Yes, that would definitely be ok! The microcontrollers included in this index are a function how we rank them in the Octopart search index, which reflects some element of "top-selling" but probably not adequately so (i.e. your point on the 8086 is a good one).

Regardless, we think stock indexes are indeed are good role model for this kind of exercise. If there's interest in this we might invest in: (a) continuing to track this with better documentation on how we do it, and (b) start tracking more categories of parts.