Quite a while ago I created a census-like form asking people for some information about themselves, and some of my friends and friends of friends on Google Reader were kind enough to fill it in. You can read the questions here. A total of 35 people filled in the form. I’m summarising this in several chunks, because I asked way too many questions. Here are the questions regarding demographics and identity.
So many Americans! So few Britishers!
West Coast = best coast.
The median year of birth was 1983. I am glad I am slightly younger than average, even if the million people born in 1985 make me feel old! Also the relatively narrow range of births here is interesting, but I guess that’s just how social groups form.
So many males!
About 80% of respondents were straight, which is less than the incidence in the overall population, as far as I know? It’s a big homofest up in these comments.
Everyone be white though.
Just one person identifying with a disability.
This is probably the biggest difference compared to the overall population. About 88% of people could be classified as non-religious/non-spiritual, and of those, the majority are atheist, as opposed to more wishy-washy definitions. If there is a bias in things people share, it is almost certainly in this dimension.
…or maybe this one. The two “other”s did not sound like conservative beliefs, meaning there is no representation from the right side of politics here. Bunch of communists I swear
I’m not totally sure if the outlier to the left isn’t a typo/conversion error. In any case, most ladies appear to be right around the average height for the female American population, while males are slightly taller on average.
It looks like there’s not a lot of demand for Google Reader mixers.
I’m not sure if this is much of a difference to the rest of the population or not – can you expect about a third of people in the general population to not want children? In any case, there is plenty of representation from the people who love babbies, so keep sharing those birthing videos.
Almost everyone is employed, and of that group, almost everyone is employed full-time. Plenty of time to spend on Google Reader, I guess. I wonder in what proportion of those workplaces is Google+ blocked? :( Most of the people not in the labour force were full-time students.
Perhaps it’s not surprising that a social network revolving around sharing and discussing (mostly) long-form content skews towards the educated, but I thought it was interesting to see just how educated the group is. We’ll be going into more detail regarding how much that education is costing everyone as soon as I find some more time.
