With recent discussion about the demise of Summitpost I was wondering about the FACTS concerning Summitpost. I see that Josh registered March 9, 2001 and Ryle on March 10, 2001. That makes SP about 11 years old tomorrow.

According to the 24 Hour Site Stats on the front page Summitpost had 20245 Unique visitors in the last 24 hours. Questions for the Elves:

What day in the last 11 years did Summitpost have the most unique visitors?
What year did Summitpost have the most visitors?
Is there an actual downward trend in SP use?
How did ending Prate and Prattle affect the use of Summitpost?
What has been the trend in posting photos to the site been in the past 11 years?

Holsti97 wrote:With recent discussion about the demise of Summitpost I was wondering about the FACTS concerning Summitpost. I see that Josh registered March 9, 2001 and Ryle on March 10, 2001. That makes SP about 11 years old tomorrow.

According to the 24 Hour Site Stats on the front page Summitpost had 20245 Unique visitors in the last 24 hours. Questions for the Elves:

What day in the last 11 years did Summitpost have the most unique visitors?
What year did Summitpost have the most visitors?
Is there an actual downward trend in SP use?
How did ending Prate and Prattle affect the use of Summitpost?
What has been the trend in posting photos to the site been in the past 11 years?

Matt gave some nice statistics, so I'll just give some personal takes on a few questions.

3. Usage in terms of visitors continues to increase. So do registrations. There seem to be fewer members submitting content pages over the past few years, but there's usually a healthy flow except during the middle of winter. Reasons are surely many and related to site issues as well as outside ones, but some I believe are strong drivers are these: dissatisfaction with the voting system, more and more "known" mountains being already "taken," and reluctance to take the time to make a really good page in an Internet age that prizes instant gratification.


4. Now that's a can of worms. Very short answer, and far from comprehensive: there is no doubt that some members left and others' enthusiasm was dampened. However, interpretations about whether that was a good or a bad thing vary widely. Read if you dare: what-happened-to-the-pnp-forums-t51220.html. The impact was mostly in the forums, though a few of those who left or went into hibernation were content contributors.

Please do not read into this post an opinion of that decision (note to newer members-- I was not an elf then although "Forum Moderator" now appears with every post I have ever made), nor should anyone reading the thread referenced automatically assume my views expressed there remain unchanged.


5. Matt showed the numbers. As far as the content goes, I think few would disagree that there has been a trend of more and more of what many used to call off-topic photos, and many (including me) believe that has dampened the participation of longer-time members as well.

Montana Matt wrote:

Holsti97 wrote:How did ending Prate and Prattle affect the use of Summitpost?

I can't recall when that happened, but I could look at the number of page views before and after Prate and Prattle went away if someone remembers a date. My guess is that the number of page views per day for the site dropped slightly, but I don't know that for certain.

January 12, 2010 (I looked up the thread; I'm not obsessed with the date!)

Happy Anniversary, SP !

Thank you, Matt and the elves for what you do behind the scenes.