Poll of the Day > At the current rate of user loss, GameFAQs will be dead in a few short years.

(+) Yeah! (+)

I'm not the only one who compares voter turnout in the polls to see how active GameFAQs is. And "Do you look at the results of the Poll of the Day before you vote?" is a good poll to gauge with.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/2174-do-you-look-at-the-results-of-the-poll-of-the-day-before-you

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/2998-do-you-look-at-the-results-of-the-poll-of-the-day-before-you

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/3681-do-you-look-at-the-results-of-the-poll-of-the-day-before-you

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/5001-do-you-look-at-the-results-of-the-poll-of-the-day-before-you

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/5999-do-you-look-at-the-results-of-the-poll-of-the-day-before-you

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/6671-do-you-look-at-the-results-of-the-poll-of-the-day-before-you

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/6999-do-you-look-at-the-results-of-the-poll-of-the-day-before-you

The peak was in 2008.

We were still going strong in 2009, but we lost 11,711 voters over 682 days by late November. About 17-18 users per day.

We lost a lot more by 2013. 36,043 voters over 1,180 days. About 30.5 users per day. The 2010s was when things started to look bad. People really started to migrate.

By Fall 2015 we lost 18,800 voters over 936 days. About 20 users per day.

The bleeding then starts to slow in Spring 2017, thank goodness. A mere 5,195 voters over 581 days. Just under 9 users per day.

But a little under a year later in late February 2018, we lose 3,975 voters in 313 days. Now we're up to an average loss of about 12.7 users per day.

And finally, just a few days ago, February 2020, we saw a loss of 5,285 voters over 727 days. About 7.27 users per day.

The last poll had 5,817 voters. If we continue at our current rate of about 7 users lost per day on average, the June 2022 version of this poll will have no votes. But let's assume the bleeding will continue to slow. How much time does that give us? Maybe 2025?

Unless the Reddits and Twitters become unpopular, and the glory days of forums return. It could happen! There was a time when forums were on top. There was a time when America Online was the only Internet. Why should Twitter and Reddit rule forever? Surely a time for them to experience a heavy loss of users must come? And someone new to take its place? Someone new, that is old?

I usually only vote in the poll when someone mentions it on the board. Doubt I'm the only one. There's likely hundreds, if not thousands, of users who don't vote in the poll, so it's not a very reliable barometer for user numbers. Certainly indicates a drop in poll-takers, which could (and probably does) indicate user drop-off, but we can't know for certain how many users have stopped coming altogether

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Should make better polls.

Also what poll?

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Far-Queue posted...

I usually only vote in the poll when someone mentions it on the board. Doubt I'm the only one. There's likely hundreds, if not thousands, of users who don't vote in the poll, so it's not a very reliable barometer for user numbers. Certainly indicates a drop in poll-takers, which could (and probably does) indicate user drop-off, but we can't know for certain how many users have stopped coming altogether

We could say "For every X amount of people who vote in the poll, there are Y amount of people who don't." Zero votes in the poll doesn't mean exactly zero people using the site, but it's a good metric for overall site usage.

But how consistent is the voting day-to-day? You can't just take one poll from one day of the year and say that number represents the average for the year. That number on that particular day could be up, could be down, from the average

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Far-Queue posted...

But how consistent is the voting day-to-day? You can't just take one poll from one day of the year and say that number represents the average for the year. That number on that particular day could be up, could be down, from the average

These are all random days out of the year, so we can assume the turnout is about on par with any other random day. Except for maybe summer, maybe kids are out of school and using the Internet more. But you're probably not gonna compare February 20th and September 14th and say "One of these days had a noticeably bigger/smaller draw than the other because of something."

FrothySolutions posted...

These are all random days out of the year, so we can assume the turnout is about on par with any other random day. Except for maybe summer, maybe kids are out of school and using the Internet more. But you're probably not gonna compare February 20th and September 14th and say "One of these days had a noticeably bigger/smaller draw than the other because of something."

But they're all of the same poll.

Let's look at it this way, if you're following a prolific person on Twitter and they frequently ask questions of their followers, but there ends up being just a small number of questions being constantly rotated day after day, how likely are you going to keep answers those same questions after you've already answered them?

Does the inevitable diminishing amount of replies mean that person is losing followers? Or are people just ignoring the recycled fluff and engaging in the new material?

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the poll is not a good metric for site usage, at all.

there's literally a place you can go to see how many people are actually on the boards, that's the number you should use. not the poll which anyone can vote in, regardless of them having an account or not.

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Far-Queue posted...

But how consistent is the voting day-to-day? You can't just take one poll from one day of the year and say that number represents the average for the year. That number on that particular day could be up, could be down, from the average

also this.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/poll/5253-character-battle-ix-division-1-final-link-vs-shepard-vs

this poll is now the average users on this website.

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Love to vote when its something about consoles and the Xbox One is getting wrecked(yet again).

@Bulbasaur

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uh, okay?

why did you tag me

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Manic_Prime posted...

But they're all of the same poll.

Let's look at it this way, if you're following a prolific person on Twitter and they frequently ask questions of their followers, but there ends up being just a small number of questions being constantly rotated day after day, how likely are you going to keep answers those same questions after you've already answered them?

Does the inevitable diminishing amount of replies mean that person is losing followers? Or are people just ignoring the recycled fluff and engaging in the new material?

No, I think people are voting in the poll each time. The numbers aren't shrinking because people are like "I voted in this poll last year, I don't need to do it again." Because the numbers are also consistent with polls that don't repeat. A new poll in 2018 has results as small by comparison to a new poll in 2008 as these repeating polls.

Game_Grumps posted...

the poll is not a good metric for site usage, at all.

there's literally a place you can go to see how many people are actually on the boards, that's the number you should use. not the poll which anyone can vote in, regardless of them having an account or not.

That's what I want to measure. Not just people who post on the boards, but people who use the site, period.

I used to vote in the poll every single day and now while I still come every day I havent vited in a normal poll in like years

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Ok, I believe you TC.

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I dont know about that, Animal Crossing Community has been around since 2004 and is still going despite a huge loss in users.

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TyVulpine posted...

I dont know about that, Animal Crossing Community has been around since 2004 and is still going despite a huge loss in users.

Is there a number we can track to see how many users Animal Crossing is losing?

HornedLion posted...

Love to vote when its something about consoles and the Xbox One is getting wrecked(yet again).

@Bulbasaur

You know damn right. Unless... did MS fire you?

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The poll is a horrible place to find out site usage. As others have said, I believe there is an actual place to go and get the real number of users. There are probably some people/without accounts, that can vote. Maybe some people don't even use the site daily, but vote in the poll daily. And, like Far-Queue said, some people only vote in the poll when reminded. I actually forget about it most days. And there are probably many that don't vote at all. Since you're assuming already, the rest of us can, as well. And I assuming that a good chunk of people probably don't vote. And there are probably a good chunk or people who forget to vote more days than not. Which would make a lot of sense... Meaning that there are probably way more people on a daily basis than you think/ Not to mentioned, some people probably google something about a game and get brought to this site onto a game board, thereby bypassing the poll altogether. They may become a daily user of that board, but never see the poll or the day...
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HornedLion posted...

You know damn right. Unless... did MS fire you?

...did you forget to switch to an alt?


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Bulbasaur posted...

...did you forget to switch to an alt?

#Exposed.

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At least there's more real users than Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, honestly I think that half their posts are from bots, especially IG booty DMs and hot girls keep voting on all my polls.

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Bulbasaur posted...

...did you forget to switch to an alt?

I quoted myself when I meant to quote you asking, Why did you tag me.

So I said, You know damn right. Unless... MS fired you.

Cause youre an MS Shill of the highest order.

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LinkPizza posted...

The poll is a horrible place to find out site usage. As others have said, I believe there is an actual place to go and get the real number of users. There are probably some people/without accounts, that can vote. Maybe some people don't even use the site daily, but vote in the poll daily. And, like Far-Queue said, some people only vote in the poll when reminded. I actually forget about it most days. And there are probably many that don't vote at all. Since you're assuming already, the rest of us can, as well. And I assuming that a good chunk of people probably don't vote. And there are probably a good chunk or people who forget to vote more days than not. Which would make a lot of sense... Meaning that there are probably way more people on a daily basis than you think/ Not to mentioned, some people probably google something about a game and get brought to this site onto a game board, thereby bypassing the poll altogether. They may become a daily user of that board, but never see the poll or the day...

Voting in the poll is still site use. I'm looking to count even the bare minimum of site use. Dedicated users as well as casual users.

And yeah, there's certainly people who don't vote. But like I said earlier...

FrothySolutions posted...

We could say "For every X amount of people who vote in the poll, there are Y amount of people who don't." Zero votes in the poll doesn't mean exactly zero people using the site, but it's a good metric for overall site usage.

The poll results don't speak for every single site user, but it's like any other sample sized based metric. If 9 out of 10 dentists recommend a toothpaste, it's fairly accurate to say 90 out of 100 dentists recommend the toothpaste.

That's the thing. it's not a good sample size because you don't know how many daily users actually vote. And like others have said, there's probably an actual way to find the number of daily users. Since you don't even know the percentage of users that vote, you random assuming is pointless. You can say for every X numbers of people who vote, there's y number of people who don't. Someone else can say for every X number of people who vote, there's 3X number of people who don't. All you're doing is assuming how many people you think are using the site off of information that doesn't matter. The only thing the poll shows is the minimum number of people who have been to the site that day. The number of users that day will normally be much higher than the number of people who vote in the poll. Unless you can come up with percentages based of of information and not guesswork, than everything you said is pointless. You don't know if 20%, 50%, 90% or people voted in each poll. Without knowing that, using the poll to figure out site usage in pointless...
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LinkPizza posted...

That's the thing. it's not a good sample size because you don't know how many daily users actually vote. And like others have said, there's probably an actual way to find the number of daily users. Since you don't even know the percentage of users that vote, you random assuming is pointless. You can say for every X numbers of people who vote, there's y number of people who don't. Someone else can say for every X number of people who vote, there's 3X number of people who don't. All you're doing is assuming how many people you think are using the site off of information that doesn't matter. The only thing the poll shows is the minimum number of people who have been to the site that day. The number of users that day will normally be much higher than the number of people who vote in the poll. Unless you can come up with percentages based of of information and not guesswork, than everything you said is pointless. You don't know if 20%, 50%, 90% or people voted in each poll. Without knowing that, using the poll to figure out site usage in pointless...

We know that 5,817 people voting in a poll means a lot less people using the site than if there were 75,000 people voting in a poll. So what can we say about, like, 500 people voting in a poll? Or 50?

OP's numbers aren't that accurate, because it doesn't take into account users that come back. Who knows how many of the "people" that "leave" weren't bots or alts?

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TyVulpine posted...

OP's numbers aren't that accurate, because it doesn't take into account users that come back. Who knows how many of the "people" that "leave" weren't bots or alts?

That's why I mentioned the glory days of forums returning. Maybe whoever/whatever we had in 2008, whether they be people or bots, comes back?

FrothySolutions posted...

That's why I mentioned the glory days of forums returning. Maybe whoever/whatever we had in 2008, whether they be people or bots, comes back?

Unlikely, since social media like Reddit are more popular than forums sites. But like comic books, I doubt GameFAQs will die completely. There'll always be diehard loyalists.

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TyVulpine posted...

Unlikely, since social media like Reddit are more popular than forums sites. But like comic books, I doubt GameFAQs will die completely. There'll always be diehard loyalists.

Why should Reddit and Twitter be popular forever? Why shouldn't they experience big user loss like forums did?

FrothySolutions posted...

We know that 5,817 people voting in a poll means a lot less people using the site than if there were 75,000 people voting in a poll. So what can we say about, like, 500 people voting in a poll? Or 50?

You can't say anything. But 50 people voting in the poll could mean 50 people using the site and everyone votes in the poll. Or 50,000 people using the site and only 0.1% voting in the poll. So, unless you can provide percentages on how many people are voting in the poll that day, you can't really use the poll to determine the amount of users. And you definitely can't use it determine the rate that users are leaving since the percentage of people voting in the poll is probably different everyday. Not to mention users that leave for a few months before coming back. And like TyVulpine said, they could be users coming back all the time. Maybe 50 user left, but 30 came back. To you, it would only look like 20 left. There's could also be a drop or increase randomly due to different things. Like the start or end of summer. Or when a new system comes out or whatever...
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FrothySolutions posted...

Why should Reddit and Twitter be popular forever? Why shouldn't they experience big user loss like forums did?

I didn't say they would, I just they're more popular than forum sites. Maybe 5-10 years from now, a new form of social media will become more popular. At one time, Yahoo and MSN Messengers were very popular, but died out. Nothing lasts forever.

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LinkPizza posted...

You can't say anything. But 50 people voting in the poll could mean 50 people using the site and everyone votes in the poll. Or 50,000 people using the site and only 0.1% voting in the poll. So, unless you can provide percentages on how many people are voting in the poll that day, you can't really use the poll to determine the amount of users. And you definitely can't use it determine the rate that users are leaving since the percentage of people voting in the poll is probably different everyday. Not to mention users that leave for a few months before coming back. And like TyVulpine said, they could be users coming back all the time. Maybe 50 user left, but 30 came back. To you, it would only look like 20 left. There's could also be a drop or increase randomly due to different things. Like the start or end of summer. Or when a new system comes out or whatever...

I think you can say something. If you count a bunch of footprints in a forest, you can use that to say very many people visit the forest. If you can correlate it to other things like how many people are renting trailers, etc.

So if you don't see very many footprints in the forest, it's probably not because people are more careful not to leave footprints. It's most likely because less people are coming by.

TyVulpine posted...

I didn't say they would, I just they're more popular than forum sites. Maybe 5-10 years from now, a new form of social media will become more popular. At one time, Yahoo and MSN Messengers were very popular, but died out. Nothing lasts forever.

Maybe 5 years from now GameFAQs is where people go instead of r/gaming?

FrothySolutions posted...

I think you can say something. If you count a bunch of footprints in a forest, you can use that to say very many people visit the forest. If you can correlate it to other things like how many people are renting trailers, etc.

So if you don't see very many footprints in the forest, it's probably not because people are more careful not to leave footprints. It's most likely because less people are coming by.

But that's still an assumption. For all you know, those could have been made by the same couple of people. Maybe a few kids were playing tag. Or hide and seek. So, you cold assume many people visited the forest. But you could be wrong... Also, and the people aren't visiting the poll, then you won't see their footprints, no matter how many times they come in the forest. So, you could have thousands of people come in the forest, leaving no footprints...
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If you click on Boards and scroll all the way down you can find approximately how many users are on the message boards at any given time.
It definitely use to be higher a few years back, but this is also taken on a Sunday evening when I would imagine there is less activity.

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LinkPizza posted...

But that's still an assumption. For all you know, those could have been made by the same couple of people. Maybe a few kids were playing tag. Or hide and seek. So, you cold assume many people visited the forest. But you could be wrong... Also, and the people aren't visiting the poll, then you won't see their footprints, no matter how many times they come in the forest. So, you could have thousands of people come in the forest, leaving no footprints...

Occam's Razor. In fact, you can hold me to it. I'm gonna save this thread, and then in a few years if/when the poll numbers start dipping into the triple (or double?) digits, we'll see if we see corresponding inactivity on the boards and stuff.

StelioKontos posted...

If you click on Boards and scroll all the way down you can find approximately how many users are on the message boards at any given time.
It definitely use to be higher a few years back, but this is also taken on a Sunday evening when I would imagine there is less activity.

I'm not just looking for board activity, I'm looking for site activity as a whole. But I am saying that "Users On The Boards" number was bigger in 2008, like the poll numbers were bigger in 2008. I'm saying they definitely correlate, and when the poll numbers drop, so shall the "Users On The Boards" number drop.

crazy mods are a reason. I got purgatory based off some political post

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No it won't because there are the core members it won't lose until later than that, eventually itll level off

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Muscles posted...

No it won't because there are the core members it won't lose until later than that, eventually itll level off

So the bleeding will eventually stop, is your theory? Not just slow?

Maybe slow down to a snail's pace but at a certain point it will remain roughly intact

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Muscles posted...

Maybe slow down to a snail's pace but at a certain point it will remain roughly intact

How "alive" is that though? You look around at some of the other big video game forums of the 2000s, they still technically have members, but it's a ghost town.

Shrug, I'll still be here if I'm alive.

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HornedLion posted...

I quoted myself when I meant to quote you asking, Why did you tag me.

So I said, You know damn right. Unless... MS fired you.

Cause youre an MS Shill of the highest order.

uh huh

sure you did

also i haven't been shilling for anyone

but if someone did want to pay me to do that, hmu

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FrothySolutions posted...

Occam's Razor. In fact, you can hold me to it. I'm gonna save this thread, and then in a few years if/when the poll numbers start dipping into the triple (or double?) digits, we'll see if we see corresponding inactivity on the boards and stuff.

I'm not just looking for board activity, I'm looking for site activity as a whole. But I am saying that "Users On The Boards" number was bigger in 2008, like the poll numbers were bigger in 2008. I'm saying they definitely correlate, and when the poll numbers drop, so shall the "Users On The Boards" number drop.

The thing is that nobody is saying the numbers aren't dropping. We're saying that you can't based how much they are dropping by the poll of the day. As StelioKontos showed you, you can see board activity by clicking on it. Of course, that doesn't help you figure out the full amount of people as some people use multiple boards. And it only shows current. So it daily users are sleeping or not on for any reason, you wouldn't know. But that's still a better way then the poll which you'll never know if 20% or 80% are voting on. Without even an average vote percentage of users, you can't find out. And even using the average number of votes doesn't work, since that will average out. Now, if you get a 90% or above vote percentage, that could help to tell you about how many people were on that day. But that's about it. End result is that the poll of the day is not the best way to judge how many people still use this site. it's not even a good way. Only a fool would think that's the best way to find out how many people use this site...
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It'll stabilize, I think. Reddit doesn't give you the forum experience where you actually know and remember the people you talk to. There are at least some people who will stay for that.

Then again lots of forums I liked died.

Even then I don't give a shit if all of GameFAQs dies except this board. It doesn't take a lot of traffic to make profit from a forum website.

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I rarely look at the polls. Only during contest season really.

I voted more in regular polls 10 years ago.

I am sure I'm not the only one.

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Wait, wasn't that the day the poll was broken? I remember not being able to vote on the poll until the end of the day because it didn't appear on the front page.

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Solid Sonic posted...

Wait, wasn't that the day the poll was broken? I remember not being able to vote on the poll until the end of the day because it didn't appear on the front page.

A it turns out, the day the poll was broken was an accident. They were trying to make it so that GameFaqs Gold members were able to vote first, then the rest. But they accidentally took it down altogether...
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Well rest assured, I'll still be browsing this site whether I'm 30, 40, or burning in hell

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LinkPizza posted...

The thing is that nobody is saying the numbers aren't dropping. We're saying that you can't based how much they are dropping by the poll of the day. As StelioKontos showed you, you can see board activity by clicking on it. Of course, that doesn't help you figure out the full amount of people as some people use multiple boards. And it only shows current. So it daily users are sleeping or not on for any reason, you wouldn't know. But that's still a better way then the poll which you'll never know if 20% or 80% are voting on. Without even an average vote percentage of users, you can't find out. And even using the average number of votes doesn't work, since that will average out. Now, if you get a 90% or above vote percentage, that could help to tell you about how many people were on that day. But that's about it. End result is that the poll of the day is not the best way to judge how many people still use this site. it's not even a good way. Only a fool would think that's the best way to find out how many people use this site...

You can gauge whether or not the site is dead. You don't need the exact amount of people on the website, if the poll gets zero results, that will probably mean the boards are near deserted. You don't need an exact number, all you need to know is "Less poll answerers = less people on the boards."