The Official Authors' Hangout Summer Lovin' 2025 Contest Support Thread

[NotWise]

Out of interest - I looked at the top stories with the 'Summer Lovin 2025' tag (NOTE - this is only a minority of stories and will not give you a complete 'leader list' for the comp), and sorted them by Views, Favourites, and Ratings. The categories of those stories are below. The top viewed in that list (in Taboo / Incest) has 53K Views and a rating of 4.18. The most favourited (also in Taboo / Incest) has 57 favourites and a score of 4.62. The highest rated story (in Mature) currently has a score of 4.79 but only 13K views (as we all know, scores will change as the sweeps happen).

The prizes (less than 2% of entries will get a prize) are awarded on scores, but for me this is a reminder that if you care about people reading and appreciating your work, ratings are not everything. Although it's hard to avoid thinking that a good Taboo/Incest story can scoop the pool for all criteria!

By the way, please nobody be tempted to game the system by bombing stories that have used the tag. I noticed one on my story today, even though it's not even eligible to win anything. I'm sure others will have had the same. There's a special spot in the frozen ice of Dante's 9th Circle of Hell for anybody who does this...

I was amused to see my story, posted in one of the dustiest corners of Lit, show up near the bottom of your "most viewed" list. I think that shows the contest effect, and maybe the effect of a catchy name.

 

[Actingup]

I was amused to see my story, posted in one of the dustiest corners of Lit, show up near the bottom of your "most viewed" list. I think that shows the contest effect, and maybe the effect of a catchy name.

That's one of the arguments for participating in contests, isn't it? Yours is a really nicely written story and it's getting the exposure that it deserves from people who don't normally read that category.

 

[NotWise]

That's one of the arguments for participating in contests, isn't it? Yours is a really nicely written story and it's getting the exposure that it deserves from people who don't normally read that category.

It's an advantage it you use it.

A good title is important to getting views in a contest, because the title is almost all that people see. If your story is in a busy category, but the title is blah, then it might feel like the contest got you no more views than you'd get from the category alone.

I say "feel" because, even with a blah title, the weeks of exposure on the contest page will probably still give you more views than you'd otherwise get, but it won't feel like much because of the way the votes trickle in.

 

[BryanRichardson]

Acting Up (or anyone else) - can you download stats? I started recording details about my stories before contests to see if there is much effect on my previous stories, but it seems like effort to do that.

 

[Actingup]

Acting Up (or anyone else) - can you download stats? I started recording details about my stories before contests to see if there is much effect on my previous stories, but it seems like effort to do that.

 

[BryanRichardson]

View attachment 2562927

Nice!

 

[bosombuddies]

View attachment 2562927

Thanks! I had no idea you could do this

 

[Not2Pervy]

Speaking as an author who used the “summer lovin 2025” tag I feel it accomplished little more than painting a giant target on my back, and that all the truly savvy contestants were wise enough to avoid that mistake.

Despite earning a score that traditionally is nowhere near high enough to win a contest I’m pretty sure I attracted a couple of bombers of the “1, 2, or 3” variety.

I also noticed that a simple open search for “summer lovin 2025” returns all the stories announcing in an author’s note that their story is a contest entry.

It will be interesting to see if the eventual winners end up being those who chose to “fly under the radar” by avoiding either means of easy identification.

 

[Jamie6977]

Welcome to:
The Official Authors' Hangout Summer Lovin' 2025 Contest Support Thread

A weekend at the beach, a campsite in the forest, a hike along the Appalachian Trail, cheap seats at the ball game, a bucket of beer and a back yard full of friends, these are all signs of summer and I'm sure you have more. While our friends in Oz are scraping frost off the windshield and thawing out the drop bears, up north we're tossing tube steaks on the grill. Either way nothing say summer like a hot keyboard and an overworked imagination!

Let's go!

Summer Lovin' (summertime) themes: warm weather, county fairs, summer activities, outdoor concerts, beaches, bikinis, camping, etc.

It's all about June to September!

Schedule of activities:
Starts: August 15
Closes: September 5
winners announced: September 12

Please ensure you have "SUMMER LOVIN 2025" in the Notes to Admin field.

This thread is to SUPPORT and ENCOURAGE authors to enter stories in the 2025 Summer Lovin' Contest. Bring out the squirt guns, the inflatable mattresses, and the sunscreen, and open yourself to some sizzling summer Fun Times!

Just remember, it has to be summer related - not necessarily beach related.

As Ogg always tells us, there is an advantage to entering stories in one of Literotica's themed contests. Apart from the possibility of winning, your story gets far more exposure and attention than it would typically receive.

Wait for Laurel's notice of the start of the contest as a sticky at the top of the Authors' Hangout before submitting and follow the instructions in that thread.

Good luck and have fun!

I saw someone mention in a comment on a story about seeing where their story was in the daily rankings. However, I haven't been able to find anything that shows the current rankings of stories. I know the admins have to do some sweeping of ratings to become final, but just curious if there is somewhere that shows the current, unofficial rankings.

 

[StillStunned]

The category pages (old design at least) show "recently popular" lists for Today, Last 7 Days and Last 30 Days.

Those don't have anything to do with the contest, but they're the only daily rankings I can think of.

 

[NotWise]

The site doesn't publish rankings until the contest is over.

Up until a few years ago I was able to gather ratings for stories listed on the contest page and construct a ranking. I never published it (probably for the same reason the site doesn't publish it), and I lost the ability when the site changed the format of the public profile.

 

[RoyalAuthor]

Probably for obvious reasons. The second your story showed up at the top of the list it would get bombed down.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Probably for obvious reasons. The second your story showed up at the top of the list it would get bombed down.

I have one story that keeps clawing its way onto page one of its category’s top list. It then magically loses at least 0.02 points. As it accumulates more and more 5s, my assumption is that the vandals have to work harder and harder to drag it onto page two.

 

[Voboy]

The site doesn't publish rankings until the contest is over.

Clarification: it never publishes more than the top three ranked stories.

 

[FrancesScott]

I know the submission window has closed, but I just sent Laurel a new Summer-themed First Time story, one that I couldn’t get finished in time for the competition, but which I saw no point holding over for next year. It’s called, I Belong To Her. Hopefully it will be live in a few days.

 

[yowser]

Contested entries are now final, another lengthy group of summery indulgences complete. Hopefully some of the characters learned something, or at least enjoyed themselves.

One Hundred and Sixty-six entries (one story dropped out for unknown reasons) in 22 categories.

Big winner is (surprise) Taboo/Incest with 28 offerings.

Followed by:

24 EC
14 Romance
12 Mature, and Lesbian
11 GS, and LW
9 GM, and Voyeur
7 First time
5 Transgender
4 Fetish, and NC
2 Non Human
3 Anal, Interracial, and Sci-Fi
1 each for Humor, Illustrated, Mind Control, Novels, and Toys/Masturbation

16 writers did more than one story, including one summer-happy author with 9.

This ought to keep us reading well into the next season. Congratulations to all the warm-weather enthusiasts.

 

[Actingup]

Winners announced tomorow! Good luck everybody - not everybody can win a prize, but hopefully we've all had some appreciative readers and feedback, and hopefully also the score sweeps will deal with any unfair bombing that's happened. What a huge crop of stories to work through - I've still got a heap on my 'to read' list.

(I haven't seen any sign of score sweeps yet, but maybe others have? If not, it might be a big day tomorrow.)

 

[NotWise]

Announcement is the day after tomorrow on this side of the date line.

I had one 4* vote swept last night.

 

[HuckPilgrim]

I had one 4* vote swept last night.

Wow, how can you know this?

 

[NotWise]

Wow, how can you know this?

I have a little program that monitors changes in the votes on my stories. When conditions are right I can back out the actual votes. In this case the number of votes dropped by one and the change in the votes was -4.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Minor sweep went through. My Summer Lovin’ story isn’t a contender, but it went up, along with a few other recent stories.

 

[StillStunned]

Minor sweep went through. My Summer Lovin’ story isn’t a contender, but it went up, along with a few other recent stories.

Dammit, does that mean I have to go back and bomb you again?

I don't have a story in the contest, but "Black Boots" lost a couple of votes and went from 4.74 to 4.82.

 

[EmilyMiller]

Dammit, does that mean I have to go back and bomb you again?

Sorry to make work for you…

 

[WeShallUnclench]

Hehe, yup. Like clockwork: the number of votes goes down, and the score goes up. So apparently we DID have another cohort of fraudulent votbombers on our hands.

 

[yowser]

Oy. Eight votes removed, score goes from 4.45 to 4.67.