wouldn't it be cool...

To know how many people are on DG at any given time? Not a list of actual members, but a general number?

Some sites I go to have a little area that says "50,000 members on-site now" or some such thing...wouldn't that be cool for DG to see how many people are actually browsing the site at any given time?

I wonder how many of us are always logged on? The count might not be very accurate if that's the case. I know my computer at home is never logged out of DG, and my latptop at work is logged on whenever I'm here.

Good points... Dave is such a whiz, he could probably figure out a way to just count up the number of people who have clicked something within the last 15 minutes to separate "logged on" from "active" members.

I think it would be cool, either way!

ME 3

If memory serves me this feature was part of DG in the beginning years. Used to be that when you logged on you could see who else was actually accessing at the time? Or was I dreaming?
Not sure why it was ended, but likely for a good reason. Does anyone of the old timers remember?

This was discussed once before, although I can't locate the thread.
Many objected to having their names listed as "being on line". And
what really is the point to just knowing the number of people logged on?

I'd rather see Dave complete work on the Marketplace and get
started on the Pets Web Site.

It can be interesting to see how many people are currently reading the same thread or in the same forum as you are. This is not a labor-intensive kind of feature to add, anyway.

I also think this would be a fun thing to do - would make dmail kinda like a one on one chat if you could know they are on and working right now. Might be a lot more work then we think, some folks like me are signed in 24/7 even when I am not on for up to a week at a time.

I think you could run into privacy concerns if each person was flagged as online/not online... plus, as you said, nobody would know with me if I were at the computer or elsewhere since I stay logged on more often than not.

But counters, either for the whole site and/or for individual forums, would be fun!

Well, you could do a kind of "friends" thing like MySpace does, where only your friends could see you online. But that is most helpful when you have a private messaging or chat function.

Can't help but notice it has been almost a month and no admin has jumped in. Theory is good concept not - but just my view. Not sure even at this point what you wish to attain with this. Like I said it was an early early feature that was unique, but think the cyber space has gotten long past this feature and not sure it would be helpful to a degree that is really useful.

Just to jump in and clarify. I wasn't meaning to show individual people as online...I know that went by the wayside ages ago, privacy issues, etc....I was just thinking it would be cool to see on our home page something like "50,000 members online now" or some such thing.

I've belonged to www.airforums.com for ages, and they've always had a box listing who's on at the moment. right now there are 135 members & 301 guests, and there's one bold name to indicate that person is the moderator of the moment, and my designated friends show up in ital.

i don't see any privacy issues. what on earth would someone do with the information that, say, summerkid is logged on right now except to possibly remember wanting to ask me something? i like it. in the middle of the night, when i'm poking around the airstream threads, it's comforting to me to see that Sneakinup & TomW are also having trouble sleeping, even if we don't chat (airforums has a chatroom that is open 24/7 for people who want to pop in there & exchange some information more quickly than DMailing).