Once again, I have compiled statistics of the messages I received for my birthday this year.
Birthday messages (change from last year)
Facebook messages – 64 (-1)
Face to face greets – 4 (0)
Text messages – 1 (0)
Phone calls – 1 (+1)
Tweets – 0 (-1)
Frequency of Facebook messages vs. Time (i.e. when was the message posted)
Use of initials (mine or otherwise) – 20
Average length (words): 4.7
Facebook email lag – none
Gender split of Facebook messages
Male – 38
Female – 26
Observations
It is easier and more interesting this year because there is data to compare with!
I expected a normal distribution (bell-shaped curve) again. The histogram shows something resembling a normal distribution, with a slight right skew, and a spike at hour 20 (8pm).
The two posts at 1am (AEST) show something different was happening compared to last year. From the raw data, one post was make in Hong Kong (where it would have been 11pm) and the other I believe was made as a result of being awake for a night-shift job.
The spike at 8pm could be due to people checking Facebook before a night out.
There is a small group of friends who have posted birthday messages in both 2010 and 2011. This subset tends to have known me for longer than others. There are also people (who I consider to be good friends with) that have not posted messages at all. This isn’t a bad thing.
Gender Split
This year is the first that gender has been analysed. I predicted an even split of male to female, but the graph is self explanatory.
Initials
This year I have counted the number of people who used any initials. This will be the count methodology for the future.
What’s interesting is that my standard birthday greeting can be transformed to a birthday message for me with the removal of the exclamation mark.
In some cases, ‘Happy Birthday’ was abbreviated to ‘HB’, and thus shows symmetry with my initials (BH). Although I usually frown upon this method of greeting, in the interests of symmetry and brevity I have accepted it.
Conclusion
Thank you for your messages!
