The Less Wrong Study Hall is still going, two years after its creation. I’m trying to make last year’s survey an annual thing, so I did it again. We’ve been growing slowly but steadily. According to this year’s census, we have 60+ users. By comparison to Yvain’s Less Wrong survey, that gives us just under 4% penetration.
For anyone who isn’t familiar with the Hall: We’re a collection of (mostly) Less Wrong users who gather to work in a video chat room. The idea is not so much to collaborate on projects, as to have visible companions in the effort to get things done. There’s a thorough description here, and its description of our efforts is still more or less accurate. The room is hosted by Tinychat, and we work according to the Pomodoro Technique.
I’ll briefly reiterate our social norms for anyone who doesn’t want to read the whole prior post:
Say hello and ask for the current time when entering, if needed.
Don’t talk during pomos.
Do talk during breaks.
Talking about work is encouraged.
Bragging about work is encouraged.
Don’t turn your mic on.
But do turn your camera or desktop view on if you want
The tinychat room is here, and the Complice frontend is here. Either will work. The password is ‘lw’. The password exists not as a security measure but as a roadblock for random walk-ins.
Aside from our growing population, the most significant change of the last year was malcolmocean succesfully integrating the room into his Complice application. This doesn’t give us control of the room, but does give us (by which I mean him) the ability to bolt on features, including a unified pomodoro timer with audible dings. It’s achieved fixation remarkably quickly; most of our participants now use it.
Last year’s top suggestion box item was better enforcement of pomodoros; break overruns were extremely common. The public timer has rapidly and all-but-completely solved the problem. No technological enforcement was necessary, which surprised me. There was some concern that users who weren’t inclined to use Complice would be left in the dark, but that doesn’t seem to have happened. I would like to emphasize that if you are joining via Tinychat rather than Complice, it is still okay to explicitly ask for the time. We know that not everyone can see the timer, and we won’t bite you.
We do have some challenges to deal with in the upcoming year. Most of them involve our continuing dependence on Tinychat. Our Complice frontend is definitely not Tinychat-approved, and I suspect they will try to step on it if they notice. With our population growing, we have begun to bump against Tinychat’s twelve-camera limit. And, of course, as long as we’re dependent on Tinychat we can’t develop the Hall into a single unified application.
There may be some indication of light at the end of that tunnel; we’ll see. In the meantime, we do still have room for growth, and we still welcome new people.
Personal Reflections
As I write this, I find that we have recovered our original Creator from the darkness of non-usage. That made my day.
I actually use the Hall less than I did last year. I changed jobs, and my new schedule leaves me less time alone that I would normally use to join the chat. So, my comments may be less reflective than otherwise.
The numbers say that we are bigger, but it doesn’t really feel that way. We have run close to the video limit, but not very often; most of the time that I go (usually on the weekends), there are three to six cameras active. I’ve talked to a few others about it, and it sounds like the increase may be coming from more users during lower-use times than an increase in peak usage.
I mostly use the Hall for handling personal chores and writing. I occasionally program, but this is one task for which I’ve found the Hall counterproductive. Pomodoro breaks flush my mental state, screwing up the symbolic juggling that any programmer will be familiar with.
If anyone else has the same problem, but still wants to use the Hall while coding, I suggest ignoring breaks and turning the volume down so that timer dings and people talking doesn’t pull you out of hack mode. That’s what I do. In the future, it would be nice to have rooms with different pomo periods to accommodate things like this. Right now I don’t think we have enough people to fill multiple rooms, but with any luck that will change.
One of the most interesting responses in the survey below came from a former user, who used the comment box to describe why they’d left. They cited a similar issue; they needed help with larger tasks, not the chunkable ones that suit pomodoros best. They also cited cultural fit; apparently they were put off by the silly atmosphere of many of the breaks.
I want to address that specifically, because there was some concern about it last year that did not seem to hold up when the survey asked about it. Here we have someone for whom it really was an issue. So it is, indeed, a real thing. On the other hand, other respondents noted the same elements as a plus, and I myself would be sad to see it go away. I think this is something that we are just going to have to accept as an aspect of our culture that inevitably will not suit everyone.
The respondent in question seemed to agree. That said: Whoever you are, sorry you left us and thank you for telling us why.
2015 Census and Survey Results
Numbers are fun, so here there be numbers. Once again, credit to Yvain for all the questions I pilfered from his Less Wrong survey.
There were 63 respondents, up from last year’s 23. I’m unsure how much of that increase is real and how much is a selection effect. This year, the Complice room automatically advertised the survey during breaks, so it’s likely a higher percentage of users took it.
Last year I took the Google Forms statistics verbatim, but this year I couldn’t do that for Reasons. The script I used to generate these numbers is possibly the worst code I’ve written in the last decade. As far as I can tell they’re still correct, but if anyone notices something obviously wrong, please let me know.
The text of the individual questions can be found here. My comments are in brackets.
Population
Population Count
Yes
60
92.31%
I used to but don’t anymore
3
4.62%
No, I’m just here to mess with your statistics
2
3.08
[[ People who were here to screw up the stats were left out of the stats. Har. ]]
Survey History
Yes
15
23.81%
No
48
76.19%
[[ This was an attempt to get an idea of the proportion of users who stick around. 15 of last year’s 23 survey takers took this year’s survey. ]]
Technology
Web Browser
Chrome
45
71.43%
Firefox
17
26.98%
Other
1
1.59%
[[ This question was intended to provide useful information for developing a TC alternative. What’s interesting about this: The best alternative I’ve found to Tinychat, that we can host ourselves, is called Jitsimeet. It does not support Firefox yet (or rather, Firefox does not yet support the tech it uses, although it’s in the pipeline), and so I never put *that* much effort into investigating it. That our users so heavily favor Chrome suggests that it may be worth a second look. ]]
Complice
Yes
55
87.30%
No
8
12.70%
[[ Almost certainly an overestimate. Complice automatically advertised the survey during breaks, so complice users would have been disproportionately aware of it. ]]
Demographics
Age
n
61
mean
25.20
stdev
6.86
min
15
q1
22
q2
24
q3
27
max
60
Country
United States
29
46.77%
Germany
9
14.52%
United Kingdom
7
11.29%
Canada
5
8.06%
Denmark
2
3.23%
Poland
2
3.23%
Other
8
12.90%
No Answer
1
1.61%
[[ Last year Germany held a plurality of our users; most of our growth since then has been in the U.S. ]]
Race
White (non-Hispanic)
49
77.78%
Asian (East Asian)
4
6.35%
White (Hispanic)
4
6.35%
Other
6
9.52%
[[ Yay, we’re not 100% White anymore. Since my script lumps any answer that got exactly one response under “other”, I’ll note that the six responses here represent one Middle Eastern, two mixed, one Asian (Indian Subcontinent), one Aboriginal, and one “none.” ]]
Sex, Gender, Relationships
Sex
Male
44
69.84%
Female
19
30.16%
Gender
Male (cisgender)
40
64.52%
Female (cisgender)
15
24.19%
Other
7
11.29%
No Answer
1
1.61%
[[ Surprisingly close to balanced, here, especially by comparison to Less Wrong proper. This doesn’t match my experience in-room, which is more heavily male; I’m wondering if our female/other participants don’t spend as much time in the room as the men, or if they just don’t run their cameras as much. (also interesting: Despite transgender options being listed, only one person actually used them. All the other “Others” were write-ins.) ]]
Sexual Orientation
Heterosexual
37
59.68%
Bisexual
14
22.58%
Asexual
5
8.06%
Heteroflexible
3
4.84%
Other
3
4.84%
No Answer
1
1.61%
[[ I am amused that Heteroflexible escaped the Other ghetto despite not actually being provided as an answer. I’m also not sure why Less Wrong has such an overrepresented bisexual contingent. I noticed that in Yvain’s survey and it shows up here, too. ]]
Relationship Style
Uncertain / no prefrence
24
39.34%
Prefer polyamorous
18
29.51%
Prefer monogamous
17
27.87%
Other
2
3.28%
No Answer
2
3.28%
Number of Current Partners
0
25
42.37%
1
25
42.37%
2
4
6.78%
3
4
6.78%
Other
1
1.69%
No Answer
4
6.78%
Relationship Goals
…not looking, but open to the possibility
39
62.90%
…and currently looking for more relationship partners
13
20.97%
…and currently not looking for more relationship partners
10
16.13%
No Answer
1
1.61%
[[ It’s funny to compare this to last year’s survey, which lacked the “not looking, but open” option. Apparently most people round that up to “looking”. ]]
Relationship Status
Single
28
45.90%
Relationship
20
32.79%
Married
9
14.75%
Other
4
6.56%
No Answer
2
3.28%
Children
0
55
91.67%
1
2
3.33%
2
3
5.00%
No Answer
3
5.00%
[[ Not pictured: One user with minus 37 children, which I unilaterally rounded up to zero. ]]
More Children
Yes
15
24.19%
No
24
38.71%
Uncertain
23
37.10%
No Answer
1
1.61%
Work and Education
Work Status
Student
38
61.29%
For-profit work
11
17.74%
Self-employed
3
4.84%
Unemployed
3
4.84%
Homemaking
2
3.23%
Academics (on the teaching side)
2
3.23%
Other
3
4.84%
No Answer
1
1.61%
[[ We’re as student-centric as ever ]]
Profession
Computers (practical: IT, programming, etc.)
17
32.69%
Mathematics
5
9.62%
Biology
5
9.62%
Neuroscience
3
5.77%
Computers (AI)
3
5.77%
Medicine
3
5.77%
Physics
3
5.77%
Engineering
3
5.77%
Statistics
2
3.85%
Other “social science”
2
3.85%
Philosophy
2
3.85%
Other
4
7.69%
No Answer
4
7.69%
Degree
High School
13
22.03%
Bachelor’s
23
38.98%
Master’s
12
20.34%
PH D.
3
5.08%
MD/JD/other professional degree
3
5.08%
None
5
8.47%
No Answer
1
1.69%
Less Wrong
Less Wrong Use
I don’t use Less Wrong at all. (skip the rest of this section)
2
3.17%
I lurk, but never registered an account.
9
14.29%
I’ve registered an account, but never posted.
9
14.29%
I’ve posted a comment, but never a top-level post.
18
28.57%
I’ve posted in Discussion, but not Main.
17
26.98%
I’ve posted in Main.
8
12.70%
[[ More Main posters than I ever expected. Do we get status points for this? ]]
Time in LW Community
n
61
mean
3.09
stdev
1.79
min
0.15
q1
2
q2
3
q3
4
max
8
Karma Score
n
59
mean
345.41
stdev
624.84
min
0
q1
0
q2
64
q3
384
max
2978
Meetups
No.
25
40.98%
Yes, once or a few times.
23
37.70%
Yes, regularly.
13
21.31%
No Answer
2
3.28%
Community
No.
34
55.74%
Yes, sometimes.
11
18.03%
Yes, all the time.
16
26.23%
No Answer
2
3.28%
Survey (Yvain’s)
Yes.
38
62.30%
No
23
37.70%
No Answer
2
3.28%
Less Wrong Study Hall and You
Time in Community (LWSH)
Less than a month.
15
23.81%
1 − 6 months
15
23.81%
6 − 12 months
10
15.87%
1 − 2 years
14
22.22%
Since the beginning (March 2013)
9
14.29%
[[ We had an influx of newbies after the Complice room was announced; I’m not sure how much that is represented here. ]]
Frequency
Every day
7
11.11%
Several times a week
13
20.63%
Once or twice a week
16
25.40%
Less than once a week
5
7.94%
It varies
17
26.98%
I haven’t been here long enough to form a pattern
5
7.94%
[[ While we have more users, they don’t come to the Hall as often. I think this explains why it doesn’t feel that much busier even though our population is much higher. ]]
Time in the Hall
n
62
mean
181.18
stdev
108.62
min
3
q1
120
q2
180
q3
200
max
600
[[ On the other hand, time-per-visit is pretty much the same. ]]
Usage
Academic studies
48
76.19%
Personal projects
45
71.43%
Chores/Paperwork/Necessities
38
60.32%
Deliberate practice (e.g. learning guitar)
15
23.81%
Work for an employer
12
19.05%
Other
2
3.17%
[[ If those percentages look funny, it’s because this question permitted multiple answers. This pair of questions and the next asked for all answers that applied, followed by the most important answer. ]]
Usage 2
Academic studies
36
57.14%
Personal projects
12
19.05%
Chores/Paperwork/Necessities
7
11.11%
Deliberate practice (e.g. learning guitar)
2
3.17%
Work for an employer
6
9.52%
Draw
Social reinforcement for working.
58
93.55%
Distraction reduction via group pomodoros.
52
83.87%
Camera-induced self-consciousness when working.
39
62.90%
Social punishment for not working.
9
14.52%
Other
10
16.13%
No Answer
1
1.61%
Draw 2
Social reinforcement for working.
27
45.00%
Distraction reduction via group pomodoros.
16
26.67%
Camera-induced self-consciousness when working.
12
20.00%
Social punishment for not working.
2
3.33%
Other
3
5.00%
No Answer
3
5.00%
[[ The carrot still gets more love than the stick. ]]
Camera
Yes, always.
18
29.03%
Yes, sometimes.
36
58.06%
Rarely
3
4.84%
Never
5
8.06%
No Answer
1
1.61%
[[ Camera use is somewhat less frequent, apparently because of people dropping from “always” to “sometimes.” That’s a bit disappointing. I like seeing five or six faces at once. ]]
Desktop Sharing
Yes, always.
2
3.23%
Yes, sometimes.
2
3.23%
Rarely
5
8.06%
Never
53
85.48%
No Answer
1
1.61%
Time Zone
UTC-08:00
6
10.00%
UTC-07:00
2
3.33%
UTC-06:00
2
3.33%
UTC-05:00
19
31.67%
UTC-04:00
3
5.00%
UTC+00:00
6
10.00%
UTC+01:00
15
25.00%
UTC+02:00
2
3.33%
UTC+08:00
2
3.33%
Other
3
5.00%
No Answer
3
5.00%
[[ Mostly east and west coast U.S., and central Europe. I still need to find a way to take these numbers and the temoral-habits questions and work out what UTC times are most heavily populated. Malcolm, is there any chance Complice could, say, poll the number of active users and graph it over time? It wouldn’t be perfect (not everyone uses Complice) but it would probably be pretty close, and it would save me the trouble. ]]
Temporal Habits (Weekdays)
Mornings (6am-12pm)
12
19.35%
Afternoons (12pm-5pm)
29
46.77%
Evenings (5pm-10pm)
37
59.68%
Late night/very early morning (10pm-6am)
12
19.35%
Too variable to say
14
22.58%
I don’t use the room during the week
2
3.23%
No Answer
1
1.61%
Temporal Habits (Weekends)
Mornings (6am-12pm)
8
12.90%
Afternoons (12pm-5pm)
26
41.94%
Evenings (5pm-10pm)
26
41.94%
Late night/very early morning (10pm-6am)
7
11.29%
Too variable to say
27
43.55%
I don’t use the room on weekends
3
4.84%
No Answer
1
1.61%
Referrals
Other comments or posts on Less Wrong
22
35.48%
The initial announcement
22
35.48%
Referred by a friend or partner
12
19.35%
Other
6
9.68%
No Answer
1
1.61%
[[ My favorite “other” referral was someone who checked the URL on tinychat entirely be coincidence, before it was passworded. ]]
Interaction
Yes, regularly.
12
19.35%
Yes, sometimes.
19
30.65%
No.
31
50.00%
No Answer
1
1.61%
Interaction 2
Yes, regularly.
7
11.29%
Yes, sometimes.
10
16.13%
I’ve met a few people in person once or twice.
11
17.74%
No.
34
54.84%
No Answer
1
1.61%
Romance
Yes.
6
9.84%
I didn’t meet them through the Hall, but they come there now.
9
14.75%
No.
46
75.41%
No Answer
2
3.28%
LWSH Efficacy
Base Akrasia
1
0
0.00%
2
5
8.20%
3
6
9.84%
4
19
31.15%
5
20
32.79%
6
10
16.39%
7
1
1.64%
No Answer
2
3.28%
Akratic Impact
1
6
10.00%
2
26
43.33%
3
18
30.00%
4
7
11.67%
5
3
5.00%
6
0
0.00%
7
0
0.00%
No Answer
3
5.00%
Base Hedonia
1
3
4.92%
2
7
11.48%
3
13
21.31%
4
16
26.23%
5
15
24.59%
6
6
9.84%
7
1
1.64%
No Answer
2
3.28%
Hedonic Impact
1
0
0.00%
2
1
1.67%
3
3
5.00%
4
10
16.67%
5
23
38.33%
6
21
35.00%
7
2
3.33%
No Answer
3
5.00%
[[ Eyeballing it, it looks like the Hall removes akradons somewhat more efficiently than it produces hedons. Which is fair given its purpose. ]]
Distractions
n
58
mean
29.29
stdev
20.57
min
1
q1
15
q2
25
q3
40
max
85
Distraction Type
Spontaneous web browsing or other computer use.
49
83.05%
Digital interruptions (email or IM)
39
66.10%
In-person interruptions (family or friends wanting attention)
37
62.71%
People talking or otherwise drawing attention in the Hall during the pomo
15
25.42%
Other
4
6.78%
No Answer
4
6.78%
[[ I am optimistic about the “People talking or otherwise drawing attention” number dropping next year, thanks to the unified pomo timer. ]]
Distraction Cause
Spontaneous web browsing or other computer use.
34
59.65%
In-person interruptions (family or friends wanting attention)
10
17.54%
Digital interruptions (email or IM)
9
15.79%
Other
4
7.02%
No Answer
6
10.53%
Overwork
n
59
mean
30.54
stdev
27.49
min
0
q1
10
q2
20
q3
50
max
100
Accomplishments
Yes
24
41.38%
No
34
58.62%
No Answer
5
8.62%
[[ “Yes” answers are down from 65% last year. :-( I’m hoping that’s because we have a lot of new users who haven’t had time to do anything big yet. ]]
Accomplishment Examples
This was a freeform question. Lots of school related answers; one of our users studied finished their PhD at Oxford. Our HPMoR translator is still translating. Some personal projects, of course (I wrote and published some fanfiction, if I may pimp myself). And the Complice frontend, unsurprisingly, was written during Hall time.
Akrasia
Akrasia
Yes
21
35.00%
No
39
65.00%
No Answer
3
5.00%
[[ Down from 50%. I was speaking with Lachouette some time ago, and commented that I thought our community was self-selected for akratic problems; mostly on the grounds that people who didn’t need help to fight their own akrasia, wouldn’t come here. She said that from her perspective it looked like we were selected for unusually productive people. Does this number mean I win or that I lose? I don’t know what percentage of the general public would answer Yes. ]]
Akrasia: Current
Yes
5
8.33%
No
55
91.67%
No Answer
3
5.00%
[[ Very slightly down. ]]
I don’t have much to say about the rest of the Akrasia questions, and I’m thinking of dropping these questions next year. At least one person suggested that the survey was too long as it is, and I think I agree. I included this section in year 1 because it was in Yvain’s survey at the time, but I’m not sure we’re getting any value out of it—by use or amusement. He doesn’t seem to be using it anymore either.
Akrasia: Illness
None
28
51.85%
Depression
13
24.07%
ADHD
5
9.26%
Autism or autism spectrum disorder
3
5.56%
Other
5
9.26%
No Answer
9
16.67%
Akrasia: Medicines 1
No
39
68.42%
Modafinil
3
5.26%
Sertraline
2
3.51%
Bupropion
2
3.51%
Other
11
19.30%
No Answer
6
10.53%
Akrasia: Medicines 1.5
No
45
83.33%
Modafinil
4
7.41%
Other
5
9.26%
No Answer
9
16.67%
Akrasia: Medicines 2
1
6
28.57%
2
5
23.81%
3
5
23.81%
4
3
14.29%
5
2
9.52%
No Answer
42
200.00%
Akrasia: Supplements 1
No
23
42.59%
Vitamin B12
3
5.56%
Melatonin
2
3.70%
Vitamin D
2
3.70%
Multivitamin
2
3.70%
Other
22
40.74%
No Answer
9
16.67%
Akrasia: Supplements 1.5
No
43
84.31%
Modafinil
2
3.92%
Other
6
11.76%
No Answer
12
23.53%
Akrasia: Supplements 2
2
8
32.00%
3
5
20.00%
1
4
16.00%
5
4
16.00%
4
4
16.00%
No Answer
38
152.00%
Akrasia: Therapy 1
No
34
62.96%
CBT
2
3.70%
talk therapy
2
3.70%
Other
16
29.63%
No Answer
9
16.67%
Akrasia: Therapy 2
3
9
42.86%
2
5
23.81%
5
3
14.29%
1
2
9.52%
4
2
9.52%
No Answer
42
200.00%
Akrasia: Meditation 1
No
22
41.51%
Mindfulness Meditation
11
20.75%
Meditation
3
5.66%
Yoga
2
3.77%
Other
15
28.30%
No Answer
10
18.87%
Akrasia: Meditation 2
2
10
30.30%
3
9
27.27%
4
8
24.24%
1
5
15.15%
Other
1
3.03%
No Answer
30
90.91%
Akrasia: Elsewhat 1
No
28
54.90%
Other
23
45.10%
No Answer
12
23.53%
Akrasia: Elsewhat 2
2
12
50.00%
1
9
37.50%
3
2
8.33%
Other
1
4.17%
No Answer
39
162.50%
Akrasia: Communication
Yes
27
49.09%
No
28
50.91%
No Answer
8
14.55%
Silliness
Tinychat Hatred
1 (Thousand burning suns)
10
19.61%
2
10
19.61%
3
14
27.45%
4
9
17.65%
5 (Emperor Palpatine)
8
15.69%
No Answer
12
23.53%
Tinychat Screams (number of)
Slightly more information than last year: The sum, mean, max, and possibly the standard deviation were all variants of infinity. My favorite answers were e^tau and the first couple hundred digits of Pi without the decimal point.
Stuffies
No
18
31.03%
Yes, but only one
11
18.97%
Yes, more than one
20
34.48%
Tons
9
15.52%
No Answer
5
8.62%
[[ Stuffies! ]]
Stuffies on Camera
Yes
27
49.09%
No
28
50.91%
No Answer
8
14.55%
Owl (Eris/Terry/Levi)
Yes
4
7.02%
No
39
68.42%
I don’t know what you’re talking about.
14
24.56%
No Answer
6
10.53%
[[ I think something went wrong here, because I know I’ve seen more than four users with an Eris/Terry/Levi. These are the owl stuffies that some LWSH residents have. They’re sort of our de facto mascot. ]]
Owl Aquisition
Yes
35
62.50%
No
17
30.36%
I already have one.
4
7.14%
No Answer
7
12.50%
[[ I am amused at the three people who answered “I don’t know what you’re talking about” to the previous question, but wanted one anyway (you can buy them here if you know how to read Dutch and live somewhere they’ll deliver). I’m even more amused by the confused soul who didn’t know what the question was talking about but still owned one. ]]
Miscellany
Suggestion/Comment/Question boxes
These were freeform responses. As with last year, the most common requests were “replace Tinychat” and variants of “give us some feature that requires replacing Tinychat.” We’re getting there, sort of! There was also a demand for more crocodiles, and a love letter from someone who appreciated the existence of the Owl questions.
I was going to complain here about how running surveys like this is a lot more grueling than Yvain makes it look. Then I found something special in the comment box; I don’t know who said it but it makes efforts to bring attention to this project seem more than worthwhile. I’ll just leave it right here. To all those who show up in the Hall: you are in part responsible for this.
“Joining the Study Hall is probably the literal best thing that happened to me this decade. Thank you to the people who made this place exist.”
Less Wrong Study Hall—Year Two
The Less Wrong Study Hall is still going, two years after its creation. I’m trying to make last year’s survey an annual thing, so I did it again. We’ve been growing slowly but steadily. According to this year’s census, we have 60+ users. By comparison to Yvain’s Less Wrong survey, that gives us just under 4% penetration.
For anyone who isn’t familiar with the Hall: We’re a collection of (mostly) Less Wrong users who gather to work in a video chat room. The idea is not so much to collaborate on projects, as to have visible companions in the effort to get things done. There’s a thorough description here, and its description of our efforts is still more or less accurate. The room is hosted by Tinychat, and we work according to the Pomodoro Technique.
I’ll briefly reiterate our social norms for anyone who doesn’t want to read the whole prior post:
Say hello and ask for the current time when entering, if needed.
Don’t talk during pomos.
Do talk during breaks.
Talking about work is encouraged.
Bragging about work is encouraged.
Don’t turn your mic on.
But do turn your camera or desktop view on if you want
The tinychat room is here, and the Complice frontend is here. Either will work. The password is ‘lw’. The password exists not as a security measure but as a roadblock for random walk-ins.
Aside from our growing population, the most significant change of the last year was malcolmocean succesfully integrating the room into his Complice application. This doesn’t give us control of the room, but does give us (by which I mean him) the ability to bolt on features, including a unified pomodoro timer with audible dings. It’s achieved fixation remarkably quickly; most of our participants now use it.
Last year’s top suggestion box item was better enforcement of pomodoros; break overruns were extremely common. The public timer has rapidly and all-but-completely solved the problem. No technological enforcement was necessary, which surprised me. There was some concern that users who weren’t inclined to use Complice would be left in the dark, but that doesn’t seem to have happened. I would like to emphasize that if you are joining via Tinychat rather than Complice, it is still okay to explicitly ask for the time. We know that not everyone can see the timer, and we won’t bite you.
We do have some challenges to deal with in the upcoming year. Most of them involve our continuing dependence on Tinychat. Our Complice frontend is definitely not Tinychat-approved, and I suspect they will try to step on it if they notice. With our population growing, we have begun to bump against Tinychat’s twelve-camera limit. And, of course, as long as we’re dependent on Tinychat we can’t develop the Hall into a single unified application.
There may be some indication of light at the end of that tunnel; we’ll see. In the meantime, we do still have room for growth, and we still welcome new people.
Personal Reflections
As I write this, I find that we have recovered our original Creator from the darkness of non-usage. That made my day.
I actually use the Hall less than I did last year. I changed jobs, and my new schedule leaves me less time alone that I would normally use to join the chat. So, my comments may be less reflective than otherwise.
The numbers say that we are bigger, but it doesn’t really feel that way. We have run close to the video limit, but not very often; most of the time that I go (usually on the weekends), there are three to six cameras active. I’ve talked to a few others about it, and it sounds like the increase may be coming from more users during lower-use times than an increase in peak usage.
I mostly use the Hall for handling personal chores and writing. I occasionally program, but this is one task for which I’ve found the Hall counterproductive. Pomodoro breaks flush my mental state, screwing up the symbolic juggling that any programmer will be familiar with.
If anyone else has the same problem, but still wants to use the Hall while coding, I suggest ignoring breaks and turning the volume down so that timer dings and people talking doesn’t pull you out of hack mode. That’s what I do. In the future, it would be nice to have rooms with different pomo periods to accommodate things like this. Right now I don’t think we have enough people to fill multiple rooms, but with any luck that will change.
One of the most interesting responses in the survey below came from a former user, who used the comment box to describe why they’d left. They cited a similar issue; they needed help with larger tasks, not the chunkable ones that suit pomodoros best. They also cited cultural fit; apparently they were put off by the silly atmosphere of many of the breaks.
I want to address that specifically, because there was some concern about it last year that did not seem to hold up when the survey asked about it. Here we have someone for whom it really was an issue. So it is, indeed, a real thing. On the other hand, other respondents noted the same elements as a plus, and I myself would be sad to see it go away. I think this is something that we are just going to have to accept as an aspect of our culture that inevitably will not suit everyone.
The respondent in question seemed to agree. That said: Whoever you are, sorry you left us and thank you for telling us why.
2015 Census and Survey Results
Numbers are fun, so here there be numbers. Once again, credit to Yvain for all the questions I pilfered from his Less Wrong survey.
There were 63 respondents, up from last year’s 23. I’m unsure how much of that increase is real and how much is a selection effect. This year, the Complice room automatically advertised the survey during breaks, so it’s likely a higher percentage of users took it.
Last year I took the Google Forms statistics verbatim, but this year I couldn’t do that for Reasons. The script I used to generate these numbers is possibly the worst code I’ve written in the last decade. As far as I can tell they’re still correct, but if anyone notices something obviously wrong, please let me know.
The text of the individual questions can be found here. My comments are in brackets.
Population
Population Count
[[ People who were here to screw up the stats were left out of the stats. Har. ]]
Survey History
[[ This was an attempt to get an idea of the proportion of users who stick around. 15 of last year’s 23 survey takers took this year’s survey. ]]
Technology
Web Browser
[[ This question was intended to provide useful information for developing a TC alternative. What’s interesting about this: The best alternative I’ve found to Tinychat, that we can host ourselves, is called Jitsimeet. It does not support Firefox yet (or rather, Firefox does not yet support the tech it uses, although it’s in the pipeline), and so I never put *that* much effort into investigating it. That our users so heavily favor Chrome suggests that it may be worth a second look. ]]
Complice
[[ Almost certainly an overestimate. Complice automatically advertised the survey during breaks, so complice users would have been disproportionately aware of it. ]]
Demographics
Age
Country
[[ Last year Germany held a plurality of our users; most of our growth since then has been in the U.S. ]]
Race
[[ Yay, we’re not 100% White anymore. Since my script lumps any answer that got exactly one response under “other”, I’ll note that the six responses here represent one Middle Eastern, two mixed, one Asian (Indian Subcontinent), one Aboriginal, and one “none.” ]]
Sex, Gender, Relationships
Sex
Gender
[[ Surprisingly close to balanced, here, especially by comparison to Less Wrong proper. This doesn’t match my experience in-room, which is more heavily male; I’m wondering if our female/other participants don’t spend as much time in the room as the men, or if they just don’t run their cameras as much. (also interesting: Despite transgender options being listed, only one person actually used them. All the other “Others” were write-ins.) ]]
Sexual Orientation
[[ I am amused that Heteroflexible escaped the Other ghetto despite not actually being provided as an answer. I’m also not sure why Less Wrong has such an overrepresented bisexual contingent. I noticed that in Yvain’s survey and it shows up here, too. ]]
Relationship Style
Number of Current Partners
Relationship Goals
[[ It’s funny to compare this to last year’s survey, which lacked the “not looking, but open” option. Apparently most people round that up to “looking”. ]]
Relationship Status
Children
[[ Not pictured: One user with minus 37 children, which I unilaterally rounded up to zero. ]]
More Children
Work and Education
Work Status
[[ We’re as student-centric as ever ]]
Profession
Degree
Less Wrong
Less Wrong Use
[[ More Main posters than I ever expected. Do we get status points for this? ]]
Time in LW Community
Karma Score
Meetups
Community
Survey (Yvain’s)
Less Wrong Study Hall and You
Time in Community (LWSH)
[[ We had an influx of newbies after the Complice room was announced; I’m not sure how much that is represented here. ]]
Frequency
[[ While we have more users, they don’t come to the Hall as often. I think this explains why it doesn’t feel that much busier even though our population is much higher. ]]
Time in the Hall
[[ On the other hand, time-per-visit is pretty much the same. ]]
Usage
[[ If those percentages look funny, it’s because this question permitted multiple answers. This pair of questions and the next asked for all answers that applied, followed by the most important answer. ]]
Usage 2
Draw
Draw 2
[[ The carrot still gets more love than the stick. ]]
Camera
[[ Camera use is somewhat less frequent, apparently because of people dropping from “always” to “sometimes.” That’s a bit disappointing. I like seeing five or six faces at once. ]]
Desktop Sharing
Time Zone
[[ Mostly east and west coast U.S., and central Europe. I still need to find a way to take these numbers and the temoral-habits questions and work out what UTC times are most heavily populated. Malcolm, is there any chance Complice could, say, poll the number of active users and graph it over time? It wouldn’t be perfect (not everyone uses Complice) but it would probably be pretty close, and it would save me the trouble. ]]
Temporal Habits (Weekdays)
Temporal Habits (Weekends)
Referrals
[[ My favorite “other” referral was someone who checked the URL on tinychat entirely be coincidence, before it was passworded. ]]
Interaction
Interaction 2
Romance
LWSH Efficacy
Base Akrasia
Akratic Impact
Base Hedonia
Hedonic Impact
[[ Eyeballing it, it looks like the Hall removes akradons somewhat more efficiently than it produces hedons. Which is fair given its purpose. ]]
Distractions
Distraction Type
[[ I am optimistic about the “People talking or otherwise drawing attention” number dropping next year, thanks to the unified pomo timer. ]]
Distraction Cause
Overwork
Accomplishments
[[ “Yes” answers are down from 65% last year. :-( I’m hoping that’s because we have a lot of new users who haven’t had time to do anything big yet. ]]
Accomplishment Examples
This was a freeform question. Lots of school related answers; one of our users studied finished their PhD at Oxford. Our HPMoR translator is still translating. Some personal projects, of course (I wrote and published some fanfiction, if I may pimp myself). And the Complice frontend, unsurprisingly, was written during Hall time.
Akrasia
Akrasia
[[ Down from 50%. I was speaking with Lachouette some time ago, and commented that I thought our community was self-selected for akratic problems; mostly on the grounds that people who didn’t need help to fight their own akrasia, wouldn’t come here. She said that from her perspective it looked like we were selected for unusually productive people. Does this number mean I win or that I lose? I don’t know what percentage of the general public would answer Yes. ]]
Akrasia: Current
[[ Very slightly down. ]]
I don’t have much to say about the rest of the Akrasia questions, and I’m thinking of dropping these questions next year. At least one person suggested that the survey was too long as it is, and I think I agree. I included this section in year 1 because it was in Yvain’s survey at the time, but I’m not sure we’re getting any value out of it—by use or amusement. He doesn’t seem to be using it anymore either.
Akrasia: Illness
Akrasia: Medicines 1
Akrasia: Medicines 1.5
Akrasia: Medicines 2
Akrasia: Supplements 1
Akrasia: Supplements 1.5
Akrasia: Supplements 2
Akrasia: Therapy 1
Akrasia: Therapy 2
Akrasia: Meditation 1
Akrasia: Meditation 2
Akrasia: Elsewhat 1
Akrasia: Elsewhat 2
Akrasia: Communication
Silliness
Tinychat Hatred
Tinychat Screams (number of)
Slightly more information than last year: The sum, mean, max, and possibly the standard deviation were all variants of infinity. My favorite answers were e^tau and the first couple hundred digits of Pi without the decimal point.
Stuffies
[[ Stuffies! ]]
Stuffies on Camera
Owl (Eris/Terry/Levi)
[[ I think something went wrong here, because I know I’ve seen more than four users with an Eris/Terry/Levi. These are the owl stuffies that some LWSH residents have. They’re sort of our de facto mascot. ]]
Owl Aquisition
[[ I am amused at the three people who answered “I don’t know what you’re talking about” to the previous question, but wanted one anyway (you can buy them here if you know how to read Dutch and live somewhere they’ll deliver). I’m even more amused by the confused soul who didn’t know what the question was talking about but still owned one. ]]
Miscellany
Suggestion/Comment/Question boxes
These were freeform responses. As with last year, the most common requests were “replace Tinychat” and variants of “give us some feature that requires replacing Tinychat.” We’re getting there, sort of! There was also a demand for more crocodiles, and a love letter from someone who appreciated the existence of the Owl questions.
I was going to complain here about how running surveys like this is a lot more grueling than Yvain makes it look. Then I found something special in the comment box; I don’t know who said it but it makes efforts to bring attention to this project seem more than worthwhile. I’ll just leave it right here. To all those who show up in the Hall: you are in part responsible for this.