Halloween Contest Support Thread

[loganforester]

I'm not commenting on all I read any more, or I'll never get through them all! And saying "good job" a hundred different ways is tedious

Loganforester I read and voted on yours yesterday.

Thanks Starrkers. Very much appreciated.

 

[RickBlackwell]

Question

How can I find out how my story is doing in the voting ie: how many votes other stories have gotten.

 

[oggbashan]

How can I find out how my story is doing in the voting ie: how many votes other stories have gotten.

You can't - unless the stories appear in the Top Lists.

Og

 

[Selena_Kitt]

You can't - unless the stories appear in the Top Lists.

Og

I'm pretty sure you can. The pilot did it when he was entering stories, made huge spreadsheets for himself and everything. But I never asked how he did it. Although I do remember asking "why?"

 

[scouries]

since you asked...

QUOTE ogg Is it my imagination or have there been more entries to this Halloween Contest than any previous one?

I wasn’t going to quote this here but since you asked. Originally posted on the SCOURIES thread…
As to your comment about the story “quality” in this contest I’ll address that next.

[size=+2]james r scouries[/size]

expounds on the

[size=+2]LITEROTICA

2008 Halloween Contest[/size]

Quite simply I discovered: Too many stories, too little quality, too much chicanery!!!​

I plan to discuss these problems and possible solutions in this and future posts. First let me start with the question of quantity.

[size=+2]1 7 8 Stories!!! Ughhhh!!!​

[/size]

And that was when Gabby counted yesterday. They’re could be even more now.

Well what’s wrong with 178 stories you might ask.

It relates to what the contest is and represents for both our authors and readers.

For the authors it should be a fun and competitive affair that produces high quality and very readable stories that can be compared to those of our colleagues. At its best it will also attract readers to works they wouldn’t normally click open. It can give us all an opportunity to find new readers that simply posting in a category doesn’t give us. But that doesn’t work very well when the authors story is buried in a sea of ALTS and multi chapter stories.

For the readers it should be an opportunity to meet some of LITs best writers and sample their work. But if you keep coming across these multi chapter stories and if you keep clicking open these one page quickies it doesn’t take long for the reader to figure out this isn’t the place for him. Goodbye!

So why are there so many entries anyway?

A – Authors chop down their stories into little bits so they can see their name up in lights more often (sxwriter42 and WRJames are good examples of this in this contest).

B – Survivalists!

C – Some writers want to ensure their stories are at the top of the NEW STORY page.

D – ALTS! For some reason certain authors love creating new ALTS for every contest and entering stories under these new names. Just check out how many stories are by people who created new names during the contest. And I’m not talking about oggman or darkboy here – they have ALTS they use for credible purposes (mind you I still believe they should be limited to only one entry).

Why do people create these ALTS? Is it because they’re ineligible to win and want to cheat us? But imagine winning with a story under an ALT. Oh sure, you could boast to your friends but the victory would never be credited to you officially. It would be embarrassing.

E – Writers want to jump the queue and not have to wait a week to have their story ok’ed. That’s why every contest has 10 or 20 stories that have nothing to do with the contest theme.

F – Last minute-ers. Those writers that take their time and write a good entry, but then, once the contest is started, they get this huge desire to write another one. It’s rushed and invariably of lower quality than their original effort. And of course there are those who weren’t going to enter but then, when the contest starts, feel left out and hastily crank out a half assed effort.

G – Those that want their stories exposed for the full month on the contest page. They couldn’t care less about the contest but just want exposure so they clog the contest page.

So here they are, this years multiposters. This list has nothing to do with quality of these author’s stories – instead it only reflects their desire to hog the spotlight:

[size=+2]LITEROTICA

2008 Halloween Contest

Hall of Shame[/size]

[size=+2]1 – sxwriter42 – 17 entries![/size] I’d never heard of this author before this contest started. He/she just joined up in time for the contest. I don’t know if he/she is an ALT of someone we know or a new author. Your entries make up ten percent of the stories entered in the contest for crying out loud. You’re taking up way too much space. As the contest went on I was afraid you were going to live up to your name and enter 42 stories. God forbid! Why didn’t you enter your two multi chaptered stories as complete stories? Think of the reader once in a while.

2 – Freddie – 9
3 – Princess E – 8 I’ll discuss our resident “survivalists” as a pair if I might. First off both of these authors have submitted fewer stories this time than the last contest. Which is a big step in the right direction! My friend freddie even showed great forbearance by not entering the other twenty some chapters of his Halloween saga. Thank you!

But the two of you still entered a total of seventeen stories in the contest (about ten percent of the entries). About fifteen stories too many.

Many of you know I don’t particularly like the survivor contest but over time I have grudgingly accepted its presence in our midst. Enter your stories on the site. But please, not in the Special Contests! Enter your best story in the contest and the rest in the normal way. Quite frankly you’re hogging the spotlight from your confreres. And I believe that you and the other writers listed in this hall of shame also turn off readers who are lured to the Halloween Contest. Which has a detrimental affect on all of us.

4 – LadyFrisky – 5 How could you?
5 – WRJames – 5 A five chapter story – why not just enter the whole story as one entry?
6 – past perfect – 5 This person seems to be a Halloween contest specialist. Enough said.
7 – hmmmmm – 4 hummmmmm…exactly!
8 – oggman – 4 He enters all these stories so he can make more last place jokes.
9 – mr tex – 3 He only enters in these contests so his stories will be at the top of the NEW STORY page and he won’t have to pay for the honor.
10 – DeeSire – 2 No, I won’t say…

And there are others who opted to enter more than one– writers like abdullah, sunnyrock, sam, Trigliceran, unvoluntary, kandi, nicky, coxswain, the baron… and others… Christ even my old pal oily resurrected himself and entered more than one. I thought he’d retired.

If each of you had shown restraint and a little respect for our reading audience (as well as your fellow authors) we’d have something like 100 contest stories and not 166. And the average quality would have been higher.

And if so many of you hadn’t also created these one story ALTS so you could enter even more contest entries we’d be back down to a manageable number of around eighty…


I’m james r scouries, and I approve this message…

[size=+2]Dolphins don’t believe in Alts…[/size]


p.s. next I’ll discuss quality questions and then later propose some simple solutions….

 

[Daniellekitten]

If we ask nicely, Jimbo, would you drop off the face of the earth?

 

[TxRad]

If we ask nicely, Jimbo, would you drop off the face of the earth?

Shhhh

If ya don't say anything, no one will know he's here and ranting.

 

[starrkers]

TheHotJD: you're at the top of my to-read list today. Anyone else need votes?

I could do with a few

 

[choad121]

Haunted Sex House gets my vote.

I liked Haunted Sex House by FeverDreamer the best. I apologize if this isn't the correct forum/thread for this.

http://www.literotica.com/stories/showstory.php?id=389327

 

[TheHotJD]

Hi, starrkers! Thanks for dropping by.
JD

 

[starrkers]

Hi JD. Loved your story - glad I got a chance to read it.

 

[WRJames]

5 – WRJames – 5 [/b] A five chapter story – why not just enter the whole story as one entry?….

Because it would be too long -- over 26K words. From what I've seen it's typical to put each chapter of a nevella out as a separate entry.

As for putting them in the contest -- I have found that stories entered in a contest get an order of magnitude more views than stories that are just submitted. So if I write for Lit, it's for the various contests.

Actually, I was only going to put four chapters out, but I got urgent requests to add chapter 5. My first four went out quite early because I was trying to get them in before I went off to Africa -- at that time there wasn't an overwhelming volume of entries.

 

[starrkers]

Because it would be too long -- over 26K words. From what I've seen it's typical to put each chapter of a nevella out as a separate entry.

As for putting them in the contest -- I have found that stories entered in a contest get an order of magnitude more views than stories that are just submitted. So if I write for Lit, it's for the various contests.

Actually, I was only going to put four chapters out, but I got urgent requests to add chapter 5. My first four went out quite early because I was trying to get them in before I went off to Africa -- at that time there wasn't an overwhelming volume of entries.

How has that held up this time? Are you getting a comparable number of views?

I ask cos mine's struggling profoundly and I'm not sure if that's just indicative of the category, or an effect of the number of entries.

 

[MarshAlien]

I'm pretty sure you can. The pilot did it when he was entering stories, made huge spreadsheets for himself and everything. But I never asked how he did it. Although I do remember asking "why?"

Pumpkintummy is right, as usual. You can learn the score of a story by making it one of your "favorites." Then the score appears next to the story on your favorites page.

 

[WRJames]

How has that held up this time? Are you getting a comparable number of views?

I ask cos mine's struggling profoundly and I'm not sure if that's just indicative of the category, or an effect of the number of entries.

Well -- the Halloween contest seems to always be short of view compared to others. My entry last year only got about 11K views, compared to over 50K for Nude Day entries (which have done the best).

The first chapter this year got about 12K views -- but it went out early before the contest got crowded. It got a lot of votes though -- 72. Frustratingly enough, it's sitting right at 4.46 -- so if one or two of you would be nice and give it a 5 ...

The last chapter has not gotten views or votes -- except for troll votes. It went out very late based on the flattering PC's to the fourth chapter.

 

[Selena_Kitt]

Pumpkintummy is right, as usual. You can learn the score of a story by making it one of your "favorites." Then the score appears next to the story on your favorites page.

But you can only add a certain number of stories to your fav's list. Then it maxes out.

I actually just accidentally figured out how to do it. But I'm not sure I should say.

 

[DG Hear]

My story has over 39,000 views. It is a loving wife story, which accounts for the reads. Votes of course has be getting sweeped a lot. It was up to 619 votes before being sweeped. Went down to around 440 votes. Whenever I get a few more votes, I lose them. Last I checked it was at 445 and dropped to 439. Please feel free to read the story but no use wasting your time voting on it. Whether high or low it will probably get sweeped.

To Tex Rad:

I wish you were right that I had some readers that liked my stuff so much that they would multiple vote but I don't know of them and I would think they would have promoted my stories. I don't know how anyone can vote more than once but I'm not that computer literate.

Congrats to the winners who will be announced this week. Also, congrats to everyone who entered the contest. It's part of what makes writing fun. In my book you are all winners.

When I was a kid, I played an accordian (still do, haha) I played a solo and made a number of mistakes. My dad said I was a winner for trying. I said, "but dad, I made so many mistakes, how can I be a winner?"

He said, "You tried, you gave it your best. It was better than not trying and putting forth the effort."

This is a true story, so congrats to all you winners!
with respect
DG Hear

 

[Selena_Kitt]

My story has over 39,000 views. It is a loving wife story, which accounts for the reads.

Yeah, not really a fair comparison with the rest of the average bear of a story You know, the category could account for the votes as well. LW readers can be rabid, and I wouldn't put it past them to try to vote a story up (or down).

 

[past_perfect]

My story has over 39,000 views. It is a loving wife story, which accounts for the reads. Votes of course has be getting sweeped a lot. It was up to 619 votes before being sweeped. Went down to around 440 votes. Whenever I get a few more votes, I lose them. Last I checked it was at 445 and dropped to 439. Please feel free to read the story but no use wasting your time voting on it. Whether high or low it will probably get sweeped.

To Tex Rad:

I wish you were right that I had some readers that liked my stuff so much that they would multiple vote but I don't know of them and I would think they would have promoted my stories. I don't know how anyone can vote more than once but I'm not that computer literate.

Congrats to the winners who will be announced this week. Also, congrats to everyone who entered the contest. It's part of what makes writing fun. In my book you are all winners.

When I was a kid, I played an accordian (still do, haha) I played a solo and made a number of mistakes. My dad said I was a winner for trying. I said, "but dad, I made so many mistakes, how can I be a winner?"

He said, "You tried, you gave it your best. It was better than not trying and putting forth the effort."

This is a true story, so congrats to all you winners!
with respect
DG Hear

My little witch lost over 100 out of 240 votes within the last 24 hours, the score went down by .08 (from 4.78 to 4.70) - as I dreaded "Cascade" lost seven votes and is now two below the required 25.

If my scores and stories are representative to what happens during the last sweeps, then I'd say making lists to follow the contest and contenders is rather pointless.

 

[DG Hear]

Yeah, not really a fair comparison with the rest of the average bear of a story You know, the category could account for the votes as well. LW readers can be rabid, and I wouldn't put it past them to try to vote a story up (or down).

I agree, I thought I mentioned that's probably why the high volume of reads, but I figured they could still only vote once? It's at 4.38, not all that good or bad. It wasn't a story that a reader would push either way.
Thanks for commenting.
DG

 

[Selena_Kitt]

I agree, I thought I mentioned that's probably why the high volume of reads, but I figured they could still only vote once? It's at 4.38, not all that good or bad. It wasn't a story that a reader would push either way.
Thanks for commenting.
DG

There are voting programs (so I'm told) called "bots" or something, that can get past the IP requirements and vote more than once. I don't know how they work or where you can get them... but I know that you can certainly vote on your own story from two different computers and have it count. (Hubby votes for mine from work, but can't vote for them here, because we share a router, and the same IP address...)

So I'm sure if someone had a vested interest in making a story have more or less votes, it's possible. Perhaps the sweeps is the way the site eliminates the result of these programs? Again, it's all speculation... I don't really know!

 

[DG Hear]

There are voting programs (so I'm told) called "bots" or something, that can get past the IP requirements and vote more than once. I don't know how they work or where you can get them... but I know that you can certainly vote on your own story from two different computers and have it count. (Hubby votes for mine from work, but can't vote for them here, because we share a router, and the same IP address...)

So I'm sure if someone had a vested interest in making a story have more or less votes, it's possible. Perhaps the sweeps is the way the site eliminates the result of these programs? Again, it's all speculation... I don't really know!

Interesting! I just don't think anyone would waste their time pushing my stories. I'm just a retired guy writing for fun. There are a lot of big name writers on this site and others who write much better than me.

I have no intention on writing books or getting paid for my stories. Hell, I might just quit at any time. Funny, That no one in Lit even knows me. No one in my family or my friends have ever read my stories. Most don't even know I write. Nice talking to you Miss Kitt, or Mrs Kitt or Ms. Kitt
DG

 

[Selena_Kitt]

Interesting! I just don't think anyone would waste their time pushing my stories. I'm just a retired guy writing for fun. There are a lot of big name writers on this site and others who write much better than me.

Well, perhaps, as I said, it's more the category, in this case? *shrug*

Dunno!

The vote "sweep" is, indeed, a mystery.

 

[DG Hear]

Wow! Just lost 13 more votes. Damn, didn't even get any new ones that I recall. Score stayed the same. I wonder how they got overlooked on my last three sweeps. Oh well, that's the way the cookie crumbles. I still have 426 more to loose.
DG

 

[starrkers]

There are people here with almost as many votes as I've got views!

Views 812; votes 22 (lost one in the sweep); score 4.45 - just enough votes and high enough score to wipe my hopes of Last Place Glory .