just for fun, I'd like to see... a graph...

[jbuttell]

that's built from a poll of all users on this forum, with as close of an estimate as possible specifying when they became Ron Paul supporters. I've been a supporter since summer of 2007 (thanks to all the Ron Paul supporters who caught my attention with freeway overpass signs in Los Angeles)

I think it would be very interesting to see a graph that illustrates, based on the many people here, when and at what rate the numbers have grown. What's a mystery to me is the proportion of new vs older supporters. I'd love to see a graph that shows this.

What do you think?

[newbitech]

that's built from a poll of all users on this forum, with as close of an estimate as possible specifying when they became Ron Paul supporters. I've been a supporter since summer of 2007 (thanks to all the Ron Paul supporters who caught my attention with freeway overpass signs in Los Angeles)

I think it would be very interesting to see a graph that illustrates, based on the many people here, when and at what rate the numbers have grown. What's a mystery to me is the proportion of new vs older supporters. I'd love to see a graph that shows this.

What do you think?

I suppose that could be done without the admin dumping a nicely formatted SQL for us. Just have to cURL through the members lists, parse the dates and the graph the points. Wouldn't be too hard.

Maybe I'll do this as a little side project. I have been wanting to mine these forums for a while now =)

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/memberlist.php?&order=asc&sort=username

1113 pages to role through. 30k + lines of data. Should fit nicely in a .csv

[jbuttell]

It's just that by gauging support by total numbers, we get lost with errors like duplicate accounts, inactive etc. Measuring by join date of course doesn't account for long time supporters that just recently decided to join.

If we begin (it maybe it has already has) to see an avallanche of support leading up to the primaries, it would be great if the graph might provide such evidence before hand.

thanks newbitech, would be great if you get some time to give it a shot :)

[FreeTraveler]

You might want to separate out or drop the people who haven't been back since the day they joined. Even better, use date joined and last visit date to do an active users graph by date. That would be an interesting curve.

[newbitech]

we can do anything we want with the data, filters, exclusions etc. come up with some rules. I'll punch out the script tonight.

[UtahApocalypse]

Look forward to seeing/working on this. Once its a .csv can someone uploaded it to google docs and share it out? would like to mess with the data myself.

[FreeTraveler]

Load 'em all in the database with join date, last active date, and number of posts.

Active users (ADate) = count (users) where join date <= ADate and last active date >= ADate.

Calc that number for each date from RPF founding until today(). Plot it. You get a curve of currently active users for the life of the site. It will fall off toward the end because of people who only visit occasionally and haven't been around for a while.

I'd include the number of posts in the database just because you could do some fun things with that too.

[brooks009]

my name in 07 was brooks007 but now it's brooks009. The data would be off in my case.

[Dr.3D]

my name in 07 was brooks007 but now it's brooks009. The data would be off in my case.
Why did you stop using the brooks007 account?

[satchelmcqueen]

cool idea. i think it may show when paul surged in support vs a steady gain. this would be fun to compare to major events and killer debates.

[brooks009]

Why did you stop using brook007?"

The password stopped working and I did not use that email anymore so I could not recover it.

[newbitech]

just a quick update. I decided to make this a .net project for the fun of it. At this point, I have populated tables for ID = member# and uName = username. I am building my looper to go back through all 334 pages of the member list 100 members/page. I thought about grabbing all the info off the list pages, but I decided to take one expansive step. Instead, I will rebuild the member page url and loop through each member capturing that member data. In this way, we can see how many friends people have, how active they are as far as groups, blogs, public messages, etc etc.. I have some other plans for this little project that I have had in the back of my head for a while.

Now that I have the connectivity and parsing scripted up, the rest is pretty much downhill. I need to put together a UI, a data stream, some interactive charts, and find an asp.net host. I'll probably just host it off my IP tho, unless I get traffic on the datastream.

Once I get the fields with the basic data we talked about in this thread, I'll go ahead and output to a .csv and throw it up on google docs so ya'll can start playing. Probably be another day or two. But the heavy lift is just about ready to go.

[jbuttell]

Wow newbitech, that's sounds really amazing! What an interesting source of info that may provide! Thanks so much for taking a stab at this!

[Edward]

Here is an ancient thread I put together that details who we are... http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?97216-Demographic-Polls

[DevilsAdvocate]

just a quick update. I decided to make this a .net project for the fun of it. At this point, I have populated tables for ID = member# and uName = username. I am building my looper to go back through all 334 pages of the member list 100 members/page. I thought about grabbing all the info off the list pages, but I decided to take one expansive step. Instead, I will rebuild the member page url and loop through each member capturing that member data. In this way, we can see how many friends people have, how active they are as far as groups, blogs, public messages, etc etc.. I have some other plans for this little project that I have had in the back of my head for a while.

Now that I have the connectivity and parsing scripted up, the rest is pretty much downhill. I need to put together a UI, a data stream, some interactive charts, and find an asp.net host. I'll probably just host it off my IP tho, unless I get traffic on the datastream.

Once I get the fields with the basic data we talked about in this thread, I'll go ahead and output to a .csv and throw it up on google docs so ya'll can start playing. Probably be another day or two. But the heavy lift is just about ready to go.

I am just starting to take my first programming classes next semester, and you just intimidated the hell out of me!

[nano1895]

Although it may not be 100% accurate due to supporters not knowing about this site this would indeed be interesting to graph. Sadly I don't even remember when I started supporting Ron Paul lol, you'd think I would remember.

[Rincewind]

I started supporting him in 07. I may have had an account back then, I don't remember, but I figured I'd just create a new one. I certainly read the forum plenty back then.

[The One]

my name in 07 was brooks007 but now it's brooks009. The data would be off in my case.

I've been thinking about changing my name to The Two.

[seekingliberty]

I started supporting Ron Paul in April or May of 2011.

[DevilsAdvocate]

Btw, do we store data on traffic from lurkers? That might be fun to see.

[Tod]

I voted for Paul in '08 primary but didn't find this forum until this year.

[jersdream]

Many people with new names probably got ban hammered :P

[Paul4Prez]

I voted for Ron Paul in 1988. I recall signing an online petition in 2004 urging him to run for president as a Republican. Something like 3 or 4 thousand people signed it. How times have changed.

[LibertasPraesidium]

I wonder would we be able to view the average posts per day and potentially how many people are online at any given time. I try not to be a lurker but my join date/ post count disagree. This could be used to figure out a ratio of people online that are posting everyday and how many lurkers. Maybe we could even make a lurker thread :p

[wayzupusc]

I think going by join date would be misleading as well because for me personally, I have supported Ron Paul since I saw him in "America: Freedom to Fascim" by Aaron Russo in early 2007 or so. I was just starting up my own business and working nearly 90 hours/week, had a wife in nursing school and two kids so I've never had the time or energy to be as active as I'd like; I barely have the time to get on here and read up on all the daily goings on but have started to MAKE TIME....I'm surprised there isn't a poll here for this sort of thing yet.

[drak]

I think going by join date would be misleading as well because for me personally, I have supported Ron Paul since I saw him in "America: Freedom to Fascim" by Aaron Russo in early 2007 or so. I was just starting up my own business and working nearly 90 hours/week, had a wife in nursing school and two kids so I've never had the time or energy to be as active as I'd like; I barely have the time to get on here and read up on all the daily goings on but have started to MAKE TIME....I'm surprised there isn't a poll here for this sort of thing yet.

Exactly, I started supporting him when I heard about him on a particular talk show back in 2003. However I didn't join this forum until recently.

[jbuttell]

Exactly, I started supporting him when I heard about him on a particular talk show back in 2003. However I didn't join this forum until recently.

Yep, to make this really accurate, the forum admins would have to push out a request for users to fill in a profile entry "When did you become a Ron Paul supporter?

[drak]

Just make a poll. When did you start supporting Ron Paul:

>2000
2001
2002
2003
etc...

[thoughtomator]

1991

[jbuttell]

honestly, I think people that jumped inboard within the past 4 years can remember approximately what month it was. The most interesting data should come from those joining the ranks this past year since the numbers have swelled do much.

[thesnake742]

Yea! I've been wanting to see the results of the last year for a while.

[Icymudpuppy]

Why not just create a rough draft poll with all the different reasons you can think of for supporting RP, with a final one for "Other please specify in comments".

Then, you can create a final draft poll thread with all the new things presented in the "Other" category.

Then, just get the admins to make it a sticky in General Politics so virtually all members will see it.

You'll get a convenient little bar graph.