Fact or FanFiction.net? More Time Spent Than Social Networks
Written by Andrew Pearlman (contact - e-mail) -- December 4th, 2007 | Recommend ThisBelieve it or not, based on the top 100 domains (unique visitors) FanFiction.net has the fourth highest average time spent per user. That’s right, they beat out Facebook, MySpace, Google, Yahoo! and MSN. Only three sites rank higher; the almighty time wasting gaming site, Pogo.com (number one), and the two hottest dating sites (so I hear) on the net; manhunt.net and adam4adam.com. Coming in at a close number five is another gaming site, runescape.com and then finally, Myspace. I’d like to once again send my condolences to Tom on his big loss for the coveted ‘most devoted internet junkie website of the year award.’
What is FanFiction.net? I had honestly never heard of it until it broke the top 30 for attention recently (now at number 28) and I did a little digging. Founded in 1988 by computer programmer Xing Li this website allows users to post their fiction on a myriad of topics ranging from anime to movies and if that’s not enough, “Misc.” It’s not hard to see why people spend so much time on this website, once you read one post about the highly anticipated Edward Scissorhands II (Johnny Depp declined comment) you will be hooked. When I say hooked, I mean it: The average user spends over seven and a half hours on this website a month and logs in more than 34 times.
Following a decade of “Blockbuster: Part II,” we have FanFiction.net - a site that finally allows fanatics of beloved media classes to live out their ultimate fantasy of having Han Solo navigate the Starship Enterprise through the Twilight Zone. That’s not to say that there is free reign on this site to post anything your heart desires; on September 12, 2002 all material rated NC-17 was banned from the website. This did not seem to have much effect on traffic to the website as almost 2,000 people posted their opinions on South Park. Although, it may not seem like a big deal to many people, I take comfort in knowing that playing games, looking for love and stalking your old acquaintances can sometimes be less enticing then letting your true feelings about Dirty Dancing finally come out. Cheers to you, Fanfiction.net, your clean site design with only one banner add and unadulterated freedom of expression has catapulted your users into a class almost of their own.
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December 4th, 2007 at 5:32 pm
That is interesting… some names you wouldn’t think of right away.
I would have expected to see Meebo or other IM services pretty high on the list. Is the full list available?
December 5th, 2007 at 2:17 pm
Hey Schoeny,
I looked into my data, and I found meebo.com.
It is ranked 417 in terms of total unique visitors per month (October 2007)
The average user spends almost 40 minutes per month, almost 6 and a half minutes and 1 minute per pageview.
Not sure which other IM services you are looking for. Online dating, gaming sites and major portals dominate the top 25, the few outliers are sites like fanfiction.net, phoenix.edu (I assume is an online school) and sportsline.net, nfl.com and photobucket.com. As you start to dig deeper you see more of the common three types of sites as well as email, major banks, retail sites.
Hope this helps out,
Andrew
December 5th, 2007 at 3:56 pm
That’s really interesting. I would think MySpace would be a lot higher.
December 6th, 2007 at 9:34 am
I’m amazed with those figures. I’d never heard of those two gay date sites. Maybe Markus Frind needs to start PlentyofGayFish.
December 10th, 2007 at 1:51 am
Gee!! I’d never heard of a couple of these sites before. Thanks for the post. I really thought that MySpace had them all beat.
December 11th, 2007 at 1:33 pm
Thank you the post. I believe that popularity of this site is contributed to it’s simplicity. You don’t need to create fabcy profiles. This not about looks, it is about expression of thoughts.
January 15th, 2008 at 8:44 pm
Go Fanfiction!
Psh. And I spend more than just 7 hours a month on it..
January 16th, 2008 at 7:36 pm
Haha, i spend at least 5 hours a day reading fanfiction. I love that site, joined it two years ago and have printed roughly 5 reams off paper of it. =]
January 28th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
Wow, number four? I never would have expected that, but I love that website! I think it’s become more used since it started having forums about a year ago.
And I definitely spend more than seven hours a month on it. Sometimes more than seven hours a day!
February 1st, 2008 at 2:41 pm
Yay Fanfiction.net!!! I love that place, it’s absolutely addicting. I spend more than an hour a day at that site.
MySpace probably isn’t that high because it’s not for younger kids, and very few older people are on there, but ff.net is for every one, I mean, I first went there in 5th grade, and I’ve read stories by people who discovered fanfiction as a thing to do in their retirement. And the site has fanfiction for almost every media catagory, so it doesn’t matter if you’re a fantasy book fan or a lover of reality TV, if it’s out there, people write stories to go with it on Fanfiction.net.
February 6th, 2008 at 12:27 am
Number four?
That’s really high! I guess I’m the norm, I spend about Ten minutes everytime I log on, Every DAY!!
It is a really good website, and it’s really diverse. I’ve discovered things on that website, and people as well, that I probably wouldn’t have in my offline life.
I can’t believe that two Date sights - male ones at that - would be in the top three, it’s unbelieveable. At least I go to ONE of the sights!
Anyway, I really liked your blog, and thought I’d tell you so!
February 14th, 2008 at 12:22 pm
Hey, I really liked your article. Personally I spend a lot more than 7 and a half hours per week on Fanfiction, but what can I say it fuels my imagination! Anyway, thanks for writing this.
February 15th, 2008 at 12:18 pm
Meebo isn’t really a website…its more like a program. I love fanfiction.net though, theres so much to find.
February 28th, 2008 at 2:23 am
Wow. 4th? I didn’t know it was so popular. Some think its for geeks, but man, a LOT of people are always on. I spend more than 3 hrs. a day on Ff.n . And if it wasn’t for all my homework, I would be there all the time. Some people ask why, and this is all I have to say: Its completely addicting. Once you start reading a good story, you’ll want to finish the whole book, and won’t stop till you’re done.
April 4th, 2008 at 8:29 am
For the women out there, I will tell you this, this site is very biased against women. They only want those wimpy women who will not come back on a rude crude, arrogant man. They will delete and ban you from the site if you do.
I was on plentyoffish for several months. They claim they have some very strict rules for members. Unfortunatly it is applied to women, but not men. Example, they speak of a profile, the woman is forced to put in a profile of greater length then the men. They say improper profiles will get one deleted, yet, there are many profiles with just bogus characters in them. They claim quality men. My experience, most (not all) were very insecure, immature men who have serious life issues. They will get very rude and crude with a woman if you indicate any form of rejection towards them. Bottom line, it is a free site. So it attracts every loser in the world.
The site itself is well done, unfortunatly, it just does not apply the rules equitably.
This is not to say there are women out there that are much better. Again, my complaint, the site is pro-man, anti-woman, so if you decide to use it, do so with much caution.
April 4th, 2008 at 6:15 pm
heyy! i love fanfiction.net! psh. 7.7 hours a month? yeah right. i spend about that much time on it everyday. Im addicted ^_^ and no, i dont have a life and seriously need one but…
where do i download that from? just kidding but getting back on topic, it really is addicting. You just want to read others and yeah, it fuels my imagination. im pretty sure that their motto is ‘Unleash Your Imagination’ and boy, do i do that.
April 16th, 2008 at 2:36 am
I find it quite realistic that Fanfiction.net and Runescape should rank so high.
On the average day…I spend about 7 off and on hours on the internet… two of those solid hours are spent on Runescape. The other hours are spent off and on reading and posting on Fanfiction.net and other things. On free days I spend about 13 hours on the internet.
Even on busy days I spend about 4 hours on the internet…7 a month is way to low…
I don’t agree with the assessment that FanFiction.net is addicting. People spend a lot of time reading the news and doing other things on the internet. But since a lot of people are not satisfied with movies or TV shows they see, then they are bound to fix that or try to find someone else who did. Then of course there is the use of imagination. Day dreaming is one thing but its always fun to find out that you and a hundred other people dream the same things happened to a character…
Runescape is addicting…not due to its out of this world graphics or lack thereof…but because it takes so long to do anything on it. Example unless you are a very high level and you can teleport everywhere you want to go, you have to walk there.(Running only lasts so long) Quests take a while due to going to location to location and finding everything needed for the quest. It takes time to raise your combat level or any other level for that matter.
All in all it is no surprise that they are popular and regularly used sites.
Nice blog by the way…real informative…
April 19th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
I spend a good deal of my time on FF.net. I have for about 5 years, and I still love it. If you really love a show, book, or game and would like to write/read about what you want to happen, what you think will happen or a combination of the two Fanfiction.net is the place to go.
I must admit though didn’t post this to show my love for fanfiction.net. I posted this because I was confused about Rebecca’s comment(the 15th comment) Was she referring to fanfiction.net? I think she may have been refering to one of the three dating sites that were at the attention sites list.
Well anyways so I don’t get too offtrack. I spend more than 2 hours of FF.net each day, and even more on weekends. I’m not surprised that its so high in the attention list. I’m actually surpised it isn’t higher.
May 30th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
I used to love this site until the administration went on a massive deletion rampage in 2002. I watched a lot of good stories disappear and authors give up trying to make themselves known for their work on the internet (There wasn’t another site like it at the time). The situation wasn’t handled well at all. No warning, no time to adapt to the change in policy, no opportunity to reason with them, not even a threatening email saying “write PG stories or else.” They just locked accounts, banned others, deleted everything, and then blocked titles and usernames without explanation. The site is well made but managed very poorly. I look it then and see what it is now and I know it will never return to its former glory.
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