Statistical Oddity

We all know that the Library's newest stories receive more views (and therefore comments) than the older ones. So it would stand to reason, would it not, that if few new stories are loaded in a given month, there would be fewer total comments made in that month. Right? WRONG! In July, which we all know had by far the most comments of any month in Library history, we had the FEWEST new stories loaded in any month since Februs, flopsy & co created the Library in September, 2009. Let me say that again - the FEWEST new stories, but the MOST comments.

The raw stats, of course, hide the fact that the 57 entries in the latest challenge were loaded in June, but not available for reading and commenting until July. Even adding those 57 stories to the total actually loaded in July, though, still leaves the total "new" stories at the 7th lowest total, barely edging out the 5th & 6th lowest months.

At the other end of the spectrum, it's easy to understand why twelve of the thirteen months with the most stories loaded all rank at the bottom of monthly comment totals = they occurred either before or at the very beginning of the oft-discussed "comment explosion."

[and please, don't let anything think that I'm in any way advocating a limitation on the number of new stories as a means of boosting the number story comments]

Hmmm...stats can be made to say whatever the writer chooses I think.

The fact established is that July had a low number of new stories and had high comments I will take as a given, without establishing it myself as it is way too much work. Now I submit with fewer new stories it is clear the comments should go UP.

Why should they go up...because there are fewer stories to comment on as the first reason and ones don't feel overwhelmed by a large number of stories to get through so they feel they have more time to comment. That is the first reason.

Second reason is because experienced commenters submit more comments on fewer stories, the newer and shy commenters feel more willing to take a chance on commenting, hoping that what they feel is a poor quality comment (which it never is by the way) will slide through without the authors noticing. The shy or new commenter feels his/her comment will get lost in the larger number of comments per story and thus offer some protection. That is a second reason

With fewer new stories those who do not comment much start to feel pressure to maintain their quota of 1 comment per 500 stories, and thus with the more experienced commenters giving lots of comments on new stories, newer ones again hope their one comment in a couple of hundred comments will go unnoticed amidst the crowd and their quotas get protected. That is a third reason.

Also the idea that any comment on a story that is several years old and has not been read for years also lets commenters think the author(s) will appreciate anything, including what new ones consider a poor comment, in order to get the story back on the first page and hopefully a lot more views and comments. That is a fourth reason

Another reason for more comments on older stories is that new commenters always have a hope that the author is no longer active in the library site, thus they will not have to worry about any possible connection or dialogue continuing on with the author. That is a fifth reason

There are other things that could be mentioned as reasons and of course it may be easy to punch holes in the submitted reasons for more comments on fewer stories. But my point is, I don't really care at all about the reasons for more comments, the fact that it happened was great and if it happens to continue that is all the better. I am also sure that njrick does not care either, but he is also extremely happy that it happened just as I am.

Thanks to all those commenters, old and new, out there in July, lets keep it up for August and prove that statistics don't mean a damm thing unless one can use them to get rich.

CS

Far more work, say, than writing a thesis on this subject - no? - as it takes all of half three clicks to get to the appropriate "stats" pages.

Forgive me, Rick, but I simply couldn't resist responding to a thread entitled 'njrick - Statistical Oddity.' Undoubtedly, it's extremely laudable but the title made me laugh!
All praise to you for your constant vigilance...

However truth might emerge, we must recognize and honor it.

Another factor is that contest entry stories seem to draw more comments than those published in the normal course.

At the time of writing the last challenge has amassed a total of 1,131 comments so I suspect that's the major factor at work.

Which makes the total of the remaining comments only slightly below the average of recent months. And if Challenge readers (who seem to be dutiful comment-ers) are busy reading Challenge stories, they can't be spending that time reading other stories. So it was still a pretty impressive total for a month.