The AH Coffee Shop and Reading Room 09

[NotWise]

I was looking at my downloaded stats from a few months ago (which one is wont to do from time to time) and noticed an intriguing anomaly.

About a third of my near-100 tales have garnered the Scarlet H, but of all the stories with a title beginning after the letter 'S' (13 of them) only one gets the 'aitch, so less than ten percent.

Now, part of this can be dismissed as another Lit oddity (by including articles in sorting titles, my 'The Bikini of Brevity' really should be a 'B' title, not a 'T'') and so this therefore artificially distorts the alpha-sorting pattern.

But still, is this a sign I should only stick to story titles earlier in the alphabet? Are readers truly that finely tuned?

That's probably just a random chance, but I won't work out the odds.

I once read a "How To" on titling. It wasn't the best "How To" I've ever read. One of the author's guidelines was "Never start a title with 'The' or 'A'." Presumably "An" would have been verboten as well. She said she'd never read a story that started with "The." Some readers have very odd rules about what they will or won't read, and why not? They're faced with a glut of stories and they're free to use arbitrary rules to narrow their choices.

If she could skip stories starting with "The," maybe other readers down-vote stories that start with "The." You never know.

Personally, I try to avoid starting titles with articles, but that's just so they don't get clumped together in an alphabetical listing.

 

[Duleigh]

Now, part of this can be dismissed as another Lit oddity (by including articles in sorting titles, my 'The Bikini of Brevity' really should be a 'B' title, not a 'T'') and so this therefore artificially distorts the alpha-sorting pattern.

Here's a lit oddity

When I download my CSV file A Krissmas Karole comes after AI Era:Agent AI
I can hear you now asking "Why Duleigh you devil may care dog about town, how could such a thing exist?" Since you asked, I'll tell you - Dear Mother Laurel's 1842 era database doesn't recognize the spaces in the names. If you list them like this

AIERA:AGENTAI
AKRISSMASKAROLE

it makes sense. However, being developed in the 20th century, Excel recognizes the space in data entries. So when you import data from Literotica into a modern day device like Excel, Google Sheets, or an abacus, always click this button before going forward:

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

Polar Vortex, Alberta Clipper, Arctic Blast, Ground Blizzard, Lake Effect Blizzard, flurry, squalls, Moon Dogs, Sun Dogs, ..

We used to just call it Winter. No need for silly names.

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

Here's a lit oddity

No, not really odd. The special character can throw sort orders off too.

I've even seen cases where 'the' is disregarded and the sort is by the next major word.

The Who for example will be listed under W.

 

[MrPixel]

Avoiding. Don't do it. Do not do it!

Sigh. You guys don't want to know about phonebook sorting rules, which is what y'all are getting into here. Numbers exploded into words, suppressed articles, not suppressed articles, caps versus lower case, punctuation in names - "d'Amato", for instance. Had to live with those rules for 10 years. It's not ASCII sort order, I'll tell you that.

 

[Duleigh]

@MrPixel said "Phonebook"

There ain't no such thing no more

Wait! What's grandma going to use in the outhouse now?

 

[MrPixel]

Yes, and I quit that job (or rather, the company went away) in 2001. But the sorting rules made a certain amount of logical sense. The Internet age with its reliance on ASCII sequence is what creates the confusion you guys are talking about.

 

[Duleigh]

Yes, and I quit that job (or rather, the company went away) in 2001. But the sorting rules made a certain amount of logical sense. The Internet age with its reliance on ASCII sequence is what creates the confusion you guys are talking about.

I thing it was @NoTalentHack who explained to me how the space screwed up the list on the CSV download - that's an ancient database!

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

In the 70s when I lived in a major metro area, we had at least 5 'regional' books and both a white and yellow for each. If you didn't live in one of those regions, you had to request a copy, but there was no charge. Each one was several hundred pages while the main city books were probably over a thousand pages. Each was probably 3" thick or more.

All 14 or 15 books took up more than just a little space.

 

[NotWise]

Yes, and I quit that job (or rather, the company went away) in 2001. But the sorting rules made a certain amount of logical sense. The Internet age with its reliance on ASCII sequence is what creates the confusion you guys are talking about.

I'd be surprised if Lit's database didn't use something like MySQL or maybe PostgreSQL. Default collation can be specified when the table is created, and it can be changed when a sort is requested. To get Duleigh's example, it might only be necessary for Lit to use a collation rule that ignores spaces or with the space following the alphanumeric characters instead of leading them, as it does in ASCII ordering.

 

[NuclearFairy]

Fun fact, orange cats can also develop freckles. I found this out after noticing some brown spots on my cat's lip and eyelid and looking it up in a panic.

 

[TheRedLantern]

I was supposed to leave town for the holiday in a few hours, but got the flu last night. Freezing, sweating, coughing, aching, waking up every 45 minutes.

 

[ElectricBlue]

But still, is this a sign I should only stick to story titles earlier in the alphabet? Are readers truly that finely tuned?

No correlation whatsoever. The majority of my top scoring stories are in the bottom half of the alphabet. "The" is in fact my most successful title starter!

 

[Candy_Kane54]

My overall highest ranked, most favorited, and most commented on series starts with 'Y', but the stories starting with 'A' are more likely to be clicked on by someone browsing through your catalog ...

I'm bracing for the Arctic Vortex. The temperature is 52 degrees right now with a forecasted high of 38 degrees today (don't ask me how the weatherman can say that with a straight face) The temperature is already starting to fall to a low of 23 degrees tomorrow morning.

I've got a fresh pot of coffee brewing and the teapot is hot. There are donuts and muffins on the counter.

I'll be over in the corner working on my story. I completed another scene and I've got two more scenes to write before tackling the final sex scene.

 

[ColtonWrites]

My non-erotic scifi/romance got published - in the sci-fi category.
I wish I'd known they were going to put it there. I submitted to non-erotic. I'd have put an author's note warning the reader that its a slow burn romance without sex. And the romance is just a subplot!

Hopefully I dont get down voted TOO badly for it.

 

[iwatchus]

My non-erotic scifi/romance got published - in the sci-fi category.
I wish I'd known they were going to put it there. I submitted to non-erotic. I'd have put an author's note warning the reader that its a slow burn romance without sex. And the romance is just a subplot!

Hopefully I dont get down voted TOO badly for it.

I think the SF&F community are pretty open about the level of eroticism in the story. It's interesting, because this means Laurel took enough interest in your story to think about the category.

 

[sirhugs]

My overall highest ranked, most favorited, and most commented on series starts with 'Y', but the stories starting with 'A' are more likely to be clicked on by someone browsing through your catalog ...

I'm bracing for the Arctic Vortex. The temperature is 52 degrees right now with a forecasted high of 38 degrees today (don't ask me how the weatherman can say that with a straight face) The temperature is already starting to fall to a low of 23 degrees tomorrow morning.

I've got a fresh pot of coffee brewing and the teapot is hot. There are donuts and muffins on the counter.

I'll be over in the corner working on my story. I completed another scene and I've got two more scenes to write before tackling the final sex scene.

We are hovering around zero celsius (32 Fairenuff) today, but a bitter wind and unpredictable snow - every update changes the guess what we will get. It appears the highest amounts will be east of Superior (we are at the west end), but not looking forward to today. wishing that I could stay home and negotiate with my muse, or at least feed the plot bunnies, but alas, I have three out of home appointments today.

Any chances of some hot cocoa?

 

[ColtonWrites]

I think the SF&F community are pretty open about the level of eroticism in the story. It's interesting, because this means Laurel took enough interest in your story to think about the category.

That's good. I mean, I guess "no sex" depends on your definition of "sex" - there are "intimate" scenes with (clothed) touching of a sort that between two humans would probably count as foreplay? - and maybe the SF&F crowd counts that.

It's at just under 500 views with 5 votes and a score of 4.8 so it must be resonating with some people.

And yeah, it probably does mean a human actually read the story enough to decide a category, before posting it. Laurel can't POSSIBLY be reading everything that goes up.

 

[ColtonWrites]

Avoiding. Don't do it. Do not do it!

Sigh. You guys don't want to know about phonebook sorting rules, which is what y'all are getting into here. Numbers exploded into words, suppressed articles, not suppressed articles, caps versus lower case, punctuation in names - "d'Amato", for instance. Had to live with those rules for 10 years. It's not ASCII sort order, I'll tell you that.

Sounds like trying to work with time zones and calendars, lol.

 

[iwatchus]

That's good. I mean, I guess "no sex" depends on your definition of "sex" - there are "intimate" scenes with (clothed) touching of a sort that between two humans would probably count as foreplay? - and maybe the SF&F crowd counts that.

It's at just under 500 views with 5 votes and a score of 4.8 so it must be resonating with some people.

And yeah, it probably does mean a human actually read the story enough to decide a category, before posting it. Laurel can't POSSIBLY be reading everything that goes up.

I think she does at least glance at every story. But something about your story caught her eye enough to read yours more carefully. Sounds like it's off to a good start.

 

[iwatchus]

Sounds like trying to work with time zones and calendars, lol.

Don't get me started on these.

 

[Duleigh]

I'd have put an author's note warning the reader that its a slow burn romance without sex.

Some of my reader's favorites have been slow burn romances without sex, and without warning. I reached out to a couple of readers and asked them if they were disappointed that there wasn't a sex scene, and every one of them said, "That would not help the story" I have continued the series without explicit erotica and except for one person, the reaction has been overwhelming positive and it's all been in the Sci-fi category.

 

[ColtonWrites]

Some of my reader's favorites have been slow burn romances without sex, and without warning. I reached out to a couple of readers and asked them if they were disappointed that there wasn't a sex scene, and every one of them said, "That would not help the story" I have continued the series without explicit erotica and except for one person, the reaction has been overwhelming positive and it's all been in the Sci-fi category.

Thats really good to hear. Because I think this story has at least 2 more parts, and they (probably) wont have any sex either. And less romance, even, as POV left the romantic partner behind at the end of this one.

 

[NuclearFairy]

My non-erotic scifi/romance got published - in the sci-fi category.
I wish I'd known they were going to put it there. I submitted to non-erotic. I'd have put an author's note warning the reader that its a slow burn romance without sex. And the romance is just a subplot!

Hopefully I dont get down voted TOO badly for it.

The scifi readers don't always expect romance or erotic content, while the non-erotic readers get upset if there's anything even a little too sensual.

 

[Duleigh]

Today's craftiness - dangly holiday ear rings.