Yo Authors, Check This Out!

[Laurel]

http://www.literotica.com/forum/showthread.php?postid=347394#post347394

 

[HSWriter]

Wonderful!

 

[Madame Pandora]

Okay...

I think this is a REALLY GREAT IDEA.

(...but...)

I *SO* do not want to be the bad guy concerning ANYTHING regarding voting ever again. So...please consider this just a couple of QUESTIONS - they are not voiced as complaints or a criticisms.

1) When you say "vote totals" do you mean the number of votes, or do you mean the rating? Because one story can have 30 votes and a 4.6 rating, while another has 300 votes and a 4.5 rating. This creates a "judgment call" situation.

2) What if a story is posted toward the end of a month (say, the 26th of February) and it doesn't get high votes until the following month. Is it still considered a February candidate because it was posted in that month, or will it be eligible under March?

Also - I want to toss out a scenario.

Let's say Story A posts in "Erotic Couplings" on March 15th. It gets 200 votes in March. It then gets an additional 200 votes in April. Now, a different story - Story B by a different author got 300 votes in March, while a third story - Story C got 250 in April.

You have:

Story A - 200 votes in March, 200 votes in April
Story B - 300 votes in March
Story C - 250 votes in April.

Under the plan, Story A, which has more votes gets no automatic nomination.

Now, please. Before you start to moan and say "here comes the bitch" let me say that I think this is a GOOD idea and it is a start to address some of the concerns expressed by authors concerning the nominations. This is not going to be an exact science and all plans have revisions and there will always be judgment calls. I am CERTAINLY NOT SUGGESTING that this will happen in every category every month. I can't even say it would happen at all for certain. I am just asking if anyone has considered these possibilities and if the "judgment calls" on the issues are prepared to be made.

I should also say that it is a big part of my JOB IRL to evaluate strategies and plans and look for possible conflicts that may arise down the road. I know some people look at it as "the glass is half empty" thinking but I look at it like "working to keep the glass half full to be certain no one runs out of water."

I like the idea, I think it is a much fairer system, but you are also looking at people requesting their stories be posted at the start of a month, etc.

Now, go ahead, flame away.

MP

 

[Laurel]

1) When you say "vote totals" do you mean the number of votes, or do you mean the rating? Because one story can have 30 votes and a 4.6 rating, while another has 300 votes and a 4.5 rating. This creates a "judgment call" situation.

Sure does. And in that case, the one with 30 votes would probably still get the nomination because 30 votes is a good deal of votes. However, if it were 10 votes/5.0 and 300 votes/4.8, then the 300 votes one would be nominated. Depends on the situation. Both numbers will be taken into context when making the decision. Only we have access to the actual monthly vote totals, and they're usually pretty cut & dried.

2) What if a story is posted toward the end of a month (say, the 26th of February) and it doesn't get high votes until the following month. Is it still considered a February candidate because it was posted in that month, or will it be eligible under March?

Generally, a story gets the bulk of its votes in its first 2-4 days on the site. After that, it may get MORE votes, but it's vote average is not likely to increase. In other words, if a story gets a 4.2 average with 25 votes in its first two days on site, it's not likely that an extra day or so is going to rise significantly. We have to have some sort of cut-off date - not just for the awards, but also for future contests. I don't think this will be a problem.

Let's say Story A posts in "Erotic Couplings" on March 15th. It gets 200 votes in March. It then gets an additional 200 votes in April. Now, a different story - Story B by a different author got 300 votes in March, while a third story - Story C got 250 in April...

That's entirely possible, and in fact probable. However, it isn't the number of votes that matters, but the AVERAGE vote. Getting more votes is more likely to bring your average down - more people=more opinions. That's why both numbers are taken into consideration.

I appreciate your interest in this, and hope that you'll continue to share your thoughts. I also hope you'll take this all for what it is meant to be: fun.

I've never been one for toplists and such, probably because my tastes aren't always what's popular. But when it all comes down to it, it's not my opinion that matters but the readers'. They're the ones who read your work. Without them, we'd be posting to air. So, we'll just keep on doing our best to gauge what readers like and encouraging more of them to express their opinions. Ya know?

 

[Jennifer Kaye]

What about a situation where a story is most excellent, but just happens to be up against another outstanding story in one particular month .... in otherwords, story "b" could actually be rated as the second best story for the entire year, but because of poor timing of being up against the one other story that is outstanding in the same month, the story would not get a nomination.

Is there some sort of method to ensure that a monthly runner up is still eligible for the annual awards?

 

[Madame Pandora]

Multi Nom Methods ;-)

I am thinking that there are going to be other methods of nomination, Jenifer.

Laurel, if I understand the system these are just the stories that will be "automatically" nominated for the end of the year. There will still be reader nominations, right?

Thankee sai

MP

 

[Laurel]

Re: Multi Nom Methods ;-)

I am thinking that there are going to be other methods of nomination, Jenifer.

Laurel, if I understand the system these are just the stories that will be "automatically" nominated for the end of the year. There will still be reader nominations, right?

Thankee sai

MP

Well, the votings ARE reader nominations - they're the reader's voting picks. I think 12 choices per category is an awful lot. I'm even considering narrowing it down further. The more stories nominated, the less likely (IMHO) a reader will be willing to actually look at every nominated story and actually pick the one they like best. With 12 choices and 20 or so categories, I'd probably (if I were a reader) just pick the first thing that caught my eye.

If we were to add 3 or 4 end-of-the-year picks, I think that would hurt the voting as a whole.

If you disagree or have a way to include every month's nominations along with "wild card" picks without turning the voting into a DMV form, please share!

 

[Laurel]

We will have end-of-the-year nominations for categories like Best Editor, Best Audio Story, Sexiest Author M/F, etc.

 

[Jennifer Kaye]

Well, if I happen to ever get around to writing and submitting another story, please be sure to post it during a "weak" month. LOL

 

[Dillinger]

Laurel - since you put the link to this thread right after my post in the January Author Nominees thread I can only conclude that you meant to tell me that I should have posted my suggestions here? So here they are:

that means quite simply that a story submitted .. say on the 27th of a month is not likely to make any awards even if maybe it hits the votes big time, simply because the month in which it was submitted is not giving it a lot of time to get voted for ... maybe I didn't get the idea ... just a ... blonde thought ...

Exactly what I thought. A story posted with just a couple days to go in the month - based on the way I read what's been described, probably won't get enough votes to be considered AND would be ineligible the next month.

Here is a suggestion - perhaps any story posted in a month that doesn't receive the minimum 10 votes should be eligible the following month?)

Also - conversely - a story posted with a week to go in the month has a good change of getting at least the 10 votes it needs BUT will not have many more votes than that, which would help level set the story (ie - the more votes a story gets the more reflective it is of the general consensus - simple statistics).

Not sure if any of this is good, bad or otherwise. Just my observations. [/B][/QUOTE]

 

[Laurel]

Laurel - since you put the link to this thread right after my post in the January Author Nominees thread I can only conclude that you meant to tell me that I should have posted my suggestions here?

LOL! heck no...I just sort of answered one of your questions in one of my posts here. I'm too lazy to rewrite it - just ask Sparky.

How does this sound...for the February nomination, for example, the cutoff date for submitted stories is the last day of the month. However, I won't consider the voting scores until the 14th of March. That gives the very last entry a full two weeks worth of voting. And the March nominations will stop at the end of March, but votes will still be counted up until the 14th of April. And so on, and so on...

Here is a suggestion - perhaps any story posted in a month that doesn't receive the minimum 10 votes should be eligible the following month?)

For the contests and the nominations, the minimum votes required will be 25. My feeling is this...a story worthy of a nomination or a contest prize should receive at least 25 votes in 2-6 weeks. I'm not saying that stories that receive less than that aren't good stories - they may be excellent stories. However, if we're going to give awards based on reader feedback (voting), then the stories that should 'win' should be stories that inspire a lot of feedback from readers.

Does this make sense at all? Hope so...

Also, the Story of the Year award will be decided by nominations by readers, like the awards were this year. This will be an opportunity for people to nominate any stories they feel were passed over.

Let me know how all of this sounds...your input is appreciated!

 

[Whispersecret]

Twelve stories in each category, plus a couple of wild cards does seem like a lot to me. I certainly won't read 12+ stories in a bunch of different categories in order to vote. Too much time required.

Is there some sort of mathematical formula that you can use to give each story an average grade, that takes into account total number of votes, the length of time it was posted, the numerical score totals? If so, you could use the formula to weed out, say all but five.

Perhaps a panel of judges could do the weeding. CHoose judges from among those who write in that category. The panel chooses the top five and the membership chooses from that.

I'm out of ideas for now. I'll keep thinking about it.

 

[Ray Dario]

Awards

Laurel,

I think this is wonderful. A great way to reward authors for the excellent stories that are posted here! I know I get a rush everytime I look at the "Top Lists" list and see my name anywhere on it and I am always envious of those who are at the top.

I have an idea for another award if you are interested. How about an award for "Best Prolific Author". My idea is for an award given to the author who has submitted at least ten stories and has the highest average rating for all his stories.

This would reward those authors who consistantly submit good work, but never quite make the top of the list.

I don't know if this is a good idea or not but I thought I would throw it out for you to think about.

Ray

 

[Laurel]

I like that idea tremendously! I will add that to my awards notes for next year...

 

[Bacomicfan]

um......wow

I'm lost.......but havin' fun anyway.......lol

 

[Guest]

http://www.literotica.com/forum/showthread.php?postid=347394#post347394

Yo YOUrself!

 

[shereads]

Laurel,

I think this is wonderful. A great way to reward authors for the excellent stories that are posted here! I know I get a rush everytime I look at the "Top Lists" list and see my name anywhere on it and I am always envious of those who are at the top.

I have an idea for another award if you are interested. How about an award for "Best Prolific Author". My idea is for an award given to the author who has submitted at least ten stories and has the highest average rating for all his stories.

This would reward those authors who consistantly submit good work, but never quite make the top of the list.

I don't know if this is a good idea or not but I thought I would throw it out for you to think about.

Ray

If we have a Most Prolific, can we also have an award for Most Restrained or "Knew When To Quit?"

:non-dancing produce emoticon:

 

[Guest]

If we have a Most Prolific, can we also have an award for Most Restrained or "Knew When To Quit?"

I win.

You stink.