These statistics come directly from the digests, in which scores have been rounded to the nearest tenth. I have not gone back and calculated any scores out to further places, but simply left scores tied at the tenths as ties. These statistics are valid through digest #1434 .

Please note that all Oracularity links go to the official Oracularities Digests archive. This site (Lee's Eclectic Oracularities) is not officially endorsed by the Internet Oracle or Steve Kinzler.

Extremes

Averages

Digest Centuries

Century 12345 678910 11121314
Century Score Mean 3.022.992.962.943.00 2.983.103.113.083.03 3.053.153.233.21
Cumulative Score Mean 3.023.002.992.982.98 2.983.003.013.023.02 3.023.033.053.05
Century Votes Mean 1315193148 73901159681 70595339
Cumulative Votes Mean 1314162025 3342515658 59595958

To translate, a digest century is simply 100 digests. Since the digests didn't start the voting system until digest #100, the first century of digests is #100-199, the second #200-299, and so on. We are currently in the 14th century of digests. (To some, this is more intuitive than how years A.D. work, where the first century is years 1-100, but we won't go there.)

Score means (averages) are calculated using the given mean for each digest. Century score means are the mean of scores for that century only. Cumulative ones are the mean of all digests through the end of that century. Likewise, votes means are calculated using the number of votes each digest received. Century votes means are the mean of votes for that century only. Cumulative ones are the mean of votes for all digests through the end of that century.

So, to summarize the table above, the score mean has fluctuated each century, but the general trend was downward for the first through sixth centuries, and upward since then.

The trend in voter turnout was upward through the eighth century, although it took 300-400 digests to get the mean above 20. This is particularly interesting since the low point in votes occurred late in the fourth century (#470-473). The all-time high occurred in the mid-to-late eighth century (#834) and has fallen steadily since then, although luckily not as fast as it rose. So help save the Oracle! Tell your friends about it!

(Thanks to Ken Adams of rhod for pointing out the trend in means that inspired this section. If you don't have a Usenet client set up, here's a Google Groups link to rhod.)

Roll Your Own

Oracularities with at least votes.
(The number of votes must be between 1 and 148.)