Re: tlug: Interesting statistic

[Rex Walters <rex@example.com>]

On Thu, Oct 01, 1998 at 03:05:36PM +0900, John De Hoog wrote:
> This statistic caught my eye today.
> 
> "We [=Web Site Journal] took more than 2,000,000 Web pageviews 
> >from approximately 5,000 Web sites using Web Site Garage's 
> Hitometer and found the following statistics:
> 
> Windows 95              63.2%           
> Windows 98              16.3%           
> Windows NT              8.7%            
> Macintosh                 4.6%            
> Other                        3.2%            
> Other Windows          2.6%            
> Solaris/SunOS           0.8%            
> Linux                        0.6%
> 
> [end quote]
> 
> (Assuming the results are meaningful, I wonder if this means Linux users
> are really that small a proportion of the online community, or whether
> they are hiding their Linux identities, or whether they just don't Web
> browse very much. I also expected Mac users to be more plentiful, and am
> surprised by the relatively high Win98 figure.)

Without more info, I can't comment too deeply. 

I must say, however, that the USA Todayish intro, "A Look at the
Statistics That Shape the Web" doesn't exactly give me the warm fuzzies
that this is a serious statistical sampling.  I can't seem to get to the
Web Site Garage Hitometer (http://www.hitometer.com/) to see how these
statistics were generated.

(For those that are interested, the URL for the factoid under discussion is
"http://www.WebSiteJournal.com/".)

Still, it sounds about right to me.  I'd have expected to see Linux
ahead of SunOS/Solaris but other than that it breaks down about as I'd
suspect.  Linux is still far more prevalent as a percentage of internet
servers than as a percentage of internet clients.

Assuming the statistics are correct, that little factoid should read:

    "Linux is already behind nearly 1 out of 100 browsers surfing the
    internet today."

*THAT* is nothing short of amazing.

PCs are nearly as common as televisions these days, and when virtually
every one ships with a copy of Windows95/98 you would *expect* them to
blow away all other contenders.  I suspect the Macintosh number will see
a probably small but noticeable increase over the next several months
due to the apparent success of the iMac.

Personally, I think it'll be at least two or three years before Linux
even has a chance to make a noticeable inroad to the desktop.  Still,
you need to keep in mind that even 0.6% of a very large number (every
browser on-line in the world) is a real market.  I would be very happy
to make 0.6 yen for each 26" color television sold in the world, for
instance.

If I'm not mistaken, RedHat expected to ship something on the order of
500,000 copies of their distribution this year.  There are individual
customers of some PC vendors that buy that many copies of Windows in a
year, but 500K pieces in a year isn't a bad revenue stream for a company
the size of RedHat, and the growth rate is nothing short of phenomenal.
I suspect (hope) that our friends at Pacific HiTech are seeing similar
growth and prosperity.

My opinions only.

Regards,
-- 
Rex
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