A few little ideas

[Assurbanipal_II]

We all here like scribblehub, or at least you have a passing interest in its continued existence.

Therefore, I would like to suggest a few changes that could be made.

a) I would like to see an option for getting an automatic notification when certain stories are updated and receive a new chapters. Not obligatory, but facultative.

b) Being able to remove your given ratings. Maybe I have overlooked it, but so far I haven't found any possible way to remove ratings you have given. If you have rated a story, you can only change them by going higher or lower, but not delete them when you have changed your opinion.

c) Perhaps a list for stories you have rated would be useful, or a list for all stories that you have somehow interacted with that runs in the background like a browsing history.

On a less serious note,

Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam and that ratings should be made public for the authors of the respective stories.

 

[ChronicleCrawler]

This thread is becoming more and more interesting.

At least, I could see where everyone is coming from. A nice fruitful discussion with less BS. Love it.

 

[AkalE]

I'm typing this out on my phone. So please excuse me for not quoting.

Authors and readers honestly cannot be held to the same standards. It is the reason why I can rate a movie without having my name revealed. My opinion on the work is not deemed to be public domain. Now if I then decide to post a review, that is public domain and any criticism on it is welcome.

This is not about whether trolls should be given a grace to piss on author's work. Trolls are already ministered by Tony. This is about authors wanting to understand why the 1-star review and if it is based on a bias.

Authors wanting to know might give then a rationing for why the received the rating, it's fair enough. But I still don't think this is a feature that would be beneficial.

The argument that authors drop work when they are criticised is true. Readers should just read what they want instead of getting triggered by something else.
But what is worse than a negative rating is no rating at all.

While in general it is easier for people with thick skins to survive, the call for readers to grow a thicker skin is illogical. While the author has put an effort into their work and published with the knowledge that others would read it. Readers do not read with the same expectations.
A new reader on SH would not join the site with the knowledge that his ratings would be public or as some have called for, need to be justified with infallible logic.

SH is better of with more freedom and less scrutiny. Again, not trolls. Those are being handled already, but more of reader's choices.

What can rather be done is a general aggregate of ratings and what type of readers have rated the story 1star. That is less intrusive and should satiate the author's curiosity. But otherwise, please don't expect readers to either have a great opinion of your story or need to explain their dislike. It won't work. At best you will get spam review with 1star like in WN.

P.S asurrba and Ace taking the same side feels wrong. Go back to normal, shoo!

 

[JayDirex]

You people are way overthinking this.

No one is asking a reader for their passport and home address.

All I said was if you want to give a one-star rating, then force a review.

No, it will not stop the most determined person who absolutely unequivocally has to say something bad about your story. if a reader insists on giving you one star, they will give you one star but now they will need to explain why. Which is fair to all authors because there's no such thing as a one star story. One star means you have a personal vendetta against the author and the author needs to know why.

And I promise you, the person writing a one-star review doesn't care if they are anonymous or not.

The purpose of this logical suggestion, that won't hurt your precious readers' feelings, is to put a fence against one stars to stop the person who does it on an impulse whim of just deciding to drive by your work, slap one star, and then disappearing off into the internet. Because if he has to think twice and press more buttons he won't do it.

No one is asking for a fort Knox security blanket to hinder your precious reader rights. im just saying stop the ability to give one star on a unthinking whim.

As a matter of fact, if it was implemented today no one would even notice nor care. The only people crying about it is you all.

 

[AkalE]

Jay I don't know who spam rated your story 1-star. That really sucks. No offense, but if this is your tone here, I don't know how you would respond to any criticism to the story directly.

I think this thread has enough to insights from both sides and Tony can make a judgement call on his end to implement this or not.

Apart from this footnote of a suggestion in Assur's OP, let's agree that the main three suggestions were absolutely agreeable.

 

[GDLiZy]

You people are way overthinking this.

No one is asking a reader for their passport and home address.

All I said was if you want to give a one-star rating, then force a review.

No, it will not stop the most determined person who absolutely unequivocally has to say something bad about your story. if a reader insists on giving you one star, they will give you one star but now they will need to explain why. Which is fair to all authors because there's no such thing as a one star story. One star means you have a personal vendetta against the author and the author needs to know why.

And I promise you, the person writing a one-star review doesn't care if they are anonymous or not.

The purpose of this logical suggestion, that won't hurt your precious readers' feelings, is to put a fence against one stars to stop the person who does it on an impulse whim of just deciding to drive by your work, slap one star, and then disappearing off into the internet. Because if he has to think twice and press more buttons he won't do it.

No one is asking for a fort Knox security blanket to hinder your precious reader rights. im just saying stop the ability to give one star on a unthinking whim.

As a matter of fact, if it was implemented today no one would even notice nor care. The only people crying about it is you all.

Either you force review with all rating or none. This is creating a penalty for rating low, which is discouraging at best and unethical at worst.

 

[JayDirex]

Either you force review with all rating or none. This is creating a penalty for rating low, which is discouraging at best and unethical at worst.

Nah, no one would notice it at all. most readers on this site are passive. They don't even leave comments, let alone ratings or reviews. if someone wants to give a one-star review they are either truly impassioned or just on an angry whim. if they run across a fence they will either snap out of their anger or continue because it's not much of a hurdle.

As for ethics, please (+_+), it's a web novel site not Parliament. no one is going to notice that there's a fence up at the one-star because no one gives one star unless they truly have something to say or they're just pissing on your story on a whim.

and it's not a penalty for giving a low rating, the site is not taking anything from the reader. the fence is just a small layer of protection for the author to not be one starred on a whim. and since so few people do it anyway no reader on this site is even going to notice.

 

[GDLiZy]

Nah, no one would notice it at all. most readers on this site are passive. They don't even leave comments, let alone ratings or reviews. if someone wants to give a one-star review they are either truly impassioned or just on an angry whim. if they run across a fence they will either snap out of their anger or continue because it's not much of a hurdle.

As for ethics, please (+_+), it's a web novel site not Parliament. no one is going to notice that there's a fence up at the one-star because no one gives one star unless they truly have something to say or they're just pissing on your story on a whim.

and it's not a penalty for giving a low rating, the site is not taking anything from the reader. the fence is just a small layer of protection for the author to not be one starred on a whim. and since so few people do it anyway no reader on this site is even going to notice.

That's not a logical argument. Saying that no one will notice isn't even an argument. You don't say that cheating is all right because no one will notice.

Ethics don't selectively apply to a group of people. Whether you are a street venture or a gigantic company you must be following rules of ethnicity.

And people will notice. It only takes one post for everyone to know about it.

 

[Ral]

Nah, no one would notice it at all. most readers on this site are passive. They don't even leave comments, let alone ratings or reviews. if someone wants to give a one-star review they are either truly impassioned or just on an angry whim. if they run across a fence they will either snap out of their anger or continue because it's not much of a hurdle.

As for ethics, please (+_+), it's a web novel site not Parliament. no one is going to notice that there's a fence up at the one-star because no one gives one star unless they truly have something to say or they're just pissing on your story on a whim.

and it's not a penalty for giving a low rating, the site is not taking anything from the reader. the fence is just a small layer of protection for the author to not be one starred on a whim. and since so few people do it anyway no reader on this site is even going to notice.

I think you are underestimating things.

First, most is not all. Even if say 1% is active. 1% of a million is 10,000. That is still a large number of people. I wouldn't be surprised if people would start talking about this if it ever got implemented.

Second, the situation could also change. In fact, it most likely would change. Readers might be passive now but they might not be in the future.

Third. One star ratings aren't just given by impassioned or angry people. From my observation many are often given because they just dislike the story. The ratings is used like a like/dislike button, though most readers here ignore the dislike button (one star) if they don't like the story. They often have no ill intention to it as you implied. They just used the feature the way they think it should be used.

And there is penalty. For giving one star ratings you have to spend more time and effort.

 

[Moonpearl]

Which is fair to all authors because there's no such thing as a one star story. One star means you have a personal vendetta against the author and the author needs to know why.

There is such a thing as a one star story? Definitely.

Here are some one-star stories I've encountered in other places:

• A short BL story claiming to be a romantic stories of two lovers meeting. It was seven chapters long and every chapter was just a miserable, unfunny rape-joke that the poor, unconscious ML had to suffer through every time he woke up. There was no other form of humour, and no true interaction between the two characters. At the end, the author wrote one paragraph about how they would later go on a huge adventure and overturn the world and have a great romance, but that they weren't going to tell that story. Not only was this story dishonestly advertised, but it was trash.
• A GL gender bender that turned out to be about a sexist paedophile loser. He pretended to be a sweet young girl while tricking lesbians into falling for him, all the while thinking homophobic things and trying (but "comically" failing) to rape them.
• "Save the Pearls" - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12393909-revealing-eden

(I can give examples from my own stories if that's too negative for people.)