How Many SL Players Are There?

I've noticed that LL has taken the inaccurate total user number away from the login page. A friend of mine speculated that a big company had a discussion with LL and told them that "well we would like to buy a sim from you folks, but we believe your user base count is inflated". I think Google came out with some statistics for SL users as well. How many human users are there? (excluding alts, bots, one timers, and banned accounts)

Well considering it seems everyone except me has at least one Alt, I'm gonna guess the actual number to be...............42.

Due to the usual concurrant number of users online over the weekend, I'm going to guess between 100,000 and 150,000.

WAY below what LL (and the poll) suggests. Cut all the alts, all the "one timers" and those that have left and that 9 million on the login page is less usefull than a possum scarf.

~Jessy

I think you are way high on that estimate.

The MMORPG industry as a whole is notorious for inflating subscription numbers. I don't see why platforms like SL would be any different in their blubbery.

Somebody many months back suggested a reasonably accurate figure of true residents would equate to 3-4 times concurrent which even peaking at 50k would fall far short of that 1M threshold.

I'm guessing 2/3rds of what usually shows as "currently online", generously allowing that 1/3rd of those online are alts.

Given time zones and the PCU numbers, Mu guess is somewhere between 80 and 100k actual active end users.

Hmm, I really can't say how many people "Play" SL. I don't

it's likely few times of what you would see on a weekend. so 150 to 350 thousand.

I'm not sure that would be accurate. For it to be 3-4 times the concurrent the average weekly online time would need to be fairly high.

Remember the servers are open 24/7.


Maybe 6-8 times instead. There are a lot of player who are not 20+ hour a week players there are quite a few who log on only a few hours a week.

Hey, possums are very cute and they have such soft fur. While I admit they would not make a practical scarf (assuming they could keep still long enough), the smaller ones might make a nice broach...

I'd guess 200 to 250 thousand active residents at the most (I see "Spent at least L$1" as the absolute ceiling), and that number doesn't change much from month to month (whoever is new replaces someone that left).

If you limit it to people who are actually here to stay and regularly and actively participate I'd guess no more than half that.

If my own friends list is anything to go on, turnover rate for "established residents" is quite high too. From the about 300ish on my list, maybe 50 at most still log on regularly, and nearly everyone on my list is verified, actively spent/spends money and was/is either renting or owning land which should make them the least likely to move on.

The problem with the numbers isn't so much that they're deceptive to outsiders, it's that LL believes their own statistical propaganda.

LOL sure does seem like that lately anyway

Id say its definitely gone up though

But at the rate concurrency does.

Thus is probably twice as many real players now as there were when the average number online was 20,000.

Even though there probably have been more than 4 times as many sign-ups in that same period.

Waaaaaaiiiiittt a minute. Have you ever seen a wild oppossum up close? Awful. They're giant greasy rats with beady eyes and pointy little teeth. Their fur is all oily and clumpy and they are vicious little diseased monsters. Yech!

/me shudders. I'd rather have a NY sewer rat in my house than a 'possum.

They have soft fur when it's taken off of them and washed.

They make nice flies as well. Very absorbent underfur for nymphs and long guard hairs for wings on streamers.

I suppose the fur is fine if it means one less of those monstrosities in the world. 'Possums give me the willies.

from the stats they give us there are only about 80k Paid users.

and that is even not a good indicator, cuz some poeple have more then 1 paid account ( like me )

i would guess 'real people' that use SL at least once per month would be under 150k


your poll numbers are more inflated then SL numbers trout

I am thinking around 250k users, since that is roughly the same as a reasonably popular MMoRPG. SL has inferior performance but makes up for it with content and free accounts.

SJ

Well, considering that we're all Ulrika's alts, I think 42 IS a little inflated.

(Sorry.. that's a REALLY old forum joke...)

They aren't my poll numbers. I'm just here to bitch about 'possums.

My only input is that I think every number we've seen is drastically inflated. I also don't know how we can legitimately answer this without defining what a "unique user" is. Unique should be pretty easy, but what is a "user". If they made an account but got bored and never got off of OI, are they a user? Haven't logged on in 6 months (what's the cut-off)? don't spend any L? Regardless of the definition, I think the numbers we have seen are inflated, but i can't put my finger on how inflated they actually are.

Way back in the - Has "Total Residents"1 Topped 10 Million? thread
/327/7e/216424/1.html

I made it about 300,000 active residents on the basis of:

Total Customers Spending Money (>= 1L$) In-World (2007 September) 302,054 *
-snip-
* Source: http://secondlife.com/whatis/economy_stats.php


Some of those avatars spending money are Alts, so the real number is lower.
Some active avatars don’t spend at least once a month, so bring the real number up again.
Divide what you’re left with by two bananas, and you have the actual number.



A multiple of Concurrency taking the 24/7 worldwide user base might suggest itself as a good guide.
However, there is a population of camping bots and traffic bot farms that inflate concurrency.
I'm not sure how many avatars get abandoned in OI/HI after contributing to Concurrency for a while. I have one there, waiting for a low-lag slot. I know a few people in RL who never made it off the islands, due to lag and/or low-end PC and/or poor bandwidth.

Way back in the Camping Stats For Your Consumption! thread
/142/d6/212151/1.html

the constant population of camping/traffic bots was estimated at around 6000 – based on some painstaking research on the ground.


I’ll still go for about 300,000 active residents. That includes alts.
Duh! - and I voted 3,000,000 because nobody else had. Or maybe I fat-fingered

Now the real question is do camping bots ever go shopping for shoes ???

Actually the serious question is if the camping bots transfer the money they earn camping back to the bot owner does that count as "Resident" spending (as opposed to being excluded since it is just a gift or straight money transfer) ?

If it does then even your previously mentioned figures based on residents spending money, are likely inflated as well.

I was never good at Math.