# Power Users and Lurkers
When looking at who contributes in crowdsourcing systems, or with social media in generally, we almost always find that we can split the users into a small group of __power users__ who do the majority of the contributions, and a very large group of __lurkers__ who contribute little to nothing. For example, [Nearly All of Wikipedia Is Written By Just 1 Percent of Its Editors](https://www.vice.com/en/article/7x47bb/wikipedia-editors-elite-diversity-foundation) {cite:p}`oberhausNearlyAllWikipedia2017`, and on StackOverflow “[A 2013 study has found that 75% of users only ask one question, 65% only answer one question, and only 8% of users answer more than 5 questions.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stack_Overflow)” {cite:p}`StackOverflow2023`. We see the same phenomenon on Twitter:

% TODO: Note on fact checking/reliability of wikipedia vs. books (non-fiction books are not fact checked: https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2024/05/the-book-youre-reading-might-be-wrong/678345/)

```{figure} twitter_stats.png
---
name: twitter_stats_fig
width: 350px
alt: 'A chart titled "A large majority of tweets come from a small minority of tweeters." A bar chart shows that for U.S. users, the top 10% of tweeters post 80% of tweets, and the bottom 90% of tweeters post 20% of tweets.'
---
[Summary of Twitter use by Pew Research Center](https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2019/04/24/sizing-up-twitter-users/) {cite:p}`hughesSizingTwitterUsers2019`
```

This small percentage of people doing most of the work in some areas is not a new phenomenon. In many aspects of our lives, some tasks have been done by a small group of people with specialization or resources. Their work is then shared with others. This goes back many thousands of years with activities such as collecting [obsidian](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obsidian#Prehistoric_and_historical_use) {cite:p}`Obsidian2023` and making jewelry, to more modern activities like writing books, building cars, reporting on news, and making movies.

% TODO: Wording above is a bit redundant