*Williamses, Serbs, Elena D, Vera Z, Sveta, Petrova, Bartoli, Daniela, Ai, Flavia, Schnyder, Mauresmo, Chaky, Kirilenko and Masha.

well the Williams's didn't even play much singles in the years prior to the new rule. Recently they've played more in both singles and doubles.
Then there's the whole olympics thing playing in as well for all players.
Masha is playing one! tournament in doubles, hasn't played since 2004 I think. And her playing indian wells has nothing to do with the rule. It is simply to test her shoulder.
With Ai, she has always been playing a lot of doubles and was ranked number 1 in doubles before the new rule. If she is playing even more now, I would guess it has more to do with the fact that she is getting a bit old in tennis-terms.

It's is indeed happening, at least to a small extent. I looked up 18 players* who have been consistently in the top thirty over the last three years and compared their doubles participation before and after the rule change.

Since the rule change, the players have averaged 22 doubles matches per season. Before the rule change, those players averaged some 20 doubles matches per season. Nine of the eighteen are playing more since the change, four are playing at least 50 % more. As compared to six who are playing less, of whom two are playing much less. Three are basically playing roughly the same. If you remove the Grand Slams, the increases in participation become a bit clearer. This isn't a perfect study and it's not any kind of an overwhelming increase, but it's wrong to say that there has been no increase since the addition of no-ad scoring.

*Williamses, Serbs, Elena D, Vera Z, Sveta, Petrova, Bartoli, Daniela, Ai, Flavia, Schnyder, Mauresmo, Chaky, Kirilenko and Masha.
Maybe some of these women simply won more matches and some of them won less, maybe some of them were injured in previous years and couldn't play as much, or maybe their form in singles was much better than it is now and therefore they needed more rest than they need now and didn't play doubles, don't forget the Olympics like Christina wrote. There are more possible explanations.

I am more interested in knowing how many doubles tournaments those players participated in in the seasons prior and after the rule changes. That would tell us more.

Anyway, I think I am not too far from truth when I say that all these rule changes have had almost no impact on the popularity of women's doubles.

This is the 3rd time she's lost to a team with Rodionova in doubles. She lost to her in New Haven in a super 3rd set tiebreak.

Can't saw I'm a fan of the new doubles scoring. I went to the BJK cup in New York where the first two matches had this new "ad" scoring and it really took away from the game, IMO.

It's is indeed happening, at least to a small extent. I looked up 18 players* who have been consistently in the top thirty over the last three years and compared their doubles participation before and after the rule change.

Since the rule change, the players have averaged 22 doubles matches per season. Before the rule change, those players averaged some 20 doubles matches per season. Nine of the eighteen are playing more since the change, four are playing at least 50 % more. As compared to six who are playing less, of whom two are playing much less. Three are basically playing roughly the same. If you remove the Grand Slams, the increases in participation become a bit clearer. This isn't a perfect study and it's not any kind of an overwhelming increase, but it's wrong to say that there has been no increase since the addition of no-ad scoring.

*Williamses, Serbs, Elena D, Vera Z, Sveta, Petrova, Bartoli, Daniela, Ai, Flavia, Schnyder, Mauresmo, Chaky, Kirilenko and Masha.
Maybe some of these women simply won more matches and some of them won less, maybe some of them were injured in previous years and couldn't play as much, or maybe their form in singles was much better than it is now and therefore they needed more rest than they need now and didn't play doubles, don't forget the Olympics like Christina wrote. There are more possible explanations.

I am more interested in knowing how many doubles tournaments those players participated in in the seasons prior and after the rule changes. That would tell us more.

Anyway, I think I am not too far from truth when I say that all these rule changes have had almost no impact on the popularity of women's doubles.

You're right in that this doesn't prove anything, but it does suggest some effect. I think it has made a small difference. If I have time this weekend, I'll do the same query for tournaments instead of matches. The way my spreadsheet works it was easier to run it the other way.

On another note, Daniela plays tomorrow on stadium court two at roughly 18:00 local time, 01:00 GMT.

STADIUM 2 start 11:00 am
[7] A Radwanska (POL) vs S Stosur (AUS) - WTA
[23] R Gasquet (FRA) vs M Llodra (FRA) - ATP
T Gabashvili (RUS) vs [11] J Tsonga (FRA) - ATP
[30] D Hantuchova (SVK) vs Y Wickmayer (BEL) - WTA
[8] G Simon (FRA) vs Y Lu (TPE) - ATP
L Hewitt (AUS) vs [17] F Gonzalez (CHI) - ATP

Cetkovska serving for the match at 5-1.
And it's over after Petra saved two break points. Huge upset and huge break for Daniela if she can take advantage of it.

come on Daniela. Your chance to reach QF has just increased significantly.

OMG

That's definitely a huge upset. I didn't think Elena could win this Tournament, but i'd never thought that she would lose in 2R. Now i hope she can take advantage of that... That's a really big chance now...