Oh, the ratings agony!

[SimonDoom]

I think the star ratings really do a disservice to all Lit authors as it gives too much power to the trolls. I know they won't change the system any time soon, but I'd really like to see it all replaced with a simple recommend check box. Then the authors can collect recommendations instead of stars. There doesn't have to be anything negative about it.

Best wishes to you all.

This wouldn't convey anything useful, however, to readers, who are interested in searching for high-rated stories. The number of recommendations wouldn't be of any use because they would be a function of total views rather than a mark of relative approval.

Any suggestions for changing the scoring system must keep in mind that a scoring system exists for the readers, not the authors. Our needs are secondary.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

This wouldn't convey anything useful, however, to readers, who are interested in searching for high-rated stories. The number of recommendations wouldn't be of any use because they would be a function of total views rather than a mark of relative approval.

Any suggestions for changing the scoring system must keep in mind that a scoring system exists for the readers, not the authors. Our needs are secondary.

Quite so, but while I agree with your general point, troll-skewed scores serve the readers no better than they do the writers.

Not sure there is a viable solution.

 

[SimonDoom]

Quite so, but while I agree with your general point, troll-skewed scores serve the readers no better than they do the writers.

Not sure there is a viable solution.

Agreed. And I agree with your second point too: I've had bright-eyed ideas about how to change things in the past but the more time goes by the less convinced I am that there's a good solution.

 

[blozo]

How about requiring a written justification for a one or two star score?
Say a minimum of ten words or so. This would discourage people from serial one bombing through proxy servers and allow a review to quickly remove the patently ridiculous.

 

[Hypoxia]

This wouldn't convey anything useful, however, to readers, who are interested in searching for high-rated stories.

I see no evidence that readers search for high scores.

 

[KeithD]

I see no evidence that readers search for high scores.

Posters to the board frequently over the years have said they don't read anything that doesn't have a red H. That would be searching for high scores. And if posters to the board are doing it, there quite likely are a lot of readers doing it who don't ever come to the discussion board.

 

[Hypoxia]

Posters to the board frequently over the years have said they don't read anything that doesn't have a red H. That would be searching for high scores. And if posters to the board are doing it, there quite likely are a lot of readers doing it who don't ever come to the discussion board.

As I said far above, my high-scored have few readers. Posters may post what they want. I see no evidence to support the contention. YMMV.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I see no evidence that readers search for high scores.

My higher scored stories slowly creep higher over time and their view rates increase more than my low scored stories, where the scores for the most part remain static. That is, more people are reading my higher scored stories than the low scored ones and continue to rate them, and do so at a disproportionate rate. That's logical to me: if they like my stuff readers are rating it in a positive feedback sense. Most human behavioural systems bias that way, I think; rankings over time skew to what people like most. That's on an evidence base of 78 stories/chapters over five years, over a spread of categories.

 

[ElectricBlue]

How about requiring a written justification for a one or two star score?
Say a minimum of ten words or so. This would discourage people from serial one bombing through proxy servers and allow a review to quickly remove the patently ridiculous.

Novel idea, but wouldn't it just lead to more comment bile, not less? Mind you, it would eliminate those who can't write .

 

[Voboy]

I see no evidence that readers search for high scores.

Back before I wrote here (ie, before I understood the system from our side), I first and foremost searched for red H stories. And I read A LOT of stories over more than ten years. I didn’t join and never thought of posting anything on any of the forums, which I didn’t know existed. I certainly never starred anything.

I have no reason to believe I was an unusual reader then. I’d assume there are faceless thousands who search out red Hs exclusively.

 

[oggbashan]

Back before I wrote here (ie, before I understood the system from our side), I first and foremost searched for red H stories. And I read A LOT of stories over more than ten years. I didn’t join and never thought of posting anything on any of the forums, which I didn’t know existed. I certainly never starred anything.

I have no reason to believe I was an unusual reader then. I’d assume there are faceless thousands who search out red Hs exclusively.

And there are a few who try to ensure that an author's red H doesn't last, particularly when on the New List.

 

[GroverLang]

Abolish 1 and 2 stars.

How about requiring a written justification for a one or two star score?
Say a minimum of ten words or so. This would discourage people from serial one bombing through proxy servers and allow a review to quickly remove the patently ridiculous.

A simple way would be abolish 1 and 3 stars which, although not very good with technology myself, I would imagine would be fairly simple. I would imagine five boxes would still show but anyone clicking 1 or 2 would find it doesn’t turn yellow.

The trolls would still vote 3 but that wouldn’t harm the ratings as much as now.

 

[oggbashan]

A simple way would be abolish 1 and 3 stars which, although not very good with technology myself, I would imagine would be fairly simple. I would imagine five boxes would still show but anyone clicking 1 or 2 would find it doesn’t turn yellow.

The trolls would still vote 3 but that wouldn’t harm the ratings as much as now.

My anonymous trolls post a comment to justify the one star.

But, if one doesn't know Literotica, it would be reasonable to assume that all votes from 1 to 5 have equal weight. They would have, if a Red H was set at 3.00. While it is at 4.5, a 1 or 2 vote disproportionately affects the Red H.

 

[SimonDoom]

I see no evidence that readers search for high scores.

I think the evidence is strong that they do.

First of all, I search by score. It's not the only basis for searching, but it's one of them. It makes sense to me to do so, and I assume it makes sense to others as well.

Second, as KeithD points out, many people write that they look only for stories with red H's.

Third, as EB points out, stories with higher scores tend to draw more views over time. This is very plainly true among my 24 stories. I have a three chapter Exhibitionist series. Chapter 3 has a significantly higher score than Chapter 2, and although it initially had far fewer views, over time it has caught up to and passed Chapter 2 in views. I assume that's because of the significantly higher score, and possibly its higher placement on toplists. There's no question whatsoever that appearing on a toplist boosts a story's visibility and reads, and to get on certain toplists you must get a high score.

Finally, it's common sense. There are ratings systems for everything. It's illogical to assume that they play no role in people picking books, music, TV shows, etc., etc. Many people may ignore ratings, but many pay attention to them.

I've been reading stories here for over 15 years and I think it's obvious that a story score IS an imperfect but useful indicator of story quality. You have to make allowances. Some authors are trolled and downvoted more than others. Some have their scores boosted by enthusiastic fan bases whose tastes may be different from mine. Some categories enjoy higher mean scores than others (Loving Wives is low). Later chapters in long series tend to receive higher scores but lower votes than standalone stories or early chapters. Very short stories tend to receive lower scores, although they may receive many views. Longer stories tend to receive higher scores -- those who like a long story are more likely to finish it and vote on it.

But once you control for these things, it's obvious to me that there is, on average, a difference in quality between a story that gets, say, a 4.7 and a story that gets a 4.2. If I had to choose between a dozen standalone exhibitionist stories with a score over 4.7 and a dozen standalone exhibitionist stories with a score under 4.2, knowing nothing else about them, I'd pick the former group, and I'd be smart to do so. I might miss a few gems under 4.2 that, for whatever reason, received unfair votes, but the probability is that the former group will, on average, be better. Searching by score, after making certain allowances, makes sense to some extent.

I've read some of your stuff and I scanned your story list. It's very long, so there's a lot of data, but it would be a challenging database to analyze for story scores because you write in many categories and you have many multi-chaptered series. It's obvious that your story database reflects the general phenomenon that later chapters tend to have higher scores but fewer views. If you did not take that into account, you might assume there's no relationship between higher score and more views, but that would be an error. Your Loving Wives stories, like everyone else's, receive lower average scores than your other stories. You cannot compare your LW stories with stories in any other category.

 

[gordo12]

You cannot compare your LW stories with stories in any other category.

So true.

25 stories in each hub.

Loving Wives Hub: not a single story above 4
mostly 2 & 3 votes
highest 3.94

Incest Hub: only two stories below 4.
One of those stories is @ 3.92
6 stories have red H's

My gut feeling is that the average penalty for writing in LW is around .25 - .50 points. (on a good day)

 

[KeithD]

As I said far above, my high-scored have few readers. Posters may post what they want. I see no evidence to support the contention. YMMV.

Perhaps if you looked at more than just your file. Actually, I don't understand what your point is in relationship to there being readers who are guided in reading selection by whether stories have a hot rating--because there actually are. They've posted they do. There are posters on this thread alone giving testimony that they have.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Really?

Novel idea, but wouldn't it just lead to more comment bile, not less? Mind you, it would eliminate those who can't write .

You haven't seen the illiterate, mindless scrawls on some boards, have you?