One True Thread: Post Rate by Time of Day

All Users - 128 Days

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Older version - 114 days

This graph shows frequency of posting to the One True Thread of Time by time of day, comparing the actual posting rate over an interval to the average rate. The flat black line at 1.0 represents the average posting rate, and the other lines show how much the actual rate varied from average (as a ratio, not by absolute post count). The heaviest blue line shows all OTT posting activity by 1-hour intervals. The thin blue line shows the same data but by 5-minute intervals.

The other two lines compare weekday and weekend posting rates. The solid green line represents weekday posts, and the dashed red line represents weekend posts. Each of these lines shows variation from the overall average, not just the average for weekdays or weekends.

Graph showing how OTT posting rate varied from average by time of day (PNG version)

Recent change — The only significant difference between this graph and the previous 114-day version is a sharp upward bump of the 4-5pm hour and somewhat smaller bump of 5-6pm. I believe this is entirely explained by the Dark Frame, after which OTTers averaged a post every sixteen seconds for the next hour. Friday, July 25, between 4pm and 5pm RDT, we posted 228 times, at 13½ times the average rate to that point (the thread averaged 405 posts per day), adding .45% to the length of the thread in a single hour.

In general — It can be clearly seen that the heaviest posting, unsurprisingly, takes place during North American daylight and evening hours, from 10am to 11pm RDT (7am to 8pm Pacific Daylight Time). The slowest interval is from 5-6am (2-3am PDT)—many North American OTTers obviously choose coma over all-night reading—but the hourly rate barely drops below half the average rate, presumably thanks to posters in Australia, Asia, and Europe.

The 5-minute line shows that the heaviest posting activity takes place, again unsurprisingly, during the first 5 minutes of each hour—the ONG—with heavy activity continuing for the next 10 minutes. (If newpixbot got the ONG it's counted in the 10-15 minute range.)

Weekends — As has commonly been observed on the OTT itself, posting drops off dramatically on weekends. The difference is much more dramatic during the day than at night; presumably we norteamericanos are all out doing yard work or building sand castles during daylight hours, instead of reading the OTT. Even in the late evening, the weekend posting rate barely breaks the hourly average. (But in the 2-3am hour, the weekend rate slightly surpasses the weekday rate; presumably OTTers are more likely to stay up until the wee hours on weekends.)

Note that the weekend line varies from the overall activity much more than the weekday line; this is simply because there are 5 weekdays per week and only 2 weekend days. So if each week OTTers post a total of 120 more posts on weekdays than on the weekend, the weekday average is increased by 120 / 5 = 24 per day, but the weekend average is decreased by 120 / 2 = 60 per day.