Second Life usage statistics since launch

[JackParkinson]

Hello all, I hope I'm in the right place or can be directed to it.

I am doing some research into the use of Second Life as an educational tool, and in my research I'd like to back up some of my results with statistics from the usage of Second Life over the years. I'm particularly interested in either the number of (distinct, if possible) log-ins or the total number of hours spent in Second Life. I've found things like http://dwellonit.taterunino.net/sl-statistical-charts/ which is very interesting but doesn't cover a long enough time period or present quite the data I'm after.

So in short, is there somewhere these statistics are published or someone I should speak to for them?

 

Side note: a few forum posts and even papers I've read have stated that Second Life is or has been in use at hundreds of universities. Is there any way to track its uptake in higher education institutions, to put some weight to these figures?

[Cindy Evanier]

Curious as to why you are researching this?  

[Resi Pfeffer]

Why dont you ask the person running that homepage, if there is more data to provide?

[JackParkinson]

1 hour ago, Cindy Evanier said:

Curious as to why you are researching this?  

Most papers about Second Life were published around 2007. I'm curious as to how active Second Life was at these times: it may indicate a popularity bias around Second Life as an educational tool. Or may not. That's just one of the things I'm interested in finding out.

39 minutes ago, Resi Pfeffer said:

Why dont you ask the person running that homepage, if there is more data to provide?

I could only find one email address on that site and it was explicitly indicated as being for news or press releases, so I am not inclined to use it for this except as a last resort. It was my hope that, upon seeing the data, someone might be prompted to direct me to a golden source which may have the information I'm looking for.

[Resi Pfeffer]

9 minutes ago, JackParkinson said:

golden source which may have the information I'm looking for.

I bet, LindenLabs has all the information you need. Just try to ask them.

[Daniel Voyager]

I hope this helps

https://danielvoyager.wordpress.com/2018/04/23/new-sl15b-infographic/

 

[animats]

The only real number visible to users is concurrent users right now. Some sites store that and display graphs. Peak was around 2007, and it's leveled off somewhere around half to 2/3 of peak.

Other info from LL is iffy. "Total users" apparently includes anyone (or any bot) that ever used the signup web page.

[WinTrain]

I been here since 2009. SL was so active in 2009 and popular. Well it had more users playing any given day then. 2014 Was a pretty good year too. But now SL isn't the same, and the places that were once popular barely even pull any traffic. Remember when Ambrosia usually was a full sim all day long with at least 65+ residents there all day, all night. Now it's lucky to have 10 even during the day.

Lots of sims have closed down that were pretty big.  So I'd say, the numbers are way lower by big percentages now.

[Coffee Pancake]

6 hours ago, animats said:

Other info from LL is iffy. "Total users" apparently includes anyone (or any bot) that ever used the signup web page.

This is no different from any other online business. The only number that matters to pundits is users and exponential growth.

[animats]

3 minutes ago, CoffeeDujour said:

This is no different from any other online business. The only number that matters to pundits is users and exponential growth.

The number that matters to advertisers, though, is daily unique users.

[Coffee Pancake]

I don't just mean social networks, business like Uber are judged on growth (and who cares if they make money).

[animats]

14 hours ago, CoffeeDujour said:

I don't just mean social networks, business like Uber are judged on growth (and who cares if they make money).

That's a good point. Because SL is shrinking, it's not taken seriously, and Ebbe is a nobody at major conferences. If it was growing by 10% a year, industry perception would be entirely different.

[Coffee Pancake]

It's not just that, SL has somewhat of a reputation, mainly because certain people who regularly cover SL bring it up at every opportunity.

[rasterscan]

As recently as 2017 there were some 500,000 regular users globally. I like to think of it as a SME ( small to medium enterprise ). It helps me to forgive them when the .. ahem .. hiccups occur. 

[animats]

10 hours ago, rasterscan said:

As recently as 2017 there were some 500,000 regular users globally. I like to think of it as a SME ( small to medium enterprise ). It helps me to forgive them when the .. ahem .. hiccups occur. 

According to Ebbe, SL has 70 employees, and Sansar has 40. Yes, small to medium enterprise.