Vitae blog by the numbers

22 January 2010

By Matthew Salois

After reading Sarah's great review discussing some of the many highlights that have transpired on the RS blog hosted by Vitae, I felt compelled to crunch some numbers.  Here are the highlights.

1. The blog debuted on 7 October with Tennie's opening post and the 100th blog was posted on 21 January with Sarah's 100 day summary: that is 15 weeks of blogging.
2. Within 15 weeks there were 106 blog posts, for an average of one post a day, every day for 15 weeks.  Or if you exclude the weekends, then that is an average of about 1.5 blog posts a day!  Clearly there is much discourse and this shows no sign of slowing!
3. Out of 106 posts, 95 have been commented on, meaning the RS blog here on Vitae has a 90 per cent response rate!  Incredible!  Not only are we talking, but we are talking to each other.  This speaks volumes.
4. Of the 95 blogs that received comments, 356 total comments were made.  That is an average of nearly 4 comments per blog entry.  Outliers include George's Academic Taboo (with 23 comments) and Elizabeth's Postcard from London (with 17 comments).  I report this not for scorekeeping, but for the sake of recognizing what seems to be especially contentious or appealing issues to us contract researchers.
5. Over the 15 week lifespan of this blog, 356 comments makes an average of 3.4 comments being posted a day.  If you exclude weekends, this average increases to 4.7 comments a day!  Clearly there is a consistent readership, but beyond that, people are being pulled into the conversation as well.

Simple statistics are not needed to underscore the success of this blog, and it's continued importance as a communication tool among researchers.  Tennie has introduced what has proven to be a catalyst for networking and the foundation for a research community. 

I look forward to reading the next 100 posts!