I Shouldn't Really Care But

[sdsioux]

I need to get over the trolling by people who post low scores which take the stories off the hotlist. I just published a story and watched it go from 4.5 to 2.9 and then built back up to 4.55 back down to 4.40. I need to accept the things I cannot change.

 

[SimonDoom]

I need to get over the trolling by people who post low scores which take the stories off the hotlist. I just published a story and watched it go from 4.5 to 2.9 and then built back up to 4.55 back down to 4.40. I need to accept the things I cannot change.

Absolutely. It's just the way things are. It's fun to get a high score but you have to let it go when it's not what you want. Don't write for the scores. Write to achieve goals that no other person can take away from you.

 

[jaF0]

I rarely, if ever even look at scores. Usually only when a thread like this comes up, and not even always then. I simply don't care about them at all. I wouldn't miss them if the whole rating system vanished.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

I need to get over the trolling by people who post low scores which take the stories off the hotlist. I just published a story and watched it go from 4.5 to 2.9 and then built back up to 4.55 back down to 4.40. I need to accept the things I cannot change.

I'll second what Simon wrote, and add yeah it's a bummer and annoying. Makes you wonder what people get out of it?

 

[BiscuitHammer]

Raging, angry incels and trolls in their mom's basement. They do make it difficult to figure out how (relatively) good a story is, but it's the price we pay for publishing on here.

 

[sdsioux]

I'll second what Simon wrote, and add yeah it's a bummer and annoying. Makes you wonder what people get out of it?

What do people get out of it? The fact that it bothers me I guess plus some people won't read it unless it has a high score.

 

[JPGmvny]

I need to get over the trolling by people who post low scores which take the stories off the hotlist. I just published a story and watched it go from 4.5 to 2.9 and then built back up to 4.55 back down to 4.40. I need to accept the things I cannot change.

Sounds like you got whacked. It may be taken care of in a sweep. You can also let Laurel know by hitting "Report Story" and putting a note. She'll tell you legit votes will stay up. But with that type of hit you'll probably pick up a bit. We all know we shouldn't care. But many (most?) of us do.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

What do people get out of it? .

Take a toddler, build a tower of toy bricks in the room. The child will get enormous glee knocking it down. At that age, it’s all they can do, the only way they can interact with their environment, proclaim their existence. I think there’s a lot of that immaturity in our trolls. They cannot create - they know that they cannot - so take their pleasure in the only way they can, by destroying or marring somebody else’s creation.

 

[gordo12]

I put those kind of people in the same mental category as the English Soccer thugs. Finally banned from soccer because of their destruction.

I do find that stories in the first 1/2 day vary in score drastically before the sheer number of votes stabilise them. After that they seem to find a level and not vary much.

Frustrating for sure

 

[SamScribble]

It's probably worth keeping in mind that some of the low scores are simply from people who march to a different drummer.

I recently had a string of 'Excellent!' 'Superb', 'Brilliant', etc, followed by 'This could have been so good but it just wasn't'. Two stars.

 

[Rustyoznail]

It's probably worth keeping in mind that some of the low scores are simply from people who march to a different drummer.

I recently had a string of 'Excellent!' 'Superb', 'Brilliant', etc, followed by 'This could have been so good but it just wasn't'. Two stars.

I had one recently along the lines of...

"You mentioned Vegemite. I hate it. Three stars... "

It is annoying though.

 

[BiscuitHammer]

"You mentioned Vegemite. I hate it. Three stars... "

It is annoying though.

Yeah, I had someone mark down a story because one individual sex thing wasn't ro their taste. Some readers are just idjits.

 

[SimonDoom]

I had a reader of a mom-son incest story get mad because of a scene where mom puts a finger in her ass. Because "respectable moms" don't do anal. Sons, sure, but ass? No way. Seriously. No sense of irony in that comment, either.

Something to constantly remind oneself is that the bad eggs are the minority. Sometimes it doesn't seem that way, but that's because of the perfectly normal tendency to be bothered much more by criticism than to be tickled by praise.

 

[Rustyoznail]

Something to constantly remind oneself is that the bad eggs are the minority. Sometimes it doesn't seem that way, but that's because of the perfectly normal tendency to be bothered much more by criticism than to be tickled by praise.

True. They get good value for their money, so they shouldn't complain too much though.

Imagine the uproar if Lit became a subsidiary of Amazon.

 

[jsmiam]

... I just published a story and watched it go from 4.5 to 2.9 and then built back up to 4.55 back down to 4.40. I need to accept the things I cannot change.

Remember that when a story is new a single 1 bomb has a massive impact. Get to a couple hundred votes, it’s barely noticeable. The same phenomena is happening to all your (our) stories, but you (we) barely notice because (a) the majority of the votes are 5, with a few 4,3,2,and 1 votes, and (b) a 1 bomb when you’re at 200 will be barely noticeable, and possibly even invisible to you (us) due to rounding to just two decimal places. There’s an ultimate final score for every story once the critical mass (quantity) of votes are cast, which includes the trolls and one bombs. 4.55 to 2.9 likely happened when your vote count was in the five to twenty votes cast range.

Are trolls annoying? Absolutely. Are there some obsessed trolls on a mission who spend every waking hour here? Yes to that too. And are there some extremely sophisticated computer experts who have the expertise to cheat? Yes. At the same time, is that person out to get you, you, and only you? Probably not.

But the same reason your (our) older established stories scores (I’m assuming vote counts in the hundreds or more) barely move is because of the math. One bombs still happen, but if your story strikes nine times more people to give you a five vs a one, on average, congrats, that’s a 4.6 story in the long run.

So, don’t celebrate too early if you have a 5.0 at first, and don’t quit writing if it’s a 1.0 when brand new. Patience, grasshopper.

 

[sweetdreamssss]

I need to get over the trolling by people who post low scores which take the stories off the hotlist. I just published a story and watched it go from 4.5 to 2.9 and then built back up to 4.55 back down to 4.40. I need to accept the things I cannot change.

Well 5 of my 9 stories were in HOT and rest were in mid 4s but over the course of a weekend,it all crashed down .

I strongly suspect it might be retaliation from a guy who kept giving crazy ideas and rhen hoping for money for his ideas before i laughed him off telling that i have a day job and earn more money than the number of views for my stories and noone is going to buy your stories ideas for money ..

 

[ElectricBlue]

I had a reader of a mom-son incest story get mad because of a scene where mom puts a finger in her ass. Because "respectable moms" don't do anal. Sons, sure, but ass? No way. Seriously. No sense of irony in that comment, either.

"Sshhh," said Suzie, "leave it."

"What?" EB asked. "What did I do?" He grinned. "I know Simon's mom is respectable, he told us so in that thread over there ----->. But hey, an incest reader with no sense of irony. Gosh, what next?"

 

[RetroFan]

One of the chapters in my 'Body Swap With Sister's Boyfriend' story series which I wrote in the middle of last year went up and within about three hours 15 people had voted on it - and it had a score of 1.0. It doesn't get much worse than that, but did improve improve over time although it currently sits at 3.05 after being less than 3 for most of the time since it was posted.

They really didn't like that story series.

 

[sdsioux]

praise

I've noticed that people who give low votes never bother to comment at all. On the other hand, it is nice to get that good response from someone who likes it. That means more to me.

 

[Maeven_quinn]

I need to get over the trolling by people who post low scores which take the stories off the hotlist. I just published a story and watched it go from 4.5 to 2.9 and then built back up to 4.55 back down to 4.40. I need to accept the things I cannot change.

What’s this story about? If i like the kink, I’ll read it

 

[gordo12]

Remember that when a story is new a single 1 bomb has a massive impact. Get to a couple hundred votes, it’s barely noticeable.

Unfortunately not all categories attract huge number of votes. For instance one of the channels that is well read has 5 stories dropping off after 3 days.

Votes: 128, 32, 46, 28, 55.
Another Channel: 19, 30, 50, 36

1 votes would still affect these a fair amount.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

Unfortunately not all categories attract huge number of votes. For instance one of the channels that is well read has 5 stories dropping off after 3 days.

Votes: 128, 32, 46, 28, 55.
Another Channel: 19, 30, 50, 36

1 votes would still affect these a fair amount.

That's very true, and I almost mentioned it. I only have one story that approaches 200 votes. Most of the other are well under 100 votes, because of the categories they're in.

 

[jsmiam]

@gordo and belle, thanks, your point is well taken.

Even just 20 votes though, the math is in action

If your very first score was a 5 and your second was a one bomb, that one bomb took your score down a full 2.0 points, (5+1) divided by 2 is a score of 3.0

If your first 19 scores were all fives, the one bomb is still painful, but it’s “only” 0.2 points (19 times 5) is 95, plus the one bomb to 96, divided by 20 is 4.8. A much smaller impact based on the count of votes.

And 99 times 5 is 495 plus 1 to 496, divided by 100 is 4.96, so at 100 votes it’s 0.04 points at the most that a one bomb can impact is.

So all I’m saying is that your first one bomb happens to be very noticeable, the later ones not as much. It’s not necessarily the case that the rate of one bombers changes, you just don’t see it. So wait a bit before assuming the Illuminati are coming for you.

 

[gordo12]

@gordo and belle, thanks, your point is well taken.

Even just 20 votes though, the math is in action

If your very first score was a 5 and your second was a one bomb, that one bomb took your score down a full 2.0 points, (5+1) divided by 2 is a score of 3.0

If your first 19 scores were all fives, the one bomb is still painful, but it’s “only” 0.2 points (19 times 5) is 95, plus the one bomb to 96, divided by 20 is 4.8. A much smaller impact based on the count of votes.

And 99 times 5 is 495 plus 1 to 496, divided by 100 is 4.96, so at 100 votes it’s 0.04 points at the most that a one bomb can impact is.

So all I’m saying is that your first one bomb happens to be very noticeable, the later ones not as much. It’s not necessarily the case that the rate of one bombers changes, you just don’t see it. So wait a bit before assuming the Illuminati are coming for you.

You're assuming a lot of 5 votes there. 19 five votes out of 20 is a 95% rate. That's optimistic although I acknowledge there are categories where a 5 votes is given just for showing up

It's one thing I wish Lit would do is use a breakdown like Amazon has. So many fives, so many fours, so many threesomes etc.

 

[jsmiam]

You're assuming a lot of 5 votes there. 19 five votes out of 20 is a 95% rate. That's optimistic....

Definitely true, but the extreme is good for example purposes, showing the worst case scenario of a one bom

A lower initial score makes the impact lower. For example, first score 4, second score one, the new score is 4 + 1 divided by 2, a final score of 2.5, but the impact/difference was only 1.5 points instead of 2.