Blue Cavern

I can't win anymore...

Hmm, you can always try to get some people to get really really really pissed at each other and have a good fight here, so that we are forced to ban and delete them, so that the number of members actually decreases


P.S. Don't tell Karen I gave you this tip though

I think you should delete members who haven't made any posts, only an idea

I think you should delete members who haven't made any posts, only an idea

Might need to revise our numbers down then! :) Cause we have an awfull lot of lurchers!

Or we could revise our numbers up

There are some strange user names being added here at the moment, are you sure someone isn't trying to rig this competition?

There are some strange user names being added here at the moment, are you sure someone isn't trying to rig this competition?

Could someone really do that?!
This is only a game...

Actually we deleted them again, their email addresses were linked to spyware sites. Fishy Stace sorted it..

Actually we deleted them again.

What?! Now my number of members will never fill up!!

oh oh!!

is that not good?

Can I have a re-guess ?

as it has gone by my 1st guess

Well, then you could keep on guessing of course until the last moment...
Sorry, but I have to stop it somewhere

those gobots?? seem to want to win!

The list of all the contestants, in order of guess. The current best guess is bolded (I'll try to update this on a regular basis).
The top position has now gone from Smurfing Beer to David Xoiox. He may have it for a few weeks, after which we will probably see a few swift changes.

Janne: 177
Sven: 223
Bookworm: 240
Locksmith: 249
hfos: 250
Beer: 255
Xoiox: 267
Syd: 269
Smurfwish: 272
Fram: 273
Yonna: 284
TYK86: 290
Tojo: 297
Bunno: 301
Davina: 307
Dyar: 311
Eggie: 312
Smurf1303: 313
Trish: 316
Lucie: 319
Gina: 321
Raelene: 325
Tor: 336
Karen: 340
Honey: 341
Rachel: 350[/b]

Today is a very hard day at work and I have lots to do.

However, now than the polls are closed, it is of major importance that we scientifically examine the reasons behind who is going to win this challenge.

First let's look at the graph of how many members joined since the beginning of times (i.e. when time begun the 14th May 2004, which is exactly 17 months ago today!).

Now the first Cartesian approach would be to take the average of new members per month (i.e. 262/17 = 15.41) and use that figure to go by until the 31st Dec 05.
As we are mid-way through October, this would be 7.70 (for the rest of October), 15.41 for November and 15.41 for December.
Which gives a grand total of 300.52.

If you accept that the 0.52 part of a member will be a full member by the time he or she joins, that would make Bunno a spot-on total winner! Good news: the beers would be on her!

However I hear you say: what about the weather?

Exactly!

The graph clearly shows the lack of new members between May and August. The summer: Most people are clearly outside enjoying the Sunshine.

But there is a clear increase of new members during the winter: rain, cold weather, nobody goes out, they get depressed as they are stuck home, in front of a computer, looking desperately to find some things to cheer them up on the Internet.
After long explorations of sites that Syd knows better than some, the next best thing is?
You got it: The Smurf Community!

While the spinning momentum caused by looking at so many roller-skating Smurfettes has proven too much for some, the sight of little blue and white pixies proves to be a great source of stress relief for most.

Of course we should not forget that many of our friends are from down south and you could argue that's only valid for the northern hemisphere... and probably again, the north part of the northern hemisphere, let's say above the 30° North parallel, but then again if you were to go too far north, you'd be really cold all year round and that's where carrots stop growing well.
So to count you in, you'd have to be below the 60° North parallel.

So it begs the question: where are we?

As 161 members have used that part of the registration form, we can try to establish the current trend. Now the following entries had to be taken as being from Smurfland:

Deep in the jungle
Jable Park
sesame street
shhhhh its a secret
simon's sofa
SmurfCapital
Smurfland
smurfyjen's house

There is only one entry from the middle of the pacific (Honolulu, Hawaii). (And that is just such a nice place to be, that I think this is a prime position for the Smurf village. I would like to put a motion forward so that we all relocate there)


So here we are:

Now I know that this may come as a shock for some, as it does often appear that we are under Aussie rules, however now that the ashes are back home, we can safely say that Europe and North America have a majority of members on this forum.

Hence the winter theory holds.

Now if the trend follows last year's...

Then the total number of members could be predicted as being 320!
Which is substantially higher than 301 and makes Gina or Lucie the winner... and they can share the bill for the beers.

But it would be too easy to finish here and we would be denying a very basic principle of life: Growth!
As without growth we would still be single cell amoebas, we need to consider the rate of growth of the forum.

For that we need to compare the month % increase from that same month last year.

So that's:

May: -30%
June: +63%
July: -16%
August: +7.7%
September: +30%

Now in May we could have really thought we were facing extinction. However you need to put that number back into perspective: it was in May (=Summer, so apply the weather theory) and this -30% only equate to 3 members.
So if you compare this to the 30% increase in September, which actually means 5 more members than the previous year: it completely obliterates the may down turn and shows the trend for this winter.

By taking a realistic view on this trend (+20%) month on month we get the following figures:
17 new members for the remaining part of October
33 new members in November
18 new members in December

December is consistently a bad month for the winter, as humans get distracted by Christmas and require less computer entertainment during that time. You could argue it is not such a good month for turkeys, but although they are not technically banned from joining the forum, they are yet to master the technical skills to do so.

Hence a total of 330 members! Which would make Tor the winner! Which is good anyway, as he recently had a baby (But babies do not count as members until they can hit keyboards real hard) and needs to buy the beers to wet the baby’s head anyway.

Now all that to say what, you start to wonder?

Well I’m sure that I won’t win this one, but as Rachel predicts 350 members by the 31st December we can be sure of 2 things:
- Somebody will win (Cause if we get more than 350 members then never believe forecast ever, never ever, ever)
- I will get a beer before the end of December!

Here you go. It’s important to know these things though… cause you never know.
Until you know that is.
Of course.





And now I might do some work… why not after all… it’s Friday…

I thought you said you were tired David......that's not a work of a tired Dragon (maybe one that's a little worn out perhaps )....but I say genius......except you forgot one very very very important principle.....something I like to call "The Cheat Factor". When you add The Cheat Factor to your theories and estimate that the person most likely to engineer The Cheat Factor to his own benefit, then you should come to the conclusion that we should hit spot on 311 members at the end of the year and that would make the winner.......oh shucks....that would make the winner me.....what a piece of luck


[Very impressive work David....I love the effort you put into this]

Thanks David, that gave me a real chuckle when I got in from work.

So have I got this right, anything over 350 and I win?
I will be back in a mo, I just have a few calls to make....................