Sweep glitch?

[tomlitilia]

I just noticed a story of mine lost about 100 votes from around 520 to 421. Said story was in the top 10 of its category, and the highest ranked that wasn't a chapter of a long series. Now it's dropped way down into forgetness. I don't normally pay attention to sweeps, and I understand literotica won't tell us what the rationalle behind sweeps are. But this was just dodgy, and I'd like to know wtf is going on. Did the sweep really think the story got 100 dishonest votes, most of them 5? Did anyone else notice weird behaviors?

 

[BelleCanzuto]

I just noticed a story of mine lost about 100 votes from around 520 to 421. Said story was in the top 10 of its category, and the highest ranked that wasn't a chapter of a long series. Now it's dropped way down into forgetness. I don't normally pay attention to sweeps, and I understand literotica won't tell us what the rationalle behind sweeps are. But this was just dodgy, and I'd like to know wtf is going on. Did the sweep really think the story got 100 dishonest votes, most of them 5? Did anyone else notice weird behaviors?

It's very interesting to me that you mention this. A few weeks, maybe a month ago, that happened to one of my stories in a similar situation. It was a lot fewer votes (10) but the story only had 73 votes to start with. Score beforehand was 4.9+ and it was in the top list for the year (not enough votes to make all time top list). After the event, 63 votes and a score under 4.7.

In the intervening time, a couple of votes have appeared and disappeared, and now the score is within 0.05 of the high.

I have no idea what really happened, and of course I only noticed it because it was my highest rated story. Two other stories of mine went through similar fluctuations, but neither were quite as dramatic.

 

[lovecraft68]

This is just a guess, but it has been done in the past. Some yahoo or yahoos whose favorite story/author was supplanted in the top lists upload a boatload of fake fives knowing the next sweep will pull them away.

Every time a sweep happens some legit votes are also removed as its not that precise and a hazard of the process, so now you're story drops big time.

The trolls used to bomb the shit out of stories, but they realized the sweeps would take away the bombs and the score would post back up. They're now going the other way.

If the site required creating a username and got rid of anon it would cut down on this type of behavior, because it would make multiple voting harder, but that's never going to happen.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

This is just a guess, but it has been done in the past. Some yahoo or yahoos whose favorite story/author was supplanted in the top lists upload a boatload of fake fives knowing the next sweep will pull them away.

Every time a sweep happens some legit votes are also removed as its not that precise and a hazard of the process, so now you're story drops big time.

The trolls used to bomb the shit out of stories, but they realized the sweeps would take away the bombs and the score would post back up. They're now going the other way.

If the site required creating a username and got rid of anon it would cut down on this type of behavior, because it would make multiple voting harder, but that's never going to happen.

+1. We can dream.

 

[Vix_Giovanni]

I just noticed a story of mine lost about 100 votes from around 520 to 421. Said story was in the top 10 of its category, and the highest ranked that wasn't a chapter of a long series. Now it's dropped way down into forgetness. I don't normally pay attention to sweeps, and I understand literotica won't tell us what the rationalle behind sweeps are. But this was just dodgy, and I'd like to know wtf is going on. Did the sweep really think the story got 100 dishonest votes, most of them 5? Did anyone else notice weird behaviors?

This literally is the exact same thing that happened to a story of mine! It was #1 in its category until this past Thursday; and then, I just hit refresh as I watched the votes go down the toilet until I finally shut off voting. In the end, the story lost .04 points and more than a hundred votes. It felt disappointing and hurtful and confusing and unfair, and there’s no one to complain to about it. When it was happening, I remembered that about a month before, BrokenSpokes made the same complaint that his stories had lost more than a hundred votes and the general response was just “Well, that happens sometimes in sweeps.”

This is just a guess, but it has been done in the past. Some yahoo or yahoos whose favorite story/author was supplanted in the top lists upload a boatload of fake fives knowing the next sweep will pull them away.

Every time a sweep happens some legit votes are also removed as its not that precise and a hazard of the process, so now you're story drops big time.

The trolls used to bomb the shit out of stories, but they realized the sweeps would take away the bombs and the score would post back up. They're now going the other way.

If the site required creating a username and got rid of anon it would cut down on this type of behavior, because it would make multiple voting harder, but that's never going to happen.

+1. We can dream.

Thanks so much for this explanation, LC. If that’s really a tactic going on, it’s quite strategic. I wonder if it’s happening now that the monthly contests have been revived?

I agree with you and TP, but doubt it will ever happen.

 

[SamScribble]

We have these discussions about once a month.

Would it be unkind of me to point out that the scores on Lit are a bit like the traffic lights in Italy: just a suggestion.

The scores are not being awarded by anyone with a deep understanding of story-telling, character creation, language, composition or anything else of that nature. They are being awarded by readers of smut - many of whom have probably not even read the story they are scoring.

Yes, it's frustrating. But it is the way it is.

 

[ElectricBlue]

"Helpful-fives" get found just as much as one-bombs, and get deleted. The vote scrubber bot will be looking for the same patterns of false behaviour, just looking high as well as low. With a little bit of thought it's not hard to figure out how it all works.

Whilst it might be disappointing to see those votes disappear and your story go "down", it's the same maths going on as the trash votes being eliminated and your story goes "up". Folk don't get upset about the latter, so why should they get upset about the former?

Be content that you've got something in the Top List, I'd say. Your story, now, is probably close to its true rating, so be content with that.

From how I've seen the sweeps evolve, I'd say the site is staying ahead of the game now, and is removing the dross fairly equitably.

Removing anons from the voting pool might help, but then anons might not be inclined to leave comments, and I'd never want that to happen, ever.

 

[ElectricBlue]

My most recently published story started out around 4.7. The score had been yo-yo(ing) around 4.5 the first 24hrs. Now it's about 4.2. What I find odd is that I've been gaining "favorites" and more "followers" as the score has been dropping. Not sure what that's about - an inverse relationship.
(shoulder shrug)

The Red H brings in readers, readers become followers, followers are what you want.

Favourites are like chocolates on the pillow, a kiss on the cheek, they're a bonus. They mean something to me when I go see the favouriter's list - if it's short, that means something; if the favourites list is endlessly long, not so much. I don't want to be like every other writer they've read.

What astonishes me, though, is the length of some of those lists. That's in a way sad, people reading all those stories, is that their only world? Does anybody else ever think that? Are we writing to fill voids? I know I do, mine included.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

The Red H brings in readers, readers become followers, followers are what you want.

Favourites are like chocolates on the pillow, a kiss on the cheek, they're a bonus. They mean something to me when I go see the favouriter's list - if it's short, that means something; if the favourites list is endlessly long, not so much. I don't want to be like every other writer they've read.

What astonishes me, though, is the length of some of those lists. That's in a way sad, people reading all those stories, is that their only world? Does anybody else ever think that? Are we writing to fill voids? I know I do, mine included.

Yeah. In every way.

 

[yukonnights]

The Red H brings in readers, readers become followers, followers are what you want.

Favourites are like chocolates on the pillow, a kiss on the cheek, they're a bonus. They mean something to me when I go see the favouriter's list - if it's short, that means something; if the favourites list is endlessly long, not so much. I don't want to be like every other writer they've read.

What astonishes me, though, is the length of some of those lists. That's in a way sad, people reading all those stories, is that their only world? Does anybody else ever think that? Are we writing to fill voids? I know I do, mine included.

I'm totally befuddled by the Favorites List. Like you, I usually go take a look at their list of stories, and some are unbelievable in the number. I don't put much stock in them. Seems they are either using it as a bookmark — or they are marking stories to pirate onto some other site. On those long lists, I don't think they even read the story — just grabbed it and stashed it away for some unknown reason Now Favorite Author, that's another thing

 

[SimonDoom]

Said story was in the top 10 of its category, and the highest ranked that wasn't a chapter of a long series. Now it's dropped way down into forgetness.

No.

This is the attitude you have to purge. Don't get wedded to scores. A drop in score doesn't mean your story has become unimportant. Don't care too much. You're a good writer -- so is Vix, who's said something similar -- and nothing that the impenetrably confusing scoring system of this site has done to adjust the ratings of your stories can affect that. Enjoy your scoring successes, but don't let yourself get bothered when the score inexplicably drops, or when it doesn't meet whatever arbitrary goal you've set. Most of your scores have red Hs. You're doing well.

One of my personal favorites among the stories I've written has never had a red H. It's never cracked that barrier. But it gets many views every day, three years after publication, and I know that among those views are readers who enjoy and appreciate it. That's much more important to me than having a silly number attached to it. Why care about a silly number?

 

[LupusDei]

Okay, I will share here my own weird scoring observation. And no, I still don't have any story of my own, but I do frequent E&V category, and I don't normally pay much attention to scores...

But there is a certain story several parts of with had hold positions in the Hall of Fame for a few years (despite it being unfinished here -- and it's available commercially in full and sequels, it seems). I'm still patiently waiting for at least the end of the book one to drop here eventually, but after four new chapters published within about 3 years there had been silence for over a year now.

So when I someday noticed it gone from the top list, my first thought was, "whoa, got it deleted altogether?" I bothered to go and check the author's page. It was still there, but every single chapter had a score of exactly 4.75 ! All ten of them! With was still quite high, one might say, but a big drop from the 4.95+ they lingered in for over two years. The weirdest thing of course was the exact some nicely rounded score displayed ten times in a row. Now it was quite long ago again, and the scores were creeping upward again when I checked. I went over to look just now; still very uniformly 4.79 - 4.80 except one part that somehow had dropped to 4.74.

But to bring ten parts of a story to uniform accurate score... Unless we assume the site did it for some strange reason (punishing a "tease"?), that's quite a feat of manipulative voting, and it haven't been cleared.

 

[RejectReality]

Anything that's on the first page of a toplist is going to be subject to the yo-yo manipulation of trolls and overzealous fans. Those who are voting 5s for you may very well be voting 1s on someone else.

The first thing you should look at is whether the large sweep is a result of a recent monthly contest announcement. If your story was published in one of those recently announced months, that's why the large sweep happened. Monthly contest sweeps are about the same as themed contest sweeps. They cut deep.

I've said it many a time, but the number of votes swept off my stories ( and more importantly, the number of 5s swept ) decreased dramatically when I started regularly informing my readers I didn't want any "help" in the form of multi-voting my stories or down-voting anyone else's.

Each person doing it feels its just a little thing. Just an extra 5 for you to help you out. Just a 1 bomb on someone positioned above you to move you up in the rankings. The problem is when several of them start doing it, it adds up. When several authors' fans are doing it at the same time, they're working against each other. That's going to trigger some of them to take it to another level, and become truly malicious voters in an attempt to get the upper hand.

But in my experience, telling them to stop it works.

 

[LWulf]

I find it humorous when I see an author favorite their own work, and/or themself as a writer. Such a person might likewise 5 star their own work anonymously. If so, they might 1 star the competition.

I don't lose the race to rats who get caught in ticking traps.
It's a tool, it's handy, that's all.

 

[BelleCanzuto]

I've said it many a time, but the number of votes swept off my stories ( and more importantly, the number of 5s swept ) decreased dramatically when I started regularly informing my readers I didn't want any "help" in the form of multi-voting my stories or down-voting anyone else's.

Each person doing it feels its just a little thing. Just an extra 5 for you to help you out. Just a 1 bomb on someone positioned above you to move you up in the rankings. The problem is when several of them start doing it, it adds up. When several authors' fans are doing it at the same time, they're working against each other. That's going to trigger some of them to take it to another level, and become truly malicious voters in an attempt to get the upper hand.

But in my experience, telling them to stop it works.

I really can't imagine that I have any fans zealous enough to significantly 5bomb me, or go out of their way to 1bomb someone else.

 

[KeithD]

RR always likes to assume it's fans. I have no trouble assuming there are a lot of authors who give themselves all the help they can.

 

[SamScribble]

RR always likes to assume it's fans. I have no trouble assuming there are a lot of authors who give themselves all the help they can.

I only have five fans. I think we can put the damage down to random one-bombers.

 

[KeithD]

I only have five fans. I think we can put the damage down to random one-bombers.

Surprisingly, you aren't the only author here.

 

[JaxRhapsody]

This is just a guess, but it has been done in the past. Some yahoo or yahoos whose favorite story/author was supplanted in the top lists upload a boatload of fake fives knowing the next sweep will pull them away.

Every time a sweep happens some legit votes are also removed as its not that precise and a hazard of the process, so now you're story drops big time.

The trolls used to bomb the shit out of stories, but they realized the sweeps would take away the bombs and the score would post back up. They're now going the other way.

If the site required creating a username and got rid of anon it would cut down on this type of behavior, because it would make multiple voting harder, but that's never going to happen.

They could also just remove anon voting and make it an account only ordeal. Might not stop it completely, but might putna nice dent in it.

 

[KeithD]

Coulda, shouda. A Lit. discussion board discussion for the decades.

 

[RejectReality]

If they're boosting themselves or cutting down the competition, they know they're doing it. They're also likely to understand that they got caught when their scores take a massive tumble and/or the score of their competition spikes.

If they're here asking what happened, that's probably not the case.

RR always likes to assume it's fans. I have no trouble assuming there are a lot of authors who give themselves all the help they can.

Anybody out there who doesn't believe you have fans or fans who might develop an unhealthy obsession with "helping" you would do well to consider the possibility. The first fan who told me they were multi-voting happened when I was struggling to get ( and keep ) 10+ votes on my stuff as Dark over a decade ago.

You don't need legions of fans for a few ( or when your vote totals are that low — one ) to cause your score constantly dip every time the Hoover comes by.

 

[KeithD]

Anybody out there who doesn't believe you have fans or fans who might develop an unhealthy obsession with "helping" you would do well to consider the possibility. The first fan who told me they were multi-voting happened when I was struggling to get ( and keep ) 10+ votes on my stuff as Dark over a decade ago.

You don't need legions of fans for a few ( or when your vote totals are that low — one ) to cause your score constantly dip every time the Hoover comes by.

That doesn't respond to your quote from me. I didn't post anything suggesting fans aren't involved. You haven't posted anything suggesting that the authors themselves are involved--and that's what my post was suggesting. Who has the most to gain from rating manipulation? The author. You always seem to slide away from that when it comes up--as you do here.

 

[RejectReality]

The response was above your quote. If the author is boosting themselves, they're probably not going to come here wondering why they had a huge sweep that tanked their score.

That's the subject of this thread.

If you're not engaging in shenanigans, and your score is dropping frequently during sweeps, then you either have a fanbase problem, or you're profoundly unlucky.

The first you can try to do something about.

You can't modify the behavior of other authors boosting themselves or bombing you. They're working for themselves. Fans believe they're working on your behalf. When you tell them you don't want it, most of them adhere to that request in my experience, which yields positive results.

Unless someone demonstrates they're probably a scumbag who will boost themselves and cut down the competition, I choose to assume they're not. I also tend toward not bringing up author shenanigans, because it can make the OP or others chiming in feel as if they're being accused of it.

There's also the fact that it has normally already been mentioned, or inevitably will be. I see no point in joining that chorus when I doubt anyone thinks every author is above reproach. As you said, the author has the most to gain from gaming the scores, so it's a conclusion that almost anyone will immediately arrive at.

I choose to focus on a possible contributing factor that people may not have considered, which you can take steps to mitigate yourself.

 

[KeithD]

If you're not engaging in shenanigans, and your score is dropping frequently during sweeps, then you either have a fanbase problem, or you're profoundly unlucky.

But a reasonable explanation is that the author her/himself was engaging in shenanigans that plumped up the score. The author is the one benefiting. Come on, you can say it. When all else fails, try common sense. We're talking about wanting to be on the top lists, and anyone monitoring closely their top list position, wants to be on the top lists.

And this can be mitigated by the author her/himself.

 

[RejectReality]

No, I won't.

Wanting to be on the toplists for the increased readership ( or even just the warm, fuzzy feeling of accomplishment ) it provides does not equal doing whatever it takes to get there. Being upset when you fall out of that position of dramatically increased readership is a natural reaction. It's even more understandable when it happens overnight as the result of a large sweep.

Unless I see evidence to believe otherwise, I'm taking the posts at face value.

But a reasonable explanation is that the author her/himself was engaging in shenanigans that plumped up the score. The author is the one benefiting. Come on, you can say it. When all else fails, try common sense. We're talking about wanting to be on the top lists, and anyone monitoring closely their top list position, wants to be on the top lists.

And this can be mitigated by the author her/himself.