If you were going to add a category...

[BiscuitHammer]

What would it be?

I might divvy up sci-fi and fantasy, but that's so niggling as to not warrant any real thought. I personally think there's a good assortment of categories, but there might be some benefit in dividing up one-shots from series. The only thing about that would be people griping about having to search twice in the same category for stories to fap to.

And you thought child soldiers in Darfur had it rough... #firstworldproblems

Anyhoo, to quote Mark and Lady Alexandra, can you think of any specific categories you'd like to see added? I've no doubt this question has been posited before, but I am not done with my first coffee of the day, and lack the gumption to check.

Maybe Historical?

Let's hear what you think.

 

[Privates1stClass]

What would it be?

There have been some suggestions in the past. One I agree with was "Memoirs."

 

[KeithD]

Bisexual (Yes, this has been discussed a lot over the years).

 

[LoquiSordidaAdMe]

"Memoirs" and "Bisexual" are both probably better than my suggestion. Since Sci-fi/Fantasy, Horror, Comedy, and Romance all have categories, I'd like to see one for Adventure/Mystery. That's mostly selfish though. I'd like to try my hand at a murder mystery someday.

 

[KeithD]

"Memoirs" and "Bisexual" are both probably better than my suggestion. Since Sci-fi/Fantasy, Horror, Comedy, and Romance all have categories, I'd like to see one for Adventure/Mystery. That's mostly selfish though. I'd like to try my hand at a murder mystery someday.

Nonsensically, the Web site doesn't permit "murder" even as a keyword. Since I write a lot of murder mysteries in the mainstream, I have to think twice about what I'm writing to submit here.

 

[UsuallyPresent]

Split Loving Wives into Cheating and Cuckold

 

[NotWise]

I'd like to try my hand at a murder mystery someday.

Go for it. I don't see anything in Lit's current categories that would prevent you from writing a murder mystery.

 

[KeithD]

Go for it. I don't see anything in Lit's current categories that would prevent you from writing a murder mystery.

You can't keyword it with "murder," so limits must exist. Did you miss that?

 

[SimonDoom]

Split Loving Wives into Cheating and Cuckold

I think this is the division that makes the most sense from the reader's point of view, but I would choose different names to appeal to the two camps.

One would be something like "Cheating With Consequences" because the emphasis of these stories is always that there are negative consequences for sex outside marriage. The audience for this type of story regards all such sex as cheating.

The other should be something like "Hot Wives". The problem with "cuckold" is that "cuckold" refers only to a subclass of these stories in which the husband wants to experience humiliation. There are also "stag/vixen" stories where the wife has sex outside marriage but no humiliation is present, so "cuckold" isn't broad enough and it will turn off some of the people who want to read these stories.

 

[SyleusSnow]

While the categories could use adjustment, I'd first like to see attributes to stories.

The "categories" of Chain Stories, Celebrities, Illustrated, Novels and Novellas, Text With Audio and arguably First Time are really just attributes, not categories: A Lesbian story can be illustrated, A Celebrity story can be about BDSM, a chain story can be a romance, and so on.

When a reader ventures into Illustrated, for example, they can encounter stories involving incest, BDSM, 'interracial' or any of the other actual subject matter related categories. Kinda defeats the author guideline of choosing category by "squick factor" "Illustrated" should just be just one of several possible attribute tags hung on a story with the story itself placed into the category by squick.

Then you could, for example, pick audio stories that only concerned Lesbian Sex, or avoid illustrated stories involving anal.

 

[LoquiSordidaAdMe]

Nonsensically, the Web site doesn't permit "murder" even as a keyword. Since I write a lot of murder mysteries in the mainstream, I have to think twice about what I'm writing to submit here.

I was not aware of that. I'd guess that's probably part of the ban on snuff stories, so there's a kind of logic. I don't think that would stop me from putting a murder mystery on Lit though. But it's all academic until I come up with an idea for one anyway.

 

[SimonDoom]

Bisexual (Yes, this has been discussed a lot over the years).

This seems like another logical one, along with dividing Loving Wives, because it would serve a presently underserved reader constituency.

 

[Bebop3]

Without hesitation I'd suggest Mystery/Adventure or Action (effectively the same thing).

There are tons of stories on Lit that have monster ratings that would fall under a Mystery/Adventure hat better than any other category descriptor.

 

[NotWise]

You can't keyword it with "murder," so limits must exist. Did you miss that?

I wasn't aware of it, but it still doesn't keep anyone from writing a murder mystery. It just keeps them from tagging it with "murder."

The murder couldn't be a sexual theme in the story anyway, and without that, it seems like a murder mystery could go into almost any category.

 

[gordo12]

I wrote a couple of Westerns last year that did well. Would love to see that as a category, I really enjoy writing them.

 

[SimonDoom]

Without hesitation I'd suggest Mystery/Adventure or Action (effectively the same thing).

There are tons of stories on Lit that have monster ratings that would fall under a Mystery/Adventure hat better than any other category descriptor.

The question is not whether many such stories do well, but whether readers identify Mystery/Adventure as an identifiable erotic category toward which they will gravitate. I'm not sure if this is true. For instance, are readers of Mystery/Adventure stories with exhibitionism also inclined to read mystery/adventure stories with interracial activity? anal activity? Maybe, but I'm doubtful. I tend to think the categories should be focused on erotic categories because I think that's what Literotica readers look for. If you create a non-erotic category like mystery/adventure, you will siphon away stories from other more erotically based categories, and readers interested in those categories will no longer get access to the mystery/adventure stories that also overlap with those categories.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

Like Keith, I think adding a bisexual category would be a good idea.

Though I do understand the idea of splitting the Loving Wives category.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Western. I’d go for that. Maybe Historical, but that blurs pretty quickly.

There’s a fairly regular geek story contest. Might a Tech, Nerd and Geek category be worth considering?

 

[DarkWhispers2U]

Bi please

Add my vote for the bi-sexual category.

I have a story I want to do about a married guy/guy couple who hire a surrogate to have their kid and end up impregnating her themselves. So far, the few people I've queried about an appropriate category for this tale seem stumped. No one thinks it will do well in Gay or Group Sex.

 

[NotWise]

As usual, this topic makes me role my eyes.

Why do you need a custom-made category before you write your story? Just write your story.

 

[KeithD]

As usual, this topic makes me role my eyes.

Why do you need a custom-made category before you write your story? Just write your story.

There is no category for it here. That's the point. And maybe the author doesn't write stories for anywhere but here. I have bi stories too. There are piles and piles of hetero categories here, each and every one capable of shelling out a monthly top story award (when Laurel gets around to adding monthly stats up), and there's one and a half GM categories, one lesbian category, and no bisexual category.

And you all are talking about what new hetero category we need here to add to the piles and piles of them already here.

 

[SimonDoom]

As usual, this topic makes me role my eyes.

Why do you need a custom-made category before you write your story? Just write your story.

Well, in a way I think that's the wrong question. But authors would do well to consider why it's the wrong question.

Categories aren't intended to serve the needs or interests of authors. They serve the interests of readers, first, and authors, second, by helping connect readers and authors' stories in a productive way. The readers outnumber us, and they are far more important to the site's traffic and success. Categories exist to help readers find stories of interest to them. The ideal number and variety of categories should strike a balance between, on the one hand, being numerous enough to accommodate the many very different kinky reading interests that readers have, but, on the other hand, not be so numerous that the number becomes unwieldy or that it becomes MORE difficult for readers to find kinky stories of interest.

There's an implicit assumption in a lot of posts and threads in this Hangout that authors matter more than we really do. It's readers that matter. Categories should serve readers. A bisexual category would help readers, because there are readers genuinely interested in this particular area of sexual interest, and right now no category serves their interest well. Splitting Loving Wives in two makes sense, because right now there are two large diametrically opposed groups of readers who go to that category and hate stories targeted at the other group.

But is there a significant group of Literotica readers looking for westerns? I doubt it. It makes no sense whatsoever to carve up the Literotica category universe into separate categories for western, sci fi, fantasy, adventure, mystery, etc. All you will accomplish is dividing real categories and making it harder for readers to find the stories they like. Anal fans don't care if their favorite ass-fucking stories are set in the old west or in 1930s noir Los Angeles. They just want to read about ass-fucking. If they want to read about ass fucking in the old west, they can use the search feature. Categories are not the right tool for this.

 

[ishtat]

Unfinished ?

As a reader rather than a writer there's a strong case for identifying unfinished series; how many people have read through 20 chapters of VertigoJ's "Party of Five" with growing enthusiasm, only to discover it just stopped - stone dead - mid stream - going nowhere.

There are a surprising number of stories/series which fall into this category, maybe they need a home of their own to fall into?

Another question, should 'Mind Control' be a subset of 'Non- consent?'

'Bisexual' previously suggested makes sense.

Non-English and Letters/Transcripts could be dumped altogether? perhaps one or two other categories as well.

 

[KeithD]

As a reader rather than a writer there's a strong case for identifying unfinished series; how many people have read through 20 chapters of VertigoJ's "Party of Five" with growing enthusiasm, only to discover it just stopped - stone dead - mid stream - going nowhere.

Good point. SOL has a slug on the descriptor, highlighted in yellow, identifying series still in progress.

 

[RejectReality]

They have a separate visual coding for stories that are incomplete and dormant as well. You know from first glance whether a story has gone at least a year without new additions, indicating that starting it might leave you frustrated.

Good point. SOL has a slug on the descriptor, highlighted in yellow, identifying series still in progress.