Voters ambush!!!!!!

[qqnforyou6]

Voters really get me! My new story in the non-consent catagory "I Know WHO You Did Last Summer Ch 2" held steady for a week at 4.80. Its is kind of funny how at the end of the month when it comes down to contest time my rating tumbles like a rock to 4.72 with just a few votes. If that contest is that important to you then I will shut of my votes!

 

[Un-registered]

Voters really get me! My new story in the non-consent catagory "I Know WHO You Did Last Summer Ch 2" held steady for a week at 4.80. Its is kind of funny how at the end of the month when it comes down to contest time my rating tumbles like a rock to 4.72 with just a few votes. If that contest is that important to you then I will shut of my votes!

I used to post stories on here (under a different nom de plume). Then I disagreed on one of the boards with a self-opinionated person and suddenly every one of my stories had a 1 vote on the same day!

Now I post on a more civilised board where any vote below 5/10 has a compulsory feedback to explain it. If you post a low vote the board forces feedback, and (surprise, surprise) very low votes are rare. Moreover they don't run a monthly contest among published stories, so there is little incentive to spike other people's stories, unless you are a top-10 junkie. Their contests are run separately (ie, entry preceeds posting) and have independent judges.

Unfortunately Lit is now so large that I suspect it is beginning to suffer from big-itis and any change is just too difficult.

 

[its Leslie]

You know Unregistered has a point, in that a vote that is not accompanied by any means of feedback justification SHOULD be discarded out of hand.
But I would extend this to include 5s, as well as the more obnoxious 1s and 2s.

After all, a 5 is a very serious compliment. It might also be biased favouritism.
If you think a story merits a 5 then surely you can justify it as well.

A 3 is middle of the road, and personally, I think the vast majority of material here at Lit is middle of the road (my stuff included).
If my material was routinely a 5, I would not be wasting it on Lit for free, you would have to buy my works at a bookstore eh.

I think a 4 is a nice way of saying "hey I liked your story".

But as was mentioned, perhaps Lit is now to big to adopt any change. Then again, so what.

I don't have voting engaged for the simple fact, I write for laughs and have no desire to gain anything more than amusement out of anything I submit.
I have not nor likely ever will be interested i n any of the contests here. Given the desire to write a "serious" piece of literature, I will be attempting to interest a paying source in it.

If it wins a real world award, hmmm that I will aknowledge.

 

[Angeline]

Feedback

I have mentioned this on other threads, so I apologize for repeating it, but feedback is the only meaningful way for me to judge readers' reactions to my postings. Numeric votes can be arbitrary. For all I know, someone gave me a 1 because they disagreed with an opinion I posted here on the boards or they don't like my AV.

Hi Leslie!

 

[its Leslie]

Hmm I became a Guru and didn't even notice heheh.

Hello Ang

Dang I kinda liked being called Really Experienced though.

 

[PaulX35]

A few repeated thoughts

Opening stories for voting means that you agree to throw yourself in front of everyone's appreciation. That can be based purely on the quality of your work, the reader's assumed understanding of it, or be a downright political vote to push you out of a contest. If you don't want that, disable voting.

I understand the problem addressed here but with a site so big the voting is just "the people's" vote. No more, no less.
If you want true and substantial comment on the quality of your work, I'd advise Story Feedback Forum.

Paul

 

[its Leslie]

Hey when do I get to pick my own meaningless under my name identifier eh?

 

[Quasimodem]

Hey when do I get to pick my own meaningless under my name identifier eh?

You have to wait untill you are twice as Guru-Some!

 

[Killswitch]

Hi Gang,
Something I am curious about is:how many times one can post a vote for their own stories.

I must admit to selfishly voting for each of my own posted materials one time. I gave them an honest, and modest score because I believe they are as yet unfortunately; mediocre at best.
But I have seen some stories that have rating like 4.8, and higher that with all due respect....just are not that great.
Which leads me to believe that authors are perhaps voting thier own stories to death, or resurection as the case may be.

If it is possible to vote more than once on a particular story, I emplore the admins to make it so only one vote can be cast from any one internet protocol address.

I am very new here as a contributor, but I am already beginning to place very little stock in the rating system.

Not because my scores are mediocre, but because some score's I believe are inflated.

And honestly, I am getting most of my feedback and judging the quality and turn on factors of my stuff, from friends here, and friends abroad. Including my wife, which is neat in its own respect.

Your thought's?

Killswitch

 

[its Leslie]

Lit has software in place so I am told to prevent anyone including the author from voting more than once period.

Now of course if you yourself vote a 3 or 4 you are only possibly shooting yourself in the foot.

I would recommend not voting at all on ones own stories.

If you vote a 5 you are not doing yourself any favour inflating your rating. And if you vote a 3 or 4 you are actually hurting your possible rating eh.

 

[deliciously_naughty]

if you try to vote more than once on a story you get a "I'm sorry you have already voted on this story" page. Also Laurel edits for fraudulent voting.

However, here's the thing unreg...winning a monthly contest isn't the be all and end all of your life. It would be amazingly cool, yes....but you can hardly worry about your rating. Eventually most stories' ratings drop, for whatever reason...it's hardly a conspiracy.

Take comfort in your feedback, which is much more valuable. Or take smug pride in your number of views. And of course, if you shut off voting then (a) you don't have to deal with the voting changes and (b) don't have to worry about the contests.
There are some positives to be had there.

 

[Angeline]

Votes

We are having this same conversation on the poetry board, and one of our poets, Rybka--a terrific writer--said something very funny. Also dead on.

Rybka said:

Also, don't pay any attention to any "votes". They have a practice of expiring like frequent flier miles, but at random intervals.


I have almost enough votes to choose my own title. I feel like I about to knight myself.

 

[its Leslie]

I think if I ever get to the point I can choose my own title I will post a thread and make it a voted process by my Lit community buddies heheh.

 

[Angeline]

I think if I ever get to the point I can choose my own title I will post a thread and make it a voted process by my Lit community buddies heheh.

I thought about that but decided I didn't want to see the write-in votes.

Some guy once called me a "complex unfathomable beastie." I deeply regret that that is too many letters to use--I really like it.

 

[wildsweetone]

you could shorten it to

C U B

 

[Laurel]

Like I've said many times, if you see suspicious voting on any story - yours or another's - PM me with the story name & author and I will look into it as soon as I can.

 

[Laurel]

You know Unregistered has a point, in that a vote that is not accompanied by any means of feedback justification SHOULD be discarded out of hand.
But I would extend this to include 5s, as well as the more obnoxious 1s and 2s.

I agree. The idea that low votes should be justified in writing but high votes should not be is illogical, as in my experience the most common vote fraud by far is up-voting, not down-voting.

Also, if I really wanted to 1-vote a story because I hated the author or to win a contest, I would leave a 1-vote along with a harsh critique of the story.

Requiring readers to comment on their votes would reduce the number of votes vastly. Making readers jump through hoops to register their votes will discourage legitimate votes while those who wish to commit fraud will work around the system.

The idea that vote fraud is unique to Literotica is also ridiculous. Any large site - from MSNBC to Yahoo - has vote fraud issues. Vote fraud is also not unique to the Internet.

There is no system on this planet that will stop voting fraud 100%. Internet voting is even more problematic that in person voting.

And in my opinion, voting on art is an odd concept to start with.

Don't take the voting so seriously. We added the voting system at the request of authors, not because we personally believe it to be the definitive judge of the worth of the story. Written feedback from readers along with feedback from other writers is much much more useful.

As for contests...We give away prizes because though we can't afford to reward every author that contributes to the site, we feel compelled to give something back for all that you people do. If the contests and voting upsets you unnecessarily, you have the right and ability to turn off voting on your stories. Participation in contests is not mandatory.

Hope this helps.

 

[Guest]

Re: Re: Voters ambush!!!!!!

I used to post stories on here (under a different nom de plume). Then I disagreed on one of the boards with a self-opinionated person and suddenly every one of my stories had a 1 vote on the same day!

Now I post on a more civilised board where any vote below 5/10 has a compulsory feedback to explain it. If you post a low vote the board forces feedback, and (surprise, surprise) very low votes are rare. Moreover they don't run a monthly contest among published stories, so there is little incentive to spike other people's stories, unless you are a top-10 junkie. Their contests are run separately (ie, entry preceeds posting) and have independent judges.

Unfortunately Lit is now so large that I suspect it is beginning to suffer from big-itis and any change is just too difficult.

If you left Literotica because you think it's an inferior site & you found another 'better' place to be? Seems you're here under a pseudonym to promote other sites while deriding this one. Very classy.

 

[Un-registered]

If it is possible to vote more than once on a particular story, I emplore the admins to make it so only one vote can be cast from any one internet protocol address.

There are four problems with (and associated with) that idea.
1. If you use an internet cafe (or a work terminal) then only one user can vote from there. Conversely you can go round town to be really vicious from many URLs.
2. If there is more than one user in your home then only one of you can vote on any given story. My partner and I both read Lit but have different tastes.
3. Some ISPs have standard URLs which are allocated on a random basis to their users. So the same user does not have the same URL every time.
4. If you do it on registered user ID, then reading without using your logon ID (kill the cookie) allows unlimited voting.

I understand the problem addressed here but with a site so big the voting is just "the people's" vote.

I would believe that if stories regularly got more than a handful of votes from 10,000 reads.

On the same theme, how can the "top reads" story have 600,000+ reads from about 150,000 members? Does that indicate that there are a million or more readers who are not members?

If you left Literotica because you think it's an inferior site & you found another 'better' place to be? Seems you're here under a pseudonym to promote other sites while deriding this one. Very classy.

I am here under a different pseudonym. Furthermore I do not "promote" other sites. I deliberately did not name the one I now use from hundreds of others.

 

[Guest]

Out of curiosity.........

Speaking of votes/scores etc. I happened to notice today that all my stories/votes/rankings page has disapeared. I'm hearing from a few other author's that they're experiencing this as well.

Anyone else notice this?

Laurel...? Is someone doing maintenance on this program or something?

I remain,

 

[Guest]

BTW.........

Try not to let it get to you too much. Had a new story post this morning....was doing great for quite a while with a fair number of readers/votes given.

Then as usual, and predictibly so....it's fallen like a rock with just a few more simple votes given afterwards. Once there's enough to "post" it and show it on the higher level rankings, that's about when you can be sure it's gonna fall. And usually does in a hurry.

So don't be too surprised.......or let it get to you too much. Even I admit sometimes it does, particularly if I feel like I've written a pretty good story which is supported by the feedback recieved.

But keep in mind...it generally happens to everyone.

I remain,

 

[Ishmael]

I agree with several previous posters.

There is no real way that this site can prevent voter fraud. Just can't be done on a site such as this. Many methods around any 'rule'.

The "justify low votes" requirement sounds good on the surface. However all it really does is compress the range of the votes and spares some feelings.

Be content for the 'views' and the feedback. Those are the important things to an author. Prizes are nice, but sales is king.

I wonder how many of the top 'voted' stories are in the "anthology"? Now there's a goal.

Ishmael

 

[deliciously_naughty]

if you think that people hate you enough to make a concerted effort to go to numerous computer cafes and such just to give you ones, you must have pissed off some people in a major way.

Just saying.

 

[its Leslie]

Hey if any one DOES actually figure out how to make the voting system work here, sell the idea to the US electoral office eh, you could make a lot of cash perhaps.

And I thought chad was some yuppie asshole with a girlfriend named buffy eh.

 

[KillerMuffin]

Lit gets 70,000 to 75,000 unique hits a day, or so it did in August. I don't find it hard to believe that people don't register with the site. Other than submitting stories and the BB there really aren't perks to go along with registration. Chat registration is on a different server, I understand.

I could, quite frankly, care less about voting anymore. I leave the stories turned on and the How-Tos turned off. I don't want people giving anonymous, blank opinions on my advice. They either take it or they don't. I used to get my panties in a twist over voting every single day, but I rarely check my votes anymore. I don't think they're much of a measure of quality. Their only purpose is to get me on the toplists so people will find the old stories. The simpler and more effective method is to write a new story and post it. People like it, they find older stuff.

*shrugs*

I'm not inclined to believe that there's as much malicious voting going on as people think. I believe that authors develop a following. People look for their stories and vote them generously because they like the author and generally the story. Then once someone hits 25 votes and sits on the top half of the first page of the top list, people will open the story. If it's not what they like, and it rarely is, they vote accordingly. No mystery, no conspiracy, just people wondering why that story was up there. It's happened to my stories and that's what I believe.

I know there are some authors and some zealous fans who commit fraud on a regular basis. I think this not nearly as prevelant as those of us who prefer not to think of our writing as less than satisfactory would like to believe.