I'd really like to be able to answer the questions:
* How many core Fedora contributors are there? * How many casual but long-term committed contributors? * How about the long tail? * How does this break down by various project areas?
with data.
I have the hypothesis that Fedora follows the "90-9-1" rule, with a very active core, a larger engaged group that isn't as visible as individuals but which collectively contributes a lot, and then a lot of casually interested contributors who chime in occasionally. Is this true? Do the numbers come down to close to 90-9-1, or something else? Has it changed over time (opened up, or become more restrictive)?
Then, building on the stats Bee (and Pingou) put together following the election.... another hypothesis: the average voter turnout of about 200 is an approximation of the highly-engaged group (at least where the engineering side of the distro is concerned). Can you support or disprove this with data? (From fedmsg, mailing lists, or anywhere?)
I also think that the same probably applies to Ambassadors and that election, possibly with little overlap of the FESCo set.