What Makes a Favourite?

In being a writer with little experience I have noticed some of my stories that I expected to go nowhere have more "favourites" then the ones I would have thought had more appeal to the readers. Can someone explain why that is. I write mostly F/M so I know that genre is in a minority on the site however I have read other stories of all genre and there seems to be no rhyme or reason why some are favorites and others are not. Just wondering if anyone has any insight that I may be missing, thanks.

It is a question of personal taste. The story with the most comments and favourites is possibly the one with most popular appeal, it doesn't mean it is the best.

I'm a bit curious about this. Predictably, some stories I make favourites have been so marked by plenty of other people, but on the competitions, there's sometimes a huge difference between the entries I liked best and the most popular. As most of my items are posted first in Flaming Cheeks, I do notice that some stories get a lot of favourable comment there and none (and no favourites) here, and vice versa. What surprises me a little is when someone makes hugely complimentary remarks about an entry, but no-one has made it a favourite, so they haven't!

I've also seen some marked as favourites which have no comments at all. If I liked something enough to make it a favourite, I'd surely comment on it.

But as Mr Blimp says, it's all a matter of personal taste.

I can see no consistent theme to what gets popular attention and what I think is a good story with great writing. But don't despair, spank-writers, just look at the publishing business in general and you will see the same phenomenon played out on a larger scale.

When all other explanation fails, just remember, in the US, where there are so many excellent microbrew beers available, Coors Light is probably the single best-selling beer around and it is akin to watered-down piss in a can.

(Sometimes you should look at the caliber of commentary for a good, but not super-popular story and consider yourself privileged to have the taste to be among a minority rather than squarely planted among the general population.)

Maybe only 20 Percent of the stories I marked as "favourites" are favourites of mine. If I like a story very much I mostly remember author and title and don't need to put it on my favs-list. The rest of my "favs" are stories
- I didn't finished yet, so I bookmarked them
- which I found through a search and want to read them later on
- are recommended to me, but not yet read
- where I want to leave a comment, but haven't done so far. After commenting I normally unmark this stories
- stories where I want to remember just a specific sentence or paragraph for whatever reasons
-stories, which I read already but forgot to unmark them afterwards.

So if a story is on my favourite list it means nearly nothing. Stories I comment are always stories I like. But I like a lot of stories very much and never comment on them, just because I don't know what I could write about the story.

LMAO ... as a Canadian where the regular beer is always 5% or better I have to agree with the comment about many USA beers, what it has to do with the subject of Favourites I have no idea but it sure made me laugh.

It's merely AKIN to watered-down piss? I thought it WAS watered-down piss. I guess I'm gonna have to change brands.

As for the ON topic issue, I agree that these things are a matter of taste - and the taste of the particular people reading here or elsewhere. A catchy title can generate reads, and the timing if when a story is posted (determining how long it stays on the front page of newly-loaded stories) can also affect the number of reads, and increase the likelihood of comments (and favorites). Of course, every comment a story receives seems to generate more reads, which in turn can generate still more comments. So there are factors beyond how good a story is that determine the number of comments and favorites.

I think it's an impulse thing. If the story floats your boat it takes no effort to mark it as a favorite, while a comment takes a little thought. Also readers might use it as a save device, a reminder to come back at some future date and re-read or perhaps finish it. Mostly though I think it's a device to save stories that the reader really liked--or at least I like to think that. Comments are trickier and I agree with Rick that position on the front page makes a difference as does the title. For example, the reads of a certain cinematic blockbuster (I'm not going to stoop to a shameless plug) have dropped precipitously since that work slipped to the back pages, while I know that there are people who would read it but probably have no idea it's there. Oh well, their loss, but it does point out that the front page is where it's at.