The LJ drama generator...

[randomness]

...seems to generate very high school drama. I thought that was kind of odd, because even though I'd been told that the stereotypical LJ user was a 17 year old girl, I don't see much of that crowd. I got to wondering if the stereotype was true.

Boy, is it ever.

http://www.livejournal.com/stats.bml shows that over two-thirds of LJ users are female. All those political bloggers wondering where the women are? Yeah, they're here. Over four million of them.

Also, the top of the age curve is in the 17-18 range, so those polibloggers best stay away, 'cause lots of them are underage.

Interesting tidbits:
There are more LJ accounts to people of high school age (15-18, over a million), than there are accounts to anyone over 21 (just over 910,000). There are almost as many middle school accounts (13 and 14, nearly 159,000) as there are accounts to people over 30 (around 160,500). A lot of users are undergrad age (19-22, over 830,000), but definitely not as many as high-schoolers.

All of these numbers are for accounts in general, not active accounts. Since only about 40% of LJ accounts are active in some way, I found myself wishing for some statistics that left out all the dead accounts.

Anyway, it was interesting to find out how close to the truth the stereotype actually was.

Comments

[antoniusrex.livejournal.com]

i find all of this fairly frightening considering the amount of adult oriented material there is on LJ...Potter Slash, indeed...

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Welcome to the Internet, man.

[antoniusrex.livejournal.com]

What is this "wide world web" of which you speak?

It's funny really. It must be the circles that i surf/search/have shared interests. I've yet to stumble upon too many of the teeneriffic pages. That being said, there are quite a few folks in my circles who are of the 19-22 age bracket...and fellow club folk. So much of our shared drama is...well...club political or alcohol induced.

That being said, you could do an LJ generator which is more adult oriented and not so realistically harsh....like "OMG, I got so drunk last night that I mailed my mortgage off without putting a stamp on it. Now i've got to call my bank and..."

Gadzooks. You're right...that's too much like real life...

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Gadzooks. You're right...that's too much like real life...

Yah, it would just be a downer to read.

[merlinofchaos]

It's kind of sad, because I've seen some people dismiss LJ out of hand, even though I personally have been using LJ for a number of years now and just haven't been exposed to any of that stuff. Of course, one kind of has to already know someone with an LJ before that kind of thing can happen, so it's a case of the community creating itself and growing of its own accord, using the tools provided.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

It's kind of sad, because I've seen some people dismiss LJ out of hand

Yah, I personally think those people are simply looking for reasons to dismiss LJ.

LJ is a tool. It's silly to dismiss the tool just because a bunch of teenage girls use it. And, as a matter of fact, teenage girls grow up, so in a lot of ways LJ is like those Asian mobile phone operators with all the cutesy add-ons. I don't see anyone making fun of those mobile operators just because their cell phones are pink and have antenna hang toys.

even though I personally have been using LJ for a number of years now and just haven't been exposed to any of that stuff.

Moreover, I don't think there's anything wrong with that stuff; no one compels me to read it, and if there's an infrastructure to support it that I can also use for whatever it is I want to do, so much the better.

Of course, one kind of has to already know someone with an LJ before that kind of thing can happen, so it's a case of the community creating itself and growing of its own accord, using the tools provided.

Yah, it's all about the network effects...

[emilymorgan.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I don't understand the "too many teen girls" complaint when it comes to LJ. It would actually take a bit of effort for me to find an LJ like that (not counting my sister *grin*). This is different from other sites that have more of a whole-community aim, like opendiary, where it's much harder to keep to yourself and your friends. (Of course, the good thing about sites like that is that it's much less awkward to "meet" total strangers, and you can meet some fantastic ones. Like Neil. Yeah, yeah, I know he's now on LJ, but that's not the point... hush...)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

This is different from other sites that have more of a whole-community aim, like opendiary, where it's much harder to keep to yourself and your friends.

Yah, I've never tried opendiary. I'm not sure what I'd say. I mean, maybe it'd be a better venue for restaurant listings, being more public and all, but I guess I never got roped into the community there the way I did here.

Also, you realize you have a very distinctive voice when you post? I can almost hear you as I read your words; you really write the way you talk.

[emilymorgan.livejournal.com]

The main thing I like(d) about opendiary is that it can be nice to have smart, kind people to talk to that have no connection whatsoever to anyone you know in real life.

And thanks! I'm assuming that's a good thing, because I like it when other people are like that. It's less of a good thing when I start writing papers for school the way I talk, though. *grin*

[redbird]

It's also easier to make mock of high school drama than of "My mother is dying of cancer" or "I lost my job and don't know how I'm going to pay the rent."

I got together, last weekend, with some other people from LJ Support. I'd expected to be the oldest person there, and I was. I was only a little surprised that the gap between me and the next-oldest was 18 years.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

It's also easier to make mock of high school drama than of "My mother is dying of cancer" or "I lost my job and don't know how I'm going to pay the rent."

That's a very good point. I started to brainstorm a less high school version and realized it was way too close to what I actually read for comfort.

I was only a little surprised that the gap between me and the next-oldest was 18 years.

:)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Insert a comma there, between "actually read" and "for comfort". Or just rewrite the sentence; I don't read other people's angst for comfort. :)

[bedfull-o-books.livejournal.com]

Not even in a, "heck, my life isn't that bad after all" sense? Sorry, was that my "outside voice"?

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

I absolutely think that about other people's problems sometimes. I mean, it really gets me to stop whining. Well, usually.

[emilymorgan.livejournal.com]

You're better than I, then! I just start whining about other people's problems. Does a fat lot of good, too.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

:)

Actually, what really works for me for a "heck, my life isn't that bad after all" sense is reading my own journals from a time when I was seriously down. All the schadenfreude, and none of the hurtfulness.

I intended to post about that, and never have.

[irielle.livejournal.com]

I'm not surprised by that statistic -- I used to pick random LJs to read, and it did seem like quite a lot of young high school kids (14-15 yrs old) were on.

Hope you're feeling better!

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Hope you're feeling better!

Thanks! If this newly returned sore throat doesn't go away by Monday I'm going to the doctor.

[esmerel.livejournal.com]

I think those statistics may be at least somewhat misleading. A number of people that I know (almost to a person, they're over 25), don't actually put in a year for their birthdate. If that's what they are using, then they're probably missing a big chunk of the over-30 crowd.

Though, this is not to say that people in general aren't doing that, just that I have noticed my friends group often doesn't do it.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Yah, I was wondering about that.

[choirsoftheeye.livejournal.com]

How do they get those stats? The birthdays you enter? Because I dunno if it was for Livejounal, but I've definitely entered that I was 80-something for this sort of thing before.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Oddly enough, the stats cut off at 13, and at the top at 55. So I don't know what they did with your entry.

There are enough issues with the stats that I don't really want to draw huge conclusions from them, although some people certainly are; if you google "livejournal demographics" you get a lot of pages of analysis, possibly based on incomplete or unreliable data.

[roozle.livejournal.com]

Well those age statistics would help explain why J has college friends who are shocked to find out that both his parents have LJ accounts.

[marmota.livejournal.com]

An interesting question for them then would be, "Do you expect to still be using LJ or something like it when you are the age your parents are now?".

I'm very interested in seeing how/if the demographic spread shifts over time, whether the teenage spike represents a transient fad or instead a wave of early adopters to a medium that will become mainstream. Considering that many of "us older folks" started using email well before AOL ever existed, and would have been equally surprised at discovering our parents having email addresses, perhaps Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose?

[alexinbeijing.livejournal.com]

As far as reasons to dismiss LJ, there's only one I've found that that resonates with me. I see a lot of people use their blog in the most passive-aggressive way possible, broadcasting their most personal feelings about someone. I always get uncomfortable reading posts like that, and I think it's irresponsible and immature. However, it's like you said, Leon, LJ's a tool, how people use it is up to them.