some things never change

[MysteryWriter]

The second novel I allowed voting on hit the big board at a perfect five. Within ten minutes somebody dropped a one on it. I know I am not supposed to let it bother me. Hell, I even knew it was going to happen. However in spite of what we all say it does matter.

Some son of a bitch whether it is a teenager, a writer, or just a general asshole managed to degrade about six months work from a real vote to his idea of fun. I swear, I am going to track the prick down and shoot his ass. roflmffao. now i feel better.

I propose a new thread. One where the authors can post answers to anon feedback good and bad. Also one where we can point out such petty bullshit as that. I never vote for my own story but I am going right now to give tracker's moon a five. And just for the hell of it I am going to go see if I cant find half a dozen other people to do the same. Just to pull the bitch back up.
if it was an author I hope his keyboard catches fire. It if was some kind of jerk off reader I hope his prick rots off. roflmao. Gee that felt good to say.

I really was trying to be nice but now to hell with it. I have said what I feel and I got a few more things to say too. Ah that can wait. And yes, i will save everyone the trouble. Mysterywriter is an arogant prick.

 

[Whispersecret]

I empathize with your frustration. However, you've been around long enough to know that the value of your work is not accurately shown in voting totals.

Just as many low votes are bogus, so too can high votes be unsubstantiated. Ask Killer Muffin. Sometimes a loyal fan base can "auto-five" something that isn't up to par with your usual fare. It goes both ways.

Besides, it's a possiblity that someone really does think your novel is shitty. I haven't read it, so I don't know for sure, but you have to admit that the possibility exists. It's not a given that the 1-vote was malicious.

And just for the hell of it I am going to go see if I cant find half a dozen other people to do the same. Just to pull the bitch back up.

I must say that I this is wrong. You are entitled to vote on your own story, yes. But to encourage friends to vote up a story to counterbalance negative votes? That is just as wrong as someone encouraging friends to down-vote something for no valid reason.

 

[MysteryWriter]

answer to whisper

I must have written ten versions of this reply. I don't have enough friends to make a difference in the score of my novel. But if I did I would have had them voting last night to even the playing field and give the novel a chance.

I am not calm enough to write more.

 

[MysteryWriter]

one more try...

Do I think someone found my novel 'Shitty'? No, I don’t. I also don't think that I am a great writer. I will tell you what I do think. I do think that anyone who gets a piece deserves bettert than a bomb. I think a person who opens a story and finds it not to their taste will close it, and move on. They won’t take the time to go to the end and vote. I do not think a vote of one is a real vote. Of course my little outburst pretty much makes any voting of tracker questionable. I do not think this thread reaches anyone, but in my mind the vote is tainted.

The thing that usually happens to a story I write is that it gets its fan votes up front. That is what happened with 'Tracker's Moon'. Then it gets the general readers votes and settles slowly into the spot where it belongs. Most of my stuff runs around 4.0 to 4.65. That is what I expect of something I put some effort into.

Once the attention I caused by this little outburst is over, tracker will settle there with less than a thousand reads. That is what I expected to happen and still do. On the other hand that does not make bombing a story right. I must confess, I am not above trying to get even. I am not the better person. The problem is trying to separate the good guys and the bad guys. I don’t want to hurt the good guys, so I am just plain mad at the world. Mad yes taking action no. By the way there is no rule that says because we write, we have to be victims.

I still think that a place for authors to answer anon feedback is a good idea. Most of us just try to ignore it. I think it would be a good idea to write the response in a place someone just might see it. They can search for their feedback answer while staying anon.

By the way I realize that no one can change the system without stopping the vote all together. No one wants to see that. Finally, I find it amusing that Killer Muffin is the authority you quoted. I am sure Muffin is a great writer, as we all are here. I would have expected you to quote the bible at me for the ‘turn the other cheek’ bit though.

 

[Ray Dario]

My Experiment

MysteryWriter, I feel your pain! (hehe ever since Clinton was elected the first time I have wanted to say that. Yes, I am a frustrated old man )

I got so frustrated with the voting here and watching my stories maintain high marks right up until they hit the "Top Lists" pages and then suddenly go from a 4.90 with 10 votes to a 3.6 with 15 votes in a matter of minutes and then slowly climbing back up to nestle around a 4.5 or so. So I created a new me. Another login which no one knew was really Ray Dario. I carefully avoided making any posts to the board, not making any new enemies for this new writer. I submitted a story under the new name, not using a editor so in theory it should not have been quite as well written as the stuff I submit as Ray Dario.

The same thing happened. 5.0 with 10 votes down to 4.33 with 12 votes up to 4.44 with 15 votes and now at 4.50 with 81 votes. Do I think that my story deserved a 5, no, but like you I know it didn't deserve the 1's.

I believe I know what is going on, but I have no proof and therefore will make no accusations but there is a rat at Lit and I wish Laurel and Manu could figure out an easy and elegant solution to this problem, but I don't think it is likely. This person, or these people are just like spammers and script kiddies. They have no personal integrity, no moral character, no redeaming traits whatsoever. They are the bilge of humanity. They are worth less than the dog shit you wipe from your shoes. The only known material more despicable than them are divorce lawyers

I assume, since it happened to my new persona who couldn't have made any enemies on the boards, that it is happening to everyone other than those responsible, so I discount the voting for those who are obviously immune and look at my stories in relation to everyone else and while I do that I seek feedback and comments from others here so that I can become a better writer. Maybe someday I'll be good enough to prove myself wrong about there being a rat at Lit.

Ray

 

[MysteryWriter]

thank you

After the first response, I was beginning to think I was just paranoid. I am glad to know that I am not the only one to take the hit though I am sorry that anyone is taking it.

maybe a three number system is going to be the answer. 3= i loved it- 2= I liked it - 1= i hated it. If that were the case the bomber would have no more power than the person who honestly did not like a piece...

 

[Rumple Foreskin]

I like your idea, MysteryWriter, about a 3 point voting system. It might be interesting to see the vote distribution. I've got a hunch "2" would be the least voted number.

For me, the voting is interesting and I'd like to see it done right. But it's the feedback and critiques, especially those coming from other writers, which keeps me slinking back.

Rumple Foreskin

 

[MysteryWriter]

i love that term

I love that slinking back term. It is how I felt about coming back here to post stories. But you know much as I was embarrassed about coming back I missed this place. It has the most readers though the lowest voting percentages. Well it seems that way. Except for the last piece of trash I posted. I have almost ten percent votes on Wagon (Shameless plug there). but it has the lowest scores and very low readers. I think the reason is because it was so short. Dont know what if anything that says about the attention span of the readers.

 

[karmadog]

Voting. Bah!

I write very little erotica, so take all of this with a grain of whatever you like. I've read some of the stories that had very high rankings and, quite frankly, I wouldn't want my stories associated with a couple of them. Not because of subject matter, but because they were really badly written. I will name no names. Voting probably means very little anyhow. I think that most of the readers are probably high school kids with their puds in their hands and very little in their heads. The opinions that matter will come from the boards.

 

[Tatewaki]

Karmadog;

It's true that I'd rather take good feedback instead of high votes. However, on Literotica, high votes ensure more readers for your story. No one can dispute that being on the Top Lists generate more hits for your story submissions. Once your story moves off the "New" listing, it vanishes into the slushpile, never to be read again, unless you have a loyal following built up.

Nothing feels worse than a story that has taken you over a month to write getting 30 or so votes and maintaining an average of 4.7, then suddenly, inexplicably, being slammed with a slew of consecutive 1 votes that lower it to a 3.8 average. The stories do eventually creep back up, but it still kills your ego.

Couple that with the feedback I got from one guy that said as long as I kept on writing stories with niggers as protagonists, he and his buddies would keep on low-voting all my stuff, and you can see why I am leery of the entire voting process. Why would racists bother reading interracial stories, anyway? It's too bad that bastards like that actually know how to work a mouse and keyboard. I could do without ever hearing from them.

Anyway, that's my two cents. The present voting system may suck, but it's all we have. I'd much rather have my stories rate 4.5 and higher than a middling 3.0. It doesn't matter what I might think of the voting process, I still get off when I see one of my stories earn a little red "H," and cry when some low-voting scumsucker robs me of it in the next 24 hours. I try not to let it determine the worth or quality of my work, but it is hard to discount the only real feedback I get on my stories.

Regards,

-T

 

[MysteryWriter]

exactly

wish I had said that

 

[MaxSebastian]

Cheer up, guys!

The stories you have written that enter the 'slushpile' won't be completely unread!

The thing to remember is that if one of your stories is in the 'new' list, you'll get people enjoying your story (if it is a good story) and they will then want to read more of your stories. So then they will go to your author list and look up previous efforts of yours that are wallowing in the so-called slushpile. Since you can't see voting scores on the author list, they won't be put off just because some Nazi nutter has given you one votes - they'll want to read more because they enjoyed the story of yours that they already read.

So the secret is to keep writing, keep getting stories on that new list. And the better your writing gets, the more attention you will attract to your other stories. So you won't have wasted your efforts on your older stories at all!

It's a kind of trickle-down effect, really. And it's how you get one of these mythical 'fanbases' that everyone around here seems to promise all the time. Every time I put a new story up, I get new readers, and they often go on to read my other stuff.


Cheer up, keep writing and everything will be rosy!

 

[KillerMuffin]

Buck up, MW. You've got the wrong site to display your works. People come here for hot sex, you don't give it, they usually back click. Sometimes they vote.

I'm a crappy writer. I'm sitting somewhere in the middle of the bottom half of the pack. It's a good thing I don't believe my own press, good or bad, isn't it.

NOTHING can be done to prevent bad voting simply because it's impossible for vote counters-- human or computer-- to know what the voter's intention is. A 1 vote from someone who didn't like the story is just as valid as a 5 vote from someone who loved the story. A 5 vote from someone who is supporting a friend or favorite author is just as wrong as a 1 vote from someone who is just trying to drag things down.

Personally, I believe the absolute best way to stop voter fraud is to remove the temptation to commit it. Get rid of voting. If that's unworkable, then next best thing is to get rid of tangible rewards to voting. Get rid of monthly contests, get rid of top lists, get rid of lists. There will be vote fraud, but not nearly as much. The only other solution is to put up with the status quo. Why? This is an anonymous site. You are not required to verify exactly who you are to join it. No one would if they had to, would they? Therefore there is no way to verify that each single vote has integrity. There never will be. You remember the Kevin Costner movie? If you build it, they will hack it.

Be frustrated, yes, turn off your voting feature, even better. You're a much better writer than the frustration is worth. You write mysteries, not pornography.

 

[karmadog]

I'm with KM. As far as I'm concerned they can turn off the voting, but I think Laurel and Manu would be against that. The vote system ensures that readers can log on and find a stroke story that worked for thousands of others. This leads to happy viewers who are more likely to return and give more views to the ads.

Even on a free site, business cannot be forgotten.

My point remains. I learn much more from reading the BBs than I could possibly learn from any amount of voting.

 

[Tatewaki]

MaxSebastian said

Cheer up, keep writing and everything will be rosy!

Words to live by.

-T

 

[MysteryWriter]

I cant believe this

Hard to believe but I am calm and I agree. There is nothing that can be done short of dumping the contest and best boards. That is not reasonable. Long as they can they will continue to do it because we will continue to write here. I stuck up a new story that will hit the board soon. I expect the exact same thing to happen to it. Fortunately it will not go up at that high a spot. Maybe it will just not be noticed.
anyway the feedback has been great lol.