Malicious voting

[AwkwardlySet]

I see a lot of guessing but not much logic at work. If people are truly wondering why their scores are dropping then the answer is quite easy to grasp. Take a look at the vote count of any story of yours whose score has changed drastically lately. If the score of a story is noticeably lower but the vote count increased then it's clearly the work of a 1* bomber. If along with the score the vote count dropped as well, only then you can be sure that it was a result of a sweep.
I'd chime in myself and provide some data but I had no noticeable change in the scores or the number of votes.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

The issue is when a reader rewards you with two fives, or more.

Last time, I had about 90% percent of my scores drop. I don't score my own stories, and I rarely score anyone else's.

The one story I mentioned that dropped from 4.85 to 4.80 in a day, has been up since 2019, and the score was just beginning to climb again, when it got knocked back down. Personally, I find it a little deflating if something I've written does well and suddenly the score drops for no reason.

 

[Bamagan]

People are reporting, after years of stability, a sudden drop. That's a pattern, not "the natural course". It's not as if the average reader has suddenly changed.

The average reader doesn't suddenly change, but the 'average' does move slowly over time. To be clear, I have no evidence to suggest that the average Lit reader now is different than a decade ago or longer, but there are some generational differences in things like humor and representation that may be detectable en masse, such as by a voting system. So the shift we're seeing might, in part, reflect a genuine drift in reader preferences that is minor in the grand scheme of things but has a noticeable impact on the margins.

Personally, I think it's more likely that it's a combination of cracking down on alt/bot accounts, and those that exhibit strongly bimodal voting. The case for ignoring votes from alts is pretty obvious, although it probably does result in some legitimate votes being lost. People who tend to reduce their voting to 1/5:dislike/like style could easily be mistaken for a bot designed to influence contest scores, especially if they're competing in said contests, too.

And to reiterate, I'm just speculating on causes based on effects. I have no knowledge of what's going on behind the curtain, I just think the silhouette looks like a blowjob with maybe a finger in the butt for spice.

 

[Bramblethorn]

If someone outside the US wins I don't think they get a check, they get an amazon gift card for the amount instead.

Confirmed.

 

[lc69hunter]

I do not 1-bomb any story. If I extremely dislike it, it gets a 2. However, if I could figure out what aliases certain commenters write under, I would probably go crazy on them.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

I have been reading and writing on here since 2018, and I have never given any story a 1. If I'm not enjoying something, I just stop reading it.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I've noticed the same thing. Some of my top-rated stories have had significant drops. One dropping from 4.85 down to 4.80, in the space of a day. I just hope they're not doing a major sweep like they did a few years back that knocked down the scores on almost everything I'd written. I can see them deleting one bombs, but I can't understand the motivation for deleting 5's as well. If a reader enjoys what you write and rewards you with a five, I don't see why they think it's necessary to delete it.

It all depends how the five is dropped on the story. Just because it's there, doesn't mean the story was read. That's all I'm going to say about the mechanism, except that I think it's the same, regardless of the vote value.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I've been here more than a dozen years. I've published some amazingly popular stories on this site. I have a nice distribution of red H's Downward progression IS the natural course on L.com. OP is WHINING!

In Loving Wives, maybe. I've been here a decade, and my story catalogue is creeping up over time, score wise, even my earliest stories.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

I've been here more than a dozen years. I've published some amazingly popular stories on this site. I have a nice distribution of red H's Downward progression IS the natural course on L.com. OP is WHINING!

When one person reports it, yes it's a whinge, absolutely. Boo-effing-hoo. But when several people are reporting it about not only their own stories but ALL of the stories on the top lists in a number of categories? Yea, something funny is going on. It's not a bitch at all.

 

[ElectricBlue]

When one person reports it, yes it's a whinge, absolutely. Boo-effing-hoo. But when several people are reporting it about not only their own stories but ALL of the stories on the top lists in a number of categories? Yea, something funny is going on. It's not a bitch at all.

I reckon I've seen at least three major shifts in score spreads/movements in the last ten years, which I put down to some refinement or other in the sweep mechanism. It's like the sunspot cycle: inevitability, there'll be another one.

 

[Wifetheif]

Assuming you're calling me out, I'm absolutely not complaining. In fact, i know exactly how blessed I am to have loyal followers that like what I write. I'm beyond humbled by their support and their responses to my work. My point is that with 1100 votes and an average score of 4.93, 98.6% of the people that voted on my story gave it a 5. That's math.

Since I took that snapshot, the number of votes on my story has only gone up by about 150 votes and the score has dropped to a 4.84. That's an average new vote average of 4.18. Also not to shabby, but a RELATIVELY dramatic impact on the score. My intended message was that, along with some malicious votes that disappeared during the sweep for the Halloween contest and have probably come back, something else is going on probably behind the curtain.

My opinion is that there is something in place that is also skimming excessive fives to go along with the malicious ones. I say this because the number of votes slowed as the score dropped. Yeah, I watched it like a hawk for a while and even reached out to Laurel. The story in question received over 1100 votes in 18 months and only 150 in the last 10. There are a lot of possible reasons for that, but the decreasing rate of incoming votes combined with the dropping score does indicate that some votes aren't making the cut and some of those are 5's.

I also noted that the drop in scores was across the entire T/CD catalog not just my stories. Others are now calling out the same thing for Lesbian and other categories.

It's a trend...

PS. since I'm now this frail little thing with super thin skin, who can't take the heat, I'm also a trans-woman. My fucking pronouns are she/her, not he/him!
Seriously, i couldn't care less about stuff like that. I'd suggest you put your faux ire back in the box it came in and relax. I can suggest a good scotch.

No offense intended

Assuming you're calling me out, I'm absolutely not complaining. In fact, i know exactly how blessed I am to have loyal followers that like what I write. I'm beyond humbled by their support and their responses to my work. My point is that with 1100 votes and an average score of 4.93, 98.6% of the people that voted on my story gave it a 5. That's math.

Since I took that snapshot, the number of votes on my story has only gone up by about 150 votes and the score has dropped to a 4.84. That's an average new vote average of 4.18. Also not to shabby, but a RELATIVELY dramatic impact on the score. My intended message was that, along with some malicious votes that disappeared during the sweep for the Halloween contest and have probably come back, something else is going on probably behind the curtain.

My opinion is that there is something in place that is also skimming excessive fives to go along with the malicious ones. I say this because the number of votes slowed as the score dropped. Yeah, I watched it like a hawk for a while and even reached out to Laurel. The story in question received over 1100 votes in 18 months and only 150 in the last 10. There are a lot of possible reasons for that, but the decreasing rate of incoming votes combined with the dropping score does indicate that some votes aren't making the cut and some of those are 5's.

I also noted that the drop in scores was across the entire T/CD catalog not just my stories. Others are now calling out the same thing for Lesbian and other categories.

It's a trend...

PS. since I'm now this frail little thing with super thin skin, who can't take the heat, I'm also a trans-woman. My fucking pronouns are she/her, not he/him!
Seriously, i couldn't care less about stuff like that. I'd suggest you put your faux ire back in the box it came in and relax. I can suggest a good scotch.

No offense intended. I think gender definitions/pronouns are just another means to divide us. I should have used the neutral "they" I apologize.
Statistics are a tricky thing. If you are a baseball relief pitcher who never got anyone out your ERA (Earned Run Average) is listed as the symbol for infinity even though infinity is a concept not a reality. Evidence of one bombing is at best anecdotal. What is the difference between two one votes and one two vote? Infinitesimal! Is mendacity in play? Perhaps but if your batting average was .1000, and you strike out, it is almost impossible to get back to a thousand even if you get three hits a day for the rest of the season. What you claim as a trend may, in fact, be a statistical abberation. Without looking into the minds of every L.com voter there is NO way to know for sure.

 

[StillStunned]

In Loving Wives, maybe. I've been here a decade, and my story catalogue is creeping up over time, score wise, even my earliest stories.

That's my (much more limited) experience too. Except when I publish an I/T story, the general trend is always upward.

 

[SimonDoom]

It's difficult to tell if malicious voting is going on, and, without dismissing the possibility, I suspect internal bias toward our own stories makes us more likely to imagine that there's malicious voting than the evidence may warrant.

For instance, my most recent story was published a day ago. It picked up votes quickly. At 104 votes, it reached a score of 4.88. I was delighted, because that would be my all-time highest score. 7 votes later, it had fallen to under 4.8. Still excellent, but I was a little chagrined and suspected mischief. But now that it has over 200 votes the score is still around 4.77-4.76, which means that's around the average of the votes since its initial fall. So I suspect instead that the early score was inflated by a disproportionate number of readers who already were followers of mine and predisposed to vote high, and then the "public" vote took over and the score settled a bit.

I'll never know, although if a sweep happens and knocks off some of those votes and the score goes up then it would suggest there was some malicious voting.

 

[Bazzle]

It's difficult to tell if malicious voting is going on, and, without dismissing the possibility, I suspect internal bias toward our own stories makes us more likely to imagine that there's malicious voting than the evidence may warrant.

For instance, my most recent story was published a day ago. It picked up votes quickly. At 104 votes, it reached a score of 4.88. I was delighted, because that would be my all-time highest score. 7 votes later, it had fallen to under 4.8. Still excellent, but I was a little chagrined and suspected mischief. But now that it has over 200 votes the score is still around 4.77-4.76, which means that's around the average of the votes since its initial fall. So I suspect instead that the early score was inflated by a disproportionate number of readers who already were followers of mine and predisposed to vote high, and then the "public" vote took over and the score settled a bit.

I'll never know, although if a sweep happens and knocks off some of those votes and the score goes up then it would suggest there was some malicious voting.

Your last story was fabulous!!!

Surely every perverted middle aged man's dream?

What was there not to like!

 

[SimonDoom]

Your last story was fabulous!!!

Surely every perverted middle aged man's dream?

What was there not to like!

Thanks!

There's no accounting for taste, I guess!

 

[THBGato]

I reported this to Lauren last month and got a polite reply. Maybe others have too. But nothing has been done. Maybe they are waiting for it to stop before they do a sweep? I don't know.

I do know that one of my stories was at 4.93 after 185 on 20th Oct (and in the top twenty). It's now 4.82 after 199 votes. Now, it's Chapter 5 of a pretty long story (87k words). There clearly hasn't been a reduction in votes, so it's not suspicious 5s being removed. Surely, genuine readers who didn't like it would have given up after Chapter 1 (if they even finished that). I mean, who genuinely reads to the end of a story like that to vote 2 or 3? So, I'm pretty sure it's malicious voting.

In contrast, Chapter 3 of the same story was on 4.84 on October 20th after 165 votes; it's still 4.84 after 172 votes. But then it's never been in the top list. Notice the difference in vote counts? 7 votes on Chapter 3, 14 on Chapter 5: I reckon those extra 7 votes are bombs.

However, something @pink_silk_glove said on another thread has made me feel phlegmatic about it all. The story hasn't changed. It hasn't got better or worse. This troll - whomever it is - is hitting every story and every author in the top list, so I know it's not personal. So I don't care that much. The thing I feared happening to my stories has happened and, you know what, it was no biggie. I'm still picking up new followers, new favourites and new comments on old stories every week.

 

[Voboy]

However, something @pink_silk_glove said on another thread has made me feel phlegmatic about it all. The story hasn't changed. It hasn't got better or worse. This troll - whomever it is - is hitting every story and every author in the top list, so I know it's not personal. So I don't care that much. The thing I feared happening to my stories has happened and, you know what, it was no biggie. I'm still picking up new followers, new favourites and new comments on old stories every week.

I noticed this a long time ago, too, which is when I stopped worrying about all this. PSG and I have had occasional clashes in the past, but I've always thought she's a shrewd poster and I tend to agree with her about a lot of things.

What can I do? I can write stories, and I can make sure they're as good as I can make them. I've been gratified that people seem to like them. As you say, new followers and positive effects on my back catalogue continue. IF there are occasional dips in my scores, they seem to be tiny and they often go away (sweeps, I guess, though I am NOT a compulsive tracker of my numbers). So is that really something I can worry about?

I certainly can't control it. So why should I stress about it?

 

[lovecraft68]

What can I do? I can write stories, and I can make sure they're as good as I can make them. I've been gratified that people seem to like them. As you say, new followers and positive effects on my back catalogue continue. IF there are occasional dips in my scores, they seem to be tiny and they often go away (sweeps, I guess, though I am NOT a compulsive tracker of my numbers). So is that really something I can worry about?

I certainly can't control it. So why should I stress about it?

Well said. Our focus should be on our work and what we can control, which is our work.

Haters are going to hate, and its far to widespread to take personally as @THBGato pointed out. We're all on the same playing field and should just play and not pay attention to the obnoxious drunks in the bleacher seats.

I also see the conversation is about older stories gradually dropping, but there are also a lot of older stories that started out meh and over time have climbed. Just seems the negatives always stand out more than the positive.

 

[Rob_Royale]

I reported this to Lauren last month and got a polite reply. Maybe others have too. But nothing has been done. Maybe they are waiting for it to stop before they do a sweep? I don't know.

This is contest season so there will be at least two sweeps between late October and late December. So she's not in a hurry knowing it will happen soon anyway.