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Surprisingly, dead mutton-chopped politicians didn't come out in force to take the survey.
The results of last week’s survey on the occupations of woodworkers are in, and the results have a few surprises.
I need to stop making fun of mechanical engineers on this blog, for one. Also, I can mock dietitians all I please.
We had 1,760 people respond to the survey. That’s not bad. But as someone whose master’s degree dwelled on social science methods and polling data, I wouldn’t take this data to the bank. Self-selecting surveys are suspect. And surveys on the Internet are even more so.
But the results (here’s a link to the original story) are interesting, nonetheless.
Here are the major categories of jobs of people who read this blog and are not too busy to answer a survey.
Architecture & Engineering, 19 percent
Computer and Mathematical, 16 percent
Management, 14 percent
Education & Library, 6 percent
Health, 6 percent
Life, Physical & Social Sciences, 5 percent
Business & Financial, 5 percent
Construction, 5 percent
Art, Design, Entertainment, Media & Sports, 4 percent
Legal, 4 percent
Other, 16 percent
Wow. Lots of technical people for a blog that regularly references pygmies, monkeys who fling fecal matter and a managing editor’s wacky money-making schemes.
Of course you can analyze the raw data yourself. I know that 16 percent of you cannot resist.
Here’s a link to a GoogleDoc spreadsheet with all the categories and raw numbers.
Thanks to everyone who took the survey – except all the bank tellers who snubbed me. You and your nice smiles and lollipops for the kids and money-counting skills….
— Christopher Schwarz
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Hmmmmm. Missed this survey and am surprised that the Scientists only represented 5% of the results. Probably spending way too much time at the lab.
I recently quit my job as a warranty administrator at a heavy duty diesel shop, and now I work at Lee Valley. They let me take tools home to play with.
It’s curious that Arts, Design, Entertainment,Media and Sports; Authors, Writers and Editors has the same ranking as Food Preparation and Serving Cooks, Bartenders, Food Service Workers, 8 votes or 0.5%. By chance are there 8 editors at Popular Woodworking?
As a member of the technical community, I want to get AWAY from my iPhone and iPad…that’s what my woodshop is for. However, most of the content in my Evernote application is “woodworking projects-current”, “woodworking projects-future” and “woodworking skills and tips”. Nothing like sitting in business meeting with my iPad researching my next woodwork project while everyone else drones on about business…..
I regret missing out on the survey. I wonder how many other 50-something semi-retired stay-at-home-dad-of-two-small- children woodworkers are out there. Oh wait, that wasn’t one of the category choices was it?
Dammit! By being too busy for the past few weeks, I have failed to represent my .01% of the legal community. If you count my boss, who is also a woodworker, that’s an extra .02%! But, since you were rounding up to get legal to 4% in the first place, it seems, I guess it doesn’t really matter, does it?
Actually, do we have a philosopher in the house to answer that question?
We technical types are suckers for low-brow humor. It doesn’t get much funnier than hearing a monkey with a British accent say “If you have any pooh, fling it now.”
Hmm .. guess I’m really surprised at the Art, Design, Entertainment, Media & Sports cata 4 percent. I see a lot of really creative work out there and thought there might be more art types. But who says you can’t be creative if your not in the arts, right?
Careful Chris, I may be an engineer but my wife is a dietitian!
Dave
Blue Spruce Toolworks
Great stuff, Chris.
With so many people responding from the technical world (myself included), how about a future blog entry or magazine article request? It would be great to learn more about popular applications found on iPhones, Androids, iPads, etc. that aid woodworkers.
I’m still waiting on LN to post an iPhone app that’s a slide show of their tools. 😉
Cheers,
bE