Dive into the Metadata – A ScribbleHub Analysis of Smut

Assurbanipal_II

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I actually don´t. What is your conclusion based on this sample size?


I took all novels from this site (except the deleted ones) and compared them by tags.

My conclusion is that smut outperforms non-smut by a factor of roughly 2.0 - 2.5, but that is only my feeling.
 

Ace_Arriande

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The issue isn't about finding popular smut novels, but finding smut author who also write non smut stories. They tend to stay in their genre if you understand what I mean.
We exist, but as you've said before on the forum, once a smut author, always a smut author. Or something like that. It doesn't matter if you only have 1/5 smut series. People will just assume they're all smut. The curse of being horny, but only some of the time. :blobtaco:

Personally speaking, all of my non-smut stories except for one (which is unpopular on all platforms due to how the the story is) are more popular than my smut. But that's just one case, and I'll admit that you've got more evidence supporting your claim.

Back to only watching the forum fires instead of burning myself on them. :blob_salute:
 

Assurbanipal_II

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We exist, but as you've said before on the forum, once a smut author, always a smut author. Or something like that. It doesn't matter if you only have 1/5 smut series. People will just assume they're all smut. The curse of being horny, but only some of the time. :blobtaco:

Personally speaking, all of my non-smut stories except for one (which is unpopular on all platforms due to how the the story is) are more popular than my smut. But that's just one case, and I'll admit that you've got more evidence supporting your claim.

Back to only watching the forum fires instead of burning myself on them. :blob_salute:

Maybe smut stories tend to plateau faster? The gain more traction initially and rise very easily at the beginning, but then their growth flattens more than conventional stories.
 

bloodyWriter

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My conclusion is that smut outperforms non-smut by a factor of roughly 2.0 - 2.5, but that is only my feeling.
Well based on views per chapter, it only outperforms the average chapter by 66%. Still a huge number, but not near your 200%. You only focused on some popular smut novels and not all of them.

Maybe smut stories tend to plateau faster? The gain more traction initially and rise very easily at the beginning, but then their growth flattens more than conventional stories.
That´s correct.
 

Assurbanipal_II

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Well based on views per chapter, it only outperforms the average chapter by 66%. Still a huge number, but not near your 200%. You only focused on some popular smut novels and not all of them.


That´s correct.

Are the 66% in absolute terms or in relative terms? Views/ chapter or views/ chapter / story?
 

Ace_Arriande

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Maybe smut stories tend to plateau faster? The gain more traction initially and rise very easily at the beginning, but then their growth flattens more than conventional stories.
The only time this has been the case was when I uploaded censored smut to RR after the original EDE was taken down for being too lewd. It hit 2k followers in a month and was top of trending, then got kicked off. Uploaded the censored version. Got about 800 followers or so in the same time and hit a complete wall of no growth. Then when the original EDE came here, it hit 2nd top followed and had consistent growth for a few months before getting killed (this time by me) and rebooted as EDO. Since then, EDO has had pretty consistent growth. I feel like most of the top smuts have had consistent growth since they're generally keeping pace with the non-smuts and not losing their positions. These are all just personal observations, though.

On a somewhat related note, I feel like there's definitely a plateau when it comes to LitRPGs. I've seen so many LitRPGs get huge on RR, gain like 3k - 6k followers in a month, and then just have no significant growth every time I go back to check on them. My own have also felt that. I think when it comes to LitRPG, people can definitely tell pretty quickly whether they'll like something or not. And with how much of it there is, they're more willing to drop it if they even slightly dislike it to find something more suitable to their tastes. And the people who read it jump onto every new one there is, so they get most of their exposure pretty early.
 

Assurbanipal_II

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The only time this has been the case was when I uploaded censored smut to RR after the original EDE was taken down for being too lewd. It hit 2k followers in a month and was top of trending, then got kicked off. Uploaded the censored version. Got about 800 followers or so in the same time and hit a complete wall of no growth. Then when the original EDE came here, it hit 2nd top followed and had consistent growth for a few months before getting killed (this time by me) and rebooted as EDO. Since then, EDO has had pretty consistent growth. I feel like most of the top smuts have had consistent growth since they're generally keeping pace with the non-smuts and not losing their positions. These are all just personal observations, though.

On a somewhat related note, I feel like there's definitely a plateau when it comes to LitRPGs. I've seen so many LitRPGs get huge on RR, gain like 3k - 6k followers in a month, and then just have no significant growth every time I go back to check on them. My own have also felt that. I think when it comes to LitRPG, people can definitely tell pretty quickly whether they'll like something or not. And with how much of it there is, they're more willing to drop it if they even slightly dislike it to find something more suitable to their tastes. And the people who read it jump onto every new one there is, so they get most of their exposure pretty early.

As scribble hub has the reputation of being the porn hub of novel sites, maybe our LitRPGs are smut, but who knows. We would need a qualified database for determine the smut factor is with a control group, which seems impossible.

Novels with similar styles, similar chapter numbers and similar update times.
 

bloodyWriter

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Are the 66% in absolute terms or in relative terms? Views/ chapter or views/ chapter / story?
View per Chapter.

On a somewhat related note, I feel like there's definitely a plateau when it comes to LitRPGs. I've seen so many LitRPGs get huge on RR, gain like 3k - 6k followers in a month, and then just have no significant growth every time I go back to check on them. My own have also felt that. I think when it comes to LitRPG, people can definitely tell pretty quickly whether they'll like something or not. And with how much of it there is, they're more willing to drop it if they even slightly dislike it to find something more suitable to their tastes. And the people who read it jump onto every new one there is, so they get most of their exposure pretty early.

Probably correct, although I cannot confirm that directly. But the average LitRPG novel with less or equal to 50 chapters has 1111 views/chapter, while the average only has 726.
Over 50 chapters LitRPG has 1908 views/chapter, while the rest has 1609, so its still better than the average, but not so much anymore.

Welcome to the dumpster fire
 

Assurbanipal_II

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View per Chapter.



Probably correct, although I cannot confirm that directly. But the average LitRPG novel with less or equal to 50 chapters has 1111 views/chapter, while the average only has 726.
Over 50 chapters LitRPG has 1908 views/chapter, while the rest has 1609, so its still better than the average, but not so much anymore.

Welcome to the dumpster fire

How do the medians look like?
 

AkalE

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You don't need to make things so complicated. :blob_evil_two: Just check some authors and compare their smut stories with their non-smut stories. You will detect a significant divergence despite them being the same authors. How is that possible? They are the same authors. Their writing is the same.
Assurba spitting facts here :blob_popcorn:
 

bigbear51

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If we're talking about smut stories relative to an author's other nonsmut works. Then using the sample size of one (myself), my lone story with the smut tag does stand at the top for views, views-per-chapter, and readers. Plus it has been on trending multiple times as well, maxing out at 2nd. The only other story that was on trending by me was the harem one. It's also worth noting that the other three stories do have the ecchi tag, so the lesser form of smut isn't nearly as attractive when it comes to views it seems.

Of course, it's only four stories that are on here. So it's not exactly anything that anyone could use for proof. But I will say that most of the stories I want to write in the future are nonsmut. So I'd consider myself as an author that just dabbles with the more lewd content.

Screenshot 2020-10-08 203106.png
 

bafflinghaze

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😍 love the data and the analysis! I would be interested in how the smut tag interacts with the adult tag, and how often works with Sexual Content warnings also tag smut or adult.
 
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