Intro
August is now over. I have been collecting data on chain about word count, the number of images in posts, and several other metrics. There's been no new features built into the data set this month, as I've been pursuing other endeavours, like getting work together for a history symposium, getting my photographic art ready for a solo exhibition, and have also been working on writing fiction, towards the goal of completing an anthology of science fiction stories.
I've been writing a lot, posting everyday about random topics that interest me - because if I much preach what I believe, which is that content on hive should not be content about hive, perhaps some other people can follow my lead. My recent and future posts will be at 100% power up until I'm an Orca. That's my goal for the time being :)
Meanwhile - this post is about HIVE, because I am trying to keep my skills serviceable when it comes to data and data manipulation. I've been applying for meat space jobs, in the analysis / data field, as I have now been unemployed for almost five months after taking a redundancy from my prior employer! I miss disposable income! :D
Features Built This Month
No new features in the data set this month. You can look at the previous month's data here if you wish to do a month on month comparison.
So, for the month of August, what have we achieved as a blockchain?
If we were writing novels on HIVE, we published three more this month, as a collective. I don't think we actually did, though, as more and more short-form content makes up this data.
There were about 150 more unique users publishing posts on HIVE in August, which sees a small uptick in activity. Still, have 2% more unique authors than the month prior is nothing to sneeze at. That's good growth. We must retain that growth. if we did that month on month - (which I am not dumb enough to anticipate, or expect as a realistic situation) - it would still take SIXTEEN months to reach 10,000 monthly unique authors of top-level posts.
Less value was given to authors this month, with the average payout being down as well.
But as I said at the start of this post, I want to focus on the features that I engineered into the data, which is to be able to look at it by word count:
I will try to let the data speak for itself here:
Word Count and Image Insights
The below is a markdown table, it is a bit wide, you might need to scroll sideways. It breaks down posts by their word count, then a number of other metrics.
| Word Count | Posts | % of Content | Total Pay | Max Pay | Avg Pay | Median Pay | Authors | Avg Words Per Picture | Images Found | Avg Images |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| < 50 Words | 12864 | 13.01% | $53,529 | $160 | $4.16 | $0 | 1816 | 5.70 | 36653 | 2.85 |
| < 100 Words | 8987 | 9.09% | $7,306 | $57 | $0.81 | $0 | 1557 | 25.60 | 39268 | 4.37 |
| < 250 Words | 36100 | 36.50% | $14,972 | $54 | $0.41 | $0 | 2720 | 29.30 | 93892 | 2.6 |
| < 500 Words | 16338 | 16.52% | $30,900 | $61 | $1.89 | $1 | 3281 | 100.60 | 158129 | 9.68 |
| < 750 Words | 11356 | 11.48% | $33,291 | $69 | $2.93 | $2 | 2538 | 137.8 | 147067 | 12.95 |
| < 1000 Words | 5213 | 5.27% | $17,552 | $91 | $3.37 | $2 | 1670 | 157.3 | 85744 | 16.45 |
| < 1500 Words | 5182 | 5.24% | $19,349 | $85 | $3.73 | $2 | 1386 | 159.6 | 112690 | 21.75 |
| < 2000 Words | 1446 | 1.46% | $5,938 | $60 | $4.11 | $3 | 540 | 189.5 | 37083 | 25.65 |
| < 2500 Words | 558 | 0.56% | $2,105 | $49 | $3.77 | $2 | 214 | 357.1 | 16332 | 29.27 |
| > 2501 Words | 860 | 0.87% | $1,719 | $61 | $2.00 | $0 | 188 | 1044.8 | 14179 | 16.49 |
| ## Top Authors by Various Metrics |
Again, here, I am letting the data speak for itself. If you want to know a particular author's stats, let me know, and if I get time, you might get a reply - as I will not be able to upload the whole data set here, it is enormous and I don't want to crash your browser. :)
Most Posts
Most Replies
Most Pay
Highest Max Pay
Highest Average Pay
Most Words Published
Most Swearing
Highest Average Word Count
Most Images Posted
Highest Average Images
Highest Pay Per Word
What I have Learned
What hasn't changed:
When I started looking into this data, my hypothesis was that longer posts should get more rewards. What I have seen by looking at this data over the last ten weeks or so, is that this is not the case.
As is the case with creative content such as blogs, travel logs, photography, art, music, fiction, philosophy, science, homesteading, code snippets, or the vast other types of content that people post on the platform, there is no single indicator of quality that can be programmatically determined.
What's gotten worse?
The distribution of payout to shorter posts seems to be increasing compared to the distribution in payout to longer posts. This , as per the comments above, isn't to discourage anyone from doing what they do. People are free to create whatever they want, and curators are free to vote however they want, but I want everyone to look at every post with intent and thought before they vote.
Comments on Purpose
Again, everyone has a different purpose on HIVE, and it is not appropriate for anyone to determine the purpose or intent of another - but we can look at the past, and from it, perhaps learn something new or improve the way we do things in the future. The last month saw me hit my nine-year milestone of publishing content on chain, and I don't see myself stopping anytime soon, because I have oh so much trapped in my head that I must simply get it out.
What do you have trapped in YOUR head?