Are challenges too much to read?

Perhaps others agree with you, however I don't think it is a good idea. I find half the fun in any Challenge event is opening a story and finding out what writers who I would not normally read have done. I don't know who wrote what, but when the writers are revealed I am often surprised the authors I read less often get higher votes then ones I read regularly.

Reading stories from different writers of genre I usually do not have an interest in has taught me a lot. I have learned how to write better, expressions and ideas for my own stories. If one limits themselves to certain authors all the time, then may be missing some great writing. I joined the Library to expand my ideas, thoughts and activities. If I chose to limit my reading I also am choosing to limit my enjoyment and learning as a writer, thereby I read and comment on most types of stories.

It is funny, every time there is a Challenge there are complaints, and there are compliments, just like every day life in the Library. I have always said the most important part of this site is to have fun, and Februs's comment above hints at the same thing, this site is for fun and sharing, do what you can, when you can and 'don't worry...be happy."

Up to this challenge I would have said "no", but this challenge has really too many entries for my taste. I always liked to read the challenges, compare the different approaches, guess the authors and then see how other readers judged and commented. But with 94 stories its shifting from a recreational activity to a kind of duty once I have started to read. I still don't know if I have the perseverance to read the remaining 50 stories or just give up. As it seems that more and more authors are participating in the challenges (what is a good thing in my view) I would prefer a limit of one story per author, otherwise the challenges commute into a workload for readers.

I agree!

I dissented from njirick's view on the length limitation, not because I object to one challenge having a tight length limitation, but because I believe some stories are better given a bit more space - so a length limitation of 2,500 should not become the norm. It only really matters if you think the outcome in terms of winners is important. I don't, but I'd still be unhappy voting without having read all the entries even if some were skimmed once I lost interest. I'd be particularly unhappy about voting for a limited number of stories I'd picked for their titles, as this would, I suspect, push titles towards the blatant and away from the mysterious.

Actually, although we have quite a few more entries this time round, the total word count is almost the same as for the previous challenge (176900 versus 173204) so the total effort involved is going to be about the same. It just appears greater because of the number of entries.

If the problem is that people feel the actual burden is getting them all read by the deadline we can very easily extend it as I'm sure has been said in the past on other challenges. The reason we haven't done so as yet is because in all the previous challenges people have complained that there wasn't enough time to read all the entries but then by the last week hardly anyone was still voting (because they'd all voted).

Not everyone views the purpose of the challenges in the same way but from our point of view they were intended to generate lots of new spanking fiction of the best quality possible and also to have fun when it comes to the voting. With that as the basis from an admin point of view, I wouldn't like to see author's restricted to one entry and in general, I prefer not to have word count limits on the photo challenges.

For the next one we'll be doing a photo challenge again - I doubt we'll get anywhere near as many entries for it but if lots of people are finding voting a chore maybe we need to look for some other means of resolving the problem rather than dissuading authors from writing or compromising on the overall quality of what's being written by always imposing a word limit. Or maybe, we just leave things be and if people want to vote and enjoy doing so, they will, and if they don't, they won't.

I look at the Challenges as a prompt. Each new scenario provides a creative stimulus to authors and their results provide readers a batch of related but different stories. And...to be honest...this is where I leave off. The actual voting doesn't appeal to me since I find it very telling that in every challenge there has never been a winner or even an honorable mention for an F/m story. Unless one assumes that this is because all F/m writers are inferior or all F/m stories are inferior, you realize that the voting is a popularity contest of subject matter and orientation and not a judging of literary merits. The odds are just against it. Were I to take the voting seriously, I would be very discouraged.

I love entering when I have the time. And I love reading whatever I have time to read, but I don't take the challenges as anything other than a nudge to create and an opportunity to put my work out there to those who might not otherwise enjoy it. I have received numerous comments during the challenges that have meant more to me than any win/loss vote or prize. As such I will continue to enter whenever possible, but I may never be fanatical about the voting process.

The problem with this suggestion is that the synopses are written by the validators not the authors, and the validation only takes place after the stories have been published.

Whilst I can't speak with total authority on this point, I would imagine there are practical difficulties in validating before publishing.

That's probably true but I don't read words or sentences, I read stories. I think the effort to read one 10,000-word-story is not as high as the effort to read ten 1,000-word-stories. In the first case you have one set of characters, one plot and one ongoing story-line. And if the story was good and I have the time I read the story in one go. But if I finished one story I normally have not enough appetite to read another 10 good stories with another 10 different plots and 100 new characters in the same go. It's a sensory-overflow for me and the joy of reading changes into a mere job which has to be done somehow.

But maybe I just follow Alef's suggestion and use the random function in future challenges if the number of stories still increases.

Ah, OK, I see what you're saying. So, basically it is then a factor of the time available. Maybe we should consider setting a period of time for voting that is based in some way on the number of entries submitted. For example, 20 or 25 stories = 1 week of voting (or whatever value we arrive at). Would that help?

I tend to think that would be a great idea. A week of reading 20 - 25 stories and voting on them should be fairly easy. Perhaps you could have a header such as: 1st week of 20-25. After that week is completed, 2nd week of 25 stories, etc... Leave the previous weeks up there. When all the stories are listed, give us an extra week of voting so that stragglers who missed them can read them later on. That gives everyone interested in reading the stories a chance to do so with a better time frame involved.