[POLL] How Many IM Buddies?

[jducoeur]

Okay, having just taught myself how to do a poll, I find a use for one for actual work-related purposes!

We're trying to get an idea of how large typical IM buddy lists are, so we can understand some scalability issues. One of my bosses asked me to ask some of my contacts how big their buddy lists are, so hey -- I might as well do it this way. So here's a short poll. If you use one or more instant-messaging systems, please respond to the relevant questions. Round all answers to the nearest option; leave it as 0 if you don't use that system. Thanks!
[Poll #338643]

Comments

[metahacker.livejournal.com]

35 is a very "ish" number. I have about that many people on largest buddy list, but I keep strict separation between my work IM handle and my other IM handles (I have five, with four in common use). I might have 60 all told.

However, only about 2/3rds of those people ever log into IM any more, and I probably only talk to about 5 of them on a regular basis.

[jducoeur]

That's fine. I'm mainly looking for largest lists here, since the question is scalability. Presence updates have an multiplicative fanout, so it's important that we get our user models right, and I'd rather be slightly pessimistic.

That said, it's interesting that a substantial number of those people don't use IM any more. IM is gradually moving from "cool toy" to "tool", which seems to be changing the usage profiles...

[metahacker.livejournal.com]

As a data reference, my cousin (17 years old) has at least four screen names because he has maxed out the buddy list (128, I believe) on some of them. And those are all people he talks with at least reasonably regularly, because otherwise he'd weed them out in favor of other screennames.

[snarkyman.livejournal.com]

I use GAIM to connect to AIM, but I only have one buddy, cosmicgarden.

[yakshaver.livejournal.com]

I answered for AIM, which I occasionally hold my nose and use. But the IM system I use the most is the oldest and IMHO still best: zephyr. There's no concept of a "buddy" in zephyr; a user's .anyone file is probably the closest thing: you can be automatically notified when people in your .anyone log in or out, and can poll who in it is currently logged in. My .anyone has 81 people in it.

Ask in IETF?

[metageek.livejournal.com]

Might be useful to post your question to the IM-related IETF working groups (impp, simple, xmpp); there'll be people there with implementation experience to share.

Re: Ask in IETF?

[jducoeur]

I'll suggest that to the folks gathering the data. Thanks...