'Through The Keyhole' Story Challenge' 2012

That's what I think. So I erased all my votes when I decided I wouldn't finish.


That's the problem. With the number of stories to read, it's becoming "work." (for me; not necessarily for everyone)

BINGO! Alef is exactly correct. If everyone who doesn't read/score every story does that, then it all averages out and you are being fair to all.

Another perfectly valid approach is to read and score the stories that most appeal to you. This approach gives those who craft good titles a slight advantage, but titles are important.

Either way, there is no reason for the notion that you must read all of the stories to score any of the stories. As the reader/scorer you are the boss. Do whatever pleases you and feels right to you.

If EVERYONE does it then, yes, you are being fair int he sense that no one has an advantage, but it also tends to randomize the "winner" rather having it based on the quality of the story, since some stories will inevitably get more reads, and therefore more votes, than other stories. Since most voters tend to award 5 or more votes to ANY story they read, the winners of the "reads" lottery will be the leading vote-getters. Randomization of which stories voters read in no way guarantees that all will be read equally. And since many readers wil NOT read randomly, but will read in order loaded, the "views" selection will NOT be totally randomized, but will be weighted towards the first-loaded stories.


Although a title is important, this approach makes it ALL-important, making the challenge in essence a "best title" challenge.

I realize that as more and more people decide they can't finish reading all stories as the number of entries grows, they will need to develop strategies other than the drop-out approach if the reading/voting isn't to be left entirely to a few people with enough time on their hands. To the degree that the "best" stories didn't win before (everyone will have his/her own opinion), this will only increase as fewer and few people are able to read and vote on all. Is that a bad thing? Not really - the challenges were never intended to be about winning and losing in the first place.

ADDENDUM:

Giving it more thought - if you follow Guy's approach - reading randomly and scoring what you read - will be both "fair" and relatively merit-based IF the voter then gives an "average" score to every story he/she hasn't read. This should be not be a minimum score, or arbitrarily a "5," but rather the true average of the scores he/she has given every other story. That wold be my recommendation for everyone who can't read all the stories but wants to participate. Note: the numbr of stories you've read, plus the total number of votes you've cast are shown right under the contest picture, so you merely divide one by the other to get your "average."

Back when you only had X amount of votes to assign I would read them all and then vote.

Now as I read each story I rate each one on a scale of 1 to 10 and give them that many votes. The ones that I normally wouldn't read if there was a synopsis get at least 1 vote and as for the 10s... I haven't actually given a 10 yet, but I'm only halfway through.

I suppose that some sort of weighted average could be worked out. Something like:
1) calculate the percentage of stories that the reader has read.
2) make each of that person's votes worth that faction.

So if you've read half the stories then your votes would only be worth half as much as someone who read all of the stories...

But that seems like a lot of work to do on the backend and would result in stories getting factional totals. Plus it's a very easy system to game, so I don't think that it would be worth doing. Much simpler to assign 1 to 10 stars and consider it a rating more than consider it a vote.

Goodgulf

When you first look at the number of stories it a daunting task. Personally I want to thank the library staff for limiting stories to 2,500 words. I feel it is not right to vote on a story that I have not read and given creative consideration. Therefore, I have divided the number of days by the number of stories and made sure I read that many that day and voted on each and move on. I have read and voted on over 70 stories so far.

This challenge has created so much controversy, I planned to ignore it and go on reading, but now that comments fill a dozen pages there are few shocking comments left to make.
My first challenge experience was two years ago just before I became active. I visited but did not know anybody. I was entranced by the first picture challenge with the row boat by the pier. Reading them was such an adventure, much more interesting than eighth grade compositions, or even 7th grade gifted students' essays. I marveled at the variety. I can't remember if I commented, probably not. but I was entranced, worked through the list and voted.
There are no participation requirements. There are no writing requirements. Write if you like, read if you like, comment if you like, vote if you like, or not. There is no set of guidelines that will please everyone. I am delighted there is a challenge at all. Most of the writers I've spoken to have entered. A few had other things on their plates and could not spare the time. I don't regret the 70 + stories I've read and scored and commented on so far and I expect to complete them. If I can't, it is not a disaster. Relax, fellow readersand writers, enjoy the community that gathers here and be grateful we have access to one of the most talented techs on the planet and his partner, the most efficient and organized librarian I've every met. We are lucky people. Rejoice!

Absolutely! And how could we not mention the incredibly hard-working (no matter what blimp says) and crisp-consuming assistant librarian who has pretty much held the place together during the long-eared one's recent vacation (with hardly any help whatsoever from me). Let's hear it folks - exuberant exultation! And in celebration, I have decided to compose a song (ok - so not really, just write some lyrics) - which I will record and submit for loading soon... er... sometime.

I don't understand, I certainly think Pink is worthy of much appreciation, however are you referring to no help from you for Pink or no help from you for Flopsy on her vacation?

I can tell you that I, at least have not been operating this way -- I ahve assigned ratings of 2 to several stories, and 1 to at least one. I have no idea how typical or atypical this may be.

I like to leave comments on the stories I feel are deserving of them. But I usually like to give some consideration to what I want to say and choose my words carefully; and that slows me down when trying to get through the challenge stories. To have any chance of getting through them, I'll have to just read and score and go on to the next one. I can go back later to leave comments.
But I'm wondering how that affects my comment ratio. Anyone know if I go back later and re-open a story to leave a comment, does that count as one comment for two stories read?