#1 curse strikes again

[RisiaSkye]

It never fails. If you write poetry, you expect the votes to accumulate very slowly. So, weeks or months after you post something, it finds its way onto the toplist. In fact, it starts at #1.

Great, right?

Not so much.

Then comes the backlash: a couple of conspicuous one votes plummet your score, without enough total votes to absorb the shock. Months pass, and maybe it gets read often enough to find its way back onto the list.

I don't know why I let it get to me. Maybe I just liked the last one a bit too much, the danger of being very personally tied to what you write.

In any case, if you feel so inclined, please give an actual read and vote to "Athletic Discipline." It's good karma for the next time your own poems are attacked.

I'm officially done feeling sorry for myself right...now

http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=23067

 

[tigerjen]

Some of my poems have been up since July, and only recently...

Hi Risia.......

I read your post.......it can be frustrating........in fact, the
one poem, "My Rose", has been up on literotica since
7/22/01.....it only recently cracked into the toplist.....I have
a couple other poems that I initially posted back 7/8/01
that cracked into the toplist but did not debut at #1.
Oh yes, those low votes......bring the score down....now
that I don't' like! That happened to the 4 stories I have
up, but are slowly going back up.....

Just one more thing......I wish that more readers would
check out the poetry section more.......there is an
excellent vault of sexy and sensual material waiting
to be read!

Tigerjen

 

[Guest]

I hear that........(slow rise to poem stardom)

It's too bad that the poems do move so slowly....and then as you say, when they do finally get enough votes to appear on the boards....the (1) Monster's come out of the woodwork like feeding little scavengers and devour a well written poem until its been picked clean and left naked on the sand to decay.

And so I humbly present another of my own poems to be so devoured. But I hope that a few of you at least may feast on it pleasurably for a while yet, before it slips away into oblivion.



http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=25261


And I still remain..........

 

[tigerjen]

to Mr. Sandman

Sandman....

Your poem "One Sexy Cunt" sounds like one
that I would write!! Are you trying to make me
wet over here in CT ?

Tigerjen

 

[Guest]

Hmmm another title for a poem perhaps?

Wet......in CT.

It has possibilities..........





I remain.........

 

[tigerjen]

Wet in Connecticut sounds funky!

Sandman....

Heehee........Wet in Connecticut sounds real
funky! Its funny you say that because I have
been told that I'm not the usual Fairfield County
female who has her nose up in the air and a
thumb up her a--!

Have you ever been to CT, and/or to the East Coast?

Tigerjen

 

[Jigs]

Curse of the 1 votes

Risia I don't know squat about poetry (or much of anything else propably) but I do know that something must be done about this scourge of the 1 votes. Too many good stories (and poems too i'm sure) disappear, bombed into a black hole where no one will ever read them. Clearly this sabotage is deliberate and mean spirited by a few misguided pricks out there who thinks it cute to be a bastard.

I've been lucky lately. Like a few others on the site I now have a base of fans who give my stories enough votes quickly enough to offset the 1 sabatours and keep the story from dropping off the end of the world. Those writers unknown to a core of readers, however, will have trouble collecting more than 15 or 20 early votes. A couple of 1s throw in with 13 other votes can be devestating. Moreover, the better a story or poem is doing early on, the more likely it will be singled out as a target.

I don't doubt there are a few submissions that deserve a 1, but from what i've seen they are few and far between. Surely there is some way to identify these bandits and keep them from sending good work down to be lost into the pile. I don't know but I'm told that every computer can be identified. How may 1's should the site accept from a given souce, before blocking the votes from that source? How about throwing out the top 10% and the bottom 10% of votes cast for any given story. anything to balance the tally.

And don't tell me to grin and bear it. The under votes don't even out with the overvotes for most even tho they may for me nowdays. The indiscriminate 1 vote is a flaw in the system and it needs to be addresed even if it can't be stopped altogether.

 

[Mr_Neb]

And no one is immune. It is not a personal attack against any particular author or authors.

My most recent story did not start out at #1 but made it that high for one day after about 17 votes. The next day, with 25 votes, it was 325. It's now down in that area with around 40 or so votes. That is about all it will get. Once it falls off the Tops List, it will only be seen on the New Stories List and when enough new stories come in, well, that's that.

It is clear this is not just the coincidence of statistics. Here is an interesting observation. I have had stories that are modestly well recieved, right from the start. They score in the low to mid fours but never reach better than the top 20 or so in their category. These stories usually get 70-100 votes before the readership (votership?) falls off. The story has long since dropped of the New Stories List but still is high enough to attract readers from the Top List. The scores from these stories stays pretty constant.

My better stories however, never get that number of votes. Since they rise to the threshold of the 1-monster, they get hammered when they have around 10-20 votes. They fall pretty far down the Top List and therefore only get new readers for as long as they stay on the New Stories List. So my better stories get 30-50 readers and the more mediocre ones get 70-120. Go figure.

Only Laurel and Manu can tell for sure but I would suspect that my more mediocre stories have received a fewer percentage of 1 votes than my initially more popular once.

I just don't know why there seems to be a denial that this is going on. It's a shame really.

 

[Laurel]

For those of you who haven't yet, please read some of the other recent threads in this forum which address this issue.

One thing that I would like to point out - a fact that has been missing from this discussion - is that a 5-vote has the exact same odds of being fraudulent or insincere as a 1-vote. There seems to be some misguided belief that only negative votes are fraudulent. Both the score of 5 and the score of 1 are the extremes of the spectrum. In theory, neither should objectively be given to anything but the most extreme story, either extremely popular or extremely unpopular. If a story has 50 5-votes and 5 1-votes, then the fraud is far more likely, in reality, to be happening on the 5-side than the 1-side. Interestingly enough, I have yet to have a single author contact me and complain that their story was getting too many 5-votes.

If you accept that certain people are going to give you a 5-vote, for whatever their reason, then you also must accept that certain people (albeit far fewer) are going to give you a 1-vote, for whatever their reason. This is the right of every Literotica reader, regardless of their personal reason.

I don't mean to sound frustrated, but the discussions in this forum historically have tended to focus less on accuracy in voting and more on how to get higher scores for authors. The voting system is not in place just for authors - it is also a system by which readers can determine which stories are the favorites (not best or worst) of other readers on the site.

Finally, as I've mentioned previously, the new member's area, soon to be in place, will allow authors to turn on or off the voting on any or all of their stories if they so choose.

Thanks for the continued feedback, and remember that we are always working on these and other issues that affect Literotica authors.

 

[RisiaSkye]

Update

Laurel, I sympathize. I really do. And I accept that what I write isn't exactly pefect score material. It's the unconvincing coincidence of timing on 1 votes that gets frustrating.

Incidentally, because I posted this, Athletic Discipline was 1'ed again. At least that schmuck had the courtesy to send me a spiteful e-mail about feeling sorry for myself. Whoever you are--fuck you. On second thought: No. I wouldn't. And I doubt anyone else does either.

 

[Mr_Neb]

Uh oh. Time for me to chill out again.

 

[Laurel]

Thanks, RS.

As I said on another thread, we were inspired by Mr. Neb to look into the idea of being able to offer a graph to the authors showing the voting pattern of each story.

I have no idea yet if this is possible, but I imagine a line graph that would show the average vote score for the day, each day, along with perhaps the number of votes and the overall score of the story. Again, I have no specific knowledge of how this would be done, but I think it would give valuable information to authors about readers' voting habits over the life of any given story.

I'm pretty sure that something like this can be done - it's just a matter of how much work and how long it would take.

I do think the poetry is more susceptible to manipulation because there have been traditionally fewer votes cast on each poem as compared to each story. This is something we will continue to keep an eye on and, as always, the comments in this forum are very helpful to us in this regard.

 

[Guest]

Laurel...and while we're on the subject....

With regards to the Poetry. As it is quite obvious there are far fewer readers who take the time to read the poetry, let alone vote. I was wondering if it was possible to allow the poems that are posted to be on the chart...even with as little as a single vote.

Reason being, in many cases, once the poem has dropped off the New Poems list....it all but disapears. Many poems are poping up month's and month's after they've been written when they finally have the required minimum amount of votes to be "allowed" to appear.

I can see keeping the minimum requirements in place for contests and such...but perhaps allowing the poems to at least be charted may eventually attract additional readers who may or may not be aware that some poems exist. Not everyone runs off to an author's bio page to see what else has been written. Often people just run down the poetry list and read whatever happens to be posted there.

Anyway...just some thoughts on that aspect of reporting that might help some of the poet's out there (Yes...me included) who have less than the required number of votes to have them appear as yet. (And we know...a hell of a lot more people are actually reading them than voting on them anyway).

Just a thought..........



I remain........

 

[tigerjen]

Brainstorm for attracting readers to the Poetry section?

As I mentioned in other posts that I've posted,
I have had quite a few poems that didn't even
crack into the toplist until very recently, and those
particular poems have been posted up on Literotica
since I started up here back in July!

My suggestion is to brainstorm for ideas for
attracting more readers to the poetry section?
I know what has worked quite a bit so far is
to do "self-publicizing" for your own writing
and others.......

What does everyone think?


Tigerjen

 

[Maximus]

I don't mean to sound frustrated, but the discussions in this forum historically have tended to focus less on accuracy in voting and more on how to get higher scores for authors. The voting system is not in place just for authors - it is also a system by which readers can determine which stories are the favorites (not best or worst) of other readers on the site.

You've hit the nail on the head, dear. I was once a Mod of a very popular poetry site. I dealt with the same complaints day in and day out. The Moderatorship was a lovely diversion, but the constant boohooing of poets who couldn't get it through their thick skulls that their poetry may not be perfect drove me absolutely batty. Every negative vote or comment was sabotage. How dramatic! If you ever need to vent, drop me a mail.

 

[KatPurrs]

The law of averages......

Well, maybe it'll make us all feel better if we just remember that the 1 trolls hit us all with the same old one, two punch. I don't think they discriminate. But, they can only hit once (I hope)and then the true vote shows as our works creep back up the list.

I like the idea of making the poetry section more visible. Do you think that if the "Poetry" section was shown before all of the categories of "Stories", that would help? I mean, now, people have to scroll and scroll down the page to even find the Poetry Section. And, after all, "P" comes before "S" in the alphabet!

Oh, and btw, a question for Laurel about Literotica.com's book of stories being offered by Amazon.com..........Has there ever been a book of Lit's poems? If not, will there ever be? That would be so cool. If it ever comes to pass, I "wannabe" in it, please, please, pretty please!

 

[KatPurrs]

Promoting Poetry

I remember when I first visited this site. I looked all over the Home Page for the way to the poetry section. There is no mention of poetry! One has to go to "Stories and Pics" for Heaven's sake to find poetry. Then, as I mentioned before, one has to scroll all the way down the damn page to finally find the word "poetry". (No offense intended here Laurel and Manu. Just explaining my frustration as a visitor hungry for poetry and not finding it without a lot of dinking around first)

So, to sum it all up, here's some ideas (for what they're worth)

(1) Improve the home page. Separate poetry, pics and stories.

(2) Stories are categorized. Why not poetry? Direct the reader toward the type of poetry they prefer. Sometimes the titles are no indication of the content. My "Orgasmic Waves" was not romantic as one might think but rather sci-fi.

(3) Drop the 10 vote minimum to get listed as Thesandman suggested.

(4) After the authors name, show a link to all work by the author (bio pg.)

Just food for thought. Please know that I think this is a WONDERFUL place and I am so happy I found it. I personally appreciate all the hard work it must take to keep it up and running. And I'm absolutely positive I don't have a clue as to just how much that is! THANKS!!!!

 

[abashed-dreamer]

Hi Laurel, and all,
If I may comment on a couple of your points.

One thing that I would like to point out - a fact that has been missing from this discussion - is that a 5-vote has the exact same odds of being fraudulent or insincere as a 1-vote. There seems to be some misguided belief that only negative votes are fraudulent.

*Yes, that's correct; there may be fraudulent 'inflation' as well as 'deflation'. But my idea, similar to Mr. Jigs' would be, on a weekly basis to eliminate 'outliers' as they are called in statistics; votes that are at *either extreme i.e. far from the mean [more than 2 standard deviations] and central cluster. The new score would be 'corrected' versus the daily 'raw' or running score.

*So to answer Laurel's point; if 30 votes are averaging 4.5, and 95% of the votes are 3s, 4s, and 5s, then a 1 which appears, is a more extreme score than 5, and, in statistical analysis the 1 would be probably be seen as noise or due to some quirky set of circumstances (not necessarily fraud). The opposite holds: if the average is 2, and votes are bunched around 1-3, then the odd 5 is likely the 'fluke'. If the votes just scatter all over the map, then this method is of no use, of course. There must be a cluster.

I don't mean to sound frustrated, but the discussions in this forum historically have tended to focus less on accuracy in voting and more on how to get higher scores for authors. The voting system is not in place just for authors - it is also a system by which readers can determine which stories are the favorites (not best or worst) of other readers on the site.

*True, the aim is not 'higher' scores, but more accurate results. Eliminating the extremes, the outliers might lower a score.
The reason for the approach is that the odds are that the 'real' degree of approval is reflected in the central cluster, not the points way off. And Laurel, I would point out that accuracy would
benefit readers. As a reader I don't want to be misled by an improperly inflated-- or deflated-- scores.

*Another approach for the suffering poets might be to narrow the range of scores, perhaps to 3: bad, mediocre, and good, --1,2, and 3. In that case the low votes do not have such a strong effect.

I really appreciate the thought Laurel and Manu have given to this issue and I hope suggestion continue to be examined. It should be clear that my approach (and Mr. Jigs' similar one)is not simply a method of stroking authors' egos by inflating scores.



abashed-dreamer

 

[Natalie Nessus]

This is a never ending debate

And I agree with Laurel that 5 votes are extreme.

I have a story that has moved into the 5th position in the Top BDSM stories again and after 267 votes, that story has averaged 4.5.

What intrigues me more than the score is that the story rises and falls, rises and falls. Fascinating. Is it word of mouth?

And what about Jigs He/she dominates the Top 10 in BDSM.

The link for my story ishttp://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=20270

but be warned it is BDSM and FF

Have a nice night

 

[Guest]

I've only just recently started posting stories and poems in the site, and so far they've managed to average 4+ and above... What irks me the most is that I never seem to see a lot of feedback vs. votes that get done.

I mean, it's one thing when your story cracks a topten list, and that's all and well...but come on! At least give me a few comments on what it was that made the readership vote it there! ^_^

Either way, I agree the voting system needs an upgrade...being able to track votes would give a writer some gauge as to what to do to improve the next tale.

(BTW, Lauren, I've only just noticed that Literotica published a print anthology...when will you gear up for the second issue, and just what were the criteria for getting into the first issue, if I may ask?)

Maintain and Check Six!

P.S. - Jigs ain't #1 anymore in BDSM...

 

[Softly]

Another Idea!

Why not integrate the "New Poems" into the "New Story" list.

They could still be in the "New Poems" section too. That way many more readers would be exposed to the poems. More votes would be cast. As the number of votes increased, the 1 votes would not push the poem into oblivion.

What say you?

 

[Natalie Nessus]

P.S. - Jigs ain't #1 anymore in BDSM...

I just went back to look - Congratulations PLD!

Very nice. Here's the link.

http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=25125

 

[Rrrosyn]

RisiaSkye,

How many votes do your poems usually get?

As a new writer, I was stunned. Three, four votes tops. No biggie. Who can vote after being spent? (Yeah, positive attitude!)

Even my first short storie received only three votes. When my second got 18 in the first day I was stunned. I know that is low, but I am breaking new ground. I'll take every little bit I can get.

BTW, I love watching gymnastics and THAT never crossed my mind! WTG

 

[Natalie Nessus]

Amazing - Jigs has 4 stories (Chapters) in the Top Ten in BDSM. Very popular