of the other 30 days in January (29), producing the new charts below.

Actually, there are probably slightly more people born on January 1st than on January 2nd. I'm only guessing, but I have a couple of reasons for this theory. First, for tax reasons, people may want to have their child December 31st or January 1st (which can be counted in the previous year) rather than January 2nd or later, and planned birthing and the all-too-common Caesarians let parents influence the scheduling more than ever before. Second, the excitement of a beautiful float in the Rose Parade or, more likely, seeing your favorite football team win a bowl game, might just send the new mom into labor!

[Wyvernspirit]

I agree. There are too many members who left it set to January 1st, maybe as a way of indicating "not specified". So I reduced the count for January 1st (172) to the average of the other 30 days in January (29), producing the new charts below.

Actually, there are probably slightly more people born on January 1st than on January 2nd. I'm only guessing, but I have a couple of reasons for this theory. First, for tax reasons, people may want to have their child December 31st or January 1st (which can be counted in the previous year) rather than January 2nd or later, and planned birthing and the all-too-common Caesarians let parents influence the scheduling more than ever before. Second, the excitement of a beautiful float in the Rose Parade or, more likely, seeing your favorite football team win a bowl game, might just send the new mom into labor!

I was born in the most popular month. Yay, I'm popular.

[wdlove]

Great job, Doctor Q, thank you. It's a very interesting spread. My birth month of April seemed to be a very average one.

[Doctor Q]

I'm not sure you can say very average. Isn't that like saying "the temperature is too medium"? :p

[zelmo]

We were all newbs once. I think it would be cool for relative newcomers (such as myself) to be able to glimpse back through the mists of time and read the first posts made by some of the more illustrious MR members. Unfortunately, when I select someone's screen name and view all posts, it only shows the most recent 500. Any way to see older ones?
Could they all be put into a single thread? Man, talk about a thread with no continuity...

[Doctor Q]

Here is the oldest post I can find for jefhatfield:04-13-2001, 10:22 PM

new speeds

Only 550 MHz for the iBook? I want to see close to 700 if iMac supposed to go 750 and G4s at 1 GHz. The 1GHz speed is overdue but it still seems unlikely (but I was shocked at the last jump to 733 from 500 for the G4 recently).

[zelmo]

Here is the oldest post I can find for jefhatfield:04-13-2001, 10:22 PM

new speeds

Only 550 MHz for the iBook? I want to see close to 700 if iMac supposed to go 750 and G4s at 1 GHz. The 1GHz speed is overdue but it still seems unlikely (but I was shocked at the last jump to 733 from 500 for the G4 recently).

A sad reminder of how far we haven't come in the last 3.5 years.

[emw]

Actually, there are probably slightly more people born on January 1st than on January 2nd. I'm only guessing, but I have a couple of reasons for this theory. First, for tax reasons, people may want to have their child December 31st or January 1st (which can be counted in the previous year) rather than January 2nd or later, and planned birthing and the all-too-common Caesarians let parents influence the scheduling more than ever before. Second, the excitement of a beautiful float in the Rose Parade or, more likely, seeing your favorite football team win a bowl game, might just send the new mom into labor!

Hmmm. My daughter was born on January 1st (01-01-01), but apparently we couldn't do a tax deduction. And she was only 40 minutes into the new year!

And as far as "planned" Caesarians, my son was "scheduled" for 11/11, but decided to come on 11/07 instead. So even the "planned" deliveries are really only estimates in many cases!

[zelmo]

Hmmm. My daughter was born on January 1st (01-01-01), but apparently we couldn't do a tax deduction. And she was only 40 minutes into the new year!

And as far as "planned" Caesarians, my son was "scheduled" for 11/11, but decided to come on 11/07 instead. So even the "planned" deliveries are really only estimates in many cases!

Was he still delivered via Caesarean?

[emw]

Was he still delivered via Caesarean?

Yup. Had to be due to other complications. Just decided he wanted to come earlier, which was too bad. We could have had 6/6 (me), 1/1 (my daughter), and 11/11 (my son). My wife's 12/18, so it didn't matter, I suppose.

But in the interest of "statistics" we all have "odd" birthdays, if you include years.

[Colonel Panik]

We were all newbs once. I think it would be cool for relative newcomers (such as myself) to be able to glimpse back through the mists of time and read the first posts made by some of the more illustrious MR members. Unfortunately, when I select someone's screen name and view all posts, it only shows the most recent 500. Any way to see older ones?
Could they all be put into a single thread? Man, talk about a thread with no continuity...

Woah there tiger. We could get caught in an infinite loop if we go down that path...

[Colonel Panik]

Add to the list: What is the sum of one and the largest number that has ever been written, calculated, described, or spoken of by any human?

?+1

[Doctor Q]

Hmmm. My daughter was born on January 1st (01-01-01), but apparently we couldn't do a tax deduction. And she was only 40 minutes into the new year!I wondered if I was hallucinating, so I asked a tax accountant and I checked a CNN Personal Finance column. The accountant told me that he doesn't remember any such provision for births, but that there may be a special provision for January 1st deaths under some circumstances. The financial columnist said that you get a year's deduction for any birth during that year, January 1st to December 31st, so you should have your children by midnight New Year's Eve for the "best deal". Similarly, a dependent's death on January 1st gives you a deduction for that whole year (another "good deal" in a macabre sort of way). But no special provision for applying a January 1st birth to the previous year.

My conclusion: I was hallucinating.

[jefhatfield]

Here is the oldest post I can find for jefhatfield:04-13-2001, 10:22 PM

new speeds

Only 550 MHz for the iBook? I want to see close to 700 if iMac supposed to go 750 and G4s at 1 GHz. The 1GHz speed is overdue but it still seems unlikely (but I was shocked at the last jump to 733 from 500 for the G4 recently).

wow, i lurked for over 9 months before i posted? i used to enjoy the banter back and forth and the earliest posters here on macrumors were definitely the most interesting, but sometimes the least polite

i also belonged to a pc related site at the same time and the people were always so civil to each other ;)

[Doctor Q]

Oldest post I can find for blakespot, one of the founders of MacRumors:04-18-2001, 10:33 AM

http://forums.macrumors.com/images/icons/icon14.gif Performance

You really do stand to see some increased performance when using a nice SCSI solution for OS X. I have a b&w G3 400 which has a pretty fast 6GB UltraATA/33 drive&controller. I get 12MB/sec sustained on that -- not bad. But on the Miles UW SCSI card with my 10,000 RPM drive, I get 23MB/sec sustained. And the CPU utilization is much lower on the SCSI subsystem, and SCSI's better in general as it's more intelligent (drive geometry is taken into account when writing, etc.) -- and command queuing is a nice feature of SCSI.

The SCSI benefit is getting smaller, with UltraATA controllers getting faster, utilizing DMA, and with the price of ATA drives dropping -- but SCSI, there's an engineer's bus for you!

[Doctor Q]

Oldest post for Durandal7:04-18-2001, 06:49 PM

http://forums.macrumors.com/images/icons/icon2.gif Another Apple PDA

http://spaceout.100megspop2.com/pda.jpg

[emw]

Oldest post for Durandal7:04-18-2001, 06:49 PM

http://forums.macrumors.com/images/icons/icon2.gif Another Apple PDA

http://spaceout.100megspop2.com/pda.jpg

Oddly enough, the picture is still there. Must have been funnier back then somehow...

[zelmo]

Yup. Had to be due to other complications. Just decided he wanted to come earlier, which was too bad. We could have had 6/6 (me), 1/1 (my daughter), and 11/11 (my son). My wife's 12/18, so it didn't matter, I suppose.

But in the interest of "statistics" we all have "odd" birthdays, if you include years.

Well, I'm glad everything worked out. It's a pretty stressful experience, even for those of us not actually getting cut. Our son was also a planned C-section (04.20.01, nothing statistically curious about that number that I am aware of).

I wasn't sure how I would react to seeing them cut open my wife and all. It was weird to be having a relatively normal conversation with my wife while there's three people standing around moving her innards around to get to our son. Glad I didn't faint or anything. She never would have let me live that down.

[emw]

Glad I didn't faint or anything. She never would have let me live that down.

Quite true. I was in the same boat and was a little concerned, but when you see that baby come out, nothing else matters...

[Macmaniac]

Just goes to show you how far we've come. Posted 5-21-2001:
I heard that Apple will start using only LCD in their products. I heard this from the Compu Dudes and I'm not sure if this is true? Will this switch be a problem?

This post came after 4 months of forum lurking for me.
Do any of you remember the Compu Dudes on WHYY?
http://www.compududes.com/

[MrMacMan]

How do you even find the first/last known post?

Geez, thats a while ago... woo.

Great Stats Doctor Q.

[Doctor Q]

Geez, thats a while ago... woo.And in Internet time these posts are centuries old!

[Doctor Q]

My oldest post

Just goes to show you how far we've come. Posted 5-21-2001:

I heard that Apple will start using only LCD in their products. I heard this from the Compu Dudes and I'm not sure if this is true? Will this switch be a problem?Just to be historically accurate, it was 5-25-2001.

[Doctor Q]

Oldest post for buffsldr, who is still an active member:05-26-2001, 11:08 PM

25th of what month

Notice, he never said what month, so maybe he meant June 25. Though he did say friday(25), so when is the next Friday(25)?
This was in response to a story by arn about the forthcoming Mac OS X 10.0.5 update.

[Doctor Q]

Anybody here remember Geert, who earned an avatar in 2002 but hasn't posted since December 2002?

Here's the Oldest post for Geert:06-08-2001, 12:33 PM

http://forums.macrumors.com/images/icons/icon5.gif

Sorry to say this but if this is the look of the new imac,
I don't like it.
This is the most pc -like mac ever than, ugly, colourless, tasteless, ...
I hope that they won't change it into this dell clone
Here in 2004 we're still talking about how our iMacs look!

[Doctor Q]

In this post, edesignuk suggested an interesting measurement, to see how many of the old-time members are still active forum participants.

I judged "active" by the last activity date (last recorded visit, not necessarily the last post date), as shown in a member's profile. I limited the data to those who registered in the first year that the current forum software was used, June 5, 2000 thru June 4, 2001. That gave me 3,376 members, from arn to neotechian.

I am surprised to find that over 15% of those members have visited the forums within the last 30 days and almost 5% of them (161 if you care) posted today!

[Applespider]

Very interesting - I wonder if it would be substantially different if you removed any early itinerant members - those who posted less than say 3 times?

[Wyvernspirit]

Using this type of info one might be able to find out the likelyhood of someone staying and becomeing an active member or user.

also might be able to figure out how long a person may remain an active member.

[MacNut]

Over the past few days I have seen a huge jump on newbies all over the threads. Hey Doctor Q I'm curious how many newbs we have gotten over the week.

[PlaceofDis]

that would be interesting to find out..... i wonder how the demographics of the site are evolving as well, but thats a lot harder to figure out!

[Doctor Q]

Your wish is my command (within reason, of course).

[PlaceofDis]

huge spike this week, for tiger of course, no big surprise really, but interesting to see it confirmed

[wrc fan]

Now the question is how many of those actually made posts, and how many are just lurkers?

[Awimoway]

In this post, edesignuk suggested an interesting measurement, to see how many of the old-time members are still active forum participants.

...


Interesting. I wonder if the curve in your graph would be nearly a straight line if the time intervals were uniform.