"Doing Well" on Literotica

[SimonDoom]

Stop right there. I have never ever asserted an inverse correlation. Not once. Ever. It's you keeps asserting that I believe this. I have always maintained that score is simply irrelevant to quality with the possible exception of N/N where plot and depth are actually part of the brief.

I stand corrected. My apologies.

I disagree that the score is irrelevant, but you're right that irrelevance is not the same as inverse correlation.

 

[KeithD]

Or you write too much, and she can't choose.

Negative. During the Green period, I was posting three stories/week. Now it's usually one/week.

 

[lovecraft68]

Negative. During the Green period, I was posting three stories/week. Now it's usually one/week.

I was joking.

 

[lovecraft68]

There's an expression I usually hate to hear.

"It is what it is."

But I think it applies here because of everything being subjective to readers, the varied readers and stories, the weird quirks each category has, the number of trolls in some categories, so end of the day its consistently inconsistent, and the over analyzing of it is meaningless and usually leads to bickering.

Just write your stories and take it all as it comes.

 

[RejectReality]

90% of all Green Es issued were in the period from 2000-2010. A significant number of them in the last 14 some odd years have been essays rather than stories. Look for yourself. Go to advanced search, make your search query a full stop, and click the Editor's choice radio button.

Nobody is really getting Es nowadays.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

90% of all Green Es issued were in the period from 2000-2010. A significant number of them in the last 14 some odd years have been essays rather than stories. Look for yourself. Go to advanced search, make your search query a full stop, and click the Editor's choice radio button.

Nobody is really getting Es nowadays.

That's quite interesting. I believe that the fact that no story had a shot of getting a green E for the last decade or so is enough to disqualify it as a quantifier in the sense of this thread.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

Also, the purpose of this thread was to try to come up with some kind of remotely "objective" measurement of doing well on Lit, and in the process of doing that discover all the limitations that aren't obvious at first glance. Maybe also discover some ways around that, some approximations that would present some new angle, and so on. I was fully prepared for this topic to fail in its task of actually finding some objective criteria, however shaky, but the fact that only a couple of people actually engaged in some sensible conversation about it is a bit sad.

 

[StopT]

I disagree that the score is irrelevant, but you're right that irrelevance is not the same as inverse correlation.

Irrelevant is one thing, but being constantly obsessed and initiating threads about it is another. Some actually wake up at 4 AM to check their stats for the umpteenth time that day and wouldn't be able to get back to sleep if their new story lost 0.02 ratings. That's just sick, beyond pathetic. They need professional help, seriously.

 

[RejectReality]

That's quite interesting. I believe that the fact that no story had a shot of getting a green E for the last decade or so is enough to disqualify it as a quantifier in the sense of this thread.

I think Laurel simply doesn't have time to read stories anymore. She's approving somewhere approaching 2x the submissions she was back in the day. Something really has to grab her hard and fast.

 

[lovecraft68]

That's quite interesting. I believe that the fact that no story had a shot of getting a green E for the last decade or so is enough to disqualify it as a quantifier in the sense of this thread.

Well if you want to factor it in note that the green E was generally used as target practice for trolls, so you get a fold star from the teacher, and see your story get beaten down over it.

 

[lovecraft68]

Irrelevant is one thing, but being constantly obsessed and initiating threads about it is another. Some actually wake up at 4 AM to check their stats for the umpteenth time that day and wouldn't be able to get back to sleep if their new story lost 0.02 ratings. That's just sick, beyond pathetic. They need professional help, seriously.

You left out them running to the forum to make an announcement about why their story was bombed, then explain everything about the story.

 

[RejectReality]

Well if you want to factor it in note that the green E was generally used as target practice for trolls, so you get a fold star from the teacher, and see your story get beaten down over it.

Only partially. They also suffer from additional highlighting by having the #1 spot above anything else on the new story list ( even contest stories, if there's one going on ) and a rare bauble, which attracts way more eyes and way more 4s than the average story. There's undoubtedly trolling, but there's a lot of legitimate non-fan voting that pulls down the scores as well.

 

[KeithD]

90% of all Green Es issued were in the period from 2000-2010. A significant number of them in the last 14 some odd years have been essays rather than stories. Look for yourself. Go to advanced search, make your search query a full stop, and click the Editor's choice radio button.

Nobody is really getting Es nowadays.

I agree that Green Es are rare these days. But, no, it was quite clear mine (under sr71plt) stopped because I irritated her by what I thought were legitimate housekeeping questions and she called me a troll. I haven't expected much for the site since then and so haven't been disappointed in what I've gotten.

Fun that you run to the defense, though.

 

[EmilyMiller]

I think Laurel simply doesn't have time to read stories anymore. She's approving somewhere approaching 2x the submissions she was back in the day. Something really has to grab her hard and fast.

OK - I’m going to get more of the Em is Laurel’s pet stuff, but whatever - she has commented to me (in PMs not as actual comments) about my stories. Yes she’s super busy, but I get the impression she loves the stories.

Emily

 

[AwkwardlySet]

OK - I’m going to get more of the Em is Laurel’s pet stuff, but whatever - she has commented to me (in PMs not as actual comments) about my stories. Yes she’s super busy, but I get the impression she loves the stories.

Emily

Somewhere across the multiverse, Martin Prince is cursing you for taking his place
You know, since she is commenting on your stories, you should ask the teacher to actually write a review of one of your stories. Now THAT would be a spectacular sight

 

[RejectReality]

I agree that Green Es are rare these days. But, no, it was quite clear mine (under sr71plt) stopped because I irritated her by what I thought were legitimate housekeeping questions and she called me a troll. I haven't expected much for the site since then and so haven't been disappointed in what I've gotten.

Fun that you run to the defense, though.

Just widening the lens. You were getting a disproportionate number of Es compared to the membership at large because you're an excellent writer. Thus, the sudden absence of them immediately following a falling out looks targeted. When you zoom out, you see that nobody was getting them, starting at that exact same time.

You're not an exception.

You could be completely right about your specific case, but the tide was going that way anyhow.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Somewhere across the multiverse, Martin Prince is cursing you for taking his place
You know, since she is commenting on your stories, you should ask the teacher to actually write a review of one of your stories. Now THAT would be a spectacular sight

I’ll PM you later. Finishing food right now.

Emily

 

[Duleigh]

1. Doing well commercially - I believe this one trumps everything else. If you are doing well commercially then you ARE doing well, regardless of all the other parameters. This now includes only the authors who use websites such as Patreon as their Literotica influx can be estimated, in my opinion.


2. Having a large following - This is also quite an obvious one. The number of readers who want to be notified as soon as we post a story must be relevant, although it does depend heavily on the categories and themes the author focuses on, as well as their prolificness (is this a word? ) Of course, authors like SilkStockingsLover, HeyAll, lovecraft68, etc. whose followers are measured in the tens of thousands are objectively doing well regardless of the themes they are writing, but I also wanted to see if we can set some thresholds in the sense of how many followers one needs for certain themes and categories to be considered of being objectively "followed well?" It might be a hard task but hey, I believe we could use one serious topic for a change.


3. Having high scores and being ranked high on the top lists. This is a tricky one. High scores and top lists are easier to achieve with chaptered stories, not to mention that one needs mere five votes to be listed in last month's top list, ten votes to be listed in 12 months' top list, and a hundred votes to be listed in the All-time top list. Also, high scores vary by category and theme. I have some ideas here but I am reluctant to write them down yet. The problem with this criterion is that is so prone to tampering in all but the most popular categories where stories get thousands of votes. I am curious to hear your opinions about this one.


4. ??? Maybe something like the number of comments, quality of feedback, number of favorites and such could be used as one criterion but I am not sure how to measure this one properly

1. Why would it trump anything else? VERY few people here are selling their work.

2. Not applicable. If you publish your shopping list in LW you're going to have a huge following, if you publish well crafted SciFi/Fantasy stories you may get one reader a day, with luck. The people you mentioned have been publishing here for ages and have published a lot of stories in highly followed categories.

3. Why is having high scores tricky? (High scores and top lists are very hard with chaptered stories BTW because nobody jumps into the middle of a chaptered story. Individual stories are read and voted on more often. But this is the only metric that counts (pun intended) this where you get your grade.

4. How about number of contests won?

 

[NightPorter]

Even that doesn't tell you much on its own. I'd be much more impressed by an author who's acquired 100 followers from a single story in Novels/Novellas than by one who's acquired 100 followers from posting dozens of stories in I/T or some other high-readership category.

Average followers per story then.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Average followers per story then.

Still a very flawed measure. The readership in I/T probably makes it much easier to get 100 followers with a single story there than in N&N.

"Average followers per story" probably ends up penalising authors who write more stories, because some of the people who'd have favourited you for your second story had already favourited for the first.

 

[toughfire]

I don't know if I'm doing well or not, but my intention when joining Literotica was to post a few stories and make people happy. I imagine I've made a lot of people happy, judging by the comments and favorites I've received. Sometimes I get a comment telling me my story made them hard or wet; other times I receive a sequence of favorites by the same user, separated by short intervals, and I imagine they are edging to my stories. Once I received a feedback message saying the amount of cum they have lost reading my stories could fill bottles.

 

[StillStunned]

Sure, but that's your definition of a good story. There are countless Red H stories that many of us could easily pick apart as bad or even terrible prose. In fact there are more badly written Red H stories on lit than well written ones. There's nothing wrong with that but it is the reality. None of these badly written stories (Red H or not) make me happy.

I also don't necessarily write a story with the intention of making people happy. I intend to give a positive reading experience for those who might enjoy my style of work, but really I just want to tell the story that's in me that I feel should come out. I know that some people will like it and others will hate it and others still will be meh. If I want to make a bunch of people happy I would write the story that the masses want to hear, not the one inside me that needs to come out.

I never said a red H indicated a well-written story. I said it was a good story. If it suffers from weaknesses in structure, grammar and spelling, or anything else, then it clearly succeeds in other areas.

You might attach great importance to stories being "well-written". But a red H means that at least ten readers enjoyed the story. And seeing as their opinions are just as valid as yours, you're outnumbered by a factor of ten or more to one.

 

[Omenainen]

…the fact that only a couple of people actually engaged in some sensible conversation about it is a bit sad.

Well, if you’re interested in my reasons for not contributing, you lost me already with this:

1. Doing well commercially - I believe this one trumps everything else. If you are doing well commercially then you ARE doing well, regardless of all the other parameters. This now includes only the authors who use websites such as Patreon as their Literotica influx can be estimated, in my opinion.

How can commercial success be any sort of measurement on a free site? For measuring success on Lit you want to go outside of Lit, as a first step no less? To me, this is nonsensical.

 

[STrent]

In one of the recent topics, I touched on the term that Simon used - "doing well"
While I believe that we all have our personal motivations and benchmarks for how well we are doing, and while I also believe that is the most important thing for each of us, I also wanted to try to set some more "objective" metrics of "doing well" besides the subjective ones we all undoubtedly have.
My intention here is to set several criteria that could be used as "objective metrics", but my ambition is to have all of you invested in this and I intend to edit my original post to adjust the criteria and expand on the options as you present your arguments.

1. Doing well commercially - I believe this one trumps everything else. If you are doing well commercially then you ARE doing well, regardless of all the other parameters. This now includes only the authors who use websites such as Patreon as their Literotica influx can be estimated, in my opinion.


2. Having a large following - This is also quite an obvious one. The number of readers who want to be notified as soon as we post a story must be relevant, although it does depend heavily on the categories and themes the author focuses on, as well as their prolificness (is this a word? ) Of course, authors like SilkStockingsLover, HeyAll, lovecraft68, etc. whose followers are measured in the tens of thousands are objectively doing well regardless of the themes they are writing, but I also wanted to see if we can set some thresholds in the sense of how many followers one needs for certain themes and categories to be considered of being objectively "followed well?" It might be a hard task but hey, I believe we could use one serious topic for a change.


3. Having high scores and being ranked high on the top lists. This is a tricky one. High scores and top lists are easier to achieve with chaptered stories, not to mention that one needs mere five votes to be listed in last month's top list, ten votes to be listed in 12 months' top list, and a hundred votes to be listed in the All-time top list. Also, high scores vary by category and theme. I have some ideas here but I am reluctant to write them down yet. The problem with this criterion is that is so prone to tampering in all but the most popular categories where stories get thousands of votes. I am curious to hear your opinions about this one.


4. ??? Maybe something like the number of comments, quality of feedback, number of favorites and such could be used as one criterion but I am not sure how to measure this one properly


I am looking forward to hearing your thoughts and suggestions

Just speaking for myself. Writing to completion. That’s when I know I will have “succeeded” on Literotica.

I’m just over halfway publishing my chapters for an intended full manuscript.

It’s not perfect yet, every submission reveals new edits to make, mistakes made, story plot holes or errors to fix, but publishing on this forum has been the best way to encourage me to write and tell the story I want.

I suppose a better word for here would actually be “Climax”

But yeah, being given the impetus to write and finish something is the big driver for me. It will probably never get published outside of these pages, and it’s unlikely to be very good, but I just wanted to achieve it, once, that I could start and write, and finish something creative outside of my usual IRL serious papers and submissions.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

How can commercial success be any sort of measurement on a free site? For measuring success on Lit you want to go outside of Lit, as a first step no less? To me, this is nonsensical.

I don't understand what is nonsensical about it? It's basic reasoning. There are authors who write on Lit for the sole purpose (or mostly) for the commercial benefit of it. The idea is to use Lit to gather readership and entice them to support the author on Patreon. If you don't post your stories on Lit then you have no source of readers. People don't just browse Patreon and randomly decide "Ah, here's an author of something, let's subscribe and pay him for a few months." So you post your stories/chapters on Lit, gather a following and then direct the readers to your Patreon.

In this model, the patrons get some obvious benefits and the author gets paid for the work. If that is your reason for publishing on Lit then you don't care about the feedback, scores, or top lists, you only care about how many of your Lit readers will follow you on Patreon. Of course, we can easily see that those things must be interconnected to a degree but still, the goal is to have readers invested in a story, world, or characters and to motivate them to pay for more content. I see it all the time in the SciFi&Fantasy category as some authors have demonstrated the profitability of that approach. It clearly works best for the huge chaptered stories, where the immersion of readers is significant so they are likely to feel the urge for the continuation of the story. I even linked one obvious example.

I really don't understand what is so hard to accept about this particular model. It's how certain authors make a living. The model I explained is commonly used for porn games and some authors have applied it to erotic stories and art as well. Of course, nobody is actually paying for content on Lit, but without Lit( or a similar public website), the model would be unsustainable as readers would have no way of getting in touch with the content and no way of becoming invested in the content.
Finally, I put this at the #1 spot not because I have some appreciation for it or because it's widespread - actually, it's exactly the opposite, but because it was by far the easiest to formulate. Unlike all other #, there is only one simple criterion - How much money you are earning from your Patreon.