POLL - geographic location of our members

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Discussion Overview

This thread is a poll aimed at determining the geographic distribution of members within the Physics Forums community. Participants are encouraged to share their country of origin and gender, with the intent of understanding the global localization of the forum's audience.

Discussion Character

  • Meta-discussion
  • Exploratory

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants express their locations and genders, contributing to the poll.
  • One participant questions the importance of the poll, suggesting it may be a way to seek dates.
  • Another participant emphasizes the significance of knowing the gender distribution within the science community.
  • Discussions arise regarding the categorization of regions such as Oceania and the cultural differences among North American countries.
  • Participants share insights about the number of countries represented in the forum, with one noting at least 28 countries based on member profiles.
  • There is a debate about the total number of countries in the world, with references to both UN and CIA statistics.
  • Some members express frustration over the spelling of country names and the categorization of regions.
  • Participants discuss the difficulty in extracting demographic data from member profiles due to incomplete information.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants do not reach a consensus on the importance of the poll or the categorization of geographic regions. Multiple competing views regarding cultural similarities and differences among North American members are present, and the discussion remains unresolved on several points.

Contextual Notes

Limitations include incomplete member profiles affecting the accuracy of demographic data and varying definitions of geographic regions that lead to differing opinions.

Your Geographic Location

  • North America

    Votes: 203 60.4%
  • Latin America

    Votes: 3 0.9%
  • Europe

    Votes: 79 23.5%
  • Islamic world (ie N. Africa and Middle East)

    Votes: 10 3.0%
  • Africa (excl above)

    Votes: 2 0.6%
  • Former Soviet Union

    Votes: 1 0.3%
  • East Asia (eg China/ Japan)

    Votes: 3 0.9%
  • South Asia (eg India)

    Votes: 11 3.3%
  • South East Asia (eg Malesia/ Indonesia)

    Votes: 8 2.4%
  • Australia and Oceania

    Votes: 16 4.8%

  • Total voters
    336
Monique
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This poll is to determine the global localization of all our members.

Physicsforums has a worldwide network of participant of all ages and cultures, it would be interesting to evaluate where they are from. I tried to come up with a fair map of the world, which I eventually based on social/cultural boundaries from a geography book.


Make a choice and mention in a post which country you are from exactly, and gender would be nice too :)

THANKS!
 
Last edited:
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Me: female, from the Netherlands
 
Male from Canada
 
Male, Morgantown WV, US
 
Male; Canada
 
female, new england US
 
One question, why is it "important"?
 
Mistake

I'm a male from Singapore in Southeast Asia.

Just want to point out something... you spelt Malaysia wrongly.
 
  • #10
Male, Australia
 
  • #11
This is a cheesy way to try to get dates, you know...
 
  • #12
Male, England/UK
 
  • #13
Originally posted by Zero
This is a cheesy way to try to get dates, you know...
Very funny, Zero. This poll will tell us something about our audience. I am sure we have many non-North American people, and I would like to know how many and from where. The importance, for instance could lie in planning future chat events.

And for the gender, I am more interested to find out how many females are in this science community, since right now I can count us on one hand..

I'd also like to find out whether there are any other Dutch people here, otherwise I have some serious recruiting to do.

Justified?
 
  • #14


Originally posted by Pandemonium
I'm a male from Singapore in Southeast Asia.

Just want to point out something... you spelt Malaysia wrongly.
I am sorry, Pandemonium, that was the dutch spelling :) I am not even sure if Oceania is the correct expression, but I guess we'll learn sooner or later since some of our members are Australian :P

Ah! The poll is locked, I cannot correct the spelling..
 
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  • #15
Male, Australia

Yeah, Oceania seems to be pretty normal, and although Australia is often put into Oceania, I don't really think of it that way...Australia seems pretty stand alone to me.

Another option is 'Australasia', which covers Australia and all the islands up to Asia
 
  • #16
Well, that is why they are both mentioned separately, although in the same catagorie. What exactly falls into Oceania? New Zeeland?
 
  • #17
Originally posted by Monique
Well, that is why they are both mentioned separately, although in the same catagorie. What exactly falls into Oceania? New Zeeland?
It depends somewhat on who's creating the categories. IMO, the Pacific island states* are there, as is/including New Zealand. Papua New Guinea? Australia??

Very few people, vast suface area.

*(not all are fully independent): Fiji, Nauru, Tonga, Samoa, Kiritabi, Cook Islands, Tuvalu, New Caledonia, Vanuatu, Marshall Islands, Palau, Solomons, Federated States of Micronesia, Tahiti (Tuamotu Achipelago), Northern Marianas. Hawaii, American Samoa, and Guam 'belong' to the US; the Galapagos Ecuador.
 
  • #18
Male Canada, and why do you lump all North Americans together? there are differences you know, cultural ones.
 
  • #19
Originally posted by Mr. Robin Parsons
Male Canada, and why do you lump all North Americans together? there are differences you know, cultural ones.
That is true, and I am aware of the cultural difference between people from the US and Canadians, since I've lived in a bordercity where the two countries are only separated by a river. I'd also have to make a different category for people from California vs Mississippi, for instance :)

But Robin, could you look up for me how many countries there are in this world? It would be impossible to list them all separately, at least this is an approximation since the US is more culturally alike with Canada, than say, Mexico. And that is also why I ask people to list their countries in their posts. I could make the same case for people from the Netherlands and Germans..

At least the poll gives a nice global visualization.
 
  • #20
male, Miami, FL
 
  • #21
For those intested: I did a little data mining myself. The following data was extracted from the member's profiles (active since 9-1-3 and more than 10 posts), unfortunately many people haven't got their location listed.

But it turns out that at the moment at least 28 countries are represented, which is kinda nice.

A file is attached with the worldmap, the resolution is not too great since file attachements are restricted in size.
 

Attachments

  • pf_map.jpg
    pf_map.jpg
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  • #22
Originally posted by Monique
A file is attached with the worldmap, the resolution is not too great since file attachements are restricted in size.

Where is the attachment?
 
  • #23
Wait a little while, all the attachment have to go through the system administrator before they show up :)
 
  • #24
If I recall it properly, the UN is about ~190 countries, something like that.
Did you want a list of their names?

PSsst even in Canada there is French and English, Irish, Scotish, Ukranian, First Nations, Etc (Sorry rude?) and many more, diversity in what had been called the Canadian Mosiac by some Canadians.
 
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  • #25
female, portland, oregon usa

quit whining robin...america and Canada are neighboring countries and have enough in common to justify them as similar nations...
 
  • #26
From the CIA website: there are 268 nations.
 
  • #27
Male.

What do you mean, from? Country of birth? Nationality? Current residence?

(a) China
(b) British
(c) England
 
  • #28
:) Mainly where your computer is standing at this moment, but if you feel very strong ties with you home country just say where your heart is.
 
  • #29
male, originally from romania, now in belgium for at least a year. couldn`t you just ask greg? by the way, greg could you put a sign in the profile to know each member`s sex?
 
  • #30
Male, 21, Born in Wales, UK. Now living in Leicester, England.

Pilgrim in an unholy land...
 

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