Sunday, March 26, 2023 - 23:40 (UTC -5)
Hello, Sergius:
I appreciate your creativity and concern for Postcrossing. I share it and continue my own efforts in various ways.
A lot of information about Postcrossing is “indirect” at best. We are often reduced to what we might call speculative anthropology as we try to figure out what’s going on. Unobtrusive measures, anyone?
But one obvious place to look is the monthly Stats page (Postcards statistics). The phrase “the trend is your friend” readily comes to mind. And the trend is not good.
After nearly parabolic growth during the first eight years, Postcrossing has entered what can only be described as a long-term secular decline with unmistakable lower highs and lower lows. Sure, there are seasonal spikes and there has been some recovery from several “anomalous events” over the last three years. The March, 2023, data has not yet been posted, but I fear that the downtrend will continue. The most active “super” Members (the top 100) can’t carry the whole Postcrossing population.
My review of county-level data in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and surrounding counties in the Delaware Valley (my local area where I’m concentrating my efforts to promote Postcrossing, e.g., The Bucks County Herald (February 4, 2021 Edition) Features Postcrossing!) shows two very concerning things: there are practically no Postcrossers in this densely-populated, highly-developed territory and the majority of them have not even logged on in y-e-a-r-s.
A look at the state-level data for Pennsylvania and New Jersey shows the same pattern. We’re not able to see how many total Postcrossers are registered in these states, but of the first 1000 people shown, the last login < 1 month stops at about 500 (Pennsy) and 300 (Jersey). Clearly, the vast majority of people in these states are not “active” in any reasonable sense.
We can’t really determine it precisely, but it looks as though a relatively small number of people are sending most of the postcards each month. Personally, I can’t say that’s “healthy” enough. Which is why I work hard to promote Postcrossing here. But the little we can piece together gives a picture of small but intense participation (both in the “operational” side of Postcrossing (Send and Receive) and the Forum) that is slowly but surely losing the battle to grow Postcrossing, at least as measured by total cards sent each month.
Keep up the good work.
Best regards,
Michael