No need to wait to find out. The effect is linear. I've known it was 6571 all along, but I didn't call it O'Reilly's Constant unfortunately. I posted this soon after the Big Fix when we noticed Mom had "lost weight".

Subject: RE: BS: The Mother of all BS threads
From: JennyO - PM
Date: 31 Oct 06 - 09:24 AM

I've noticed something interesting. It says Mom has 8112 posts now (8113 after I post) but if you click on any of the other 293 pages, the count in the address bar changes to 14683 (14684 after this post). It also shows up that way if you click on the number to get here instead of the d.

There are 294 pages listed. If you assume that 293 have 50 posts and 1 has 33 (which it does), that adds up to 14683. Trouble is, I claimed post 14700 76 posts ago, so the count should be 14776, not 14683. So we may have actually lost 93 posts. That may not have only just happened now - I'm wondering if we lost those posts some time ago and didn't notice?

I hope Mom isn't as confuserated as I am.


14683-8112=6571

Not only that, but I still think we have lost 93 posts at some stage, maybe back in June 2005 when we had the Big Crash.

I also have a theory that the 6571 posts, which actually are there - just not being counted - are the posts made between the Big Crash in June 2005 and the Big Fix in October 2006. I think the numbers would work out about right.