Meebo Math

We've been recording our Meebo chats for over two months now and I wanted to take a look at our statistics to get a picture of which days and times are more popular. I'll just be straightforward and give you the numbers I crunched.

Disclaimer: The results may be skewed because everyone would record their sessions differently. Some of us would record a request to be added to the buddy list as a transaction and some of us didn't. When a student would navigate away from a chat window and then come back, some of us would record that as multiple sessions while others would count it as one. If a chat session wasn't recorded in the Google Documents session, then naturally it won't influence the results here. Finally, I'll admit to rounding, estimating and even human error on my part. Counting seemed so much simpler in first grade.

April and May Overview:

April: 81 chat sessions over 122 hours for a rate of .67 questions per hour.
May: 143 chat sessions over 133 hours for a rate of 1.08 questions per hour covered.

That's an improvement of 62%!

Morning, Afternoon and Evening Chat Overview:*

I divided up the chat sessions into three time periods. The first period is the morning period and it covers any time before 1 p.m. Central. I didn't second guess the times entered, however. If a librarian was on the east coast and said their session went from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m., I counted it as an afternoon session even though it was technically only 1 p.m. Central when the session ended. There were a few times when two librarians would have the same hours covered because of this. The afternoon time period went from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. The evening time period covered any time after 5 p.m. That technically makes it the longest time period but most of the evening chat sessions were done before 9 p.m. Central. If a session went from 12:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m., I'd split the session up and give one hour to the morning and another to the afternoon. If there were an even number of questions recorded, I'd divide them equally between the two time periods. If there was an even number or an easily dividable number (3 questions over 3 hours), it was random which time period received the extra. Overly scientific, this is not.

Morning: 57 questions over close to 80 hours with a rate of .71 questions per hour.
Afternoon: 99 questions over 111.25 hours covered with a rate of .88 questions per hour.
Evening: 110 questions over 95.75 hours covered with a rate of 1.15 questions per hour.

*These figures include the past week's June sessions so the numbers aren't just April and May.


Days of the Week Overview:*

The most popular days of the week were Tuesday, Wednesday and Sunday with averages over one question per covered hour. The least popular were Friday and Saturday with about one question per every two hours.

*Listed by most popular days to least popular days.

Tuesday: 60 questions over 43.75 hours for a ratio of 1.37 questions per hour.
Sunday: 27 questions over 24.5 hours for a ratio of 1.1 questions per hour.
Wednesday: 62 questions over 57.75 hours for a ratio of 1.07 questions per hour.
Thursday: 54 questions over 62.25 hours for a ratio of .87 questions per hour.
Monday: 37 questions over 46.25 hours for a ratio of .8 questions per hour.
Friday: 13 questions over 24.5 hours for a ratio of .53 questions per hour.
Saturday: 13 questions over 25.75 hours for a ratio of .5 questions per hour.

It should be noted that most of Friday and Saturday's chat sessions were done in the morning or early afternoon which could influence how low they are since morning is the least active time period. In the same vein, all of Sunday's sessions were done in the evening which is, according to the time period comparison, the most popular time for chat sessions. The numbers aren't weighed down by inactive morning or afternoon sessions.

*These figures include the past week's June sessions so the numbers aren't just April and May.

There is a rough glance at the numbers. We can perhaps study these to determine which time periods are important to cover as best we can while leaving room for a life. Or maybe just look at them because numbers are cool.

-Krista