When surveying liblogs, I called this metric “conversational intensity”–but I’ll use neutral terminology here.
Across all blogs, the average number of comments per post is 0.3–that is, an average of three comments for every ten posts. Since the median number of comments per blog is zero, the median number of comments per post can’t be anything other than zero.
Here are the quintiles–noting that the blogs with the most comments aren’t necessarily the blogs with the most comments per post. (Indeed, the blog with the most comments is tied for 13th in number of comments per post; the single blog with more than ten comments per post only had two posts during the study period, so it’s a slightly artificial number. It and the second-highest blog in terms of comments per post are both teen or game blogs: This should not surprise anyone.)
- Q1: Most comments per post: 0.33 to 13.5 comments per post
Average (mean): 1.3 comments per post
Median: 0.67 comments per post. - Q2: More comments per post: 0.11 to 0.29 comments per post
Average: 0.188 comments per post
Median: 0.184 comments per post - Q3: Average number of comments per post: 0 to 0.10 comments per post
Average: 0.02 comments per post
Median: Zero comments per post - Q4 and Q5: No comments.
And here are the “subquintiles”–excluding all the blogs with no comments at all.
- Q1: Most comments per post: 0.67 to 13.5 comments per post.
Average (mean): 2.2 comments per post.
Median: 1.14 comments per post. - Q2: More comments per post: 0.33 to 0.67 comments per post.
Average: 0.49 comments per post
Median: 0.50 comments per post. - Q3: Average number of comments per post: 0.20 to 0.33 comments per post.
Average: 0.253 comments per post
Median: 0.250 comments per post - Q4: Fewer comments per post: 0.111 to 0.196 comments per post
Average: 0.149 comments per post
Median: 0.154 comments per post - Q5: Fewest comments per post: 0.016 to 0.111 comments per post
Average: 0.067 comments per post
Median: 0.08 comments per post.
