Okay I'll finally bite; how the hell do they pick the contest winners?

[lovecraft68]

As much as it pains me to say it, this question comes from reading one of Scouries rants a month or two ago. They just announced the November contest winners.

The First place winner had less than 5,000 views closer to 4,500 actually. Now there has been a lot of debate to how many actual "reads" you get in comparison to views and a median number seems to be 1-15 if that were the case the first place winner was read by less than 300 people.

The third place winner had a little over 8,000 views.


The second place story at least appeared to have gotten some attention with 20,000+ views but more importantly almost 50 comments so it had to have something going for it.

Don;t get me wrong I think that it's great that it is not always the most voted or viewed story that wins but under 5,000 views?

Now I am aware that different categories will get different view totals (my bdsm stories get a fraction of the views as the incest stories) but still to win a monthly prize I would think the story should have some respectable numbers.


So what I am leading up to is a question for those who seem to have a good grasp on what goes on here. How are these stories chosen in the first place and how is the winner decided? Is it literally the "owners" who pick?

 

[sr71plt]

They award them according to the posted rules(?) Is this a trick question? Views aren't a factor. It's votes with a minimum vote requirement.

 

[lovecraft68]

They award them according to the posted rules(?) Is this a trick question? Views aren't a factor. It's votes with a minimum vote requirement.

The fewer the vote total the more each individual vote is worth. So a story that barely made the minimum, but the voters liked it gets an edge over a story that was heavily voted upon? It seems backwards.

If I didn't write incest and automatically have a dozen or so trolls I would tell my readers not to vote and therefore I would have a better chance, is that how it works? rewarded for low readership? Seriously I'm not trying to be a jerk here it just seems as I said backwards.

 

[sr71plt]

The fewer the vote total the more each individual vote is worth. So a story that barely made the minimum, but the voters liked it gets an edge over a story that was heavily voted upon? It seems backwards.

If I didn't write incest and automatically have a dozen or so trolls I would tell my readers not to vote and therefore I would have a better chance, is that how it works? rewarded for low readership? Seriously I'm not trying to be a jerk here it just seems as I said backwards.

As I said. Check the contest rules.

So far you get whiner of that day honors. Stealing them from Freddie is quite an accomplishment.

 

[lovecraft68]

As I said. Check the contest rules.

So far you get whiner of that day honors. Stealing them from Freddie is quite an accomplishment.

I'd be whining if I was saying I think I should be winning which is what they do. I post a couple of stories a month out of the 75 a day that get posted I'm not winning anything and I'm fine with that. I just think a story that garners more votes, readers, and comments should be looked at before a story that amassed a 4.9 rating on 15 votes.

The first place winner was a GM story. Now I have never looked at your stories but I would think with the name you have established in that category your stories see more than 5,000 views you don't feel slighted in anyway?

 

[sr71plt]

The first place winner was a GM story. Now I have never looked at your stories but I would think with the name you have established in that category your stories see more than 5,000 views you don't feel slighted in anyway?

Nope, not in the least. 5,000 views is a good result in GM. The interests of the Web site readership isn't even. So, it seems like the contest rules are adjusted to treat the categories as equally as possible.

 

[manyeyedhydra]

CHECK THE CONTEST RULES!

FFS

You can't win off 15 votes. You need at least 50 for a monthly contest. Views mean squit all, as they should. The view counter clicks up regardless of whether someone clicked on the link, read the first paragraph, decided the writer had a horrible grasp of English and back-clicked out again. At least with a vote you'd hope someone read enough of the story to form an opinion of it.

Yeah, it seems odd that a 50 vote 4.91 story would be 'better' 1000 vote 4.90 story, but they had to pick a threshold and 50 votes just about gives all the categories a chance. They could set it to something like a 1000, but then the only winners would be from the incest category.

Some categories do have a better chance, largely because the readers are looking for similar things from a story and tend to all vote the same way for stories they like (Romance, NonHuman). Series also have a better chance as by the later chapters the only people reading and voting are people that like the series enough to still be there. You still have to have written something good (or at least popular) to win.

It's not perfect, but it probably does the job well enough for the site owners.

Stop paying attention to the trolls before they make you come across as even stupider than normal.

 

[sr71plt]

before they make you come across as even stupider than normal.

Hmmmm.

 

[Stella_Omega]

i am pretty sure that one source of the views is Google. When someone enters a search term and it applies to a lit story, Google makes contact with the webpage. So lit registers a hit-- even if the searcher never sees the link because it's buried two hundred pages back in the results.

I would love to see lit update its hit counter. On the other hand, thousands and thousands of hits looks so impressive.

 

[lovecraft68]

i am pretty sure that one source of the views is Google. When someone enters a search term and it applies to a lit story, Google makes contact with the webpage. So lit registers a hit-- even if the searcher never sees the link because it's buried two hundred pages back in the results.

I would love to see lit update its hit counter. On the other hand, thousands and thousands of hits looks so impressive.

It would never happen but I would love to see them find a way to register a view only if the reader clicks the last page at that point you would know how many are actually reading. Then again that could be a case of careful of what you wish for because 20,000 views look so much better than 500.

 

[lovecraft68]

CHECK THE CONTEST RULES!

FFS

You can't win off 15 votes. You need at least 50 for a monthly contest. Views mean squit all, as they should. The view counter clicks up regardless of whether someone clicked on the link, read the first paragraph, decided the writer had a horrible grasp of English and back-clicked out again. At least with a vote you'd hope someone read enough of the story to form an opinion of it.

Yeah, it seems odd that a 50 vote 4.91 story would be 'better' 1000 vote 4.90 story, but they had to pick a threshold and 50 votes just about gives all the categories a chance. They could set it to something like a 1000, but then the only winners would be from the incest category.

Some categories do have a better chance, largely because the readers are looking for similar things from a story and tend to all vote the same way for stories they like (Romance, NonHuman). Series also have a better chance as by the later chapters the only people reading and voting are people that like the series enough to still be there. You still have to have written something good (or at least popular) to win.

It's not perfect, but it probably does the job well enough for the site owners.

Stop paying attention to the trolls before they make you come across as even stupider than normal.

I think I would be better off not paying attention to people who use the term stupider. That sort of says a lot.

 

[sr71plt]

I think you missed the irony of that word choice.

 

[Stella_Omega]

It would never happen but I would love to see them find a way to register a view only if the reader clicks the last page at that point you would know how many are actually reading. Then again that could be a case of careful of what you wish for because 20,000 views look so much better than 500.

more like 150, is my guess. Really. I work on websites that recognise search engine hits and discount them. HUGE difference. HUUUUGE.

 

[lovecraft68]

I think you missed the irony of that word choice.

No you just think I did because you always assume you're the smartest person in the "room". Sigh. tell you what there is a thread in the BDSM section up at the top it is called "tumblr's finest dominant" go take a look through and see the game that is going on over there. Things are not always what they seem.

 

[lovecraft68]

more like 150, is my guess. Really. I work on websites that recognise search engine hits and discount them. HUGE difference. HUUUUGE.

Very disheartening. I guess in my next author's note I will start with:

"As always, I would like to thanks the ten's of people who are following this story"

 

[sr71plt]

No you just think I did because you always assume you're the smartest person in the "room".

Well, choosing between you and manyeyedhydra is no contest.