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Scoring vs Author Satisfaction
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Active Ink Slinger
The short answer is yes.
I have not written as many as you but the readers and scorers have not given the same ratings as I would have.
I guess if we could answer that question we would be "best selling" authors.
I have not written as many as you but the readers and scorers have not given the same ratings as I would have.
I guess if we could answer that question we would be "best selling" authors.
Primus Omnium
This question is rather difficult to answer. I have over 500 stories here and my average score is 4.93. I would have to say statistically that it is essentially the same score for every story. I have outliers that might give a lower score but other readers will bring the score back up. No story has lower than about 4.5. Low votes usually reflect the readers' dislike for the category. Or there might be lower scores received during a competition.
What my stats show is that I seldom get low scores. I'm perfectly happy with the votes. And I am quite happy with the views. That is a more meaningful statistic to me.
What my stats show is that I seldom get low scores. I'm perfectly happy with the votes. And I am quite happy with the views. That is a more meaningful statistic to me.
Rainbow Warrior
On the whole, my stories have garnered exceptionally high scores and my readers seem to love them. It just seems to be the mods who rarely read my stories or give me the numbers of RRs and EPs that my readers claim my older stories warrant. Same with competitions. Readers often tell me my entries belong in the winners' circle, yet my last comp entry didn't even finish in the top ten by the judges' decision. There seems to be a big discrepancy between what my general readership thinks of my work, and what the mods and judges think of it. That's the only satisfaction I'm lacking here.
Her Royal Spriteness
if you went by the scores i get on my stories compared to what others get you might think i was somewhat of an average writer. honestly, i wouldn't take the scores you get as a true representation of quality. as for contests, quite a number of factors go into the judging and, quite honestly, the quality of what we get these days keeps setting the bar higher. one of the reasons i don't enter that often anymore is too many people can outwrite me these days. lol
You can’t truly call yourself peaceful unless you are capable of violence. If you’re not capable of violence, you’re not peaceful. You’re harmless.
Quote by hidden_agenda73
For you author's out there.....have any of you found that a story that you thought was one of your best, has the lowest rating of all your stories?
Hard to say since I don't pay that close attention to scores. I'll look and see. I know that there's a couple of my stories that I adore personally but have disappointingly low views (e.g. Sweet Tasty Treats, my second RR).
Active Ink Slinger
It seems the scoring on this site very generous compared to other sites I am on. One of them allows non-memberes to vote, which results in either brutal honesty or mere trolling - it's hard to tell which sometimes. They have a one to five system as well, and I've gotten a few quite low scores there. Sometimes it's because the subject matter is unpopular. But it definitely keeps you on your toes.
Testing The Waters.
Quote by sprite
if you went by the scores i get on my stories compared to what others get you might think i was somewhat of an average writer. honestly, i wouldn't take the scores you get as a true representation of quality. as for contests, quite a number of factors go into the judging and, quite honestly, the quality of what we get these days keeps setting the bar higher. one of the reasons i don't enter that often anymore is too many people can outwrite me these days. lol
I've given up on contests. There are just too many top tier writers entering regularly for there to be any room in even the honorable mentions. Any negligible increase in readership is balanced by more critical voting ( which is perfectly legitimate in a contest ) meaning there's nothing in it for me to enter.
As to the question of the thread, there's one. Somebody dropped a 1 on the second chapter of Merchant Princess not too long ago, dropping it into the 3s since it only has a handful of votes to begin with. No vote on any other chapter, just the 1 on the second.
Good Will ---|--- Three Alarm <= Both almost famous, give them a read and get them one step closer!
Weaver of Words
Quote by Beffer
On the whole, my stories have garnered exceptionally high scores and my readers seem to love them. It just seems to be the mods who rarely read my stories or give me the numbers of RRs and EPs that my readers claim my older stories warrant. Same with competitions. Readers often tell me my entries belong in the winners' circle, yet my last comp entry didn't even finish in the top ten by the judges' decision. There seems to be a big discrepancy between what my general readership thinks of my work, and what the mods and judges think of it. That's the only satisfaction I'm lacking here.
I do have you agree with you on the competitions. I think that there should be a limit to how often a person can win one of the top three spots. It might encourage more new people to enter.
Writius Eroticus
Quote by adele
I think that there should be a limit to how often a person can win one of the top three spots. It might encourage more new people to enter.
I asked Usain Bolt to slow down to give everyone else a chance. He told me to run faster.
Please browse my digital bookshelf. In this collection, you can find 126 full stories, 10 micro-stories, and 3 poems with the following features:
* 30 Editor's Picks, 83 Recommended Reads.
* 16 competition podium places, 11 other times in the top ten.
* 23 collaborations.
* A whole heap of often filthy, tense, hot sex.
Active Ink Slinger
I may have said this elsewhere, but there's absolutely no significant correlation between my own estimation of a story I've written and that of readers. Sometimes they align, but my feeling about this is that authors may actually be the very worst judges of their own work - too invested, not objective enough. It's actually quite common for properly famous musicians, authors, film directors etc to throw hissy fits because certain work of theirs which they themselves consider the pinnacle of their career are not appreciated to anything like that extent by the public and/or by critics.
Quote by WannabeWordsmith
I asked Usain Bolt to slow down to give everyone else a chance. He told me to run faster.
....or get your nose out of the judges butt. Your comparison is so dumb it defies description. A race cannot be prejudiced as to the outcome, the story competitions here can be and are.
Her Royal Spriteness
Quote by hidden_agenda73
....or get your nose out of the judges butt. Your comparison is so dumb it defies description. A race cannot be prejudiced as to the outcome, the story competitions here can be and are.
noses in the judges butt do not, in anyway, make any sort of difference in the results. to imply otherwise is, frankly, insulting.
You can’t truly call yourself peaceful unless you are capable of violence. If you’re not capable of violence, you’re not peaceful. You’re harmless.
Scarlet Seductress
For the record, each judge has their own butt. They do not share one collective butt.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Her Royal Spriteness
Quote by Liz
For the record, each judge has their own butt. They do not share one collective butt.
Thank you.
i have heard that some of them share foof, tho. hoping it's true.
You can’t truly call yourself peaceful unless you are capable of violence. If you’re not capable of violence, you’re not peaceful. You’re harmless.
Writius Eroticus
Quote by hidden_agenda73
Your comparison is so dumb it defies description. A race cannot be prejudiced as to the outcome, the story competitions here can be and are.
Sorry, it wasn't meant to be taken literally. To spell it out: putting a limit on the number of times someone can win doesn't promote competition. Everyone striving to become better at their craft does.
I've written stories for comps that I thought were great and they didn't make the top 10. I've written stories destined for comps and pulled them at the last minute because I had the humility to realise they weren't my best work. I've occasionally reimagined the stories and posted them much later when they were mature, sometimes to good reception, sometimes not. Many stories I've just iced - some I've written nearly 10k words and probably won't revisit, which seems a terrible waste, but I'm not prepared to present anything I feel is substandard.
To insinuate that some authors may have sway with the judges is frankly hilarious. I, for one, don't even know who the judges are and it changes from comp to comp anyway! If my story's not deemed good enough for the cut, so be it. I'll work harder next time. I'll run faster.
Back on topic, I know I can't please everyone all the time, and accept that. The scores are largely meaningless, as some people drop a low score because they don't like the subject matter rather than skipping it or scoring the quality of the writing, as intended. Their call, not mine.
If anyone feels a story deserves a 1 or a 2 vote based on the quality of the writing, my take is that moderators shouldn't have verified it because it's likely littered with errors or has little plot/substance.
Please browse my digital bookshelf. In this collection, you can find 126 full stories, 10 micro-stories, and 3 poems with the following features:
* 30 Editor's Picks, 83 Recommended Reads.
* 16 competition podium places, 11 other times in the top ten.
* 23 collaborations.
* A whole heap of often filthy, tense, hot sex.
Rainbow Warrior
If the competition judges here all had degrees in English literature, I would concede that competition judging accurately reflected which were truly the best written stories, but since that level of objective and qualified critical decisions is absent, the risk of bias due to popularity of authors and other factors completely unrelated to writing skill calls into question the impartiality of the decisions. Also, since very few seem to know the actual mechanism of how judges are selected, and how many judges have actually read every single story entry, this too casts doubt in the minds of the authors whether or not the competition judging is even remotely fair.
There's no doubt if Usain Bolt crosses the finish line first, but literature is not as simple as who gets to the finish line first. So let's not equate the two races as if story judging was so cut and dried.
There's no doubt if Usain Bolt crosses the finish line first, but literature is not as simple as who gets to the finish line first. So let's not equate the two races as if story judging was so cut and dried.
Clumeleon
Quote by Liz
For the record, each judge has their own butt. They do not share one collective butt.
Thank you.
I'm gonna need more noses...
Scarlet Seductress
Quote by Beffer
If the competition judges here all had degrees in English literature, I would concede that competition judging accurately reflected which were truly the best written stories, but since that level of objective and qualified critical decisions is absent, the risk of bias due to popularity of authors and other factors completely unrelated to writing skill calls into question the impartiality of the decisions. Also, since very few seem to know the actual mechanism of how judges are selected, and how many judges have actually read every single story entry, this too casts doubt in the minds of the authors whether or not the competition judging is even remotely fair.
There's no doubt if Usain Bolt crosses the finish line first, but literature is not as simple as who gets to the finish line first. So let's not equate the two races as if story judging was so cut and dried.
I have a degree in English literature. I judge competition entries on lots of factors:
- Character development
- Plot progression
- Originality / cliches
- Writing style
- Technical expertise
- Eroticism
- etc.
I also know that quite a few other judges do the same thing. Questioning the impartiality of the judging process because the entire panel may or may not meet your expectation of being 'academically qualified' is foolish and unrealistic. As for who is offered a position on the judging panel by Nicola, she has stated before that they are people she thinks would do a good job and have a demonstrated proficiency in writing. If you can write a good story, you can spot a good story.
The comps here are as much about building community as "winning" and to turn them into a formal literary competition with the focus on the prize would be shortsighted. I'm fine with how they go and I've only hit the top 10 twice in the 8 years I have been on Lush (no, I don't know offhand how many comps I have actually entered in that time), never in the top 3. Having the comp theme, length, etc. has helped me focus at times when I was kind of flailing for something to write and that's been more important to me than whether I win, place, or show.
Voyeur @ f/64
Leaving aside the comps of which I have no knowledge and to answer the OP. I write in a restricted genre, lesbian stories/poems, which are not to many people's taste. On the whole, I can't argue with the scores I've received over 65 posts. There were two recently that were give a 2 against half a dozen 5s, but that was someone who simply disliked me, though I've never found out why. I do wish more people would vote, of course. Comments are much more a personal popularity thing, it seems to me. I don't get many of those.
Testing The Waters.
Quote by adele
I do have you agree with you on the competitions. I think that there should be a limit to how often a person can win one of the top three spots. It might encourage more new people to enter.
With the number of top tier writers ( and I'm not talking about popularity, etc. Genuinely talented authors writing captivating stories ) regularly entering, you'd have to bar people from winning for a year at a time to open up a handful of spots for anybody else, and that's excessive restrictions for minimal returns.
The contests are suffering from a glut of exceptional talent. Nothing that can really be done about it.
===============
I'm just here to write, so the social aspects don't particularly sway me. Absent that, the increase in readership is minimal, and the scoring more critical. That ends up reducing long term readership due to the hyper-inflated average scores making anything not above 4.95 virtually invisible once it leaves the front page. So for me it's a wash at best, and more often a detriment to enter a story in a contest rather than simply submitting it to the regular story file. Add in the month of invisible statistics making me twitch from my statistical analysis OCD going bonkers... With little possibility of the serotonin reward from making the top 10, the equation is pretty simple.
Good Will ---|--- Three Alarm <= Both almost famous, give them a read and get them one step closer!
da Bear
Quote by sprite
if you went by the scores i get on my stories compared to what others get you might think i was somewhat of an average writer. honestly, i wouldn't take the scores you get as a true representation of quality. as for contests, quite a number of factors go into the judging and, quite honestly, the quality of what we get these days keeps setting the bar higher. one of the reasons i don't enter that often anymore is too many people can outwrite me these days. lol
sprite, that may or may not be true, but not many writers have your imagination. It makes a difference.
James
An incredibly talented, but modest Polar Bear, often mischievous, but never malicious!
Advanced Wordsmith
Quote by hidden_agenda73
For you author's out there.....have any of you found that a story that you thought was one of your best, has the lowest rating of all your stories?
To be honest, I never care about scores. Each story I write is unique, and I mostly write for my own enjoyment.
Of course I like when others enjoy them also, and there are times I actually write "bad" stories, either out of satire or to try and say something. And since I write in a variety of different styles, I would never expect to please everybody.
Raised on Blackroot
I have EPs for stories I don’t consider my best, and only RRs and very paltry reviews/scores/comments for what I consider my best (and are my favorites) and, somewhat arrogantly (you have to have some arrogance to write) among the best on this site.
Everything else I’ve written is utter trash and I loathe it and I’ve hidden it for a reason.
Things don’t often make much sense. It is what it is. The scores I’ve never cared about though. At all. Comments mean more. So it can suck, more when you start out than later on, when you don’t get any.
After a while you learn to say fuck everyone and fuck what they think and write for yourself.
Everything else I’ve written is utter trash and I loathe it and I’ve hidden it for a reason.
Things don’t often make much sense. It is what it is. The scores I’ve never cared about though. At all. Comments mean more. So it can suck, more when you start out than later on, when you don’t get any.
After a while you learn to say fuck everyone and fuck what they think and write for yourself.
Troublemaker
Scores don't mean much to me although high scores can help in a Comp. Most folks score high, myself included. Personally I don't feel my stories warrant 5's but I do appreciate the support. I agree with others above, comments are more meaningful. I had to really think about the satisfaction thing. In common with most I'm sure, it's a little bump to make a Comp Top Ten, maybe a reminder I don't totally suck. I write a ton of crap that I never finish so I think I get the most satisfaction of actually finishing a story. Nope, that's number two, the best satisfaction is a comment where the reader totally caught some meaningful detail in your story or totally got the feel of it you intended. That's pretty satisfying. I should really write better comments.
Is sprite a judge on the Debauched Comp? She has a great ass.
Is sprite a judge on the Debauched Comp? She has a great ass.
Chatterbox Blonde- Rumps Mystical Bartender
I'm only an iddy biddy writer out here but for me it isn't the scores, it's the feedback I get from people I admire.
If someone like Kistin says she liked my work, that means more to me then a box full of 5's.
It lets me know I've set a bar for the standard for the next story, gives me a clear target to aim for, and motivation to call the muse to task one more time.
Then again I'm far too new to be setting sights on big scores, or huge viewings. I'm aiming to hit the mark a little more easily next time, and keep making readers ask for more.
If someone like Kistin says she liked my work, that means more to me then a box full of 5's.
It lets me know I've set a bar for the standard for the next story, gives me a clear target to aim for, and motivation to call the muse to task one more time.
Then again I'm far too new to be setting sights on big scores, or huge viewings. I'm aiming to hit the mark a little more easily next time, and keep making readers ask for more.
Whatever was posted is always meant in love and respect never to offend.
I'm also highly likely to have posted this from a phone so there may be typos or odd word changes, auto correct can be a pain.
I've been listening to my kinky pencil here's my current work
Simple Scribbler
I have some 1's and 2's. I don't get them as much anymore though. My twisted sense of humor laughs. It means my story incited a passionate response, which I would take over indifference. For me, I enjoy the reader comments the most. If you look, I may get a lot of comments, but my reads are fairly low. No famous story in sight. As for comps, I wouldn't feel great about winning if all the previously recognized authors sat out. And, FYI, I detest what I consider personal attacks in discussion forums. Whatever you think about comps and judging, publicly insulting those contributing to the conversation is uncalled for.
Trust people to be themselves...
There will always be a disconnect between scoring weight, amount of scores and an author's satisfaction. I have plenty of stories I believe deserve more scores on them, but they don't.
Does it suck? Yes.
Reality is, a lot of the views we get probably aren't full reads either, so I don't take too much stock into views.
Does it suck? Yes.
Reality is, a lot of the views we get probably aren't full reads either, so I don't take too much stock into views.
My last published story: Ho For The Holidays
Mod
Quote by Guest
For you author's out there.....have any of you found that a story that you thought was one of your best, has the lowest rating of all your stories?
Not necessarily the lowest rating of all, but there are a couple that I felt deserved to get more love on the like button!
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