Net Applications retroactively changes stats, moves Opera to 2%
Monday, 10. August 2009, 12:39:31
Those who have followed my blog may recall that Net Applications has previously dumped Opera's figures with no explanation what so ever.
This time, Net Applications took the time to once again admit that their statistics were skewed, and actually explained the changes:
In the past, we reported only on our raw numbers. As of August 1st, we have implemented retroactive country-level weighting in our reports. This means that we adjust our reports proportionally based on how much traffic we record from a country vs. how many internet users that country has. For example, although we have significant data from China, it is relatively small compared to the number of internet users in China. Therefore, we now weight Chinese traffic proportionally higher in our global reports. This change produces a much more accurate view of worldwide usage share statistics.
After consulting with many of the organizations we report data on, we decided to use C.I.A. data as the source of the number of internet users per country.
In addition to providing better share numbers, the reason we made this change was due to growing traffic imbalances in certain countries. Some countries were growing traffic at a much higher pace than the rest of the world and it was creating unacceptable variances in the share numbers. The reason we delayed June numbers was due to these imbalances. From now on, a single high growth country will not be able to affect the global share numbers.
The statistics from Net Applications still seem to be skewed, but neither this admission of flawed stats nor the inherent unreliability of "global" browser statistics are likely to make people think twice before referring to them as an authority in the future. That's how far "research" goes these days
WIDGETIZE
DanielHendrycks # 10. August 2009, 14:08
Micky # 10. August 2009, 14:20
DjiXas # 10. August 2009, 14:36
Originally posted by Micky:
Falling.
DjiXas # 10. August 2009, 17:48
Originally posted by WayOfTheBastard:
Hi,
September, 2008 2.01%
October, 2008 2.12%
June, 2009, 2.03%
July, 2009, 1,97%
Net App shows that it's falling
P.S. Please don't spam me via private messages next time, thanks.
DjiXas # 10. August 2009, 20:36
Anonymous # 10. August 2009, 22:54
I am a fan of the Opera browser and have used it for years, but the NetApplications statistics clearly show that we are in a short-term decline of Opera's market share. I don't know whether that is actually true or not, but it is comments that like WayOfTheBastard's that make me be more likely to be embarrassed by my use of the Opera browser. WayOfTheBastard, I would assert that you are hurting your own cause by your tone.
DanielHendrycks # 11. August 2009, 01:01
Originally posted by anonymous:
True
qlue # 11. August 2009, 06:41
Anonymous # 11. August 2009, 08:59
WayOfTheBastard: Your tone! There is no reason at all to shoot the messenger (should sound familiar). There are lies, damn lies, and statistics (should sound familiar too). Opera doesn't need your tone, please tune it down.
kilsmo # 11. August 2009, 09:14
Haavard, what makes the 3% figures more accurate?
DjiXas # 11. August 2009, 11:50
Originally posted by WayOfTheBastard:
Well, I'd recommend you to read before posting.
Net Applications is NOT reporting users growth, it IS reporting market share.
Not sure why you complain even when have no idea what market share is.
Market share includes internet users growth. If there are 100 users, 10 are using opera, it's 10% market share for opera. Lets say 100 more people get internet = 200 users total and 15 are now using opera. That's 7.5% market share for Opera = decreased, even if it has more users.
Chas4 # 11. August 2009, 21:33
I wonder where Asa is? I know he wants to comment
53north # 12. August 2009, 16:06
Sniffing Wap and giving them links to opera mobile and mini could bring in many eastern euro and central asian users.
It wouldn't be impossible to charge for an enhanced opera mini 5 - leave a hybrid 3 or 4 version free. Asking for €3 of phone credit for something that's infinitely more useful than a game or ring tone seems fair dinkum?
haavard # 12. August 2009, 16:42
Originally posted by kilsmo:
Internet World Stats reports on the total number of people online, and we report to the public how many users Opera has every now and then. Opera's 40 million users at the time was about 3% of the total number of desktop users reported by IWS at the same time, if I recall correctly.
Tolque53 # 14. August 2009, 11:54
I personally still use it, but I seldom use it to use Facebook, for example (even in 10 beta 3 now), because its way too slow, especially when using apps.
Still, Opera is my standard browser, and Opera Mail is my standard email software - that has now been drastically improved.
Khaled-Khalil # 16. August 2009, 17:24
Originally posted by haavard:
and how does opera get the real number of its users ?number of downloads for example don't tell anything, many people download softwares just to try it, many download alike shareware from third party web sites, or even copy it from friends offline by storage media.
kilsmo # 16. August 2009, 18:03
You can use the update mechanism to track the number of used installations, but:
* A user can do several installations on different machines. (even several installations on the same machine)
* The browser can be used by several people in a family.
* The user will maybe use a number of other browsers too.
* To get to 100% in total, you can't really count all the users of a browser, but will have to count the amount of data from the different browsers to decide which browser the user is using the most. A browser maker does not have this information.
haavard # 17. August 2009, 12:48
Opera's user numbers are the number of active users, not data or anything like that. Actual data usage is only reported for Opera Mini.
Khaled-Khalil # 17. August 2009, 22:41
haavard # 18. August 2009, 08:08
While browser statistics rely on questionable samples and sample sizes, counting the number of users based on update checks gives you a fairly straightforward data set to work with. Potential errors sources are either easily taken into the calculation, or don't really make a difference, depending how the calculations are made.
53north # 18. August 2009, 09:11
I believe the standings show importance to the net, through weight of traffic and quality of content.
hellspork # 24. August 2009, 03:46
If My.Opera is growing, good. Link and the phone versions have likely done wonders to increase traffic. Do synch events register as hits to My.Opera? Even if not, Link has been leading users to My.Opera, and lack of invasive ads has led some users to recommend the service to others.
So Opera can draw on update checks and startup events, total hits and number of users on My.Opera, very accurate numbers for Mini and Turbo (both users and traffic). And that would still only be an internal statistic. I couldn't care less about the rest of the internet, so long as Opera is profitable and still maintains a desktop version.
haavard # 24. August 2009, 06:49
hellspork # 27. August 2009, 03:59
illiad # 5. November 2009, 14:04
Correct me if wrong, but Alexa only track what sites are accessed, not what browser is used to access them?? If you check for 'microsoft' it shows that most are not interested in going there, I guess due to the *total* lack of a support forum! The big ones, of course, are email sites, not even google or yahoo..