Encouraging Reviews

[Alex Bragi]

Sometimes too i feel a little inadequate after more eloquent reviewers have written and all i want to say is "Yeah, what he said." Perhaps others who have trouble expressing things verbally might have the same problem.

Never underestimate yourself like that. If you can read a story, you can write a review. You and I are the people authors write for; something that jars us may jar others. Something that we really like about a story will more than likely appeal to others. Authors, good authors, need to know these things and will welcome your comments.

I also agree with janie about not reviewing a great story because everything has been said before. I am reticent about repeating what others have already said and so don't end up reviewing, mostly anyway. I don't think any system would change that and it is only the rare case when the story is so good other people have already articulated most of the praise you can give.

I have never heard an author complain that they had received too many high ratings or great reviews. Don’t hold back, Jason.

[longrover]

I sympathize with authors hoping for feedback from readers. Otherwise, it must be like throwing a stone into a bottomless well -- no splash, no echo, ...

On the other hand, reviewing stories is something like what I get paid for, which makes it work. I do it though, irregularly, and with varying standards. Once in a while I even hit the top reviewers list (shoulder dislocated from patting self on back ).

It might help if the reviewing process was easier to figure out, but readers will do what they do no matter what. Some of them would review if they could be annonymous, but I'm not sure how an author would compare anonymous and signed comments, even when the signature is a nic.

Interesting discussion, thanks!

[coyote]

As an author who contributes to the site I can say that I do look forward to any reviews or opinions of my product and, yes, I do think more readers should take the time to say a word or two. even if the word or two is detrimental. We do learn from all this.

The suggestion that reviewers be rated has some merit but we don't want to orchestrate here. The one thing that I can say is that a reviewer should not be able to "low grade" an authors product simply because he/she doesn't like the subject matter. I had this happen to me and it was not only disappointing but took an otherwise highly reviewed story and dropped it's rating severely. As so few readers DO review, one can have several 5 star reviews and the one that didn't like the subject matter can drop it's overall rating to a 3 regardless of the story's quality and appeal to the larger audience and that truly sucks.

Stories should never be rated on subject matter. What's unappealing to some may be the height of erotica to others. Sort of like saying "everything in the story was great but I'm not really into the ball gag thing so I give it a one".

Anyone agree?

[H Dean]

I happen to like the idea of reviewing stories with a numbered system for different categories.

The idea of a 1-10 (10 being best) with categories like story flow, content, writing skills (ie; grammatical) and maybe a few others would be a good way to rate these things.

I, for one, have been stymied by certain stories due to the fact that the flow was bad based on grammar. However, some of those tales were quite interesting and erotic.

As for a free membership...I tend to think that if an author contributes on a consistent basis, tales that are well liked and receive generally good reviews, that it might be worthwhile to provide free membership as a thanks to solid contributory participation. After all, a good writer will draw keep people coming back.

Also, you might want to encourage authros to report bad reviews that are based on idiotic reasons like - "Good story, but I don't like snuff, so I gave you a 1." And, if someone repeatedly makes reviews based on such criteria they should be restricted from reviewing since they shouldn't be reviewing anyway.

Dean

[alura]

I've been a member of a site called writing.com for years now. It is the number one writing site in the US today. There are many famous and well known authors that are members [anonymously]...all this to build up to........

....... MY point. They have an area where it gives a step by step breakdown guideline that really helps you get the logical and proper steps of reviewing burned into your brain. From what I understand, some parts of this guideline were submitted anonymously by the editors of the famous authors who are members.

You might want to go and check it out.

[Aurelius]

Coyote: The one thing that I can say is that a reviewer should not be able to "low grade" an authors product simply because he/she doesn't like the subject matter. I had this happen to me and it was not only disappointing but took an otherwise highly reviewed story and dropped it's rating severely.

Interesting point. At the Olympics (in ice skating, diving, boxing etc.) the lowest judge's vote is ignored to make a fairer and less corrupt rating.

The idea of entirely removing the reviews of destructive imbeciles also has merit. Witness: http://www.bdsmlibrary.com/stories/u....php?uid=10015

[zephyr]

I seldom make reviews but I've made some in the past. Most of the time, I haven't really got much to say and don't want to spam the reviews by making a review that has less than 10 words in it. I never let my kinks determine the rating of the stories that I read. Mostly I base it on grammar, development of the plot, etc.

Interesting point. At the Olympics (in ice skating, diving, boxing etc.) the lowest judge's vote is ignored to make a fairer and less corrupt rating.

The idea of entirely removing the reviews of destructive imbeciles also has merit. Witness: http://www.bdsmlibrary.com/stories/u....php?uid=10015

Now that is definitely a user that should be banned from making reviews. He's destroying the ratings of perfectly good stories.

Btw, I recognize your name Aurelius. You're the only one who bothered to respond in a PM to say thanks for my writing a review for your story. It was a pretty nice thing to do.

[ProjectEuropa]

Now that is definitely a user that should be banned from making reviews. He's destroying the ratings of perfectly good stories.

I think when a rating for a story is so out of sync. with other ratings for the same story, it should be removed, unless backed up with competent and objective analysis. Of course not all story ratings can be indepentently adjudicated because there are so many of them but I think there should be an appeals system where an author can make an objection to an outrageously low rating that is out of sync. with other ratings of the story.

There should be no truck given to maliciousness. That is not to say I want authors protected from critical and competent analysis that might well be hurtful. Authors actually do put themselves up there to be shot at. It's malicious intent that I object to.

[Mothbrad]

I'd love to review stories, but, as I think I mentioned before, every time I like a story enough to review it, it seems like the author loses interest and nothing is added to the story. See my list of reviews here (not counting the Cortez story, which was already complete before being posted here). That's 3/3! Come on writers, just cause I like something doesn't mean it has no merit

[H Dean]

I'd love to review stories, but, as I think I mentioned before, every time I like a story enough to review it, it seems like the author loses interest and nothing is added to the story. See my list of reviews here (not counting the Cortez story, which was already complete before being posted here). That's 3/3! Come on writers, just cause I like something doesn't mean it has no merit

It might be a good idea - in your case - to check to see if the authors have other works. I suspect that those authors who failed to continue the story had few to no entries prior to that story.

Chances are good that if an author has a few stories he/she will finish what they started.

[somewriter]

I'd like to add my own experiences to this thread, if I may. I am both author, and to an extent reader.

As a reader, I don't think I've ever written any reviews. It would be quite hypocritical for me to moan about lack of reviews so I won't. If I may offer my poor excuse for why I haven't written a review, it is this: it seems that every time I read a story on this site, I always end up with a feeling that it "wasn't really my cup of tea". That's why I started writing myself really; every story seemed to feature a twist or action that put me off, I'm quite picky in that respect. And because of this, I didn't write a review. Writing a review would have involved either marking them down for a part of the story that didn't meet my preferences (which seemed unfair), or ignoring that part of the story (which meant reviewing only part of the story, which seemed wrong). So I haven't written a review. A lame excuse I know, but there it is.

So I decided to write some stories. Some of them have had reviews, some haven't. But what may interest other authors is that I decided to put my e-mail address at the bottom of stories with a note saying to e-mail me if you enjoyed the story. I was interested to see if this would generate any e-mails to me or not. The answer was that it did; I have had e-mails from more people than have reviewed my stories. The people that e-mail seem to be distinct from those that have reviewed.

The stories I seem to have got most e-mails about are the ones with primarily F/m or similar codes. Most of the e-mails appear to be from male subs. If I look down the new stories on the main page of the library right now, there are 38 new stories. Only 1 of these has a F(+)/m(+) code. I think that speaks volumes.

Feel free to suggest reasons that people seem more inclined to e-mail the author than write a review, or why F/m stories are so lacking, as I am a little stumped on that count.

[Alex Bragi]

Feel free to suggest reasons that people seem more inclined to e-mail the author than write a review, or why F/m stories are so lacking, as I am a little stumped on that count.

I think the reason people are more inclined to email an author is simply that they feel less intimidated than posting in public. I think Janie's post reflects many reader's thoughts "...Sometimes too i feel a little inadequate after more eloquent reviewers have written and all i want to say is "Yeah, what he said." Perhaps others who have trouble expressing things verbally might have the same problem."

As for why there aren't more femdom stories, that's a good question. I know the ratio of dominant women to submissive men is very unbalanced. Maybe submissive men just don't feel comfortable writing about their experiences/fantasies? That being so, why they're not is another good question.

[Mad Lews]

. I think Janie's post reflects many reader's thoughts "...Sometimes too i feel a little inadequate after more eloquent reviewers have written and all i want to say is "Yeah, what he said." Perhaps others who have trouble expressing things verbally might have the same problem."
.

I suspect an author would appreciate a simple and sincere review as much as any outburst of eloquence. A simple "Nice story" means a lot. A "Your story sucked" means a lot too but should probably be saved for a private e-mail ;-)

[Aurelius]

Just an idea...

Perhaps if it was called "Visitors' Book" or "Readers' Comments" instead of Review It, readers would be more likely to write something?

[longrover]

The existing scale does not accommodate nonliterary responses. A code that said something like, "Nonliterary response," or "Not for me " would let readers comment without affecting summary values and let authors know that the reviewer started off the usual track.

Example: I usually avoid stories coded Z (whatever that is) but I read this one. Not being familiar with the reactions and expectations regular readers of such stories have, I might want to comment without assigning a score.

Now, I would probably not review the story, to avoid mixing literary apples with non-literary oranges. Adding something like "N" with the label "Nonliterary" or "Not for me" might encourage readers who do not review stories to do so, and some who already participate to offer more reviews. Such comments might even provoke discussion among readers.

Except for adding the code, there would be no extra burden on site administrators, no checking for nonliterary comments.