FAQ:   

Who are we? 

      Bete Noire loves limes and hanging out in /newbie.  Fnord7 is an inquisitive, life-loving person who is responsible for chatbot.  Fresh curd is an inveterate forum lurker who has been known to dress up as a weretaco.  

Why did we conduct this survey? 

      Many people who are involved with the KoL community often find ourselves wondering who the 'playerbase' really is.  We know that there are different types of players with different goals in the game, and we know that behind the player IDs are people of all ages and backgrounds, but how many are there of which persuasion?  How do different people interact with the community, or not interact, and how is that correlated with their playing style?  We can draw some conclusions from the questions and opinions posted on the forums or encountered in chat, but the most vocal are not always the most representative.  Forum polls often get shot down as 'not a good sample,' even when the questions are unbiased.  Thus much of the information remains unknown, from basic demographics to more interesting correlations.   

      Last June, SolarFlare conducted his Census of Loathing (http://forums.kingdomofloathing.com/viewtopic.php?t=33349; http://forums.kingdomofloathing.com/viewtopic.php?t=35502 ), compiling information from the profiles of 1000 randomly chosen player IDs.  He did this just prior to the Ascension roll-out, and again several weeks after.  This was a well-timed effort that yielded interesting data about account activity, character classes, familiars, etc.  The Census was one of the inspirations for our project.  Although we knew that we could not get the same kind of unbiased data by doing a voluntary survey, many of the questions that we wanted to ask could not be answered by looking at a profile page. 

How did we pick people? 

      We (and by 'we,' I mean 'Fnord7') used a bot to randomly choose 3000 player IDs, with the condition that they had to have logged on in the prior two weeks (we wanted to maximize the number of active accounts that we hit).  The bot collected profile data from the selected accounts, and sent a kmail to each one with a unique link to the survey questions.  We waited two weeks (the point at which kmails get auto-deleted form the inbox).  Then the bot went back and re-checked the selected profiles to see how many had logged on in the interim.  
 

Are you tracking people's IP addresses? 

      No. 

How about associating player names with their answers?

 
 Although survey results and user id are associated internally, we see no reason we would make this data public, and will not do so without contacting users individually. 

What about the raffle/limes? 

      When we were putting together the survey, we wondered whether people would be more likely to respond if there was something in it for them, besides the satisfaction of contributing to the survey effort.  So we split the chosen players into 3 groups: one which received nothing, one which received 3 limes with the invitation, and one which was eligible for a Mr. Accessory raffle for answering (so stated in the invitation).  In the end, response rates were as follows: no reward - 28.5%, limes - 39.7%, raffle - 41.2% (out of invitees who logged in during the 2-week survey period).   

Why so many personal questions?  (i.e. my sexual orientation is none of your business) 

      First of all, we have no wish to embarrass or offend anyone with our survey.  Although not explicitly stated, it was possible to skip questions in the survey. And again, we will keep the answers confidential as requested.  

      We came to this project from a community perspective.  Personalities and personal traits play a huge role in how people interact with the community.  There have been KoL clans based on gender and sexual orientation, people in chat trade stories about their children, people on the forums make jokes about their jobs.  We thought it would be fun to get a better understanding of where people are coming from when they join the KoL community. 

      Also, many of us have noticed that the community here is different from many other online communities.  The gender ratio seems to be more balanced, the age range is impressive, and the number of real-life meetups advertised on the forums appears to grow exponentially.  A lot of people stuck around waiting for ascension for months, when there was nothing left to do in the game, quest-wise.  We all know that the game is fun, and funny, and provides a lot of options for different styles of play. But it also seems to attract a certain crowd, or set of crowds, that make up this vibrant community.  We want to know more about them. About you. About us.     

What are you going to do with the data? 

      We have done some basic analyses of the data and are making the numbers public here.  We will continue to mine the data for interesting trends and correlations.  We hope to conduct this survey on a regular basis (with some changes based on excellent feedback by the survey-takers), and we plan to do follow-ups with the survey-takers whom we have permission to contact again.  

How can I participate? 

      Although we will continue to choose accounts randomly for the survey, we are happy to take suggestions for future questions and/or analyses.  Please contact Bete Noire in-game or in a forum pm.