Well following the new regime I entered a contest and noticed that this time my story did not immediately get marked down with a '1'.
They did a 2 instead.
I don't think anything can be done about it but it is pretty clearly a competition related thing. Some people really think that the way to win a competition is to mark down all the competing stories.
For me, low scores without valid comments as to why, are just a lame ass paybacks for something the writer did, or didn't do. If you want to snuff out all the bullshit scores and revenge attacks, just force comments with the scores..you will get genuine feedback, most likely from those who actually take the time to read and comment honestly. IF you have 20 straight 5's then a 3 appears from nowhere, you have to really question the motive behind it.
I am not a writer but am an avid reader. I have read many stories here but have never given less than a 4 because if it is that bad I never finish the story and just go to another story. I can't, in honesty, tell them their spelling or comma is wrong because I would probably make the same mistakes. If you want to read stories that are perfect, buy a book, it has been edited and reedited many times, all the flaws removed. Even professionals make mistakes.
I read a lot of stories on lush, and typically I only ratings I give out are 4s and 5s, if I liked your story and I'm in a rating mood you get a four, if I thought your story was something special I give a five, I give out very few fives.
I don't give out lower scores because typically I either a) do what kinkygirl said she does and simply stop reading before the end or b) don't want the person to be bummed out. I know that if I put a whole bunch of work into a story and got a bad review I would be sad, regardless of what the quality of the story was.
If you make it mandatory to leave a comment if you leave a score, can't you tell who gave the low score? I do wonder why some of the great writers here who are being given 1 and 2 on their stories, don't use the option to demand a comment.
Thanks Mazz, there are some things there I hadn't thought of, because I'm not a writer... thanks for taking the time to explain.
Good post, Mazza. That's exactly why I haven't set mine to require comments with votes. Often this results in a lower score, but really - the scores on the site are rather generous as a whole, so it's all relative. For example, even though my last story received an EP, I was never on the Top Author List nor did the story manage to hit the Top Stories of the Month list for more than about a day or two during both months. If one is concerned about being on those lists and getting a perfect score then the 'comment-to-vote' option might be the smartest route to take.
For me - I still think it stifles the amount of total votes and reader-friendly environment. All one has to do is look at the comment to vote ratio to get a feel for this. As another example, one of my stories has 251 votes but only 107 comments. That's a significant number of voters that didn't want to comment, yet to date that story has a score of 5.0 - so not all non-commenters are looking to vote something down. They may just not be the type to want to type out comments with everything they read or they may feel like their vote speaks for itself.
I definitely prefer a more 'open' option setting for readers. I hate to force people into doing anything or making people feel obligated to hand out 5's and glowing comments for fear of hurt feelings or reprisal from jilted authors and their friends. That might mean taking a few lumps with your scores now and then, but overall I think there's more positives than negatives.
So I just did a bit of research. As we all know, a "3" is explicitly average when voting on stories. What percentage of stories here would you consider above average?
Take a guess, and then scroll down a bit.
*
*
*
*
*
*
It's 99.695%.
Out of 15,104 stories that came up when I searched by popularity, the top 15,058 are above average. I won't speculate as to why or what that means, but I consider it interesting all the same.
I DO think this is an above average site. Having checked out a lot of others, as we probably all have, I think LS is a few cuts above the rest. Moving on.....reading a lot of the comments, I think they have a lot of merit, and the scoring of stories is extremely important to most. From my own viewpoint, I just love writing. The score I get I take on board as a guide. 3 some people thought it just okay, so I need to review and up my game, 4 I'm doing okay, and 5 well, I'm right on the money. For whatever reasons I got those scores, I have no way of knowing, be it good penmanship, or great subject, whatever, and I don't really care. The fact they voted was important, but in the end....I LOVE WRITING, and that's what's important to me, and I try to do the best I can.... the rest, well........ .
Why not set it up to where the author and only the author can see who is placing the scores? Like send a automated message or email saying "XX has rated your story with a X score."
I would rather get an honest low vote, than none at all, so long as the criticism in the comment is actually constructive. At least that way, I will know what to work on to improve in the future.
When I rate a story, I do so honestly. I don't feel every story deserves a five just to stroke someone's ego. However, if I give someone a lower score, I try to find at least one good thing to say about their efforts and give constructive feedback.