More Germans in SL than Americans!

You leave our pediatricians alone!!

Well, some are better at it than others, so it's good to know.

WoW was made and is still operated by Blizzard Entertainment, a French company based in Calais.

All your Calais are belong to us!

Chum, look up Superheroes- The Tick

The Linden metrics are a joke, and have been rubbished on lots of sites now that have examined their numbers.

The statistics in the article came from ComScore Inc. ComScore is the #1 stats company for the internet, and is used by the advertising departments of every major corporation in the world.

The actual research that ComScore did into second life, that all the other sites refer to is here:

http://www.comscore.com/press/release.asp?id=1425

How do they get their figures? ComScore have a user panel of over 2 million volunteer members, spread across the world, and rising. All their demographic stats are provided, age, nationaility, gender, country of residence, income bracket, occupation etc. All of their surfing and buying habits are monitored and the results are statistically scaled.

I remember reading an article about ComScore once when I was at business school. Afterwards the lecturer asked: Who would you rather believe: the store that puts out stats on their customer base, who likes to count a customer when they walk in the door, and again when they use the store rest-room and come out again, and count them twice if they are pregnant, and once more if there is an echo; or the independent company that stands outside the store and counts the numer of customers going in and out?

You can believe who you want Brenda. The company that has its own vested interest in numbers, its own agenda, and tends to count all accounts, even if they include all alts, dormant accounts, and even accounts where the user has been banned (like counting the dead in your county's population statistics!). Or, an independent monitoring company, respected worldwide, who actually measure only active accounts.

I know who my money is on.

I also notice, increduously, that LL have only TWO German-speakers on its staff. Wow! way to go, global player! They are asking for German speaking volunteers.

I also find it incredible that so many Americans just cannot believe the numbers reflecting the dominance of German residents. How many Americans are actually are online when it is prime time in Germany? I'll bet they only look when they are online, during American prime time, and say 'Germans? I don't see many Germans'. LOL

I own a rental Estate, and half the residents are German (but many you would not guess, as their English is perfect). I myself am English, but live in Germany (same village as Ansche). From the constant discussions in our work restaurant about SL I can believe the numbers, it is HUGE here.

It might come down to what defines an active user. As for the SL stat being "a joke" I have not heard that about them as of late. The only time I can recall them being questioned was when all they had was the total number of accounts listed. If there are sources out there that can point out how the key metrics they release are wrong, I would like to read them.

Close, but no cigar Vivendi whom own Blizzard now are French. Blizzard themselves are an American company.

Google is your friend, these hits from "Second Life" statistics hype

http://www.micropersuasion.com/2006/08/second_life_hyp.html
http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2007/02/second_lifes_li.html
http://valleywag.com/tech/second-life/a-story-too-good-to-check-221252.php
http://valleywag.com/tech/second-life/virtual-world-stats-as-misleading-as-a-dating-profile-225349.php
http://www.valleywag.com/tech/second-life/a-story-too-good-to-check-221252.php
http://dwellonit.blogspot.com/2006/09/projections.html
http://many.corante.com/archives/2006/12/12/second_life_what_are_the_real_numbers.php
http://www.nonprofittechblog.org/more-proof-second-life-is-a-boondoggle-well-sort-of

Let me know if you need any more. You will find Google at www.google.com

There has been numerous newsreports, website articles, and postings in these forums about the numbers. I wont search or Google for you, you will have to do that yourself.

Wow! Two rocks posting at the same time. Too bad ALL those links point to the one thing I already said about total users. Those numbers were not made up, you just had to understand what you were looking at.

The best part is that http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2007/02/second_lifes_li.html that link actually says that the metrics that LL is releasing are the better numbers to use. I still don't see where the metrics are wrong. Again, it comes down to how they define "active" user in the country breakdown section. I think that LL defines an active user as someone that has logged on within the last 60 days. I don't know if they count unique users or accounts. That could play a factor, but I would think that the Germans have as many alts as someone in the US would.

http://static.secondlife.com/economy/stats_200705.xls is where I get my data from showing that the US is still bigger then any other country, but small if you count all of Europe.

With so many different numbers, it's hard to say which ones are correct.

Mandy C

Im online during German Prime time -

And I dont see many Germans. Maybe the Germans mainly hang out with each other.

The numbers are always going to be guesses becuase LL needs to keep its max number good and inflated.

If the germans outnumber the Americans - why is it that its during US prime time that the max online number tops out? Very Interesting since Germany shares its prime time with Europe.

Is many possibilities as to why the German number might seem inflated to someone trying to gateher data - they might have more camping Zombies , more alts, higher quit rate, w/e.

Being the number one statistic site on the Internet is kind of like Fox News being the highest rated cable news channel - so what? doesnt mean their news is any good.

More apathy/ambivalence towards this fact than SL age verification!

Wow, you obviously care about this WAY more than I do? It was just a throwaway question, but I do appreciate all the trouble you took to answer it. But for the record, THIS American couldn't care less where the majority of users come from.

Haben Sie einen schönen Tag

@Colette Meiji: How would you be able to "detect" Germans anyway? I almost never talk German when in SL, and my name doesn't sound German either....voice chat might give away a few Germans on the voice beta grid, but without that? To be honest, I don't even WANT to be recognised as a German. A year in the UK has taught me that.
Actually, I only know TWO other Germans in SL apart from my s.o., who's online as well...compared to dozens of people from other countries. Maybe I'm just an atypical German then?


@Rock Ryder: You call the place where Anshe/Ailin lives a VILLAGE? Shame on you. You're DEFINITELY not German! The town where i live is about the same size and you'd possibly get thrown into the river Main if you called it a village.

Just going by the fact that 75%+ of people I meet ask me where Im from in RL - and then reply back where they are from.

LOL, I laughed out loud in RL when I read the title of this topic...of course!

I thought EVERYBODY knew there were a lot less Americans in SL. like somebody said early in this topic, a lotta folks who are used to MMO's are used to only MMORPGs, not somethin like SL. The ones that came before SL made this Client look like manna from heaven, they were so primative...and the "complaint" I heard the most was "but we can't fight".

SL gets press over here to have a LOT more American users, from what I have seen...the majority of Americans in SL live in big, stressful Cities, and look to get away from "drama" when they relax.

Almost ALL of the cool American citizens I have met in SL are from Texas, New York City, Chicago, and gang-ridden parts of California.

These are places where, a lotta the Residents like the drama in thier city and "hate" it at the same time...so when they come home, time to drink a beer & hit SL.

big shout out to the SL Irish!, all 6 of you!

LOL...aw come on...it can't be THAT bad

*shrug* I'm always stumbling across Germans in this game, to the point where I'm brushing up on the langauge again; I guess it depends on where you go. Easily half to one third of the people who wander across our land are Deutcher (might have something to do with my house being a Fachwerkhaus, though [timber frame house]).

The ones I've met are pretty good at masking, and there's a pretty significant German-themed set of sims; I suspect any Germans whose English isn't up to par hang out there instead. I also hear they're pretty well represented in the fur community.

The ones I've met have been polite party animals with a thing for electronica and Carribean, holding to a compulsive tropical beach obsession.

Sorry to hear about the troubles one of them had in England. Over where I'm from (Minneapolis/USA) they're just as likely to be asked to compare family histories.

6 and a half with me!

Count me in for another 1/16th

Yes there are a lot of Germans well up there with Americans for numbers but being Australian I seem to meet more Germans because they are up before the Americans

Does an American of Irish Decent count?

(And DAMN Proud Of it!!!!!)

Then you can count me as well. (Actually Irish/German/Slovakian)