Just a question about an odd voting trend on my stories.

[JadeMynx]

Hello all!

I think I may have originally posted this in a dead section of the forum... oops...

Anyway.

I have been noticing an odd trend when it comes to my stories being voted on. And though It really isn't a big deal as they always eventually reach the 4+ star territory, I just want to know if any other authors have noticed something similar.
Almost immediately after I publish a story (within 20-30 views or an hour, whichever comes first) it is voted one star. The weird thing is, is that it is always only a single 1 star vote. And then it climbs up and up to a comfortable level.

Anyone have similar going ons? I know for some authors that get tons of votes really quickly it might be hard to notice, but just wanted to check in.
Trolls? Or have I just gotten really lucky and the first person to vote on my stories is always the person who, for whatever reason, hates my stuff?

Just wondering.
Thanks for any and all replies.

~Jade

 

[ElectricBlue]

Unfortunately, It's a common phenomenon, the "one bomb". Very common. It's most likely pure trolling and, depending on the criteria around the vote, that vote may disappear when the site runs a "sweep", which it does regularly, and more often when a contest is running.

There's nothing writers can do about it - but it's not a reflection on your writing, just some clown with no life and nothing going for them.

 

[LetsMisBehave]

Thanks for posting this. The same happened to me this week, As a new writer it was demoralising to find a 1 marking on my latest story without anyone explaining what was so wrong with my story. Six 4's or 5's eventually brought it up to respectability, but i suspect it caused people not to give the story a try. Still as electricblue66 says trolls will be trolls

 

[KeithD]

People do realize this is the Internet, don't they?

 

[JadeMynx]

People do realize this is the Internet, don't they?

What is the internet?

Thanks for posting this. The same happened to me this week, As a new writer it was demoralising to find a 1 marking on my latest story without anyone explaining what was so wrong with my story. Six 4's or 5's eventually brought it up to respectability, but i suspect it caused people not to give the story a try. Still as electricblue66 says trolls will be trolls

You are welcome, good to see that it usually trends upwards.
Could be cool if literotica added a like/dislike button to the story in addition to the rating system. Then someone could say if they personally disliked it without commenting on the quality of the writing itself.

 

[Twanquavius]

Hello all!

I think I may have originally posted this in a dead section of the forum... oops...

Anyway.

I have been noticing an odd trend when it comes to my stories being voted on. And though It really isn't a big deal as they always eventually reach the 4+ star territory, I just want to know if any other authors have noticed something similar.
Almost immediately after I publish a story (within 20-30 views or an hour, whichever comes first) it is voted one star. The weird thing is, is that it is always only a single 1 star vote. And then it climbs up and up to a comfortable level.

Anyone have similar going ons? I know for some authors that get tons of votes really quickly it might be hard to notice, but just wanted to check in.
Trolls? Or have I just gotten really lucky and the first person to vote on my stories is always the person who, for whatever reason, hates my stuff?

Just wondering.
Thanks for any and all replies.

~Jade

Yep. I saw it on both of mine :/

 

[JadeMynx]

Yep. I saw it on both of mine :/

That is unfortunate. I just don't think a completed story can even be 1 star. Unless it is purposefully horrible.
People should try to judge based on quality not opinion.

And trolls can just go eat a buffet of gaping dickholes.

 

[Imstillfun]

Hello all!

I think I may have originally posted this in a dead section of the forum... oops...

Anyway.

I have been noticing an odd trend when it comes to my stories being voted on. And though It really isn't a big deal as they always eventually reach the 4+ star territory, I just want to know if any other authors have noticed something similar.
Almost immediately after I publish a story (within 20-30 views or an hour, whichever comes first) it is voted one star. The weird thing is, is that it is always only a single 1 star vote. And then it climbs up and up to a comfortable level.

Anyone have similar going ons? I know for some authors that get tons of votes really quickly it might be hard to notice, but just wanted to check in.
Trolls? Or have I just gotten really lucky and the first person to vote on my stories is always the person who, for whatever reason, hates my stuff?

Just wondering.
Thanks for any and all replies.

~Jade

I get hundreds of votes on my stories. Even I can tell that the first few trolls hit me right away. I have hundreds of trolls who hate my stories. I once had 7 hall of fame stories. Someone mentioned that in a comment on my stories. Within a week all 7 were 1* bombed till they were out of the hall of fame.

 

[Pureotica]

My stories only get a small number of votes. I must have gotten one-bombed because a story that scored less than 5 now has a 5. It only has a few votes, and it's a bit different, so I don't take much stock in the score. I should probably finish more stories to get a better sense of their reception. I tend to experiment and work on multiple projects. Productivity isn't my strong suit.

 

[FelHarper]

I feel that. I work damned hard in my meager spare time to come up with original, well-researched, hard sci-fi erotica. I self-edit and have gotten steadily better at making sure my work isn’t marred by bad punctuation or a prior edit gone wrong. Usually, my stories score above 4.9 for the first couple of days after being published. Then someone comes along with a 1-bomb.

Thankfully those seem to get culled, but it’s still irksome. I wouldn’t hit someone with a 1 unless the story was so poorly written that I couldn’t follow it. And even then, I would probably just leave it alone. I would rather recognize an outstanding work than express disdain for something sub-par.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Oh yes. Stories go up at about midnight my time and, every time, my new one gets one-bombed at about 0600. There are sufficiently few votes at the time that it’s obviously a single vote. It’s just part of the game.

Meh, having to deal with trolls online isn’t so bad. Imagine having to interact with them if they ever emerged from Mom’s basement…

 

[DanDraper]

Happened to me a couple of times. And I usually see this with the LW stories where there's a lot of hate going on there.
Haters like to get their 1 star bombs in early, before the regular readers rate them honestly.


...

 

[Codoc24]

Can someone explain how to see what the different votes are for my story, like how many 3 stars, 4 stars and 5 stars. I only see my one average score.

 

[KeithD]

Can someone explain how to see what the different votes are for my story, like how many 3 stars, 4 stars and 5 stars. I only see my one average score.

That's not provided at Literotica.

 

[dmallord]

Can someone explain how to see what the different votes are for my story, like how many 3 stars, 4 stars and 5 stars. I only see my one average score.

As Keith noted, Lit does not provide a tabulation of scores - just the average. Many have asked for this feature and there are a lot of threads addressing similar conversations. A positive response had not been forthcoming on those requests ... for years.

The 'next best' solution is to create and keep your own personal 'estimator' spreadsheet to handle this. A number of experts in the threads do that. If you search for stats on stories you can find those. You are able to download the stats for your stories from Lit and import them into an excel or similar format and manipulate the data.

Still, it only provides an estimate but can be somewhat useful. By 'guestimate' you can determine how your average is determined with a fair degree of certainty.

I'm not proficient at excel but I've been able to create a table that provides that information without too much difficulty. I'm sure there are formulas in the threads that could point you to a viable solution, more so than my approach.

 

[Codoc24]

Thanks for the replies. From the earlier posts I thought it sounded like something that LitE provided.

 

[Cheerleader Fan]

I haven't noticed a 1 bombing shortly after a story is posted, but I think I may have gained a troll/hater some time yesterday. My most recent story had been doing better than any other I'd written, bouncing back and forth between 4.86 and 4.88. Some time yesterday I got my first bombing, taking it down to 4.81 and I received one again within the last hour or two dropping me to 4.75. Yes, they're good marks, but it was by a good chunk my best performing story ever and it had me quite happy. This is all very disheartening.

FelHarper, if I understood you right you said something about some 1s on your stories getting removed. How does that even happen? It is just a matter of waiting and crossing one's fingers?

 

[ElectricBlue]

FelHarper, if I understood you right you said something about some 1s on your stories getting removed. How does that even happen? It is just a matter of waiting and crossing one's fingers?

The site runs a regular sweep through all story scores, more frequently during contests, to remove what it deems illegitimate votes (both high and low). We don't speculate how it works, but suffice to say, votes go and the story score gets adjusted.

So yes, just wait and see - you don't have to have a contest story to benefit, the sweep trawls through the whole story set, from what I've seen.

 

[Richard_Hunter]

I do often sometimes wonder however, whether it is not just randoms or trolls bombing the ratings of stories.
Is it sometimes other authors here, who keeping an eye on their stories in the Top Stories ranked by Last 30 Days or whatever, notice that other stories are around the same as theirs - maybe just outperforming them by .01 of a decimal and so they go on to rate it 1-star just to improve their own rank?

 

[Cheerleader Fan]

The site runs a regular sweep through all story scores, more frequently during contests, to remove what it deems illegitimate votes (both high and low). We don't speculate how it works, but suffice to say, votes go and the story score gets adjusted.

So yes, just wait and see - you don't have to have a contest story to benefit, the sweep trawls through the whole story set, from what I've seen.

Good to know. I guess I'll cross my fingers and wait. I wonder, though, if haters continue piling on the 1s will they be seen as more legitimate or will those in charge of such things wonder what's up with this story getting mostly 5s, some 4s and then a couple few 1s.

I do often sometimes wonder however, whether it is not just randoms or trolls bombing the ratings of stories.
Is it sometimes other authors here, who keeping an eye on their stories in the Top Stories ranked by Last 30 Days or whatever, notice that other stories are around the same as theirs - maybe just outperforming them by .01 of a decimal and so they go on to rate it 1-star just to improve their own rank?

I can't speak for other people, but that's certainly not something I'd do. It's such a bummer to see my own numbers drop, so I'd rather not inflict that feeling on others, no matter how I might benefit.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Good to know. I guess I'll cross my fingers and wait. I wonder, though, if haters continue piling on the 1s will they be seen as more legitimate or will those in charge of such things wonder what's up with this story getting mostly 5s, some 4s and then a couple few 1s.

As I say, the site runs an algorithm with several elements to it, to determine whether a vote is "genuine" or "malicious". The site has had it in place for many years now, and from I've seen, it keeps getting refined and tightened up.

 

[StarGazer58]

I have seen my scores jump around a bit too but just thought some didn't like that story. Hadn't thought about trolls deliberately bringing scores down. I have also seen some of the hate comments for Loving Wives stories so have been afraid to write anything and put it in that category.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I have also seen some of the hate comments for Loving Wives stories so have been afraid to write anything and put it in that category.

Very wise. I looked in that category when I first joined Lit, and thought, "You have got to be kidding, the comments, the stories, are those guys for real?" There is a great divide across Lit, and there it is, right there.

 

[StarGazer58]

Very wise. I looked in that category when I first joined Lit, and thought, "You have got to be kidding, the comments, the stories, are those guys for real?" There is a great divide across Lit, and there it is, right there.

If there is a genre of stories that a person does not like for whatever reason, then why even read those stories? I guess I just don't understand the trolls. I know the hard work a writer puts into writing a story, well written or not.

 

[JadeMynx]

If there is a genre of stories that a person does not like for whatever reason, then why even read those stories? I guess I just don't understand the trolls. I know the hard work a writer puts into writing a story, well written or not.

This is what I was saying when I started this thread. Like... Why just go around being a dick...

To be fair though, I think that question has been asked for, well, since the beginning of time, in all contexts.