New Scaratings

Thanks to everyone compiling data and contributing to this thread. Does involve some work, and I find the results both interesting and relevant.

Count for Monday, 3/6 - 3591, 14% of those in the west.

BO

Any way to tell what percentage of the on average 3346 came from the west before the split? This is the one game where you would expect the biggest effect, at least on the number of players in the west. Of course, as you can tell by the hall of fame, it looks like only 2 teams played (as the third and fourth place bars did not even have 5 people playing).

I did a little number crunching before the split and it appeared that in premium games the west feed had 20-22% of the totals. However I did not check SIQ specifically, but seeing as how it should have been airing at 9e/6p we can easily assume the ratio would be similar.

So what I've been doing this week is comparing the west numbers to the 2012 averages multiplied by 0.22 for the premium games. The specialty games for 2012 increased or decreased slightly depending on whether or not they occurred before or after the premiums.

We need a little more data before determining whether or not the specialty block would draw more in the west if the games aired nationally.

BO

Do we have any idea why Sports IQ East yesterday night is showing up as a repeat game, in much the same way as Spotlight was last Friday, thus preventing site rankings for showing up?

Brooke/AARDVK
(preparing for the firestorm if this glitch happens to Showdown tonight)

I don't know and can't see any logical pattern to the madness.

BO

Just brainstorming... maybe it's because of the Years round? Those clues tend to get re-used a lot. Maybe some kind of glitch is causing them to get marked *

Player count for Tuesday 3/6

GD - 6917 (5728 east 1189 west) 17% west, total count up 18%
SD - 7579 (6297 east 1282 west) 17% west, total count up 9%
BB - 4497 (3784 east 713 west) 16% west, total count down 22%

Overall count higher than average, count in the west down. BB taking a big hit due to placement after SD instead of before.

BO

And really, the total actual players for BB must be much lower, if they're counting zero scores as players. I noticed that at our table, when people left after SD, their boxes weren't immediately put back in the charger by the waitress. So they sat there while 3-4 of us played BB, and probably counted in the total number of players. I think if Buzztime's main goal is to keep players in the bars (thus appealing to bar owners), they're not succeeding by shortening their premium Tuesday game and putting Brainbuster after it.
XT

Thanks for catching my mistake, the numbers have been corrected above.

All my numbers for 2012 have not included zero scores so comparisons will be accurate. After checking for zeros in both SD and GD and finding none in the rankings for last night, I wrongly assumed that BB would be listed similarly.

BO

Player count for Wednesday 3/7

SF - 5037(4199 east, 838 west), 17% west, total count up 10%
Six - 6011(5025 east, 986 west), 16% west, total count up 24%
PT - 2623(2184 east, 439 west), 17% west, total count down 34%
Lex - 2368(1984 east, 384 west), 16% west, total count down 42%

BO

Player count for Thursday 3/8

AIA - 4651(3832 east, 819 west), 18% west, total count up 8%
IW - 4770(3932 east, 838 west), 18% west, total count up 13%
Six - 6271(5238 east, 1033 west), 16% west, total count up 26%
Topix - 3821(3201 east, 620 west), 16% west, total count down 17%

BO

Do these figures include "guest" (non-P+) boxes?

_________________
Anon
"He may seem like Mr. Rogers but a dark spirit lies beneath."

Yes, if you go to your player page and look at your SD scores it shows your place ranking and number of players. This is how I've pulled all the above numbers and they still include all participants and excludes zero scores.

For the record, 43% of SD participants this week were non-registered players.

BO

Percentage of non-P+ players by premium game

SIQ - 48% 1727 of 3605
SD - 44% 3316 of 7592
Six - 45% 2843 of 6252
Six - 50% 3232 of 6429
SL - 52% 4474 of 8531
PB - 61% 5143 of 8437

Totals - 51% 20735 of 40846

Over half the players now mean nothing. Swell.

BO

Never thought to look at that. Thanks for the data, Bo.

thanks for the data. Not every person who is non players plus is a nothing. about half the persons who play Showdown regularly at Three Monkeys have never bothered to register..and they play 2-3 times per month

Some interesting changes in the first two weeks (well, dozen days) of the split nation system:

1) California is up by 60 Gold Medals, 867 to 927. The Total Score metric for every site in the state is up as well, from 2,424 million to 2,456 million. California, the nation’s largest state, seems to thrive under the new system.

2) Texas is up by 31 Gold Medals, 984 to 1,015. Total Score in Texas is up from 3,608 to 3,635 million points. Texas, too, thrives under the new system.

3) Ohio is up by 81 Gold Medals, 1,628 to 1,709. Total Score in Ohio is up from 4,019 to 4,068 million. Ohio, too, thrives under the new system.

4) North Carolina is up just one Gold Medal, 204 to 205. Total Score in North Carolina is up 988 to 1,003 million. North Carolina, the tenth-largest state by population and a middling state by Buzztime standards, is a little better under the new system.

5) Virginia is up 30 Gold Medals, 508 to 538. Total Score in Virginia is up 1,580 to 1,622 million. Virginia, a little smaller than North Carolina but a bigger Buzztime state, thrives under the new system.

6) Colorado, the biggest Mountain Time state, has gained 16 Gold Medals, 174 to 190. Total Score in Colorado is up 1,574 to 1,588 million. Colorado thrives under the new system.

7) Hawaii is up four Gold Medals, 42 to 46. While Total Score has increased marginally, it still rounds to 46 million.

***

While we really need to look at one-month, three-month, six-month, and twelve-month results, it seems to me that the recent changes at Buzztime have increased Total Score, a better metric of aggregate play than mere player count.

While every state is getting more Gold Medals, the rates vary considerably. Colorado and Hawaii get a whopping ten percent jump, and California gets around seven percent, while Texas gets around three percent and North Carolina gets almost nothing. It seems that the West is favored overall by the split with respect to Gold Medals, as would probably be expected, although some Eastern sites are thriving, too.

Thanks for the analysis. Of course Gold Medals were going to double overall as a direct consequence of the split, so it would seem to me that the utility of the metric "increasing gold medals" is somewhat limited.

For aggregate score, do you have a breakdown between the increase in "regular" and "specialty" games? While for apples-to-apples aggregate score I think does make for a better metric, it has an inherent weakness when comparing apples to oranges. A one-hour Showdown or Six game will produce more than twice the potential points than an hour's worth of Countdown, which could blur a meaningful comparison of playership over the course of the night. It seems that playership has risen somewhat for each night's premium games (e.g., Showdown), but dropped for the games that now follow it (e.g. BrainBuster). I'm curious as to whether this is a wash overall. Because the main reason given for the change was to increase the number of players, that should be at least part of the equation.

_________________
Anon
"He may seem like Mr. Rogers but a dark spirit lies beneath."

Looks to me as if their time changes have been successful, and that overall, especially whenthey and the bars want eyeballs in seats, they've picked up players.

Not in the West, these changes still suck ass for us out here. Actually they don't suck I haven't played since this shit started.

Oh yeah, I don't give a shit if the East/Central gets more players or not. If I have to play repeats it all can go away for everyone for all I care.

_________________
Buzztime is a company full of dumbshits.

But will these changes payoff during sweeps months?

What are these new players going to do when they find out that their scores don't count?

I don't think most people care. Buzztime doesn't either, obviously.

I know it sucks for the West, and I'd be pissed if I lived out there too, but they appear to have hit their mark in an immediate sense, as much as I personally think that sucks from a player perspective.