Confused on the stars ratings

[lilredfox74]

Hi all!

I'm new here. I posted one poem and one story. I just checked and the story has 4/7 stars and the poem 1/1 stars. Can someone explain what these mean?
Are the stories rated out of 7 and the poems out of 1?
Or, is it that 7 people voted and gave it 4 stars?

Not sure how to interpret these ratings. Any other helpful notes since I'm new would be appreciated too

 

[StillStunned]

4/7 means 7 votes, with an average rating of 4 stars (out of 5).

Unfortunately only 1 person rated your poem, and they didn't like it it.

But early on the votes don't mean much. Wait until you have 10 or 20 before you draw any conclusions.

In the meantime, welcome here, and have fun writing!

 

[lilredfox74]

4/7 means 7 votes, with an average rating of 4 stars (out of 5).

Unfortunately only 1 person rated your poem, and they didn't like it it.

But early on the votes don't mean much. Wait until you have 10 or 20 before you draw any conclusions.

In the meantime, welcome here, and have fun writing!

Thank you for the explanation! So are both stories and poems out of 5 stars total?
My poem is now 2.5/2 so I'm guessing the second voter gave it a 3? Is that how that works--like an averaging?

 

[StillStunned]

Yes, the most stars a reader can give is five.

In the case of your poem, it seems that the second reader voted it 4 stars: (1 + 4 = 5) / 2 = 2.5. So your second reader was much more impressed! (Unfortunately that 1 will drag the average down for a long time.)

 

[AchtungNight]

4/7 means 7 votes, with an average rating of 4 stars (out of 5).

Unfortunately only 1 person rated your poem, and they didn't like it it.

But early on the votes don't mean much. Wait until you have 10 or 20 before you draw any conclusions.

In the meantime, welcome here, and have fun writing!

If you ever get that many. Most of my stories didn’t get past five votes when I put them on, and with troll sabotage once I posted a “happy swingers” story in the Extramarital Affairs section, aka Loving Wives… two Hs in eighteen years of posting here isn’t worth putting up with tons of 3s and 4s. I’m good but I’m not popular. [shrug] Oh well, I’m just in this for fun.

 

[StillStunned]

I’m good but I’m not popular.

Yup, good and popular are two entirely different things when it comes to readers voting.

 

[AlinaX]

Poems don't get many votes as a rule.

 

[StillStunned]

Poems don't get many votes as a rule.

Readers won't rate it
Unless they masturbated

 

[TheLobster]

Readers won't rate it
Unless they masturbated

And you’ll only get five stars
If they came very hard

 

[StillStunned]

And you’ll only get five stars
If they came very hard

And only one, I think,
If it's not their kink

 

[TarnishedPenny]

The most important thing about ratings here is to learn to not take them too seriously. Write for yourself and let everything else be a bonus.

Good luck.

 

[lustychimera]

The most important thing about ratings here is to learn to not take them too seriously. Write for yourself and let everything else be a bonus.

Good luck.

Yeah, that's definitely been my takeaway. From what I've seen and heard, people are voting based on whether the story beats hit on their kinks. Ratings seem to be more a gauge of the market for your content, not your writing ability.

 

[MillieDynamite]

It takes a minimum of three 5 votes to offset one 1 vote. But even with one 1, you could never reach the five-star rank. No one every maintains a five, or I don't think they have.

 

[MyBareTorso]

Yup, good and popular are two entirely different things when it comes to readers voting.

And lots of other things too...

 

[Trionyx]

Along a similar vein, I am sometimes surprised by the votes compared to my thoughts about a story of mine. There are a few which I felt were some of my better stories (interesting plots and charming or unique characters) yet the average score was relatively disappointing. Likewise, some of my more ‘so-so’ stories have received very generous scores. I don’t have a thought provoking insight into this paradox, I merely am putting it out there in case anyone else has had a similar experience.

 

[StillStunned]

Along a similar vein, I am sometimes surprised by the votes compared to my thoughts about a story of mine. There are a few which I felt were some of my better stories (interesting plots and charming or unique characters) yet the average score was relatively disappointing. Likewise, some of my more ‘so-so’ stories have received very generous scores. I don’t have a thought provoking insight into this paradox, I merely am putting it out there in case anyone else has had a similar experience.

Sometimes, yes. Just the other day I posted a story, "Pas de Trois", which I like well enough, but the initial response was staggering. I'm not complaining, it just took me aback.

 

[lilredfox74]

Yup, good and popular are two entirely different things when it comes to readers voting.

whats the difference on this site

 

[intim8]

Sometimes, yes. Just the other day I posted a story, "Pas de Trois", which I like well enough, but the initial response was staggering. I'm not complaining, it just took me aback.

The author himself is usually the last to know. He's too close to it to distinguish tripe from genius. That's why writers are so insecure.

That was a damn good story.

I had the same kind of pleasant surprise on my latest. People saw things in it I didn't see, and didn't see the few things in it that I hoped they wouldn't.

 

[lustychimera]

whats the difference on this site

Depends on who you are. Writers tend to judge by how well written a story is. Readers tend to judge by what the actual story is with little care for the pacing or prose or the nuts and bolts type stuff. And readers are largely the ones scoring.

 

[ElectricBlue]

whats the difference on this site

Other than Erotic Couplings, which is a grab bag of a category covering a wide range of content, Incest and Taboo is the next largest category by far, with 67,000 stories. That's popularity, as determined by numbers. On the principle that supply probably follows demand, one could assume there are more readers of that category compared to others.

"Good" is a measure of something that might be indicated by score, might not. There's a whole range of debate about that; but "good" and "popular" are two different things.

 

[Trionyx]

but "good" and "popular" are two different things.

Ain’t that the truth?

 

[Priscilla_June]

Rabble rabble, something, rabble rabble, hate star ratings, rabble rabble

 

[SimonDoom]

whats the difference on this site

It depends on whom you talk to. Everyone's standards are different.

Some stories have high scores but low view numbers. Some stories have very high view numbers but lower scores. Some people find that neither view numbers nor scores correlate highly with quality, however you want to look at it, and some do. You have to figure out for yourself what kinds of stories you like and focus on that. I like to know that people are reading and enjoying my stories, and I see numbers as a tool for confirming whether they are or not, but I don't get obsessed by them.

Keep in mind that if total vote numbers are low scores are highly volatile, and they don't mean that much.

 

[StillStunned]

whats the difference on this site

Readers tend to rate stories not just for quality, but also for how well the story satisfies their kinks or matches their expectations of the category. And depending on the category they might be harsher than they would otherwise be. And fewer views means fewer votes, which means that each vote carries more weight.

If you have ten followers who like your style, you can put out a story that's only seen by a thousand readers but has an average rating of 4.9 from your followers' votes. If the same story is read a hundred thousand times, it's more likely to score lower, because the people reading it aren't necessarily fans of your style or content, no matter how well you write.

 

[TheLobster]

Readers tend to rate stories not just for quality, but also for how well the story satisfies their kinks or matches their expectations of the category

And if it's a standalone story, or a final installment in a series, then ratings are very strongly influenced by how much the readers liked the ending, much more than everything else that happened before.