12MAY19 05JUL22 12AUG22 29SEP22 12NOV22 04JAN23 11MAR23 12MAY23 14JUL23
Z1 302 298 307 304 304 296 300 303 281
Z2 571 528 509 493 490 493 494 497 499
Z3 24 19 21 20 22 21 22 21 20
Z4 18 23 21 21 21 21 21 21 21

915 868 858 838 837 831 837 842 821

The large drop in Z1 is explained by not counting the entries with expired domains and no other listed contact method. They are "dead" whether the concerned *C removes them or not.

These probably are not the final figures. There are so many listed sysops now with virtual systems in the cloud, somewhere, anywhere not tending to that system anymore that it is safe to assume the real numbers are way lower ... plus there is dead-wood ... segments which have not been maintained for ages. When a segment lists batches of entries with just phone-numbers, then I get suspicious.

The counting method:

* Remove administrative overhead and comment lines
* Remove all temporary 999-style lines
* Remove all double sysop names
* Remove all silly sysop names not refering to a sysop but to a function
* Resolve silly doubles such as "TJ Barlow" and "Terry Barlow"
* Remove special wise-guy cases
* Remove expired DNS references

--- IC
* Origin: International Coordinator (2:2/1000)