I would like to know the 300 most visited (2001 or 2002) websites and
the number of unique visitors they receive.

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Request for Question Clarification by netcrazy-ga on 11 Aug 2002 08:03 PDT

Hello,
Is it ok if I give you top 100 websites?

Thanks

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Request for Question Clarification by voyager-ga on 11 Aug 2002 09:36 PDT

Hi joel,

are you looking for sites worldwide (including foreign language
sites)? Is the topic of the sites of any concern?

voyager-ga

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Clarification of Question by joel1357-ga on 11 Aug 2002 21:40 PDT

Netcrazy-ga, I actually need the top 300. Voyager-ga, I hadn't
contemplated that question. The top 300 in the United States or
Worldwide would be fine with me.

Thanks,
Joel

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Request for Question Clarification by voyager-ga on 12 Aug 2002 15:53 PDT

Hi again, Joel,

I did a little research and it seems to be pretty problematic to get
the data you want for free. There are a number of sites which sell
this information. I also found information on who the top500 at a
given time were, but no ranking or unique visitor information in that
list (I could provide that for the first 50, though).

Another point you should take into account is that whatever list
you'll get, it will be different. The top properties will probably be
the same and maybe their numbers will even be roughly the same.
However - even in countries, where websites report their numbers in a
semi-official way there are big discussions about the counting schemes
they use. Most of the rating sites that operate on a global level use
test panels to determine unique visitor numbers. It is obvious, that
this will result in rough estimates which are extremely dependant on
the size and quality of the sample.
Another problem is that you didn't specify a specific time the data
should fit in. Statistics like these seem to change pretty quickly and
there are even seasonal or event-based adjustments (e.g. christmas
shopping, or a big news event).

In the light of this - would you also accept a list of sites rated
only relative to each other?
Which time frame do you have in mind?
Can we point you to proprietory sources?
Would you accept a list where only the top sites are rated with the
rest just consisiting of sites which are counted among a specific
number of top sites?

I'm sorry that this turns out to be such a difficult question. I hope
I or one of my fellow researchers can help you.

voyager-ga

Media Matrix: Top 50 Web Properties - April 2002
http://www.jmm.com/xp/jmm/press/mediaMetrixTop50.xml

The top ten links categorizes over a thousand.  A good page to bookmark.

http://www.toptenlinks.net/

The following site might have the data you need, but without becoming
a member I cannot tell for sure (it does list the Top 25 publically):

Nielsen//NetRatings
http://www.nielsen-netratings.com

Joel,

I didn't see anybody mention Alexa.com. They currently post the
rankings of the Top 500 sites on the web at

http://www.alexa.com/data/ds/top_500?p=Dest_W_t_40_R1

I searched the web for methods to translate the Alexa rank to actual
vistors, but didn't find anything I'd trust. If I stumble across a
translation method in the next day, I'll post it as an answer.

morris-ga