I think there were so many 'non-standard' accounts being created in July that it's hard to compare across the two months. I've been impressed with all the interconnected spam accounts that @sherlockholmes and others have found. I recall posts during this rapid growth where at least one person was bragging about making lots and lots of accounts that match celebrity names, with the hope of selling those accounts when Steemit hits the mainstream. Simply counting accounts doesn't account for nefarious intentions associated with many of them. Maybe a better count is the number of active authors over a week or a monthly period.