From part iii of this rather long entry.

QuoteEarlier this year, I was privileged to go "on tour" with Jimmy "Jimbo" Wales, the founder and public face of Wikipedia, as we crisscrossed the nation, talking to educators in Adelaide, Perth, Sydney and Melbourne. Everywhere we went, people asked the same question: why is Wikipedia such a success, while my wiki languishes? What do you need to achieve critical mass? The answer, Jimmy said, is five people. Five individuals dedicated to an altruistic sharing of collective intelligence should be enough to produce a flowering similar to Wikipedia. Jimbo has learned, through experience, that the "minor" language versions of Wikipedia (languages with less than 10 million native speakers), need at least five steady contributors to become self-sustaining. In the many wikis Jimbo oversees through his commercial arm, Wikia, he's noted the same phenomenon time and again. Five people mark the tipping point between a hobby and a nascent hyperintelligence.

I wonder if that applies to discussion forums, social networks and so on - get five dedicated people and it'll take on a life of its own?

Certainly I've seen plenty of occasions when there were less than five dedicated people involved in a site and it went kaput... What do you lot reckon?

My experience here and elsewhere was that you need at least 100 semi-regular posters in order to keep a message forum alive in such a way that its even remotely interesting.  Of these, about 10 need to be daily posters. But the 90 or more non-daily posters are just as important, you can't ONLY have that tiny group of dedicated daily posters, or you might as well just have a mailing list, and not a forum.

RPGPundit

I would agree with RPGPundit here.

A informational website may work with five regular contributers, but a forum is a social site and are best when they have around 100 to 200 active people with around 5% to 25% regular posters.

On a side note, there is an interesting anthropological theorem regarding community/social group sizes revolves around Dunbar's Number (or more amusingly written as the Monkeysphere).

There is a lot of online documentation on how this applies to online forums and online gaming. Essentially it breaks down to the fact that ideal social group sizes -tend- to be around 10 to 250 people with the median around 148 (which is usually rounded to 150 for ease of use). Above that the social group tends to splinter off into smaller subsets, though the numbers are usually lower for non-survival based social groups.

There are a lot of social site developer commentary out there that revolves around this concept. Governments use the concept in their trending data I am told, as to does the financial instituition that I work for (I spent six months using it for demographic statistical analysis).

For the most part, anecdotal evidence seems to back this up for online communities.

Focus is important.
 
I'm a limted scope moderator at another general RPG site which is now a virtual ghosttown. It has more game-specific subforums than posters. Once, about 10 years ago when it was called a different name and had different owners, about 50% of those forums were active.
Now, there are four active forums.
 
Two are support/general bs forums for the two affiliated chatrooms.
The other two are focused on one specific RPG. I'd guesstimate one has about 20 regular posters, the other probably half a dozen.
 
IMO, if you have a core group that are tightly focused on a single subject then the "five good posters" is probably right.

Having 5 people is good but to keep a community truly alive, you need people who actually communicate with each other rather than having loads of people not reading the threads and posting their own opnion without considering anyone else's ideas. That's why I like RPGSite.

Quote from: Rob Lang[...] people who actually communicate with each other rather than having loads of people not reading the threads and posting their own opnion without considering anyone else's ideas.

"I haven't read the thread, but..."

I just want to say, "then shut the fuck up." Which you can here, which is why almost no-one says it

Quote from: RPGPunditMy experience here and elsewhere was that you need at least 100 semi-regular posters in order to keep a message forum alive in such a way that its even remotely interesting. Of these, about 10 need to be daily posters. But the 90 or more non-daily posters are just as important, you can't ONLY have that tiny group of dedicated daily posters, or you might as well just have a mailing list, and not a forum.
 
RPGPundit

This pretty much describes the first incarnation of this board.  There were 10-15 regular posters (mainly a subset of Nothinglanders) but most of the other early arrivals wandered off after a week or two.  Within two months, the regulars had largely run out of gaming stuff to talk about and posting dried up.
 
Jimmy Wales seems to be talking about a more goal directed situation, where you have 5+ who all agree on the same well defined goals.  His idea of dedicated might be different than what we think of as a dedicated board member, more like 20+ hours a week.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron"I haven't read the thread, but..."

I just want to say, "then shut the fuck up." Which you can here, which is why almost no-one says it

I misread this as you telling me to shut the fuck up. So I was about to launch into a rant, realised my mistake and stopped. You have to laugh at the irony, caught by the very thing I was complaining about!

RTFMS!

!i!

Quote from: Rob LangI misread this as you telling me to shut the fuck up.

As far as I remember, the only time I've told a fellow gamer to shut the fuck up was in a game session. Then it was, "shut the fuck up and roll the dice."

Quote from: Rob LangYou have to laugh at the irony, caught by the very thing I was complaining about!

Of course. That's like how if you make a post criticising someone's spelling or grammar, you'll have a spelling or grammatical mistake in it.

This is of course as good a place and moment as any to remind people that they should try to promote this place if they want to see it keep thriving.  Let people on other fora know about us! Link us to your posts, write about us in your blogs, etc. Show people we exist, and show them why its worthwhile to be here.

That way we always keep up that crucial number, both core and "Peripheral" posters.

RPGPundit