---
title: "Converting Lurkers into Contributors in Online Communities – Nielsen’s 90-9-1 Rule"
date: 2009-08-20
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# Converting Lurkers into Contributors in Online Communities – Nielsen’s 90-9-1 Rule

[Jakob Nielsen explains that with web 2.0 communities](http://www.useit.com/alertbox/participation_inequality.html), 90% are lurkers who never contribute, 9% contribute a little, and 1% actively contribute. I wish I knew the secret formula for reversing those statistics. Nielsen mentions a few strategies for improving those stats at the end. One strategy is to take advantage of"read wear," which refers to the natural marks of reading. Online, I believe it means to give more weight or to make more visible content that has more hits. (Thanks to [Anne Gentle](http://justwriteclick.com/) for the link.)