Stats From First Month

[Jeannie]

As of yesterday, our one month anniversary, here are some stats you might find interesting:

522 members, and 677(!) banned spammers.

We just passed 4 million total page hits since the site has been online. On average, Wednesday is our busiest day of the week and Saturday is the slowest

We've had visits from 122 different countries, and these are the top 5 so far this month:

Countries Pages Hits Bandwidth United States us 442,678 764,646 7.13 GB Great Britain gb 235,317 412,325 3.54 GB Canada ca 84,441 139,757 1.45 GB Australia au 45,474 89,779 801.64 MB Netherlands nl 29,209 57,554 434.00 MB

As well as numbers, it's useful to review how we're doing in terms of the character of the forum. It's no secret that we started IWL because we were no longer happy where we were, but mostly we were excited by the idea of using our experience to create something new and fresh. We were aiming at a few things:

1) A cool modern look
We didn't want the 'budget supermarket' look with bold colours and banners competing for attention. We wanted a relaxed clarity that made it easy to get around and do things, while leaving the focus on the posts. We think we've pretty much achieved that, with a clean, consistent look.

2) A cohesive community
Our experience elsewhere told us that you can have too many sub-forums. Some themes and brands need their own space, but if you have too many sub-forums you run the risk of dividing the community. We wanted a single community where members feel at home everywhere. It's something we'll continue to think about as we grow.

3) A courteous but not stuffy environment
We didn't want a dry academic tone, but neither did we want the hullabaloo of a playground. We haven't seen the macho posturing that can turn forums into boys' clubs, and we don't have habitually confrontational members. We do have one or two members who could be a little less vivid and forceful in their language but we're hoping that they'll adapt... Generally, we've been able to trust the members without too much in the way of intervention. As we all know, a self-policing membership means lesss moderation, which makes all of us happy, particularly the mods who get to talk more about fun stuff like watches.

IWL Staff