confusion about voting

[luna_oscuro]

I'm new here and while I've looked through a lot of the FAQs, I can't seem to find anything that explains how voting is handled. Would someone point me in the right direction or answer my question here? Can someone remove a vote once they have voted? I've noticed that my story has decreased in the number of votes since it was posted. I'm just curious about how it all works.

thanks for the assistance.

 

[Darkniciad]

The site performs "sweeps" to remove votes considered illegitimate. Someone voting more than once, someone maliciously voting one on every story on a toplist, etc. Nobody really knows the criteria, other than the multiple voting -- necessary to keep cheaters from finding a way around the sweeps.

When figures for a contest are being tallied, there is usually a strong sweep. Such is the case today, with the winners of the Valentine's Day contest coming out.

It's a necessary evil that probably sucks up some legitimate votes, too. Without the necessity to log in to vote, there's little that you can do to control votes at the point of casting. Without the sweeps, anyone with bad intentions and a couple of hours to spare could destroy the scores of anyone they didn't like, or vice-versa for a favorite.

 

[luna_oscuro]

that makes a lot of sense actually. In my case, I guess it's helpful, since my rating went up after the sweeps. Thank you for the answer. Is that information available somewhere? I'm so lost on this site...there is way too much information!

 

[Darkniciad]

that makes a lot of sense actually. In my case, I guess it's helpful, since my rating went up after the sweeps. Thank you for the answer. Is that information available somewhere? I'm so lost on this site...there is way too much information!

That's not in the FAQ anywhere that I know of. I think the information has just been passed down in the forum since the sweeps were first introduced years ago.

 

[elfin_odalisque]

Dark has it nailed but, as I understand it - and it is intrinsically unfair, because you don't have to log in to vote, the 'sweeps' get rid of multiple voting from the same ISP. That means that two or three guys sharing the same WiFi only get one vote.

 

[luna_oscuro]

thanks for the additional info.