Over-ambitious vote sweep?

[29wordsforsnow]

In the past few days I noted that quite a number of votes I gave stories, poems and artworks have been removed - some even a second time after I voted again. As it happened quite drastically today to some of my own published works, I'm wondering if the sweep algorithm isn't working too aggressive now, while it has been very relaxed until recently.

It's quite sad to see especially niche works like non-erotic poetry or artwork loose votes as they rarely get more than a handful, some now reset to zero votes at all

While I do understand that reading a dozen stories of 30k words in one day, appreciating them and leaving votes is quite extraordinary, it's very doable with a dozen poems or drawing.

Maybe there is a way to find a compromise between relaxed and aggressive behavior of the sweeping?

But I'm also open for discussion on this.

 

[LexxRuthless]

I'd noticed a discussion thread on this in the Author's Hangout a few days ago, and saw that I had lost 1100 votes from my stories since the last time I had saved my story stats:

http://forum.literotica.com/showthread.php?t=1528484

I just went back through and built an Excel file to track all the votes for all my stories from each time I'd checked my stats, and found I have been losing votes consistently for three weeks now. This includes stories that were published two years ago or more. Overall, my stories have enough votes that the scores have remained about the same, but it is cause for concern. The vote loss continues, and eventually that will leave my stories much more susceptible to malicious down-voting.

 

[29wordsforsnow]

I'm highly frustrated, re-rated some works of different authors now for the third time. Will they vanish again next week? Has it become suspicious to leave more than one rating per day?

 

[Leenysman]

Losing almost as many votes to the sweep(s) than I got for the past 3 months

I haven't released a new story for a while, but do still get votes on my existing ones, which I track on a spreadsheet, capturing the end of each month. Today, my vote total is almost back down to where it was at the end of April - if they keep dropping, it will soon have neutralized three months worth of votes. I've seen more stories drop in score than rise.

 

[Leenysman]

The other issue is the discrepancies between the votes/ratings in our stats and the ones that show up in the Top Rated lists. I've got one story that shows 35 votes and a 4.80 average in my stats, but the Top Rated 12-month page for that genre shows 37 votes and an average of 4.73. It's at position 151 on that page, but if it were listed at 4.80, it would be in the top 50. I assume those 2 low votes were deleted by a sweep, but why not in both places? Increased sweep activity is only going to makes these discrepancies worse.

 

[bushyTrail]

The other issue is the discrepancies between the votes/ratings in our stats and the ones that show up in the Top Rated lists. I've got one story that shows 35 votes and a 4.80 average in my stats, but the Top Rated 12-month page for that genre shows 37 votes and an average of 4.73. It's at position 151 on that page, but if it were listed at 4.80, it would be in the top 50. I assume those 2 low votes were deleted by a sweep, but why not in both places? Increased sweep activity is only going to makes these discrepancies worse.

This thing is getting out of control, really... I have a story that used to have 91 votes and was close to be admitted in the Hall of Fame (which requires 100 votes) and now it's back at 88. Those 3 votes may not seem much, but they took almost as much months to get! (it's a niche genre)

 

[Salacious_Scribe]

The other issue is the discrepancies between the votes/ratings in our stats and the ones that show up in the Top Rated lists. I've got one story that shows 35 votes and a 4.80 average in my stats, but the Top Rated 12-month page for that genre shows 37 votes and an average of 4.73. It's at position 151 on that page, but if it were listed at 4.80, it would be in the top 50. I assume those 2 low votes were deleted by a sweep, but why not in both places? Increased sweep activity is only going to makes these discrepancies worse.

Different parts of the site update/refresh at different rates. The author page is the most accurate and updates instantly.

 

[Leenysman]

Different parts of the site update/refresh at different rates. The author page is the most accurate and updates instantly.

I expect that, but the vote discrepancy between my author page and the Top List for this story has existed for months.

 

[LexxRuthless]

STILL losing votes. Lots of them. I was assured in the Author's Hangout that this was a result of ongoing contests, but those have closed. My 59 entries have lost a combined 1435 votes in the past month, and they have been losing votes daily. I haven't submitted anything new in that time, and only a couple of my most recent entries have wound up garnering more votes than they have lost.

What the hell is going on?

 

[soulhouse]

The sweeps seem to be acting most peculiarly at present.

I've only published two stories: one about 9 months ago and a follow-on chapter about 3 months later. They've both had an average of about one to two votes a month for the last 4 months or so.

After being at 4.51 for 135 votes in mid April, and gaining or losing a vote here or there and sticking at 4.5 since, the first story has suddenly dropped from 139 to 133 votes today with a score of 4.48, so losing its magical hot tag. It's clearly been mildly affected by sweeps over the last few months, so why 6 votes from a long time past would suddenly become suspect, I have no idea.

More peculiar though is the voting movement on the second chapter. That had been stuck on 4.69 for 48 votes since late January, very slowly rising with almost no voting changes to 4.7 for 54 votes on 22 July. Then suddenly on 23 July it rose to 4.75 while dropping to 52 votes, so I assumed a sweep had removed two votes and raised the score by .05. Then a week later it gained a vote and dipped to 4.74, and then another few days later it has lost a vote and dipped still further to 4.73.

What were fairly stable scores and voting patterns seem to be going haywire at the moment, although on nothing like the scale other more successful writers are experiencing, of course.

 

[Leenysman]

Losing good votes

It's most annoying when you can definitely tell that what the sweep is deleting is 5 votes, rather than malicious 1s.

Here are the last few end-of-month numbers for one of my stories and today's numbers. Because it has less than 100 votes, calculating the total stars is easier than on a story with more votes:

4/30: 4.72 x 67 votes = 316 stars
5/31: 4.70 x 69 votes = 324 stars : +2 votes, +8 stars, either 5+3 or 4+4. Average drops
6/30: 4.65 x 72 votes = 335 stars : +3 votes, +11 stars, either 5+5+1, 5+4+2, 5+3+3, 4+4+3. Average drops
7/31: 4.65 x 71 votes = 330 stars : -1 vote, -5 stars, avg unchanged, but only because of rounding up.
Now: 4.64 x 67 votes = 311 stars : -4 votes, -19 stars, equaling 3 5s and a 4. Average drops

So, which is more representative of the story? The five new votes averaging just 3.8, when the story had been in the 4.65-4.72 range for more than a year previous? Or the five votes averaging 4.8 that were removed?

Just, WTF, Lit? We authors provide you content for free and these ratings are our main reward (unless we manage to win one of your contests) and you take away the better votes instead of the bad ones?

 

[ElectricBlue]

Just, WTF, Lit? We authors provide you content for free and these ratings are our main reward (unless we manage to win one of your contests) and you take away the better votes instead of the bad ones?

Boosting votes (ie: fives) can be just as fraudulent as one bombs. Over zealous fans with "not so helpful fives" are just as bad as trolls who don't read a story but drop a one-bomb.

It's happening to everybody, across the site, so the relative value and meaning of story scores, overall, is the same.

Consider it a great purge of scores that were probably fake in the first place, by whatever criteria the site uses to clear its drains and gutters.

You just need to encourage your readers to vote once after they've read the whole story, not come back and give it a quick score later, and not to vote multiple times.

 

[Leenysman]

These were votes on a year-old story

Boosting votes (ie: fives) can be just as fraudulent as one bombs. Over zealous fans with "not so helpful fives" are just as bad as trolls who don't read a story but drop a one-bomb.

They CAN be fraudulent, but were they?

This particular story was already a year old at the end of April and the last of its series, so there haven't been any new chapters to prompt anyone to read the older ones and the two stories I've posted since have been in other categories. Of the five votes the story received since April, at most three of them could have been 5s, but only if accompanied by a 3 in May and a 1 in June. A more consistent result would have been two 4s in May and two 4s and a 3 in June. Which is fine, even if that lowered the story's average.

Yet, the sweeps in July and August eliminated four 5s and a 4, a full 1.0 difference in average from the five votes in May and June. Thus, at least one of the eliminated 5s had to be an older vote, if not all of them, if I didn't actually collect any more 5s after April.

I don't ask my readers to vote in any way and in this case I didn't even ask for constructive criticism, because it was the series ending and I was glad to be done with it. I don't see why someone (or multiple someones) would have been motivated to leave fraudulent 5 votes (and why a 4?). Or even how they would go about it.

It just leaves me feeling that I'm being punished for someone else's fraud.

 

[ElectricBlue]

It just leaves me feeling that I'm being punished for someone else's fraud.

Why personalise it? It's happening across the board, so it's affecting every writer (in proportion to their vote count, obviously).

So what if it's a year old? Someone just left a comment on one of my stories, and it's five years old. Happens all the time, and kicks up every time I release something new - folk wandering through my back catalogue. I'm just thankful they do so.

 

[lovecraft68]

They CAN be fraudulent, but were they?

This particular story was already a year old at the end of April and the last of its series, so there haven't been any new chapters to prompt anyone to read the older ones and the two stories I've posted since have been in other categories. Of the five votes the story received since April, at most three of them could have been 5s, but only if accompanied by a 3 in May and a 1 in June. A more consistent result would have been two 4s in May and two 4s and a 3 in June. Which is fine, even if that lowered the story's average.

Yet, the sweeps in July and August eliminated four 5s and a 4, a full 1.0 difference in average from the five votes in May and June. Thus, at least one of the eliminated 5s had to be an older vote, if not all of them, if I didn't actually collect any more 5s after April.

I don't ask my readers to vote in any way and in this case I didn't even ask for constructive criticism, because it was the series ending and I was glad to be done with it. I don't see why someone (or multiple someones) would have been motivated to leave fraudulent 5 votes (and why a 4?). Or even how they would go about it.

It just leaves me feeling that I'm being punished for someone else's fraud.

As it was explained a few years ago, but now not repeated in fear its teaching the trolls something they don't already know...the sweep is imperfect. If there is a handful of suspicious 5's it takes them, but often times some legit votes are erased with it. Same with 1's...there are such things as a real one bomb someone can hate your story enough to do it...but the sweep will take most of them

So, it is unfair in a way. The site could go a long way towards fixing this by doing away with anonymous...want to comment or vote? You need a user handle and screw the 'privacy' thing...my name isn't lovecraft68 on my birth certificate.

Granted some people will create a few handles to multi-vote, but you need an individual e-mail for each one and its a lot of hassle.

But the site will never do that, instead it continues to do a lot of extra work that they could render unnecessary. Same for comments...you'd lose a lot of hate filled spew if they had to even provide a fake name.

 

[Leenysman]

As it was explained a few years ago, but now not repeated in fear its teaching the trolls something they don't already know...the sweep is imperfect. If there is a handful of suspicious 5's it takes them, but often times some legit votes are erased with it. Same with 1's...there are such things as a real one bomb someone can hate your story enough to do it...but the sweep will take most of them.

What isn't being explained is why it seems to be much more aggressive lately. It used to be I'd see a few deleted votes a month or two after posting a story, but just for that story. Now it is deleting greater numbers of votes and touching all stories, even going back to my very first story in 2016, which lost 5 votes last month and 3 this month and has dropped in average as well. So, either there have been a lot more suspicious votes of late or the criteria were changed. Based on it hitting older stories, my instincts say it's the latter. It would be nice to hear the admins confirm that there was a change, even if they withhold what the new criteria are. And I'd also like an explanation for why it seems to be the source of disrepancies between the rating averages we see on our dashboards and what shows on the Top 250 lists.

I would certainly like to see the anonymous voting and commenting ended. The handles should be enough.

 

[Salacious_Scribe]

I'd also like an explanation for why it seems to be the source of disrepancies between the rating averages we see on our dashboards and what shows on the Top 250 lists.

Different parts of the site update at different intervals.

I would certainly like to see the anonymous voting and commenting ended. The handles should be enough.

On your author dashboard, click your icon then click options and my options tab. You can turn off anon comments. All votes are anon. No way to see who voted on your story. You can turn off alll voting if you want.

 

[Leenysman]

Discrepancies exist long-term

Different parts of the site update at different intervals.

That's the second time you've said that on this thread and, while it's true as a statement, it's still irrelevant to the issue -- the discrepancy has existed for months and still exists today. That is not explained away by site update frequency.

In particular, the story I mentioned on Aug 3rd has since gone up by 1 vote in both places, yet still has a 2-vote difference. So, it's clear that the top list DID update yet still has 2 more votes than my dashboard. The average went up in both places, too, reflecting that the new vote had to be a 5.

And it's not like the 2 extra votes are 1s, to have been obvious sweep targets. They appear to be a 3 and a 4, based on the difference in the averages. Just enough to pull the average down from 4.81 with 36 votes to 4.74 with 38 votes, so that the story is in the 120s on the list, instead of top 20.

 

[gordo12]

I have to agree. I've been watching my stories drop all week as votes disappear. Much more than usual. Usually a sweep increases the score but in this case...

Sample: Story from April 2019. Previous 1,474 votes. Score 4.49. Now 1,471 votes. Score 4.47. That means only 5 votes are getting exorcised.

I've lost approx 50 votes in the last week and given the way the scores are dropping it seems they're all 5 votes.

 

[LexxRuthless]

I have to agree. I've been watching my stories drop all week as votes disappear. Much more than usual. Usually a sweep increases the score but in this case...

Sample: Story from April 2019. Previous 1,474 votes. Score 4.49. Now 1,471 votes. Score 4.47. That means only 5 votes are getting exorcised.

I've lost approx 50 votes in the last week and given the way the scores are dropping it seems they're all 5 votes.

That's...not actually accurate. You can only compare the number of votes that are showing between snapshots. Each of those stories might have had additional votes, and a larger number swept away than you realize. If you typically get a vote per 100 new views (this varies greatly, you can figure out what your stories typically get), then a story with 300 new views should have gotten ~3 more votes. If it is showing 2 fewer votes, it probably lost 5.

Also, this is happening EVERY DAY and has been for at least a month and a half now. If you just look at your overall numbers across all your stories, you are missing just how many votes your stories are losing. Older stories are being hit a little bit harder than new stories, but the impact is greater on stories with fewer votes overall.

 

[gordo12]

That's...not actually accurate. You can only compare the number of votes that are showing between snapshots. Each of those stories might have had additional votes, and a larger number swept away than you realize. If you typically get a vote per 100 new views (this varies greatly, you can figure out what your stories typically get), then a story with 300 new views should have gotten ~3 more votes. If it is showing 2 fewer votes, it probably lost 5.

Also, this is happening EVERY DAY and has been for at least a month and a half now. If you just look at your overall numbers across all your stories, you are missing just how many votes your stories are losing. Older stories are being hit a little bit harder than new stories, but the impact is greater on stories with fewer votes overall.

Thanks for your effort however I've been monitoring that particular story daily for months. It's a holiday theme and only gets a lot of traffic around that time of year. It's been hovering just under the H level for a long time and I can tell you day to day the changes. At that score level it needs 5 votes for it to move up. Those votes keep coming in till it hits 4.49 and then a sweep drops it again to .47 or .48. Because I monitor that one daily I see those sweeps. That makes no sense to me that so many 5 votes have been removed and understand again it has been going on for months. And I also didn't mention that in the last few weeks virtually every singe story in my portfolio has been taking the same 5* hits and the scores (all above 4) reduced.