Sony opens complete EverQuest 2 database to researchers

Reader Comments (2)

As a professional data analyst I would use the data to:

1. predict who was likely to cancel their subscription
2. build a predictive model to identify gold seller accounts
3. build another model to identify gold buyers
4. identify community influencers through their interactions with others
5. cluster customers into similar behaving groups for the purpose of understanding behavioural trends (think Bartle test using real rather than claimed behaviour)
6. use econometrics to predict network usage patterns
7. maybe some influence and sentiment analysis of the free text

All of these analyses are pretty simple to conduct apart from the last one. The data would need some flattening and interactions categorised - which would be 80% of the effort.

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The Bartle test has and always will be a joke. Because "someone" says this is the way things happen doesnt make it so, the creator of the test needs to learn this. I love how folks flock to "trendy ideas" with big words, must make them feel important.

As for the "Analyst" part, what does anyone hope to gain by reading player chat logs and the like, by showing how ignorant and banal people can be when they are behind a monitor?

There are plenty of studies showing subscription trends and server population migrations, why do something like this again, to waste my taxpayer money? It certainly isnt coming from a rich private grant.

The waste and ignorance of the people conducting this study simply reflects a want for some type of job security to get paid so they dont hit the street and souplines, wasteful and uneeded. Spend the money and time on something worthwhile like improving your community.

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