I'm sure there's bots crawling all over the system. I watch my numbers closely and have seen the pattern they take as a contest draws to a conclusion or the monthly awards are being determined. That's far too much work for a few techs to do, there's bots doing the work out there.
I posted an EDIT, saying I haven't seen the vote numbers change on my stories lately. They may have an automated routine. But the fact you can request a sweep means they apply that routine to an author's story.
It always comes faster when you spend time fingering the button.
I find that two fingers making tight circles is the most effective technique. On an unrelated note, I've been banned from three hotels and one parking structure.
Thankfully, most places will only call the police once you start applying some tongue.
That made me gag a little bit. Those buttons are nasty!! Full of brown grime packed down in the little detents by a million shitty fingers--and salty as fuck with a sharp metallic after-sting. After a rain is the best time.
One doesn't have to read the story to vote it.
You can't see them directly, but you can calculate them.
The site may make the "reader" do that. I don't know. But some "readers" are so vested in trying to discourage some story themes or individual authors here that they will go through whatever hoops they have to to vote an unread story down with doing no more than checking to see it's on their hit list. I'm sure this is routinely done in the Loving Wives and Incest sections and, to some extent, in Anal, Nonconsent, GM, and Transgender. Even if the site will sweep anything that doesn't use the time reviewed requirements you mention, they do, I'm sure, let the initial vote stand until a sweep is done. That serves the downvoter's purposes. Most of the reading a story is going to get is while it's on a "New," "Hub," or "Contest" listing. By the time a "not-really-read" vote is swept, its intended damage is done and potential readership is cut down.
Not a good idea to speculate how sweeps work. If you clue to it, the trolls might too, and then the whole process gets blown open. Sweeps have worked since they've been introduced, so let's not break the site's system.
Absolutely. I'm a bit OCD when it comes to numbers and excel and I manually check my scores every night and I can see when I get hit. I can also see a pattern in the sweeps but I keep track of that too.
