Steem statistics for 6 years
Ever since I signed up for Steemit, I've always been interested in how the platform is developing. I love statistics, they can tell a lot. However, I could not get the data I was interested in, which would allow me to look, as if from a height, at what direction we are moving. Couldn't until yesterday. Yesterday, @moecki sent me data that I was interested in, collected over the last 6 years. So, without him, this post would not be possible.
Today I spent several hours processing the information, but not because it was difficult. I wanted to somehow visualize it better. However, after all the attempts, I returned to the usual Microsoft Excel. Due to the large amount of data, my other attempts were not very successful.
So, let's go over some information that I'm sure many of you will find interesting.
Active authors
The question of how many of us there are, active authors, has interested me for a long time. And not only me, I have come across similar questions more than once. However, before giving the diagram, I want to say what is meant here by the term "active author". If the author published a post today, it is active as of this day. If he did not publish a post yesterday, then he was not included in the list of active authors yesterday. In other words, this is the number of authors who published at least one post on a given day.
So now there are about 2000 of us. 2000 different authors publish at least one post every day. That's less than this cool platform deserves and way more than I imagined.
Let's look at the same data, only grouped by month:
And by the years:
I confess, the constant decline in the number of authors from 2021 to 2024 does not please me. However, 2024 still has every chance to surpass 2023.
Post per days
And now let's see how many posts are published every day for 6 years.
For the last time, on Steem, about 3000 posts are published every day.
The same data, grouped by month:
And by years:
Active commentators
Now let's estimate the number of active commentators every day. As with active authors, active commenters are the number of people who have posted at least one comment in a given day. In my opinion, this indicator will show us whether Steem really used to have much more interaction than now.
The same data, grouped by month:
And by years:
New accounts
Let's try to estimate how actively new users join Steem. For this purpose, we will build a diagram that will show how many new accounts have been created every day for the last 6 years.
Recently, approximately 120 accounts are created daily.
The same data, grouped by month:
And by years:
It looks like this year will see the least number of new accounts created, but that doesn't necessarily mean that fewer people have started joining Steem. The rapid spikes in the chart in the past show that sometimes someone created hundreds of accounts automatically in a short period of time.
Activity and price of STEEM
And now let's examine the dependence that everyone guesses about. Do people post more actively when the price of STEEM is higher? To do this, I will place the charts already indicated above near the chart with the price of STEEM for the same time period.
In my opinion, there is an almost direct dependence.
UPD: Following @event-horizon's good point, I took a closer look at the relationship between activity and STEEM price by overlaying two charts:
Interesting results. Now I would not dare to say that there is a direct dependence.
"Daily authors"
Another statement I've seen in the comments is that there haven't been as many "daily writers" in the past, meaning writers who post every day. It has been said that people used to spend more time commenting than writing posts.
I'll try to check this by overlaying a chart with the number of active authors on a chart with the number of posts per day.
In the chart:
- red line - the number of published posts per day
- blue line - the number of active authors per day
Judging by the resulting chart, in the past people did not hesitate to publish several posts per day, while now authors are gradually reducing to writing one post per day.
Conclusions
Of course, the presented data may not fully objectively demonstrate the state of affairs. Some accounts are known to generate many comments automatically, and there are also posts that consist of one word. However, I believe that we can still draw some conclusions.
It is clear that the overall activity on the platform has been decreasing over time and it seems that this has something to do with the price of STEEM. Therefore, it can be assumed that the decisive factor in the blockchain's attractiveness is the price of the token, and not the interface or convenience.
Judging by the number of active commenters, the level of engagement on the platform is still at its lowest point. However, this year the number of active commenters remains at the same level as last year (about 900 per day), so it is unlikely that there will be any further decline.
I also looked at our competitors. It is interesting that the number of new accounts created daily in Steemit and Hive is practically the same. The same applies to the number of posts per day, which surprised me. I could not compare the number of active authors.
Considering everything I wrote above, I got the impression that we are not as bad as we sometimes think. I think the way ahead is only up ⬆. 🙂
UPD #2
@moecki was interesting to consider how the number of comments changed over time. He sent me the necessary data and I worked with it a little. Here's what I got.
First, I overlaid a chart of the number of comments on a chart of the number of active authors.
And then I overlaid the chart of the number of comments on the chart of the number of posts.
It seems people prefer posting over commenting. You can also notice a significant drop in the number of comments in March 2020, after which it was never able to rise to the previous level.
Thank you for the presentation.
While reading, it came to my mind that the comments per day would be interesting to see how the relationship between the number of posts and the number of comments developed.
Maybe we can do that...
Data origin (info for the reader):
The data were extracted by me from my Hivemind test node, which receives all updates, i.e. contains all (relevant) data of the chain.
To the results:
Unfortunately, that data came from steemdb, so it's long gone now unless someone wants to scan the blockchain or hivemind for author reward transactions. But I think it looks like SBDs stopped briefly in May, then started again and stopped again in June (or the very end of May). I'm pretty sure that the print threshold was around $0.252 back then, so based on the price history, I guess they stopped printing in early-mid June.
Past research also found a link between posting activity and the price of STEEM. In particular, they said that posting activity lagged price by about 2 weeks and voting lagged by 90 days (I'll bet that changed to 30 days when the power-down rules changed).
I had skimmed over that earlier, but it is fascinating. There was a lot of antisocial and other atypical behavior going on between March and May that year. I'd suspect malfeasance - my guess would be that it was someone trying to strain steemit's resources or setting up a bot farm.
Update: And this had slipped my mind, but I found it again when I was looking for the article above. Maybe useful for some historical data:
Yes, that's exactly why I expected more influence on the activities at this time. The fact that a few more accounts were created there is the lesser evil.
I also used your burned token posts for the estimation. :-)
Too bad that we didn't have the data saved somewhere. But it's not worth running the chain because of that.
I have discovered an alternative (paid rewards). I looked at an account that posts daily (nodex).
With this query and the appropriate times, we can determine the reward shares (and thus also the print rate): https://sds0.steemworld.org/rewards_api/getRewards/author_reward/upvu.proxy/1598918400-1656633600
I couldn't find a better graphic in a hurry. :-)
As you can see, there were fluctuations in the print rate at the end of 2020, but after that it was fairly stable until May 2022.
Have you downloaded the data? I'm a little hesitant because I don't know how large the amount of data is.
No, I haven't downloaded it. I also don't know how big it is, but I was assuming that I don't have enough storage available to do anything useful with it.
I believe the current steemit team took charge at that time. Initiatives like The Diary Game were also introduced in that timeline as per my knowledge. The platform was coming back to life.
Yes, 100 Days of Steem started in about April 2020, and then came the Diary Game which generated significant new activity.
I don't think I had seen the initiative live yet. Only when browsing through old posts. :-)
But as with so many activities, it's a challenge to get users to stay on the platform. It's not easy.
Only a few have the stamina to organize events over a longer period of time so that users are motivated to participate on a permanent basis. Users should also be bound to the Steem. A quick profit is of little help to the platform.
Speaking of developing the platform: I would like to develop some minor changes in Hivemind over the next few weeks that could change the view of the platform a little. So that users are not falsely incentivized by investor posts.
I know it's an incentive for new users when they see the amounts under some posts. But this is not the “normal life” on Steem. These posts should therefore not end up so high up in the Trendings. If this is also in the interest of the Steemit team, please give permission for the code changes later.
Can't wait to see such a change. All the best.
I wasn't active around that time. What was 100 Days of Steem about?
Yes and I think st this moment we really need more initiatives that can improve the engagement rate in this platform.
I've added an update at the end of the post where, based on your data, I've tried to show the relationship between the number of comments and active authors, and the number of comments and the number of posts.
It seems that the price of STEEM affects the activity of authors, but it is not the only factor. At least now I don't see as direct a dependency as I thought at first. Perhaps a more in-depth analysis is needed, indicating when SBDs were printed, when they were not, and when SBDs were printed simultaneously with STEEM.
What surprised me the most is that Steemit has about the same number of active authors as Hive. Hive knows how to promote itself better and it seemed to me that there is more activity there. The only difference is the geography of the authors.
Thank you for the update. My diagrams really don't look like much :-)
Yes, Hive can also present more development activities. The hard forks alone that have taken place so far. It doesn't all have to be good, but it gives them attention.
I think it's good that more proposals are being approved. But it seems to me that the supposed centralization at Steem is now taking place at Hive. Even if this is not openly stated there, and probably denied.
Where is the comparison from? Is there a source for this?
I've been looking into this a bit: https://hive.blog/created/hive-133987
This is my subjective impression due to the presence of such posts:
I remember you repeatedly said that you are ready to work on a hard fork. How are things in this direction? I think you did not manage to find like-minded people?
I'm not sure how hard it would be to generate, but it might be nice to have a data series on the value of author rewards that takes into account SBD price and percentage of reward paid out in SBDs vs Steem. (Also maybe things that affect the author/curator split).
Yes, indeed. Some historical data would be very interesting.
Unfortunately, we don't have the data, and it can't be obtained overnight. The steemSQL database mentioned by @remlaps is unfortunately no longer available.
I have looked at the rewards payouts as a workaround. See here.
A thorough analysis indeed.
Two observations of my interest:
Posts have fluctuated significantly over the years, but a downward trend is evident, correlating with the decline in active authors.
The number of active commentators has similarly decreased over time, (obviously) paralleling the drop in authors and posts.
Is this downward trend only tied to the price of the STEEM token, suggesting that economic rewards significantly drive user participation, or could it also be a shift towards valuing quality over quantity?
I think the former is likely the main reason, but perhaps a small portion of it is also due to more conscious and thoughtful posting.
I'm optimistic too :)
Unfortunately, it is not easy to assess the quality of content. It is possible that there were more posts before, but short, hastily created ones, maybe not. It would be interesting to come up with some parameter that would help to understand how the overall average content quality has changed.
Your observations are very accurate. I think we need to increase the number of active authors, and the rest will come naturally.
Hoping some of the recent changes relating to curation will help bring positive effects - especially on good quality commenting.
I believe so. These updates should inspire more thoughtful and meaningful discussions, and as writers/curators/investors, we’re energized by the possibilities this new month holds. It’s a fresh chance to see how these changes will not only shape the community but also elevate the overall experience for everyone involved.
Fingers crossed 🤞🏻
If the activity is directly dependent on the price of token then why the highest activity was in 2019 when the max price was only $0.5? Did I miss something? 🤔
I noticed that too. There is a peak in the graph in the same place, but the x-axis is slightly shifted. That's why I wouldn't draw the same conclusion.
Thank you for the valid remark. It made me look into this question in more detail and this is what I came up with:
The blue line is the number of published posts.
The red line is the price of STEEM.
Now I would not make such unequivocal conclusions. 🤔
In my opinion, the current Steam price graph seems to reflect the influence of the entire coin market as well.
To check the price fluctuation graph due to the internal situation of the Steam ecosystem, how about controlling the influence of the entire coin market (if possible)? :)
For example, below is the Steam and Bitcoin price graph taken from CoinMarketCap.
Although there is a difference in the height of the graph, the Steam price graph since 2021 seems to be related to the fluctuation of the Bitcoin price. This is because it may have risen due to the overall coin market situation, such as the rise in the Bitcoin price, rather than due to the internal situation of Steam.
Thank you!
You are definitely right. The price of the dominant cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, has a huge impact on the market of all cryptocurrency. STEEM is no exception. However, there are other factors as well. For example, during the last bull run, the price of STEEM was significantly higher. Let me guess that the maximum price of STEEM of this bullish phase (if it continues) will be much lower than the previous one.
We have a lot of work to do to increase the appeal of Steem. This is the task of each of us 🙂.
I agree with you. Thanks! :)
Would that have coincided with when Steemit Inc was giving out large delegations to new projects like DTube, Utopian etc. And was Steemmonsters (now Splinterlands) born around that time?
I don't know for sure.
Utopian already received a delegation in 2017, which was increased in 2018 and completely canceled in 2019. The delegation for dtube was similar in terms of timing, but was only canceled in 2020.
Steemmonsters was probably introduced in 2018. I haven't found an introductory post yet, but the alpha test phase was in 2018. However, it may well be that the “swings” in the diagrams are dominated by the subsequent phases.
As we know, a game like this has a special appeal. Especially as many users would then also be prepared to put money into the system and not just withdraw it. A game development on Steem would certainly help the ecosystem.
However, it is also clear that this is a feat of strength that cannot be achieved alone. Perhaps you as the Steemit team could put out a kind of call for tenders for this. Call for developers to submit concepts and you support them either with a delegation or by supporting a proposal (SPS). I know there have been bad experiences with this in the past. Maybe this doesn't happen anymore because it mainly resulted from the split. But maybe appropriate conditions/provisions can be made.
I'm not sure when Steemit Inc gave those delegations. When I joined, Steemmonsters was there as much as I can recall and that was in 2018.
Great analysis with useful information. It's a shame how contents have reduced these periods.
I think I also noticed that few months ago when Steem price was high, there were many new authors and some old accounts revived from dead zone to profess how they missed Steem blogging. And they were active again....but later dissappear when the price decline.
I wonder how content quality are also doing for the past 6 years....
You have very accurately noticed that when the price of STEEM is high, there are a lot of "patriots" who appear to miss Steemit. However, this is probably a completely natural phenomenon. People are looking for a place where it is better and more profitable for them.
It would be interesting to assess the overall quality of the content and how it has changed over the years, but this is extremely difficult to do.
The problem is that when they appear, they seems to make more noise , disturbing everywhere😀.
Anyway, that's just by the way, I understand that phenomenon.
I can imagine that. Moecki said the same thing.
This is not so easy to find out ;-)
I thought as much. Only guess work could do here..., but that won't be entirely accurate.
First of all I am a late 22 year old member. It may not experience its previous active or valuable state.
But the information in your post made me want to know. But as long as I've been around, I've seen many active writers. Without praising myself, I can say that I have been posting at least 1-2 posts daily.
Active authors or accounts may be decreasing for two reasons.
Reduced price on Steam. On the other hand, not having TRX means less money.
Post standards may not be supported. It means that the support is more than before. But still this is noticed by me or other users.
But all in all I am always on this platform. And I will stay inshallah.
In my experience, persistence is the key to good results in Steemit. So you are right to stay with us despite everything. 🙂
Thank you, It's my pleasure 🥰
Active is not only posting twice a day. If you are active you also engage! There are 100 things one can do on or for Steemit and Stewmians and I can say most of my time goes to tasks which have to do with Steemit's business and no one can see or measure. Hours on Telegram helping out for example.
Yesterday I was busy from 3 am till 10 pm without eating and the only foot I set outside was to feed the wolves and visit the bathroom!
And no I had no naps and also no cigarette breaks or breaks for prayer.
All this hard work of mine can not be found back in what I write or perhaps it can if you see my absence as a sign I am too busy to write! Is my work therefore in vain?
I think engaging also if this means talking to someone who doesn't feel well, has a rough day or feels neglected or lost on steemit is part of engagement and it will do this platform good even if people forget me. The message that will remain is that someone helped, did not give up on them and made them laugh, did actually listen and good people and true engagement can be found on Steemit.
If a platform has no heart and is only a place where a quick post is dropped, one that is a copy of former ones, no one will stay around long enough to look, read and meet what can be helpful to them and best of all makes them smile.
Ps typo (of the keyboard?) Steam should be Steem
Nice to hear your comments about the activity. Two lines must be appreciated. Someone who puts aside all their work and devotes time to Steemit. And anyway an active man on Steemit. Who forgets about his work while working on Steemit. He who is supposed to eat, forgets even when he sleeps. He's a soul of Steemit anyway.
There is logic with your words. Posting 2-1 can't be activated. It takes mind. Love does not come by paying some duty. Instead, it takes love So not just posting, sticking with Steemit, giving time. pay attention I like yours. stay well
Thank you for sharing some wisdom.
All the bestvto you.
♥️🍀
Thank you for the insight!
I'm also a stats lover!
I think that overall, your analysis provides a comprehensive overview of Steemit’s dynamics and highlights both challenges and areas of resilience.
There is clear evidence that while there are obstacles, Steemit still has a dedicated user base and potential for recovery and growth.
I would like to think that there are still elements of the platform that maintain user interest.
It is my opinion that this is due to the new Newcomers certification. It is not so easy to be verified anymore, and there will be less duplication of accounts.
I might be wrong.
The steemit platform has really changed alot and I believe you can fully testify to this because you have been here for more than 6 years.
I love the newcomers verification of this period because it has really reduced the rate of lazy people who just come to steemit to steemit and act as gold diggers.
Yip! You are right.
There is more work in the communities that participate in the newcomers program, but it is for sure the way to go.
It is quite possible. I also think that in the past a lot of accounts were created automatically by various apps. Since there are not so many applications now, such activity has also decreased.
I agree with you. This analysis gave me more optimism than pessimism. 😃
These show the 'real' facet of STEEM. If we remove the posts to get voted from several voting services, the number would be much smaller. By the way, good job for the stats.
Thank you. 🙂
I hope one of your apps will bring back the appeal of the Steem blockchain. I have special hopes for the payment application you are working on. 🙂
I think that is not true. Back in the early days of Steemit, there was a lot more "garbage" posted here and definitely not more comments, at least now I comment a lot more. And a daily post is exactly the optimal norm for active authors, which does not allow clogging the feed. There were times when I used to publish four posts a day and they were definitely not of the best quality. However, this is because I was afraid to publish in my native language at the time, and the translator was much less perfect then.
Я на початках теж публікував багато дописів і вони точно не були якісними. 😄 З часом все таки зрозумів, що якість має вирішальне значення. А ще спілкування. Мабуть саме спілкування в коментарях зробило мене тим автором, яким я є станом на сьогодні.
Ну власне спілкування і бажання залізти у "внутрішню кухню" Стіміту, проводити всі ці дослідження, вивчати та обробляти статистику)) Величезний респект, наприклад ця стаття - це грандіозна пророблена робота. Знову ж таки кураторство, це величезна залученість у проект. Я ж ніколи сам не шукав цього, точніше раніше не знав де шукати, а зараз не важко це зробити, але в мене не вистачить на це часу. Максимум для мене зараз - це намагатися якомога більше коментувати. І не через те, що я хочу досягти якогось рівня коментарів, просто справді коментарі показують, що твій пост цікавий людям і не дарма ти його написав. То ж якщо я прочитав допис, і він справді цікавий, то треба залишити коментар)).
Так, ви праві, що є - то є, мені завжди було цікаво як тут все влаштовано. Також я завжди хотів якось допомогти цьому величезному проекту зростати, але для цього потрібні значні ресурси. Мої старання зазвичай марні 😄. Проте, як у нас кажуть, чим би дитина не тішилась, лиш би не плакала!
You have presented excellent results through data-based analysis.
Thanks to your post, I was able to understand the overall state of the current Steam ecosystem.
After reading your post, I thought for a while.
Why don't people come into the Steam ecosystem and continue to be active?
Why don't the number of people participating in the Steam ecosystem increase?
My subjective and personal answer is as follows.
Is it possible for a newbie without Steem Power to grow into a whale just by writing well in our current Steem ecosystem? If such a case occurs and word of mouth spreads, many people will come to our Steem ecosystem, and I think the value of Steem will rise even more than it is now.
I would like to thank @o1eh for giving me the opportunity to think like this, and @moecki for collecting and providing data for a great analysis (I have already voted for @moecki as a witness! ^^).
A good and rather difficult question. No one is professionally promoting Steem, instead there is a lot of conflicting information on the internet. In addition, many people do not understand what Steem is and how it functions. People are used to investing in cryptocurrency and waiting for a price jump to sell and make a profit. Most people don't realize that there are other ways to make money in the world of cryptocurrencies.
We lack DApps, the ecosystem needs to be developed. Small steps are now being taken in this direction. I hope we will see results in the future.
Thank you for that. Maintaining active witnesses is one of the best ways to successfully develop a blockchain.
Thank you so much for sharing your insights on my question. :)
Interesting to see something wonderful as this. I really feel lucky seeing this post, wow steemit really has alot of history and from what am seeing here, 2019 was a very great year for this platform and I pray a year like 2019 comes again.
Steemians don't comment like before, assuming al rh steemians are always making at least 7 comments everyday then the engagement rate for this year would have been very high.
Incredible statistics, I hope to see more.
I hope good times are ahead for Steem 🙂 . I'm glad you enjoyed the stats. It's really helpful to look at things like this.