Forum: Author Hangout

I wonder how many people don't read the story since it has such a low initial score.

When you hit 40 votes, an extra top and bottom score will be discarded, and I bet you'll get a jump in score. This will continue each 20 votes (with the score jumps getting smaller each time)

Thanks, I forgot about that.

What makes you think they've actually read any of it? It's well established that the early votes on a story tend to the extremes, usually ones (I call them Unibombers)

Unibombers are an evergreen topic in the chat. I understand the concept, and I understand the theory that in doing so they may be attempting to protect a favorite author from being overtaken.

Given the frequency of 1-bombing reported, have they got a grievance with every other author?

~ JBB

#1: Fanbois giving 10 to a favourite author

From when vote profiles were available, most stories had a nice smooth curve, although off-centre from a normal distribution. An unpopular author would have a small peak at 1, usually lower than the peak of the curve. A popular author would have a massive peak at 10 that dwarfed the peak of the curve. In my opinion, fanbois cause more of a distortion than antifans.

AJ

fanbois cause more of a distortion than antifans.

Is it a distortion if they like the story and give it a high score?

Is it a distortion if they like the story and give it a high score?

It's a distortion if they give an author a 10 based on the author's previous work, even if that author has only published the first chapter of their new story and, frankly, it sucks.

ETA my opinion is worth exactly what you paid for it, and has no more weight in the real world than any other reader's.

AJ

It's a distortion if they give an author a 10 based on the author's previous work, even if that author has only published the first chapter of their new story and, frankly, it sucks.

This is why I've been tempted to post an unrelated, non-universe story, under a new ID, to see how the scores are distributed, versus my universe stories with a (theoretically) large fan base.

This is why I've been tempted to post an unrelated, non-universe story, under a new ID, to see how the scores are distributed

That seems to be the reason why the likes of Stephen King/Richard Bachman, JK Rowling/Robert Galbraith created pen-names. They wanted to see what their writing was like without prior expectations.

I can see the attraction, as that was the very reason I did the same. For me, it turned out the scores were roughly similar across the board, so a year or two back, I changed the names to add my main account name to the original pseudonyms, with the addition of a Roman numeral to indicate the timeline in which the accounts were created. The higher the number, the more recent the account.

This is why I've been tempted to post an unrelated, non-universe story, under a new ID, to see how the scores are distributed, versus my universe stories with a (theoretically) large fan base.

I'd like to read it, to see whether you can come up with something different ;-)

AJ

I'd like to read it, to see whether you can come up with something different ;-)

The first 2 full books are available on my support sites, along with a partial 3rd book.

I intend to release the first book on ZBookstore during 2Q26 and on SOL a month later, per my typical release cycle.

Sorry, but I've read several stories that I take an immediate dislike to (descriptive violent rape, blatant racism or, as always, politics, yet I've been attacked for 'creating' fictional characters who express an in-story political opinion that certain readers assume mirror my views (they don't, as again, it's fiction and the characters aren't real).

Those two individuals 1-voted every story I wrote since that period, which rather than dissuading me, only reminded me that, despite downvoting my stories, they were actively reading every single story I wrote within two days of my posting each and every chapter.

Nothing like dedicated enemies who still adore your work. But as they say, politics make for strange bed-fellows.

f that's what the first chapter is, don't post it alone. Post Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 together.

That's what I will do from now on. Who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks?

Post Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 together.

That makes quite a bit of sense. I'm going to consider it for the next universe story release.

What might be worse are comments that make you wonder: "Did the author of this comment read the description of this story?" and "Do they realize there are previous books centered around the lives of Steve Adams, Michael Loucks, or Johnathan Kane?"

Bingo. Especially the one who rage quit after reading one comment, without full context, by Doctor Mike.

As always, there are those who read for smut, and those who appreciate plot. I always aim for both, but I've always been a bit weird, as I only write explicit porn to get to the apres-sex scene, where I've found my characters open up, admitting thing I've never imagined about my own characters. Which is literary gold, when the characters even surprise the author putting the words in their mouths.

But for those people who think plot just gets in the way, there's no way to please them if you story does contain both. Those are the people I'd prefer pleading "Please, for heaven's sake, quit reading my stories!!!"

I've always done that, however I also track how my scores change, chapter by chapter (back when I was still posting stories). I'd love to see those more detailed scores return again, yet I'm guess that's not to be.

But knowing which chapters succeed and which fall flat are useful for crafting your stories and developing your storytelling skills. As otherwise, you're just fumbling in the dark, unable to tell what you can't see.

when my stories finally get to the 20 vote threshold, then the number of votes jump considerably

That shows the power of having a visible score.

Even if a reader doesn't really like a story and casts a downvote, they may still be doing the author a favour by pushing the number of votes to 20 and making the score visible.

AJ

As others have noted, I won't even glance at a story with a score under 6, and I also won't start a story until there's enough to read (at least five to seven chapters), so between those two, there are many stories I'll never even consider. At a time when there are more and more authors who never get better than a 5 (mediocre, nothing special about the story) score.

Then again, there are fewer SOL stories that I'll even read anymore, and sadly, I don't see that changing anytime soon. As again referencing ASSTR, that's what ultimately killed the site, as the quality of stories decreased, so did its readership.

As I've always said, readers come to SOL for the porn, but stay for the stories.

"porn, stay for the stories" - love that.

Out of curiosity, and likely because I haven't poked around the site enough, has there ever been an authors reviewing authors kind of thing? My child has an amazing English teacher who has the students review and comment about stories (anonymously), which has helped them learn to write better, both from others' feedback and by giving thoughtful feedback. I'm pretty sure that I could pay people to do that, but given the $48.25 I have made from my writing, I'm not sure if I could afford the service.

We the writers need more control over when voting begins based in the length of the story.

Agreed. A system tied to word count, where, below a certain word count, you could keep it disabled at your discretion, and have it turn it on automatically past a certain word count.

Maybe 20K words or 3 chapters, whichever is greater, for incomplete multi-chapter stories.

Or something similar.

Again, a secret to higher scores is attention, so even with a two chapter story, posting both within the same week will gather more votes than if they're weeks or months apart, simply because they're more visible than the more infrequent stories.

I've also noted that lately, the "New Story" posts rarely have any votes whatsoever, which indicates that no one is actually reading them anymore. As again, with an unclear description and no score to base decisions on, why take the chance?

Which again, was the whole purpose of the various story scores (content ratings rather than just up and down votes).