Interesting: what threads are getting read right now at HW/PC?

I found this interesting, and I believe other site "veterans" will, too.

I noticed this evening that there was a very high number of HW "Guests" online...at that particular moment I took a "snapshot" and found that there were 407 guests and only 13 "Registered Member" online. This was not the interesting part, however, because almost certainly all of us look at the site sometimes without logging in...I know that I do.

The interesting part is what people were looking at...in particular at the HW/PC page. At the time of my "snapshot," 32 people were on the Prostate Cancer page (only 2 were logged-in). Three were on the Forum Listing page (one of those was me), and one person was on the "Newly diagnosed..." sticky page (yeh!), leaving 28 on a wide variety of other pages.

Now, here's where it gets most interesting...

When I go to HW/PC, I rarely wander past the current top listing page, which shows all the most recent posts. Right now, the 25 threads posted on the top listing page were all updated either yesterday or today. BUT, when I looked at which threads the 28 "Guests" online right now were looking at, I found that the average thread was started nearly 5-years ago, and the most recent update to those threads averaged about 4-years ago! The oldest currently open thread was started in 2006!

Here is the list of threads that were open when I took the "snapshot", with the year that the thread was started, and the year of the most recent update: (the list is sorted in ascending order of the date the thread was started)

Prostate Cancer >> what is considered a safe PSA count ?  2006 2013
Prostate Cancer >> Removal of catheter - can anyone describe?  2007 2007
Prostate Cancer >> Viagra vs Cialis vs Levitra  2007 2010
Prostate Cancer >> your first post-prostatectomy erections: what were they like?  2007 2015
Prostate Cancer >> Is bone metastases and a 4.6 PSA passible  2009 2009
Prostate Cancer >> Acute Urinary Retention after Catheter Removal? WAS No Subject  2009 2010
Prostate Cancer >> Prostate Cancer Study Results  2009 2010
Prostate Cancer >> Father Has Elevated PSA Levels  2010 2010
Prostate Cancer >> Monday: back from uro/surgeon's office  2010 2010
Prostate Cancer >> Orgasms  2010 2010
Prostate Cancer >> Dealing with side effects  2011 2011
Prostate Cancer >> here's what i'm doing today.....  2011 2011
Prostate Cancer >> USPIO MRI using Feraheme - Contact with Dattoli Cancer Center  2011 2013
Prostate Cancer >> Biopsy Experience and when is it OK to have sex again  2012 2012
Prostate Cancer >> Pistachios and ED  2012 2012
Prostate Cancer >> How much does sex before a blood test affect PSA?  2012 2015
Prostate Cancer >> Introducing myself and my prostate  2013 2013
Prostate Cancer >> Urologist vs Medical Oncologist  2014 2014
Prostate Cancer >> Urologist vs Medical Oncologist  2014 2014
Prostate Cancer >> Fluctuating PSA in the ultra senstive range-My Experience  2016 2016
Prostate Cancer >> how to (if possible) regain muscle mass lost on ADT?  2016 2016
Prostate Cancer >> PSA Raising and Bone Scan show mets  2016 2016
Prostate Cancer >> Advice on action plan  2016 2017
Prostate Cancer >> Overtreatment is Alive and Well in SW Florida  2016 2017
Prostate Cancer >> How long to wait in between scans ?  2017 2017
Prostate Cancer >> Pain 8 weeks after RRP  2017 2017
Prostate Cancer >> What would you do -- if anything?  2017 2017
Prostate Cancer >> What would you do -- if anything?  2017 2017

Average start year of all currently open threads: 2012.214286
Average most recent update year of all currently open threads: 2013.178571



I find this interesting and surprising, and it reinforces a point I have made repeatedly about being careful to post good info because you may very well be posting for posterity and not just for today.

Of course, the other interesting thing is the topics which are obviously being looked-up.

Post Edited (JackH) : 1/4/2017 7:36:16 PM (GMT-7)

I thought you might be a reader, Bozo, and not just a bullsh1tter.

You gonna "sign-up" and participate? Would like to have you.

I'm reading "The Gene, an intimate history" by Siddhartha Mukherjee (author of The Emperor of All Maladies)

Really interesting. And occasionally humorous. For example, he quotes this line of quiet understatement from Watson and Crick's paper on DNA (it's the last sentence): "It has not escaped our notice that the specific pairing we have postulated immediately suggests a possibly copying mechanism for the genetic material."

I want to say, "Really?????" It has not escaped your notice.....??????

Sr Sailor said...
Thanks JackH for the analysis. Without really thinking about it, the results do appear surprising to me.

A topic to explore some more in a Bachelor's or Master's thesis?

Already got my bachelor and master degrees...just a little too much spare time on my hands while vacation winds-up.

If you could see more details of the guests..You'd probably see things like:

Google AdSense Spider - 03:33 AM showthread.php?t=272493 - Viewing Thread Yahoo hacked again

The above came from a site running vBulletin.

Paxton said...
It is possible that some/many of the "guests" are really phantoms who connected and left, but were never disconnected.

Paxton, it seems likely that at least some fall into that category. Just to test my understanding, is it correct that you are talking about some "Guests" who viewed a thread on a device, perhaps a long time ago, and for whatever reason has abandoned that device...or at a minimum have simply left that window open for a very long time?

Seems very plausible...but, I think we can get a fairly clear indication of the extent of that scenario by running the same "test" in a few days and comparing how many of the same old threads are still open. I wouldn't premise that this would 100% explain every open thread, but I believe we could then fairly confidently apply the 20/50/80 rule...that is, we could estimate whether the percent of open threads by "Guests" which may have been abandoned is closer to 20%, 50% or 80% of the total.

Do you agree? If so, I'll run the test again in a few days. (Evening seems to be the busiest time at HW, but I'm unavailable to run it tonight...going to Phantom of the Opera at the famous Cadillac Palace Theater in Chicago tonight.)

Bololidat said...
Im not sure exactly how your book club works...is it separate from HW...does it meet online...at different and or set times...

I'm glad you raised the question. I truly tried hard to think the process through in advance and articulate the steps clearly, but if one person (you) speaks up that you cannot clearly understand it, then others may also be experiencing the same uncertainties.

Will you please return to the Book Club thread, re-read the first posting, then ask any appropriate clarifying question(s) there, in that thread? Please focus in particular on the six numbered HW/PC Book Club GUIDELINES. I'll endevour to clear-up any gaps, but by replying there, in that thread, everyone benefits by the added clarity (although it gets away from the "multi thread threads," which you claim to like but can be confusing to others).

Or if it becomes clearer as you re-read that first thread (obviously, as evidenced in this thread, some people respond without even reading the first posting), then please just let me know in that thread if you are going to participate; if you don't want to participate, then no need to reply there (in fact, I would rather that non-participants simply not reply at all). As I said, would like to have you...

tusen takk

(Hey, the truth is that I don't know if the HW/PC Book Club concept will work at all. I've never seen it work anywhere else like I'm envisioning it working here. I think it can...and I'm willing to give some effort to making it work. We'll see...maybe it goes down in flames...)

Post Edited (JackH) : 1/5/2017 8:52:11 AM (GMT-7)

Jack:

Yes, how about we confine our comments regarding the Book Club to the one thread rather than diffusing them all over the place.

That has been suggested on other topics, too.

Mel

This is a very interesting thread.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>
407 guests and only 13 "Registered Member" online. This was not the interesting part, however, because almost certainly all of us look at the site sometimes without logging in...I know that I do.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
That ratio seems off the charts. So, I would guess that there is a software bug. When I get on HW, I am almost always automatically registered. Yes, once in awhile, I get on HW without being logged on. Still, that is rare.

Also, I am surprised that there were only 13 Registered Members on all of HW? I think the fact that the unregistered guests were generally on posts that were many years old indicates that they are phantom guests. I realize newbies/guests might go back a bit further on the posts, but I would still expect them to be perusing reasonably recent posts. When I get on, I usually just peruse the more recent posts (ie: with answers that were posted since my last previous HW session)

Mel

Lots of users come in without signing in (which is why we want no personal info in the posts, just the profiles, visible only to "real" members).

The server/app does get rebooted on occasion, Peter W. is the only one who deals with that. But I can say that it has happened fairly recently, and that there are no connections left open from before that point.

And remember that there is more than PCa on HW, so people just browsing for info wind up in the counts.

As to remaining "Logged In", yes, it happens. If you leave without logging out, you remain "In"for some days (I used to know how many, but ...). Eventually you will be dropped, whether you are active or not.

It is interesting information, and does show that the site is useful to many who never announce themselves.

Everything typed on HW is searchable via Google - Bing etc....

So it isn't surprising that of the Billions of people on the planet - that many are going to find posts here..... One little click and they end up on the site and show up on the list that Jack is pointing out.

The "Google AdSense Spider" that I mentioned in my last posts are the reasons why posts on HW show up via searches.

I just checked some of the larger sites I administer:

23 members and 1563 guests
5 members and 917 guests
2 members and 303 guests
1 members and 999 guests
1 members and 538 guests

The sad part is the low number of members....But the pay is the same. LOL

Jack
I think this posts was very informative, interesting and surprising. Your detailed analysis of those online was eye opening. Not sure how the ghost poster really exists. Just seems anyone searching but not officially logged in as a member still shows up as online. Half the time I don't log off, like probably many of us, so next time in, I am already automatically logged in.
l have been here about 3 years and never pressed the Details of posters. duh. I often do see who is online on any given post. late last night I was a bit sad, many online but only two of us actually logged in. Me and someone from another forum! Always looking for interesting posts, I love the search feature to be able to go back and pull up old posts about certain subjects.
Keep the faith
Wings -online logged in lurker!