Observation from the April Fool's Day contest

[davion2308]

Hey, everyone!

I have an observation and I'm 50/50 on whether or not I'm reading too deeply here.

I submitted my first attempt at any writing contest this month for April Fool's Day. The story I wrote was quick, nowhere near my better-developed works, but the scoring it received is equivalent to what I consider a stinker.

Question: Do stories in contests get purposefully low-voted so as not to interfere with the fan favorites or the well-known writers? I'm sure no one knows my name by looking at it and I don't have a following the way some of these prolific writers do. Does that impact voting specific to contests?

I've written some garbage on here and even those stories get higher votes than the contest story, so I'm trying to understand the rhythm and pattern of contests. It's discouraging even if I don't tie my writing happiness to what others think of my work.

May I have someone's thoughts or experiences with contests? I'd appreciate it.

 

[KeithD]

Contest entries do tend to get low voted more than regular entries--whether from position jockeying or the "oh, yeah, you think it's competitive?" syndrome, but the sweeps by the Web site at the end tend to more than make up for that. The perspective of how the contest went considered and given after the contest is actually over will be different from the one given during the contest.

 

[yukonnights]

All of the contests tend to draw both very high and very low voting. Since it's a known problem, there are usually a series of "vote sweeps" to remove 'fraudulent votes' (for lack of a better term). Best just to ignore the rating until the end when the final "sweep" is over. Once the contest ends, the views & votes remain pretty static.

ETA: KeithD said it while I was writing

 

[davion2308]

Short, sweet

That answers the question very well. Thank you, both of you.

 

[gordo12]

I don't think the contest voting had anything to do with it. If you look at what you posted carefully you'll see you made (I assume) a mistake and double posted the ending or perhaps alternative endings that you didn't delete.

It kind of took the steam out of the story at the end. Otherwise I enjoyed it.

"In what felt like hours but was 90 seconds or fewer, she let the dress fall around her, back over her hips and down her legs. She grabbed his crotch.

"Wow, it worked, huh? We should go take care of this before we eat" she said. Andrew almost slapped her hand away. He wasn't used to her (or any girlfriend) being so sexually outgoing. He wasn't sure if he even liked it. But he nodded, confused, mumbled an 'okay' to her.

She laughed, walking back to the parking lot, and wrinkled her nose at him.

"You know this means it's my turn to pick something fun, right?"

He nodded, his cock pulsing, wondering what shit he got himself into. What

Moments later, drops dress, walks towards him. She was never so sexually outgoing, grabs his crotch. "Wow, works, huh? Let's go take care of this,"

He nods, dumbly, confused, aroused, mumbles "Okay,"

And then she laughs, wrinkles her nose at him, "And then it's my turn to pick something,"

Oh, shit, what did he get himself into? Goddamn April Fool's game by goddamn Danny, he thought. What was her thing?

He was afraid to find out."

 

[SolarRay]

As far as I understand, I'm not even eligible for a win in the April Fools contest due to an earlier win and yet my entry has still been 1-bombed. At least part of it is attributable to a troll comment I removed but it's more than that from what I can see. So no matter what, you'll always get both positive and negative attention in contests, for a variety of reasons. I still consider entering contests a net win though in the long run.