21 replies to this topic

[rudy]

With a little time on my hands the other day I toured around the Cartotalk forum and discovered that I was member #167. So, being curious, I wanted to know who #1 was (Nick S., joined April 15, 2004). Reviewing the join dates of everyone, I put together a little graph that shows the growth rate of Cartotalk by number of members.
(There seemed to be a glitch in the stats in April 2006.

Impressive! But perhaps our Cartotalk administrators could show up some stats on growth by number of postings and a breakdown of members by postings.

Just curious. Good work (and good idea) starting Cartotalk. Love the forum.

[ELeFevre]

Nice work Rudy. It's awesome to see the growth this website has experiened over the past couple of years. If I remember correctly, Ben mentioned he was working on some "visuals" several months ago. Maybe he can chime in on this and provide an update. Nick posted some stats as well some time ago. You can probably blame a hacker for the glitch in April 06.

[benbakelaar]

I was indeed, and the half-finished work just sorta sat around for the past few months!

Here's one to whet your appetites. These numbers are accurate as of 12-11-2006. This chart shows all posters with 100+ posts. Their total posts account for 6017 of 8651 posts.

I'm trying to get one that shows who has posted the most characters.... in other words, the longest posts/the most content.

Attached Files

•  2006_Cartotalk_Posts_Chart1.pdf   9.61K   115 downloads

[MapMedia]

Any interpretations of Rudy's graph? Such as, what accounts for the upward trend beginning around March 2005?

This might be content for a poster at next NACIS conference? Include other 'stats' such as members who have the 'last word' on discussions. Members' emoticon preferences, etc.

[Hans van der Maarel]

I'm trying to get one that shows who has posted the most characters.... in other words, the longest posts/the most content.

Are you accepting bets on who that might be?

[DaveB]

I'm trying to get one that shows who has posted the most characters.... in other words, the longest posts/the most content.

Are you accepting bets on who that might be?

Most verbose poster? Maybe it should be "normalized" by number of posts? Otherwise Hans probably takes the prize.

[ELeFevre]

what accounts for the upward trend beginning around March 2005?

Up until March 05 there were only a handful of regular posters (Nick, Hans, me, Kartograph, Cartomat and few others) and much of our time was spent sending out emails, requesting links, waiting for the site to show up in Google et cetera. Everyone was promoting in their own little way. All of this "work" started to pay off about that time. March 05 saw the coming of Martin who really boosted the quality and quantity of content at Cartotalk, as well as other heavy-weight contributors such as Frax, Dennis, Ecographic, Rob, Daveb, Mike, Rick Dey, Derek Tonn and Ben (who must have lurked for a few months before pouring-it-on!) plus several others. By the end of 05 there was enough substantial content and exposure to keep the site growing.Thus began the upward trend in March 05. The rest, as they say, is history! Thanks Nick for building such a great site.

My guess is that Martin is the most "verbose" poster and Hans is obviously the most active poster (12.36% of all forum posts!). Although Hans is probably a close second or possibly even first in the "verbose" category.

[benbakelaar]

My guess is that Martin is the most "verbose" poster and Hans is obviously the most active poster (12.36% of all forum posts!). Although Hans is probably a close second or possibly even first in the "verbose" category.

Well since we are naming names My vote for most verbose is datonn! I would place money on it.

BTW, it's going to be really hard for me to work out an automated way of calculating length of posts, due to the way the post is stored in the SQL table. It's hard to separate from the rest of the table... but I'm working on it.

[Hans van der Maarel]

My guess is that Martin is the most "verbose" poster and Hans is obviously the most active poster (12.36% of all forum posts!). Although Hans is probably a close second or possibly even first in the "verbose" category.

I think Derek would win in a # of words per post comparison

Ben joined a few days after me, but just lurked for some time. Me, Erin and Andreas (Kartograph) joined in the period of 2 months in late 2004 and started posting quite actively. Then, as Erin said, it really started taking off in early 2005.

I think it's safe to say we as Cartotalk succeeded. Every board deals with this: you need to reach a certain critical mass of posts and posters to really make it a viable thing. Thanks to everybody involved (both as admins and as normal users) for making this possible. We've got a good thing going here, let's keep doing it.

[ELeFevre]

Hans,

I think you're dead-on with Derek being the most verbose. Yes, this board has really taken off, much more than I ever imagined it would! Thanks to all!

[CHART]

I must say, I personally enjoy this forum's friendliness and helpfulness. I have circled the NACIS St-Louis annual meeting on my calendar, hoping I will make it to meet some of the contributers of this Forum. In the meantime I will have a beer (a Dutch brew in Hans honor) tonight to celebrate my inclusion (last place finish) in Ben`s PDF graph.

Thanks to those who maintain this site alive.

[benbakelaar]

Yikes I just realized how unreadable that graph is - even though it was a quickie and made late last night. I'll probably get around to a better version tonight - maybe even a 12-month animation showing all 100+ posters as of each month last year.

[benbakelaar]

Here are counts for 2004, 2005, and 2006 (through 12-12). I've included all posters with 100+ posts, and also the "other" category, so each pie chart represents the full amount of posts for that year.

Attached Files

•  2004_Carto_posts.pdf   9.65K   92 downloads
•  2005_Carto_posts.pdf   10.21K   88 downloads
•  2006_Carto_posts.pdf   10.93K   97 downloads

[BEAVER]

4 more posts and I would get a pie.

[Hans van der Maarel]

Ben,

Thanks for putting these graphs together (and for pointing out how much free time I seem to have...)