Regression To The Mean

[sirhugs]

Opps, my bad!

but when she's bad, she's really really good...

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

Do you check those citations? Because they are known to make them up.

The ones I did check were valid, but I wasn't looking for depth at that moment, so...

 

[Bramblethorn]

Before assuming that your highly-rated story is being vindictively down-voted, be aware of this common fallacy:

Regression Fallacy

I suspect that's often the "reason" that highly-rated story scores tend to drop. And having a high rating means that the regression will happen quite fast because more people look at high-rated stories than low-rated ones.

A few years back I posted some simulations of how story scores can drift over time, but it looks like the attachments got stripped at some point, maybe in the forum migration. Just as you say, sometimes what looks like a successful story being bombed is just a had a run of luck in the early votes, regressing towards its long-term mean.

I'm not denying that bombing does occur too, but I think people are often too quick to assume bombing as the explanation for a drop without considering other possibilities.

 

[SkyBubble]

I can't help wondering what you consider a better candidate for that accolade.

For lists and things like that, Wikipedia is pretty good. For any contentious topic, it's awful.

 

[ruddygore]

Ah, Wikipedia, the most accurate website on the entire internet!

It's not a bad place to start, but you have to stay aware that it has volunteer editors that may have an axe to grind on the subject.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Again, it was a joke.

It's not a bad place to start, but you have to stay aware that it has volunteer editors that may have an axe to grind on the subject.

 

[TheWorldBuilder]

All the bits I wrote were accurate. Unfortunately, there's no way to prevent future Wiki-editors from messing around with them.

 

[Kelliezgirl]

A few years back I posted some simulations of how story scores can drift over time, but it looks like the attachments got stripped at some point, maybe in the forum migration. Just as you say, sometimes what looks like a successful story being bombed is just a had a run of luck in the early votes, regressing towards its long-term mean.

I'm not denying that bombing does occur too, but I think people are often too quick to assume bombing as the explanation for a drop without considering other possibilities.

I've had a story start out in a rather disappointing manner, and slowly climbed up to a rather respectable score. I'm not going to complain that I got "5 bombed".

 

[Britva415]

Do you check those citations? Because they are known to make them up.

They don't get away with it for long, though, because people do check them.

I'm not saying nothing ever gets by, but sourced statements is a feature, not a bug.

 

[alohadave]

They don't get away with it for long, though, because people do check them.

I'm not saying nothing ever gets by, but sourced statements is a feature, not a bug.

This was in reference to the AI providing sources, not Wikipedia.

 

[TheRedChamber]

I'm guilty of this myself. For a story to hold an average of 4.5 it needs to get seven 5 votes to every one 1 vote. So, I sit there hitting refresh going "it's going UP, it's going UP, it's going UP, it's going UP, it's going UP, UP, UP, damn it it's back where it started..."

 

[Statius]

Again, it was a joke.

There's no joking on LitE allowed. All statements MUST go through hair- splitting arguments to the nth degree, for days and days, until the next joke or generalized statement is made. It's a rule. I looked it up on Wikipedia so it's true.

 

[TheWorldBuilder]

The contents of Wikipedia do NOT need to be true, it is more important that they are verifiable. Look it up, it's in their policies.

 

[DeMont]

I actually think that people tend to naturally temper their opinions based on other people's opinions - so a person's voting score will be "pulled" towards its existing average -- people prefer to agree with the consensus. And obviously there's the "friends, family and followers" effect for new stories.

@nice90sguy,
The group convener of a writer's group I was in, somewhere around 2004 I believe, summed up such a phenomenon as "the sheeple effect", (Sheeple of course being people who followed the trend) It was their opinion, when it came to entering regional writing contests, that the people judging the contests came to 'know and love' certain authors while looking down on others regardless of the piece of work before them. This contest situation, it would seem, might be seen in the same light.

The only thing that I can suggest as a means of countering these effects is to have an "Established Panel" of judges who could be relied upon to render (more or less) fair and reasonable verdicts free of personal bias. This would alleviate the twenty person vote up (4.92 or whatever) rating which after the fact could be seen to be a much lower vote score than it actually took to win the contest.

The only other thing to do would be to hold the contest open until each entry had received a pre-determined number of views, say fifty. When the limit of views had been reached close the entry to further voting. Naturally, the problem there would be what if a story didn't get fifty views?

A conundrum either way you look at it I think.
Respectfully,
D.

 

[DeMont]

However, while I didn't put my usual , one might assume I was joking, as smart-assed remarks from me are almost always jokes.

@MillieDynamite,
Didn't I tell you that sense of humour was going to get you in trouble one day? Oh, I didn't, I'm sorry, my bad, I was going to, honestly, really...!
Respectfully, always (no joke!)
D.