OMG One Bombs!

[DHerbert]

Correct on this statement! I track my scores in an Excel spreadsheet. I can make a drop like the one cited happen and not even use a -1- vote. With a high score at 4.9 just a couple of fours will do it - depending on the total votes tabulated of course.

Hah - I thought I was the only one to use a spreadsheet!

I've one person that 1 stars and comments on each new chapter I put out (and I then delete him). Each time he says something like the non-con story is terrible as "the main character might get STD's or pregnant - and have I thought of the consequences to her? Have I?" Part of the play of such stories is the threat such things occurring outside of the characters control. I don't understand why he'd even bother reading this sort of story if he is so down on them!

 

[lovecraft68]

Hah - I thought I was the only one to use a spreadsheet!

I've one person that 1 stars and comments on each new chapter I put out (and I then delete him). Each time he says something like the non-con story is terrible as "the main character might get STD's or pregnant - and have I thought of the consequences to her? Have I?" Part of the play of such stories is the threat such things occurring outside of the characters control. I don't understand why he'd even bother reading this sort of story if he is so down on them!

I love the skewed morality of some readers. They're reading in a category that deals with rape fantasies, meaning the character is being forced, or likes to engage in, dangerous rough sex....but you better use a condom!

 

[lovecraft68]

What makes you think they were 1-bombs? You can't really tell unless you're actually back-calculating the votes, and a lot of people seem to think that any down vote is a 1-bomb. With a high score and low vote total, anything below a 5* vote is damaging.

Contest stories are where you tend to see the 4 or 3 vote because seeing people can't stop talking about it, the trolls learned that you can lower a 4.80 story with anything less than a five and there's a chance the vote will survive the sweep.

Non contest entries, and older stories are usually one bombs.

 

[Lifestyle66]

What makes you think they were 1-bombs? You can't really tell unless you're actually back-calculating the votes, ...

For my latest story, it was a 1 within the first few hours of publication, because it was the ONLY vote until two days later.

Since then, I've received three more votes, and the average rating risen to 4.

 

[Lumiere_Amie]

I pretty quickly got my first One Bomb after publishing my second story. User didn't like that the characters didn't use safe sex practices. I, very politely I thought, told him I write what I write and they could go find other authors. They downgraded me to a one and got all angry. Told me 'I believe your stories will be rated below 4 very quickly, if you continue with this kind of story line.' Well today that story has a rating of 4.75. Some people just gotta troll.

 

[8letters]

You don't believe what? That I get one bombed? Everyone here gets one bombed, its the amount of damage it causes that fluctuates depending on category.

Has one of my stories ever got a one-vote? Probably.

Can I say with certainty that this story on this day got a one-vote? My stories get way too many votes for me to tell if I've gotten a one-vote, and Literotica intentionally bunches the votes so that you can't tell what individual votes are. To my knowledge, none of my stories has been maliciously one-bombed (been given it a one rating without having read at least some of the story).

You do this regularly - a new author posts about one-bombing and you then follow up with how you get one-bombed all the time from the many different types of malicious one-bombers. It must be disheartening for a new author like Wark2002 to hear about all these malicious one-bombers. But the malicious one-bombers you mention in your first post in this thread I wouldn't notice because of how many votes my stories get, and I know you get more votes than I do. So I called you out for posting bullshit.

How did you respond? Did you offer some proof that you've been hit by the malicious one-bombers you listed? No. You talked about a different malicious one-bomber.

I also do have stories that aren't in incest where the votes totals are low enough to keep track of(example my Halloween entry last year was in Group Sex) My only other story from last year was in Mature, also a contest entry.

How many votes does your Group Sex story have? How many votes does your Mature story have?

I have older stories on categories that don't get that many votes that on the occasions I scroll through my file I see have gradually sunk over time because the bombs can affect them.

Every vote below the current rating of a story isn't a bomb. Readers have a right to give a story the rating they think the story deserves, and sometimes that will make a story's rating go down. A story's rating going down isn't proof of bombing.

 

[Bray123]

You don't need multiple accounts. Anyone with a basic knowledge of Windows can repeat-vote on Lit anonymously, it takes around 15 seconds a go.

It's a good reason why the voting system is not worth a great deal (without getting into the debate of episode 300 of a story getting a perfect score and a place in the Hall of Fame).

 

[8letters]

You don't need multiple accounts. Anyone with a basic knowledge of Windows can repeat-vote on Lit anonymously, it takes around 15 seconds a go.

And all those votes will have the same IP address so will get pitched out in the next sweep. Not a great use of a person's time.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Folks, this is not a good place to discuss, even in the most general terms, how to game the system or how sweeps will deal with trolls and gamers. It’s an interesting thing on which to speculate, but would-be trolls can read it too. Sorry.

 

[SimonDoom]

Has one of my stories ever got a one-vote? Probably.

Can I say with certainty that this story on this day got a one-vote? My stories get way too many votes for me to tell if I've gotten a one-vote, and Literotica intentionally bunches the votes so that you can't tell what individual votes are. To my knowledge, none of my stories has been maliciously one-bombed (been given it a one rating without having read at least some of the story).

I think you're mistaken about how difficult it is to tell if you've been 1-bombed, but I think part of that is a result of the stories you write. You write almost exclusively longish incest stories, usually brother-sister. So your stories get many views, but they also tend to stay within a groove that is less likely to draw the 1-bomb response. I've read perhaps half a dozen of your stories, and you don't "throw your readers for a loop" most of the time, which is the thing that can make readers hit that 1-key in an instant.

I write incest stories, and see some pretty big numbers, but also write other stories that draw far fewer votes, and it's pretty easy to tell sometimes that I've received a 1-vote. I track votes and views fairly regularly and carefully on an Excel spreadsheet, and even when the numbers climb I can still tell.

For example, if I have a story with 400 votes and an average score of 4.8, and I'm paying attention, and the numbers suddenly shift to 401 votes and a 4.79 score, I know I've received a 1. You can just do the math. Sometimes the reader lets me know. They're not a shy bunch.

I write "hot wife" stories, and I can tell on the first day that I've received 1-bombs from readers who went there as soon as they realized what the wife was doing and that the husband wasn't going to punish her for it. The comments sometimes back that up. The first day is the easiest to tell, because of the lower vote numbers, but one can infer that if it happens on the first day it happens later, as well.

I am SURE you have received "no-read" 1-bombs. You wrote a Loving Wives story, after all, and it has a score of 3.49, which is far below your average, and most of the comments are negative. Some even told you they gave it a 1.

 

[NotWise]

For example, if I have a story with 400 votes and an average score of 4.8, and I'm paying attention, and the numbers suddenly shift to 401 votes and a 4.79 score, I know I've received a 1. You can just do the math. Sometimes the reader lets me know. They're not a shy bunch.

I've concluded that writers here want to think they're getting 1-bombed, and this is an example of why I think so.

You can't say you got a 1* vote on the basis you describe. All you can say is that the vote was less than five. Say you had 400 votes and your 4.8 score was really a less-rounded 4.796, which rounds to 4.8. If vote #401 was a 4* votes it would drop your score to 4.794, which rounds to 4.79. I do keep close track of voting, and I've seen it happen.

I don't understand why some people want to think they're getting one-bombed, but a lot of us disregard alternatives and claim to be 1-bombed. I'm not saying people aren't voting ones on your (or my) stories. I'm saying that the 1-bombs aren't as common as some people want to think they are.

 

[8letters]

For example, if I have a story with 400 votes and an average score of 4.8, and I'm paying attention, and the numbers suddenly shift to 401 votes and a 4.79 score, I know I've received a 1. You can just do the math. Sometimes the reader lets me know. They're not a shy bunch.

LOL. That's a great example of the "My rating went down. I must have been one-bombed" mentality. I won't repeat NotWise's math, but they nailed it.

I think you're mistaken about how difficult it is to tell if you've been 1-bombed, but I think part of that is a result of the stories you write. You write almost exclusively longish incest stories, usually brother-sister. So your stories get many views, but they also tend to stay within a groove that is less likely to draw the 1-bomb response. I've read perhaps half a dozen of your stories, and you don't "throw your readers for a loop" most of the time, which is the thing that can make readers hit that 1-key in an instant.
:
I write "hot wife" stories, and I can tell on the first day that I've received 1-bombs from readers who went there as soon as they realized what the wife was doing and that the husband wasn't going to punish her for it. The comments sometimes back that up. The first day is the easiest to tell, because of the lower vote numbers, but one can infer that if it happens on the first day it happens later, as well.

That's not a malicious one-bomb. That's a one-vote based on the content of your story. My position is that one-vote based on the content of the story is just as valid as a five-vote. You may not like the criteria the reader used to decide to one-vote your story, but that's the way LW is. It's why it has by far the lowest average rating for stories.

I am SURE you have received "no-read" 1-bombs. You wrote a Loving Wives story, after all, and it has a score of 3.49, which is far below your average, and most of the comments are negative. Some even told you they gave it a 1.

It's a story that I knew would get a low-rating when I published it as it appeals to no one. It totally deserves its 3.49 rating. I have no problems with any of the one-votes that it has gotten.

Some of my stories with a 4.8 rating or better have gotten comments that indicated that the reader read the story and hated it. If they gave the story a one-vote, I'm fine with that. One-votes are valid votes.

 

[Lifestyle66]

I've concluded that writers here want to think they're getting 1-bombed, and this is an example of why I think so.

You can't say you got a 1* vote on the basis you describe. All you can say is that the vote was less than five. Say you had 400 votes and your 4.8 score was really a less-rounded 4.796, which rounds to 4.8. If vote #401 was a 4* votes it would drop your score to 4.794, which rounds to 4.79. I do keep close track of voting, and I've seen it happen.

I don't understand why some people want to think they're getting one-bombed, but a lot of us disregard alternatives and claim to be 1-bombed. I'm not saying people aren't voting ones on your (or my) stories. I'm saying that the 1-bombs aren't as common as some people want to think they are.

I've had over 34 ones on my story "A User Guide - A Geek Pride Story" at the end of May for the author challenge. I watched the votes as they came in two or three at a time, and now weeks later (with the one scraps) it's still only rated at 1.92.

Several authors here commented that they enjoyed the story and the tech guide approach. One commented he liked the unique way I wrote the poker game ending. So, their more positive ratings have kept it from being much lower.

I posted that to Loving Wives to poke those 1-bombing trolls deliberately. Sometimes we DO know we're being 1-bombed.

 

[Lifestyle66]

That's not a malicious one-bomb. That's a one-vote based on the content of your story. My position is that one-vote based on the content of the story is just as valid as a five-vote. You may not like the criteria the reader used to decide to one-vote your story, but that's the way LW is. It's why it has by far the lowest average rating for stories.

One-votes are valid votes.

I don't agree that they are always valid votes.

If you READ a story and really hate it for whatever reason, then a 1 is a valid vote.

But if I tell you with the title and story tag line it's about swingers, then if you open it and scroll to the end just to give it a 1, I consider that an invalid 1-bomb. Those trolls don't bother to read the story. And they are opening stories they KNOW they will hate, merely to tell us they hate those kinds of stories.

Those are merely sad, hateful people who don't bring anything positive into the world around them.

 

[PennameWombat]

I've concluded that writers here want to think they're getting 1-bombed, and this is an example of why I think so.

You can't say you got a 1* vote on the basis you describe. All you can say is that the vote was less than five. Say you had 400 votes and your 4.8 score was really a less-rounded 4.796, which rounds to 4.8. If vote #401 was a 4* votes it would drop your score to 4.794, which rounds to 4.79. I do keep close track of voting, and I've seen it happen.

I don't understand why some people want to think they're getting one-bombed, but a lot of us disregard alternatives and claim to be 1-bombed. I'm not saying people aren't voting ones on your (or my) stories. I'm saying that the 1-bombs aren't as common as some people want to think they are.

Correct. You can‘t always differentiate from valid 1 or 2 votes and “one bombs”. But sometimes you can strongly wonder.

One of my somewhat recent stories I was able to track the first six votes. 5-5-4. Well, it had a total of 14 points for the first 3 votes, but the order I didn’t catch, but I definitely grabbed the stats at that point. The next three votes that came in rapid succession added a total of three (3) points to my total score. So it’s demonstrable all three were ones. And, unlike some postings here describe, the only commenter on that story claimed they gave it a 4 and said it was an “interesting story.” And that comment came days later. All of the votes (thirty or so) since then have averaged over 4.5, but those three 1 votes keep the overall score down given the total number of votes.

So I have no clue why those three one votes appeared, whether or not they’re thoughtful judgements on my story. No comments, nothing. Just the votes. But if there’s been a sweep or sweeps since, they’ve never gone away. Or, they did and were immediately replaced with new one votes. You choose the most likely option.

Multiple things can be true. A reader can completely read a story and give it a ’1’. I don‘t know how, if I dislike a story that much, I bail. I’m not a critic or editor getting paid to force my way through so I have better uses of my time. But, I may give a story I read a ’2’, but even that would be hard for me. And that “one bombs” happen can also be true.

As to sweeps, over the time I’ve been here, I seem to have lost as many 4 or 5 votes as ’1’s on them. The most recent ’lost vote’ I have across all of my stories was, almost provably, a 5. Whether the reader came back and removed it or a sweep did, I don’t know. But I do know it’s gone. Or, multiple 1 votes were removed and I received new 1 votes, just one fewer vote in total than I lost. But the arithmetic says I lost a 5, the other cases don’t work out without lots of twists.

 

[SimonDoom]

I've concluded that writers here want to think they're getting 1-bombed, and this is an example of why I think so.

You can't say you got a 1* vote on the basis you describe. All you can say is that the vote was less than five. Say you had 400 votes and your 4.8 score was really a less-rounded 4.796, which rounds to 4.8. If vote #401 was a 4* votes it would drop your score to 4.794, which rounds to 4.79. I do keep close track of voting, and I've seen it happen.

I don't understand why some people want to think they're getting one-bombed, but a lot of us disregard alternatives and claim to be 1-bombed. I'm not saying people aren't voting ones on your (or my) stories. I'm saying that the 1-bombs aren't as common as some people want to think they are.

You're right; that was a bad example. There are examples very early in stories where I can tell it's a one-bomb but the data I gave for that example was insufficient. And, as 8Letters points out, there's a difference between "I gave your story a 1 as soon as I figured out the subject matter" and "I read your story all the way through and hated it and gave it a 1 bomb." I maintain that a decent and responsible reader should not bomb a story simply because of hating the subject matter, but many readers disagree, and it doesn't cause me any personal distress at this point, in any event.

 

[lovecraft68]

Has one of my stories ever got a one-vote? Probably.

Can I say with certainty that this story on this day got a one-vote? My stories get way too many votes for me to tell if I've gotten a one-vote, and Literotica intentionally bunches the votes so that you can't tell what individual votes are. To my knowledge, none of my stories has been maliciously one-bombed (been given it a one rating without having read at least some of the story).

You do this regularly - a new author posts about one-bombing and you then follow up with how you get one-bombed all the time from the many different types of malicious one-bombers. It must be disheartening for a new author like Wark2002 to hear about all these malicious one-bombers. But the malicious one-bombers you mention in your first post in this thread I wouldn't notice because of how many votes my stories get, and I know you get more votes than I do. So I called you out for posting bullshit.

How did you respond? Did you offer some proof that you've been hit by the malicious one-bombers you listed? No. You talked about a different malicious one-bomber.


How many votes does your Group Sex story have? How many votes does your Mature story have?


Every vote below the current rating of a story isn't a bomb. Readers have a right to give a story the rating they think the story deserves, and sometimes that will make a story's rating go down. A story's rating going down isn't proof of bombing.

You're the one that is so obsessed with your numbers, and numbers in general you spend hours creating graphs about every useless stat there is. But other people don't know when they've been one bombed? Yeah, that makes sense.

As far as disheartening? Seeing the people come here already complaining I'm not telling them anything they haven't already experienced. I'm simply telling them it happens to everyone, its part of things here, and you have to deal with it because short of shutting off voting, you can't do anything about it.

Not that I owe you any information at all, but I looked it up. My Halloween story-live since 10/10/21 has 554 votes. Six months have passed since the contest so my guess is it didn't have many more than 400 during the duration of the contest. That's easily slow enough to be able to spot trolling.

My mature story, a Nude day entry has been live since June of last year, 582 votes same deal easy enough to follow.

In fact, seeing I've slowed way down in dropping stories here, I don't get these 'thousands of votes' you seem to think I do. But you're constant mentioning of it shows the real problem here.

You're jealous. You're not just obsessed with numbers more than you are writing, but you're such a narcissist and so desperate for attention, you start 'extended notes' threads on your stories as if people want to hear the back story on your story. How many responses do they get?

You think you're some type of big shot here with your 'thousands of votes" and spending 24/7 checking your status on top lists. Meanwhile I have numbers and accomplishments here that you envy, but piss you off because I denigrate them for being pretty much worthless when it comes to being any indicator of whether or not its a good story or I'm a good writer.

I shit on the things you hold sacred, and you can't play the "people say that when they don't have..." because you name it, I have it. There are others here who have a lot of 'status' here as well, but don't really care, and for the same reason, it doesn't mean a hell of a lot where the actual skill of writing is concerned.

You've been here for nine years and have yet to try your hand at anything but taboo stories because OMG, you might not get 2k votes if you write in another category. All you care about here is numbers to the point you're attacking me for saying get trolled? Claiming I don't get one bombs? With the types of things I write, let alone post here?

Yeah, okay.

Off the top of my head....this comment is on my April Fools Day contest story from this year.

Anonymous3 months ago
An instant 1* for the use of the abbreviation "BRO". My god, grow up.

I got a bomb because they didn't like "Bro" this is the same stupid crap everyone deals with.

Anonymous3 months ago
This was trash

I bet that was a five star vote to accompany that glowing praise.

I'm not going to go on anymore. Try focusing on your writing instead of bitching about what top lists you seem to think you deserve to be on. You're a one trick pony writing only in the biggest voting category, and writing safe stories based only on what the readers will eat up.

Is it wrong you do that? Not at all write whatever you want, but if you're going to start a pissing contest then you should have the resume to get the job done.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I've concluded that writers here want to think they're getting 1-bombed, and this is an example of why I think so.

You can't say you got a 1* vote on the basis you describe. All you can say is that the vote was less than five. Say you had 400 votes and your 4.8 score was really a less-rounded 4.796, which rounds to 4.8. If vote #401 was a 4* votes it would drop your score to 4.794, which rounds to 4.79. I do keep close track of voting, and I've seen it happen.

I don't understand why some people want to think they're getting one-bombed, but a lot of us disregard alternatives and claim to be 1-bombed. I'm not saying people aren't voting ones on your (or my) stories. I'm saying that the 1-bombs aren't as common as some people want to think they are.

Yes, you have to take rounding into account, but if you do the maths on the two rounded averages, you can see exactly what the new score was. The maths is always clear on that. I suspect many folk don't actually know what the maths is, which makes their comments a little more speculative - I think Simon knows his maths, but maybe forgot rounding, as per your example.

I see a fairly regular pattern straight out the gate on most of my new stories, especially in the first ten votes, when you can do the maths in your head - a typical spread of several fives, a few fours, then a one. Then, when a Contest sweep is run (and my stories at hardly ever contest stories), the vote count drops by two or three, and the score bounces up.

So my suggestion to newbies is submit the story and try to ignore scores for a month (I know, I can't do it either), because straight out the gate, most stories are going to cop a few one bombs.

Mind you, I don't submit stories in One Bomb Valley, and I don't think any particular tool has got me targetted - and if they do, they should know by now if they want their one bomb to stick, they can't just jump to the end and plant it.

 

[NotWise]

Multiple things can be true. A reader can completely read a story and give it a ’1’. I don‘t know how, if I dislike a story that much, I bail. I’m not a critic or editor getting paid to force my way through so I have better uses of my time. But, I may give a story I read a ’2’, but even that would be hard for me. And that “one bombs” happen can also be true.

As to sweeps, over the time I’ve been here, I seem to have lost as many 4 or 5 votes as ’1’s on them. The most recent ’lost vote’ I have across all of my stories was, almost provably, a 5. Whether the reader came back and removed it or a sweep did, I don’t know. But I do know it’s gone. Or, multiple 1 votes were removed and I received new 1 votes, just one fewer vote in total than I lost. But the arithmetic says I lost a 5, the other cases don’t work out without lots of twists.

You never know the voter's motivation unless they tell you, and most of them don't. I tell myself "opinions differ," and leave it at that.

The sweeps generally work, but their aim is to remove "invalid" votes, not 1* votes. For my most recent story, which isn't very recent anymore, I had three one* votes, and they were all swept. I had four two* votes, and they were all swept. The sweeps also took seven three* votes, seven four* votes, and six five* votes. The average vote removed was 3.33, so it improved the score despite taking high votes as well as low votes.

Those numbers include some constrained estimates as well as votes I could unambiguously observe.

 

[NotWise]

Yes, you have to take rounding into account, but if you do the maths on the two rounded averages, you can see exactly what the new score was. The maths is always clear on that. I suspect many folk don't actually know what the maths is, which makes their comments a little more speculative - I think Simon knows his maths, but maybe forgot rounding, as per your example.

There is a limitation somewhere just over 100 votes where you can't always back out the vote, even if you do catch the votes one-at-a-time. You can constrain the estimates fairly well up to nearly 200 votes, but it all becomes pointless not far over 200 votes.

 

[Bramblethorn]

You never know the voter's motivation unless they tell you, and most of them don't. I tell myself "opinions differ," and leave it at that.

The sweeps generally work, but their aim is to remove "invalid" votes, not 1* votes. For my most recent story, which isn't very recent anymore, I had three one* votes, and they were all swept. I had four two* votes, and they were all swept. The sweeps also took seven three* votes, seven four* votes, and six five* votes. The average vote removed was 3.33, so it improved the score despite taking high votes as well as low votes.

Those numbers include some constrained estimates as well as votes I could unambiguously observe.

As evidence that 1* votes don't automatically get swept, there are stories on this site which have long-lasting "perfect" 1.00 scores.

 

[ElectricBlue]

There is a limitation somewhere just over 100 votes where you can't always back out the vote, even if you do catch the votes one-at-a-time. You can constrain the estimates fairly well up to nearly 200 votes, but it all becomes pointless not far over 200 votes.

Lol. Over 200 votes and it becomes pointless, I hear you brother.

And yet we've had people moan when their story has gone from 4.82 to 4.81. Anyone would think they're writing about their dear, precious mother, and how dare anyone smear her good name with anything less than a five.

 

[Bramblethorn]

There is a limitation somewhere just over 100 votes where you can't always back out the vote, even if you do catch the votes one-at-a-time. You can constrain the estimates fairly well up to nearly 200 votes, but it all becomes pointless not far over 200 votes.

Easy way to see this:

The rounded score for a story will be somewhere in 1.00, 1.01, ..., 4.99, 5.00. If you do the math, that means 401 possible values.

For 100 votes, the story will have somewhere between 100 and 500 total stars - again, 401 possible values. 100 stars = rating 1.00, 101 stars = 1.01, etc. So, up to 100 votes, you can always tell exactly how many stars the story has in total, and when a new vote comes in you can subtract the old total from the new total to figure out what that new vote was.

But if you have more than 100 votes, then there are more than 401 possible values for "total number of stars". That means that at least two of those cases have to map to the same rounded score, so you can't guarantee being able to get the exact star total from the rounded score.

For instance, at 101 votes, a rounded score of 2.50 could mean either 252 or 253 total stars.

This isn't quite the end of the road. If your rating at 100 votes was 2.47, (i.e. 247 stars) then you can't have 253 stars at 101 votes; that would require a 6* vote. So in that one case you could resolve the ambiguity. But that kind of logic only gets you a little further; it only works for just the right combinations of scores.

(If you ever do see something that looks like a 6* or 0* vote, it probably means that a sweep and some new votes came in close together.)

The solution is to write stories that never get more than 100 votes. That way you'll always know.

 

[Morm]

This thread is fascinating to me. It seems clear from the tones of the folks with high post counts that you’ve had this discussion many times before, but reading everybody’s philosophies on votes and 1-bombs is new to me, and quite interesting.

A few reactions.

First, maybe I’m just unfamiliar with the Literotica platform, but I feel like a lot of heartache could be saved by displaying the distribution of ratings on our author portals in addition to vote count and the average. The data must be saved in the backend somewhere because The Sweeper leverages it. Is there a reason we don’t have access to that data, or is it simply a feature that’s on the to-do list somewhere buried beneath the hundreds of other things that go into site upkeep?

I’m surprised by how down on people who value ratings the community seems to be.

Maybe I’m in the minority here, and maybe it says something unflattering about my maturity level or whatever, but here we go. I like seeing big numbers next to my stories. There, I said it. On top of being an evolved ape that is chemically programmed to enjoy dopamine, I pour hours upon hours of work into writing my stories. Every little “ya done good, kid” I get makes me feel good. Are ratings the best indicator of quality writing? Probably not. But given the slim pickings for alternatives, they’re certainly not nothing.

But there is something else to it. How many times have each of us had the experience of looking for something new to read, and coming across a few possibilities in the genre of our choice and with some appealing tags. Option A is a 4.8, B is a 3.2, and C is a 4.2. Which are you gonna click first?Everybody who didn’t say “A”, you’re a less superficial reader than I can claim to be.

As a storyteller, I want people to read my stories. Having high ratings helps. Especially for those of us who are new to the site, and don’t have a large following or portfolio of work in place. We feel like, to get noticed beyond the week or two that we’re on the “new stories” page, we need every bit of help we can get. So, when somebody like the original poster writes something that’s in range for the Hall of Fame when/if it reaches 100 ratings, it feels amazing, beyond simple dopamine response to big numbers. Their work will be there on the main genre page for people to see and read, for as long as it can keep the rating.

So, when they fall out of that rating range by a single person submitting a 1-star rating, it feels like a real blow. Especially when it’s done anonymously, without any comment to indicate why the reader was displeased or what the writer can do to improve their craft. And remember, most of us newcomers have pretty low total rating counts, so math dictates a single 1-star does a disproportionate amount of damage.

And then, trying to talk about those feelings in a forum of people who, presumably, can understand, but and getting responses like:

Poor baby. Your story got one-bombed down to the "high 4.70s." Sounds like a humble-brag to me. Cry me a river.

(With positive emote reactions from three people)

Still 4.7? That doesn't even break the skin.

Is a story in the 4.7 range still very respectable? Certainly. Are there folks who have gotten more screwed over? Undoubtably. All that feels like it should be part of the dog in the burning house "this is fine" meme.

And yes, yes, I know that Literotica is a space on the internet, and as such that's just the way things are. The Sweeper exists, and is certainly better than nothing, but anonymous 1-bomb ratings are just a thing that will happen, and the only real solution is to come to peace with it.

All I'm trying to say is that, from the perspective of a relative newcomer who isn't used to it like the original poster, it really feels bad to have invested a lot of themselves into a story, start getting rating feedback that reflected a lot of people really liked it, and feel like that's been blemished by a tiny minority of people with 1-stars. Is the original poster really so out of line for feeling that way?

 

[Bramblethorn]

Lol. Over 200 votes and it becomes pointless, I hear you brother.

And yet we've had people moan when their story has gone from 4.82 to 4.81. Anyone would think they're writing about their dear, precious mother, and how dare anyone smear her good name with anything less than a five.

I won't repeat the threads I did on this a while back, but: people tend to over-analyse patterns in story scores.

I'm not saying that people never abuse the system - that definitely does happen, I've seen it happen. But it's natural for averages to fluctuate as votes come in, and the kind of fluctuation you'd expect even with honest voting is larger than many realise. If a story was sitting on 4.85 for a while and then drifted down to 4.80, the most likely explanation isn't a coordinated downvoting campaign, it's just the random element of who sees that story first and who sees it later.