NEWS: 'Second Life' User Numbers Don't Quite Add Up

News/Social Networks/Second Life/Users
Found on: foxnews.com

Clay Shirky just completed a four-month study on the number of users in Second Life, based on his findings, Shirky claims that the actual number of regular users are less the 200,000 versus the 3.2 million Linden Lab reports to have...numbers don't quite add up?

FoxNews post:

How many people use "Second Life"? Not as many as you might think.

In December, New York University lecturer Clay Shirky launched a one-man Web crusade against the widespread misrepresentation of "Second Life"'s popularity, claiming most publications — including PC Magazine — were inadvertently overstating the number of users.

When reporters ask how many people are using "Second Life," the folks at Linden Lab typically respond with the number of "residents," and most reporters assume that "resident" means "unique user."

But as Shirky points out, a resident isn't a unique user. A single user can create multiple virtual residents. "Second Life"'s popularity is significantly smaller than the press claims, and though Linden Lab won't tell us how many people are really using the service, Shirky thinks he's finally gotten to the bottom of things.