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Simultaneous MLT YouTube Views
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Now this sounds intriguing.
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Here’s another update on I Bought Myself a Politician. Over the past week, C = 1.7 and V = 646. And just over the last 24 hours, C = 1.9 and V = 750.
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MLT is really keeping me busy! Just as I finish my detailed hundred-hour monitoring of The Many Faces of Mona, they throw another video at me.
For the early stats for Stuck in the Middle With You I’m going to try letting the time interval just be however long it’s been since the last measurement. That should reduce the fluctuations, as well as allow me to get by taking half as much data.
After two hours, S = 71. After three hours, S = 72, C = 76, and V = 30048. After four hours, S = 76, C = 85, and V = 33864. After six hours, S = 78, C = 84, and V = 33348. After eight hours, S = 81, C = 87, and V = 34380. (No sign of any decline yet!) After ten hours, S = 80, C = 77, and V = 30408. After twelve hours, S = 79, C = 74, and V = 29148. After fourteen hours, S = 76, C = 58, and V = 22920. After sixteen hours, S = 72, C = 49, and V = 19284. (Okay, now the dropoff is underway.) After 24 hours, S = 60, C = 35, and V = 13926.
Interestingly, after one full day Stuck in the Middle With You, I Bought Myself a Politician, and Sound of Silence have all had an S value of around 60. Drive My Car (the newer version) was about half that.
After 28 hours, S = 56, C = 36, and V = 14082. After 32 hours, S = 56, C = 49, and V = 19338. After 36 hours, S = 56, C = 59, and V = 23376. (We’re going up again!) After 40 hours, S = 54, C = 41, and V = 16242. After 48 hours, S = 50, C = 26, and V = 10443. (And back down…) After 52 hours, S = 48, C = 25, and V = 9780. After 56 hours, S = 46, C = 26, and V = 10338. After 60 hours, S = 45, C = 31, and V = 12144. After 64 hours, S = 44, C = 19, and V = 7566. After 72 hours, S = 41, C = 16, and V = 6429.
On to day four! After 76 hours, S = 39, C = 17, and V = 6864. After 80 hours, S = 38, C = 19, and V = 7458. After 84 hours, S = 38, C = 23, and V = 9192. After 88 hours, S = 37, C = 22, and V = 8712. After 96 hours, S = 35, C = 16, and V = 6180. And after 100 hours, S = 34, C = 16, and V = 6372.
So although the measurement techniques have been evolving, I think we can say that Stuck in the Middle With You has so far been the second-most successful of the handful of videos that I’ve kept early stats on, after Sound of Silence.
I believe the time interval used here (generally four hours) works pretty well: considerably longer than the YouTube update time, but still short enough to reveal variations that may be attributable to what time of day it is in the time zones that produce the most views.
I read recently that YouTube provides data, to those who post videos, on the viewing history of their own videos. This job would be a lot easier if I had access to that! Not only could we generate data for C and V from such information, but a Fourier analysis (nerd alert!) could reveal the timescales, and hence hint at the reasons, for the up-and-down variations.
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Awesome work, David
Just think thousands of smiles are being inspired by these timeless masterpieces today ????
It’s another great lazy Sunny Sunday
JP
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That’s great to see, thanks for doing this David! You are super groooovy!!! 🙂
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Here are the latest top 20 lists, covering the period from September 5th through October 3rd. This is my first attempt at a roughly one-month average. Such a long time probably merits inclusion of a second decimal place in the C calculations.
A one-month period will not give very accurate results for relatively new videos, so I’ve substituted data for just the last day for Stuck in the Middle With You, and for the last week for I Bought Myself a Politician.
Also I’m now doing the calculations in a spreadsheet, so I have data for the entire YouTube inventory. If you’d like to know the stats on any videos outside the top 20, just ask.
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simultaneous views:
1) Please Mr. Postman / Wipeout: C = 11.27 (+0.60)
2) Stuck in the Middle With You: C = 10.95 (new)
3) Drive My Car (2012): C = 10.10 (+0.24)
4) While My Guitar Gently Weeps: C = 6.89 (-0.63)
5) Wish You Were Here: C = 5.60 (+1.64)
6) Sound of Silence: C = 4.32 (-1.02)
7) Africa: C = 2.77 (+0.33)
8) I Saw Her Standing There: C = 2.75 (-0.66)
9) MonaLisa Twins Interview 2016: C = 2.68 (+0.18)
10) Nowhere Man: C = 2.51 (-0.19)
11) When I’m Sixty-Four: C = 2.48 (-0.25)
12) You Can’t Do That: C = 2.40 (-0.11)
13) Lola: C = 2.16 (+0.28)
14) If I Fell: C = 2.13 (+0.26)
15) Bus Stop: C = 1.81 (+0.03)
16) I Bought Myself a Politician: C = 1.79 (-5.97)
17) Day Tripper: C = 1.77 (-0.09)
18) Both Sides Now: C = 1.75 (-0.13)
19) I’m a Believer: C = 1.70 (+0.05)
20) Twist and Shout (2015): C = 1.67 (+0.20)
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views per day:
1) Drive My Car (2012): V = 5225 (+123)
2) Stuck in the Middle With You: V = 4339 (new)
3) Please Mr. Postman / Wipeout: V = 3975 (+211)
4) While My Guitar Gently Weeps: V = 2172 (-200)
5) Sound of Silence: V = 1823 (-428)
6) Wish You Were Here: V = 1656 (+486)
7) When I’m Sixty-Four: V = 1226 (-120)
8) I Saw Her Standing There: V = 1172 (-280)
9) Nowhere Man: V = 1120 (-83)
10) You Can’t Do That: V = 1103 (-51)
11) If I Fell: V = 965 (+121)
12) Africa: V = 821 (+98)
13) Till There Was You: V = 779 (-56)
14) Day Tripper: V = 771 (-40)
15) Bus Stop: V = 746 (+13)
16) San Francisco: V = 706 (-210)
17) This Boy: V = 699 (+21)
18) I Bought Myself a Politician: V = 689 (-2306)
19) Twist and Shout (2015): V = 686 (+80)
20) You’re Going to Lose That Girl: V = 684 (-88)
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Nice work David pulling those stats???? Thanks. I Bought Myself a Politician hit 100K views today, and I’m rooting for it to do a steep trajectory to a Million and beyond in short order.
A 100,000 youtube views in approx 1 month in my mind equates to a huge crowd many times bigger than the Cavern could accomodate if it packed it in every night for a month to listen to the song. So many joyful moments!
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It might happen, Jung. If IBMAP stabilizes at 500 views per day, it would reach a million views about five years from now.
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Based on the most recent data, here are the top 20 most frequently viewed videos of MLT original songs over the past month, omitting interviews and behind-the-scenes videos and such. (V means average number of views per day.)
1) I Bought Myself a Politician: V = 689
2) That’s Life: V = 336
3) Close to You: V = 311
4) Still a Friend of Mine: V = 261
5) Sweet Lorraine: V = 189
6) Once Upon a Time: V = 115
7) Waiting for the Waiter: V = 111
8) One More Time: V = 93
9) Won’t You Listen Now: V = 92
10) The Wide, Wide Land : V = 91
11) I Don’t Know Birds That Well: V = 91
12) June: V = 90
13) I Wanna Kiss You: V = 81
14) Nothing Is in Vain: V = 59
15) Club 27: V = 53
16) All About Falling in Love (duo): V = 41
17) All About Falling in Love (studio): V = 37
18) Dreams: V = 37
19) All I Want Christmas to Be: V = 32
20) When We’re Together: V = 25
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Here are the latest numbers on the most recent videos. For the past week, I Bought Myself a Politician has C = 6.19 and V = 2389. And for the past day, Stuck in the Middle With You has C = 4.19 and V = 1662.
The increase for IBMAP is remarkable: nearly 3.5 times as many views in the past week as in the week before!
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Woohoo, what great news about IBMAP!!! Thanks for pulling those stats David.
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Time for another weekly report! For the past week, I Bought Myself a Politician is at C = 4.90 and V = 1891. And for the past day, Stuck in the Middle With You is at C = 3.77 and V = 1493.
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Over the past week, I Bought Myself a Politician has C = 4.36 and V = 1680, while Stuck in the Middle With You has C = 3.46 and V = 1371. So an MLT original song is still being viewed more frequently than a slightly more recent cover!
I’ll probably be too busy this week to track Lazy Sunday Afternoon in great detail, but I’ll try to give a daily update. Over the last four hours it’s at C = 30.4 and V = 13602. (Previous calculation error corrected.)
For LSA on October 25th, C = 20.7 and V = 9259. For the 26th, C = 11.5 and V = 5152. For the 27th, C = 7.8 and V = 3473. For the 28th, C = 6.1 and V = 2750.
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Lazy Sunday Afternoon stats, continued:
For the 29th, C = 6.1 and V = 2714. For the 30th, C = 4.9 and V = 2183. And for the 31st, C = 3.5 and V = 1573.
Meanwhile, here are the numbers for the past week for the other two most recent videos. For I Bought Myself a Politician, C = 5.08 and V = 1960. And for Stuck in the Middle With You, C = 3.38 and V = 1340. Once again, IBMAP has defied the usual trend and actually increased in viewing rate!
Coming up next weekend: new top 20 lists for October.
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Nice, David!
Thanks for the update. Watching how much fun the band has with Lazy Sunday Afternoon leads to a world full of simultaneous smiles.
JP
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Thanks David. It’s great to see I Bought Myself a Politician doing well, and it looks like Lazy Sunday Afternoon hit the pavement running. Hope it gives Mr Postman and Wish You Were Here a good run and catches up to them, and all 3 skyrocket, along with I Bought Myself a Politician. Momentum in numbers you know. Kind of like drafting in NASCAR, and the leaders pull way ahead of the pack. 🙂
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Here are the top 20 lists for MLT video viewings from October 4th through November 5th. (For the most recent video, Lazy Sunday Afternoon, the data are for just the last five days.)
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simultaneous views:
1) Please Mr. Postman / Wipeout: C = 8.42 (-2.85)
2) While My Guitar Gently Weeps: C = 4.80 (-2.09)
3) I Bought Myself a Politician: C = 4.75 (+2.96)
4) Wish You Were Here: C = 4.26 (-1.34)
5) Drive My Car (2012): C = 4.22 (-5.88)
6) Stuck in the Middle With You: C = 3.81 (-7.14)
7) Sound of Silence: C = 3.12 (-1.20)
8) Lazy Sunday Afternoon: C = 2.26 (new)
9) I Saw Her Standing There: C = 2.04 (-0.71)
10) You Can’t Do That: C = 2.01 (-0.39)
11) Nowhere Man: C = 1.89 (-0.62)
12) Africa: C = 1.83 (-0.94)
13) Lola: C = 1.77 (-0.39)
14) When I’m Sixty-Four: C = 1.69 (-0.79)
15) If I Fell: C = 1.61 (-0.52)
16) MonaLisa Twins Interview 2016: C = 1.61 (-1.07)
17) I’m a Believer: C = 1.42 (-0.28)
18) Both Sides Now: C = 1.31 (-0.44)
19) Starman: C = 1.25 (+0.21)
20) I’ll Follow the Sun: C = 1.24 (-0.28)
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views per day:
1) Please Mr. Postman / Wipeout: V = 2968 (-1007)
2) Drive My Car (2012): V = 2185 (-3040)
3) I Bought Myself a Politician: V = 1830 (+1141)
4) While My Guitar Gently Weeps: V = 1514 (-658)
5) Stuck in the Middle With You: V = 1510 (-2829)
6) Sound of Silence: V = 1315 (-508)
7) Wish You Were Here: V = 1261 (-395)
8) Lazy Sunday Afternoon: V = 1011 (new)
9) You Can’t Do That: V = 925 (-178)
10) I Saw Her Standing There: V = 869 (-303)
11) Nowhere Man: V = 842 (-278)
12) When I’m Sixty-Four: V = 833 (-393)
13) If I Fell: V = 730 (-235)
14) Till There Was You: V = 635 (-144)
15) I’m a Believer: V = 568 (-113)
16) You’re Going to Lose That Girl: V = 567 (-117)
17) Lola: V = 555 (-121)
18) Africa: V = 543 (-278)
19) Day Tripper: V = 525 (-246)
20) San Francisco: V = 518 (-188)
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So there was a surprisingly large drop in overall viewership in October compared to September: the top 20 accounted for about 31% fewer total views per day. And yet I Bought Myself a Politician surged, increasing by about 60% in viewing frequency. Any ideas on how to account for either of these unexpected developments?
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Hi David, it is of course difficult to draw conclusions from descriptive statistics. Here are some personal working hypotheses:
- I don’t know what the exact distribution of views is (MLT members versus external visitors), but in my opinion, participation here on the MLT forum has also been declining for several weeks. Perhaps the two factors are correlated.
- Other factors: seasonal conditions (preparation for Thanksgiving, Christmas holidays etc.).
Due to the end of the year or the turn of the year, personal issues / problems are coming to the fore right now. Other interests temporarily recede. - The market is saturated: The old songs are sufficiently known. The only newer song “I bought my self a politician” receives therefore increased attention, or is the only new song that is advertised as soon as you open the MLT- Website. As a non-member you don’t get to see more and close the page again. Most Internet users respond to headliners and do not click through submenus. At this point marketing strategists would probably start to pay attention: Maybe it’s time for a new album? Youtube is a fast lane. The viewers are always looking for new attractions.
Thank you for the certainly time-consuming and laborious evaluation of the data.
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