Better lost sheep, lone faithfuls etc.

[Jesse]

I like to post under lost sheep and lone faithfuls but I'm wondering what the criteria are.  It's frustrating to want to encourage someone and then they haven't posted in months so there's no reason to encourage them.  I assume lost sheep haven't posted in a while but isn't there some sort of limit, if they suddenly come on after not posting for a while, that's when they should get the encouragement, but until then it's wasted time.  And lone faithfuls--is that people who've consistently posted and don't receive a comment?  It seems that it's still people who haven't always posted in a long time.  No use encouraging if they never see it.

[Sasha Pachev]

Lost Sheep = randomly picked 7 bloggers that have not posted in a month. Suggest a better selection criteria, I am open to ideas. I have considered limiting the bottom end, e.g somebody who was around at least 6 months ago, but at the same time there have been lost sheep that have been gone longer than that who came back.

Lone Faithfuls =  7 bloggers from the ones that have posted something in the last week that have received the fewest number of comments in the same period

[Jesse]

I guess it's just the randomness that's sometimes annoying.  It's impossible to encourage someone who's not blogging, however, if lost sheep refers to someone who hadn't posted in a while and then starts to post again--they need all the encouragement they can get and that would be an ideal time for them to get comments.

[Sasha Pachev]

If a Lost Sheep posts a workout for the first time after their absence, they will likely make the Lone Faithfuls list as soon as they post because they will have a post and no comments at all in the last week.

The purpose of the randomness is to allow all Lost Sheep to have a chance to be displayed in limited space. One way to see it is if a Lost Sheep popped up for you and you noticed, that is your sheep to feed.

[Emery]

As someone who would consider themselves a recently "recovering lost sheep", I'm throwing this out there.. What if there were two separate lists, one for REALLY lost sheep, and one for recently distracted and only slightly wandering sheep?

Over the last ~8weeks (while I wasnt running) I'd actually log in and check if I had become a lost sheep, but once I realized all the lost sheep I looked at had been idle for 6+ months.. I figured I had plenty of time to get back at it! A "Hey, you better be running!?" message from a friendly random blogger might have inspired me to get back running sooner..

You could always say anyone w/o a post in 6+ months is a "lost" sheep, and anyone w/o a post in 1-6 months is a "wandering" sheep. But what if you used something like: Anyone that had less than X (say 5) posts in the last 30 days AND at least 1 post in the last 90 days was eligible to be a "wandering sheep"?  Aren't those the sheep mostly likely to be brought back to the flock? That way one post a month wont save you from "embarrassment" and keeps the "recovering lost sheep" (like me w/ 2 posts in 60 days) on the list too, so they can continue to get encouragement for a few days. Maybe that still doesn't get the "right people", you could create and run a report w/ those kinds of criteria and see who you "snag".. post their names back here and see what kind of feed back you get?

I know it all ultimately comes down to personal dedication and inner encouragement, but just an idea from the lazy, fat sheep (I might even just be a fuzzy pig?!) just trying to keep the flocks dust in sight!