A Hundred to One — Internet Companies with Few Employees but Many Users
by Kage, posted Sunday, 2011/02/13 – 09:33
The existence of the internet gives small-scale companies the opportunity to reach users around the world. The result of this is that some companies or organizations have users in the tens of millions, while in fact they have only a few hundred employees, or even fewer.
It is estimated that the companies below each have more than ten million users.
Automattic
- Employees: 72
- Users: more than 32 million WordPress blogs worldwide at present
Automattic is known as the company behind the open-source blogging software WordPress (WordPress.org) and the blog hosting service WordPress.com. Among all of Automattic’s users, the software-installation users of wordpress.org and the blog users of wordpress.com each account for about half.
Mozilla
- Employees: 250
- Users: all Firefox browser users. The latest official version of Firefox 3.6 has been downloaded nearly 400 million times.
Mozilla is the company/organization behind Firefox, and Firefox is one of those open-source projects that can gain real benefits from the surrounding community. Nearly 40% of Firefox’s work is done by volunteers.
Of course, the Firefox browser is not the only product under Mozilla, but it is the one with the largest user base. Firefox accounts for about 30% of the web browser market.
Tumblr
- Employees: 18
- Users: 12 million blogs on Tumblr
Tumblr was one of the biggest internet miracles of 2010; in a very short time, its blog service had already amassed 12 million users. They are currently recruiting on a large scale for their ever-expanding user base.
- Employees: 300
- Users: 175 million
As user numbers have surged, Twitter’s ranking has also risen rapidly in recent years; yet what supports the world’s largest microblogging service is only 300 employees.
Opera Software
- Employees: 757
- Users: 150 million users (including users of all versions of the Opera web browser—desktop browser, mobile browser, and other services)
Opera is only one of the five major internet browsers (IE, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Opera). The main source of Opera’s vast user base is Opera Mini. Opera Mini is a browser for mobile phones that is quite common worldwide.
Canonical
- Employees: more than 350
- Users: it is estimated that there are at least 12 million Ubuntu users
Canonical is the company behind Ubuntu, the most popular Linux desktop operating system and the second most popular server operating system.
Wikimedia
- Employees: 57
- Users: Wikipedia has more than 408 million monthly visits
The Wikimedia Foundation is the organization that operates Wikipedia and several other similar wiki projects. In recent years, Wikipedia has become known for content edited by hundreds of thousands of people. Today, more than 100,000 volunteers worldwide help write and revise Wikipedia.
Skype
- Employees: 500
- Users: more than 560 million (and that is still data from a year ago; it should have grown again by now)
Skype, a leading force in internet voice calling, came into prominence in 2003. Although it is somewhat like comparing apples and oranges, according to the figures surveyed, in terms of user numbers, Skype is basically on par with Facebook.
Do you think a traditional “offline” company could manage such a number of users with the same number of employees? Very likely not. This kind of situation has only been made possible in the economic environment brought about by the internet and the World Wide Web. This is the gift the internet gives technology-based companies — using a small team to accomplish big things.
Translated by WordPress啦
Translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The original text is authoritative.
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