Implemented Fairer sorting of lists

[SealJohnson]

Currently, the trending lists, tag rankings and series finder—indeed, pretty much everything on this site—are by default sorted by total views.

Total views is a pretty meaningless stat, and using it as the primary means to sort series is, to be frank, screwing over a lot of series posted here.

Why is it meaningless, you may ask? Because the total number of views depends on the number of chapters posted. And a chapter can be any length.

A series with lots of tiny chapters is going to have many times more total views than one with fewer, larger chapters, even if they have the exact same number of readers and the same number of words written. This puts authors in a difficult position. Either they have to game the system by dividing their chapters into tiny snippets posted separately, or their series are less likely to get discovered, and don't get read.

A somewhat related problem: the current trending list creates a massive snowball effect, where the only series being viewed are those that already have the most views. This kind of thing is a problem everywhere, but the trending lists on other sites such as Royal Road are much more successful at getting readers to view new stories. Here, it's mostly the same titles, week after week.

Many of the stats shown next to series in the various lists are equally unhelpful.

• Number of chapters: Not a valid unit of measurement. A chapter can be any length.
• Chapters per week: Same problem.
• Favourites: Depends on the number of chapters.
• Total views: See above.

Here are some stats that are actually useful for sorting / showing in summaries:

• Average views: Total views / number of chapters.
• Number of words: Unlike number of chapters, this accurately represents how much has been written.
• Words per week: Much more meaningful than chapters per week.
• Number of pages: Many readers don't know how long a 'page' is, but it's certainly more meaningful than number of chapters.
• Rating: A bit iffy sorting by ratings, because they're so easily abused. Only useful if you take into account the total number of ratings as well as the overall score (e.g. something with a single 5-star rating should not beat something with a 4.9 average and 50 total ratings).
• Number of readers: This would probably be my pick for default sorting stat.

 

[Eukro]

Ok, so I was curious about this whole people posting more chapters crap and looked at the chapters per week of all stories in the top 25. Only two authors have more than 6 per week, Xian Piete and Ace Arriande. So what you are saying then, if this isn't about Xian, it's about Ace. I don't see anyone calling Ace out as anything other than a prolific author with his own fans. Which means this thread from top to bottom was an attack on Xian.

I think some people owe Xian an apology.

 

[Jemini]

Ok, so I was curious about this whole people posting more chapters crap and looked at the chapters per week of all stories in the top 25. Only two authors have more than 6 per week, Xian Piete and Ace Arriande. So what you are saying then, if this isn't about Xian, it's about Ace. I don't see anyone calling Ace out as anything other than a prolific author with his own fans. Which means this thread from top to bottom was an attack on Xian.

I think some people owe Xian an apology.

Your point would be valid if there was an attack involved here in the first place. We are only talking about how to make the system better, not attacking someone who happened to do something that called attention to the flawed nature it had right now in its current form.

Xian only made it clear that something had to be done due to the fact that, whether intentional or not, he happened to exploit the current weakness in the system. I don't blame him for taking advantage of it. That's just what people do. It's not Xian who's at fault, it's the system itself.

I have no doubt Xian is a pretty good writer and deserves a high position. Whether that be the case or not though, it's creating problems. Also, the two you pointed out are absolutely not the only ones to take advantage of the current flawed system. Xian and Ace being otherwise good writers are the reason they shot up there and stayed up there. There have been a few other authors who used the same trick who are not so good in terms of their writing who have since fizzled out. And, the only reason they aren't still on the top trending list with those tactics is because they just didn't have the wherewithal to keep writing.

A few weeks back, there was this guy who was posting 300 word mini chapters at a rate of about 5 per day who made it to the number 4 spot on trending They have since fallen down to below the 50 mark since they just stopped posting entirely. In terms of overall quality, it was about middle of the road in terms of some of the stories that appear on this site. It was definitely not top 10 material though.

So, Xian is indeed someone who exploited the system, again intentional or not, but it is due to his talent as a writer that he's stayed at the top. So, that's the way things are. I think the best analogy would be to compare Xian to Lance Armstrong. Lance Armstrong had a legitimate excuse to be blood doping due to his cancer, and this won him the tour-de-France several times in a row. It was still seen as completely illigitimate though because it's the exact same tactic that a lot of far less honest people were using, and the matter of it having given him an unfair advantage over the other cyclists is a completely unavoidable fact. Doesn't make Lance Armstrong a horrible person, but it does call the legitimacy of his position into question.

Overall, changing the system to even out the field is going to be every bit as good for Xian as it will be for other authors. It will spare Xian from the hostility as soon as his preferred writing method is no longer something that takes advantage of the current system, and it will also give other authors more of a chance.

 

[Tony]

I don't get the drama. It's obviously SH's fault that the trending system works like this. I guess if it's that big of a deal, I'll drop what I was working on to make a "fairer" trending system. It's in quotes because it will never be perfect imo. I'm not sure when it'll be finished but I'll start working on it tomorrow.

I haven't been lazy. I just never thought the trending system was a big deal as it was just there as a placeholder until I can implement something better. I've been working on SH every day for anyone who is curious: https://forum.scribblehub.com/threads/change-log.313/

Anyways, I'm locking this thread because the drama is unnecessary.