Interesting observation – Lurkers
Discussion
I made a suggestion on a thread that people should e-mail me for help on a specific car mod. I found myself inundated with e-mails that surprisingly came mostly from members who never post.
I find myself in somewhat of a dilemma. The information has a value in regard to the time effort and expertise within. I give it freely because I see PH as a place where people help each other. In this case people want to take without giving.
This leads me to wonder what proportion of visitors actually engage. It feels like 15:1 in favour of lurkers be them non-posting members or non-members. (Same thing really)
I find myself in somewhat of a dilemma. The information has a value in regard to the time effort and expertise within. I give it freely because I see PH as a place where people help each other. In this case people want to take without giving.
This leads me to wonder what proportion of visitors actually engage. It feels like 15:1 in favour of lurkers be them non-posting members or non-members. (Same thing really)
I think you have the wrong impression of lurkers, possibly influenced by the unfortunately name. Don't think of them as lurkers, think of them as intelligent listeners.
I 'lurk' a lot, both here and on other forums, simply because I don't have anything useful to add, and I know how to use a search button when I need to find out something.
There seems to be three general types of users;
- those who go for the biggest post count (inadvertently or not),
- those that only post when the have something useful to say,
- the silent 95% who are interested in some of the topics but know they don't have anything intelligent to add.
Would you like the last group to join the first?
Also something to keep in mind is that if the numbers are what you suspect, even though they don't contribute in posts to the site, the lurkers are responsible for 95% of the site's advertising revenue. They are 95% of the eyeballs looking at the banners and clicking on them, and so in essence the 'lurkers' are the ones paying for the site.
I 'lurk' a lot, both here and on other forums, simply because I don't have anything useful to add, and I know how to use a search button when I need to find out something.
There seems to be three general types of users;
- those who go for the biggest post count (inadvertently or not),
- those that only post when the have something useful to say,
- the silent 95% who are interested in some of the topics but know they don't have anything intelligent to add.
Would you like the last group to join the first?
Also something to keep in mind is that if the numbers are what you suspect, even though they don't contribute in posts to the site, the lurkers are responsible for 95% of the site's advertising revenue. They are 95% of the eyeballs looking at the banners and clicking on them, and so in essence the 'lurkers' are the ones paying for the site.
napiston said:
There seems to be three general types of users;
- those who go for the biggest post count (inadvertently or not),
- those that only post when the have something useful to say,
- the silent 95% who are interested in some of the topics but know they don't have anything intelligent to add.
-those who only post when they have something to say. Useful or not
-Those who jump on the bandwagon to feel important
-and the trolls
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