The 2022 Literotica Awards

[NoTalentHack]

It's also really nice to see a story you wrote a year ago all of a sudden gets hundreds of new views a day.

That's awesome!

 

[SouthernCrossfire]

I’m honored, like NoTalentHack, to be nominated in the Most Influential Writer category this year. I found the nomination comment recently and was really honored by what the nominator said. Since it’s unlikely I’ll be serious competition to more popular authors, I choose to look at it like the Academy Awards: very few of those nominated actually win but they treasure the nomination!

 

[AwkwardMD]

The other is Most Literary/Genre Transcending. The more literary and genre transcending a story is, the less popular it's likely to be.

I'll fight you on this one. I've been up for it twice (three times if you count the aborted 2019 awards where one of mine had a sufficient amount of nominations). I'll never win it because I'm not popular enough, but I've gotten close.

My stuff is (usually) more liter than it is otica.

 

[AwkwardMD]

Most of the time, I'm really happy to be in the conversation. Sometimes, I'm bitter.

 

[MelissaBaby]

I'll fight you on this one. I've been up for it twice (three times if you count the aborted 2019 awards where one of mine had a sufficient amount of nominations). I'll never win it because I'm not popular enough, but I've gotten close.

My stuff is (usually) more liter than it is otica.

I’ll say that you are, in my opinion, one of the most consistently genre transcending authors on the site. But I’ve read a good number of nominees in that category over the years , and have found most of them worthy for praise as “literary” but rarely genre transcending in any way.

As I think about it now, I am uncomfortable with that term generally, and perhaps that colors my view.

“Genre transcending” sounds kind of like “not bad for porn”

 

[SimonDoom]

I don't think it's weird for people to think that things they participate in could be improved.

Truth in advertising: Call them the "Cool Kid Awards" and I think everybody would be OK with it.

It's also really nice to see a story you wrote a year ago all of a sudden gets hundreds of new views a day.

It is. Happened to me in 2017 and I had no idea why because I didn't know the contest existed.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

Fun fact, every time I've been nominated, my scores drop. Same as this year, 'Just Roomies' that's nominated in Mature was at 4.88 for months, until the nominations were announced, and the same day it dropped a point, along with two of my other highest rated stories. I guess, hoping to boost their own standing, some decide they'll knock down a few others.

 

[SouthernCrossfire]

I meant to add above that the Academy Award nominees use their nominations in the advertising for their future works for the rest of their careers. Unfortunately, I don’t suspect the RCAs will work quite like that!

 

[SimonDoom]

Fun fact, every time I've been nominated, my scores drop. Same as this year, 'Just Roomies' that's nominated in Mature was at 4.88 for months, until the nominations were announced, and the same day it dropped a point, along with two of my other highest rated stories. I guess, hoping to boost their own standing, some decide they'll knock down a few others.

Same. I think this is common. The high point for a contest winner, I think, is when it's clinched the top spot before anybody realizes it. Then, boom. Happened to me with my one contest winner. That story wouldn't sniff a contest win with the score it has now.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

It annoys me, only because I don't touch anyone else's scores, and I don't even vote for my own stories. I just figure, whatever happens happens. And if the readers like what I've written, that's great. But whenever I have a story nominated, or it makes it onto the front page of the Hall of Fame, it's almost guaranteed that it'll be knocked down by someone who wants it gone.

 

[SimonDoom]

It annoys me, only because I don't touch anyone else's scores, and I don't even vote for my own stories. I just figure, whatever happens happens. And if the readers like what I've written, that's great. But whenever I have a story nominated, or it makes it onto the front page of the Hall of Fame, it's almost guaranteed that it'll be knocked down by someone who wants it gone.

They just think they're helping with the natural regression to the mean.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

They just think they're helping with the natural regression to the mean.

I'm sure you're right. And I could do the same, but then I really wouldn't have won anything, if I had to do it my knocking someone else down. But I guess, whatever floats their boat and makes them happy.

 

[SimonDoom]

I'm sure you're right. And I could do the same, but then I really wouldn't have really won anything, if I had to do it my knocking someone else down. But I guess, whatever floats their boat and makes them happy.

You're taking the high road. That's a better win.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

You're taking the high road. That's a better win.

I don't expect to win. I never do. But at least I know I didn't do anything underhanded to try and change the results. So, I'm fine with whatever happens and with whoever comes out on top.

 

[NoTalentHack]

. So, I'm fine with whatever happens and with whoever comes out on top.

That… that’s what she said?

 

[Smuttyandfun]

That… that’s what she said?

How can I tell you write porn?

 

[Bramblethorn]

As I think about it now, I am uncomfortable with that term generally, and perhaps that colors my view.

“Genre transcending” sounds kind of like “not bad for porn”

...yeah, that's fair. I would defend having a category along those lines totally not because I got nominated there once but it does feel like a self-denigrating name for it.

 

[RejectReality]

Keep in mind that a 4.88 doesn't need a lot of 4s to knock it down quite a bit unless it has a buttload of votes.

Any time you're exposed to a much wider audience, as happens with nominations and wins, you're going to get a lot of "liked it, didn't love it" 4s. There are undoubtedly some sour grapes/manipulation votes, but the long term "damage" is done by those 4s, because a lot of the obviously malicious stuff is going to get swept.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

Keep in mind that a 4.88 doesn't need a lot of 4s to knock it down quite a bit unless it has a buttload of votes.

Any time you're exposed to a much wider audience, as happens with nominations and wins, you're going to get a lot of "liked it, didn't love it" 4s. There are undoubtedly some sour grapes/manipulation votes, but the long term "damage" is done by those 4s, because a lot of the obviously malicious stuff is going to get swept.

Except for one thing, it had been on the Hall of Fame front page for months, and the score never wavered. Yet the day it was nominated, it instantly dropped. Coincidence? I don't think so.

Not that it matters, because I never thought it would be nominated, much less win. But it would be nice if people didn't dump on each other's work, just to try and get ahead.

 

[RejectReality]

If the score never wavered, I suspect you were well outside the "threat zone" of the HoF. 4.88 is a sweet spot score for most of the toplists. Gets attention from regular readers, doesn't blip the troll's radar. First page doesn't necessarily cause people to come after you. It's that top third where all the shenanigans take place. Unless the score range is extremely narrow, getting bombed off page 1 is as often as not an accident of the update schedule where your old, higher score stays up for hours after it's already been knocked down, causing others to come along and bomb it again.

Unless you have several hundred votes, any time your score drops, the first question you should ask yourself is "How many 4s would it take to cause this change", and then "how many 1s if every other vote was 5". Once you start doing the math, you realize that most of the time, you're looking at maybe one bomb, and it's just as likely that 3s and 4s from perfectly legitimate readers caused the same amount of change.

Anybody who's bombing a year-end story in an attempt to influence things is an idiot who's probably going to get their votes erased in short order due to incompetence. Score doesn't affect anything beyond the nomination process. Once you're nominated, score is already irrelevant to the results.

 

[Omenainen]

I’m very surprised and happy to be nominated! I actually didn’t even know I’d written a story that’s on the category all time list, currently #3, because its score is only 4.82 and I thought all all time lists (except possibly LW) would have scores with 4.94 or something, so I never went looking. It was published in December last year and I was only alerted to this success when the monthly awards were posted, so I’m still floating. I’ve had one story on the First Time top list for a while, and it keeps traveling at like #50-#100, and I thought that was the best I could do. Pays off to write in different categories

I read it again yesterday and even if I say so myself, it’s a really good story! So come, come, people! And then come and read my anal story

 

[Smuttyandfun]

If the score never wavered, I suspect you were well outside the "threat zone" of the HoF. 4.88 is a sweet spot score for most of the toplists. Gets attention from regular readers, doesn't blip the troll's radar. First page doesn't necessarily cause people to come after you. It's that top third where all the shenanigans take place. Unless the score range is extremely narrow, getting bombed off page 1 is as often as not an accident of the update schedule where your old, higher score stays up for hours after it's already been knocked down, causing others to come along and bomb it again.

Unless you have several hundred votes, any time your score drops, the first question you should ask yourself is "How many 4s would it take to cause this change", and then "how many 1s if every other vote was 5". Once you start doing the math, you realize that most of the time, you're looking at maybe one bomb, and it's just as likely that 3s and 4s from perfectly legitimate readers caused the same amount of change.

Anybody who's bombing a year-end story in an attempt to influence things is an idiot who's probably going to get their votes erased in short order due to incompetence. Score doesn't affect anything beyond the nomination process. Once you're nominated, score is already irrelevant to the results.

You could be right. But since this isn't my first nomination, and the same thing has happened before, it does seem odd, that a story that's maintained a high score for almost a year, since this one is from last September, instantly drops the day that it's nominated. This story has over 87k views and over a thousand votes, so for it to drop in one day, does seem a tad strange, at least to me.

I don't really check the math all that closely, so you could be absolutely right and a few votes was all it took to knock it down a peg.

 

[Ian_Snow]

Congrats to all those nominated! I have lots more reading to do.

 

[lovecraft68]

The only people who will see this are forum members. If you're a member of this forum you know about these awards not just because of the links, but some of the people who are nominated-especially the OP-have mentioned about ten times already that they're nominated.

This isn't about "its sad people don't support this" its a plea for votes.

The same people who will say themed contests are flawed popularity contests get all in on this which are far more easily manipulated because of the low vote totals. Does it suck they get so little attention, sure. Can anything be done about it? No. But politicking for an extra few votes never hurts.

 

[Omenainen]

The only people who will see this are forum members. If you're a member of this forum you know about these awards not just because of the links, but some of the people who are nominated-especially the OP-have mentioned about ten times already that they're nominated.

This isn't about "its sad people don't support this" its a plea for votes.

The same people who will say themed contests are flawed popularity contests get all in on this which are far more easily manipulated because of the low vote totals. Does it suck they get so little attention, sure. Can anything be done about it? No. But politicking for an extra few votes never hurts.

Hey LC68, I don’t know if you heard, but I was nominated this year! Go vote for me, won’t ya?