Maxieplus Posted November 1, 2015 Report Share Posted November 1, 2015 Well done everyone, congratulations winners and non winners, all the stories had something wonderfully appealing about them. It was good to read them all. Some stories were within the ballpark and some were way up the road, but thats why our lives are not boring. Time to relax and maybe ponder a number one next year. Now I must chase my story I think its caught the bus and is halfway to New Zealand. Hahahah. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Schaeffer Posted November 1, 2015 Report Share Posted November 1, 2015 Kudos to all the winners. I found something to like in ALL the stories, and the three that rose to the top this year were certainly worthy contenders. I enjoyed each of them for various reasons. Even though my story didn't make the top 3 - I understand the scoring was very, very close - I am very glad I participated this year. I feel like these contests really push us writers to up our game, and for that I am grateful.But I have a serious question for everyone who read my story: I am at a total loss how 3 people could score my story as having almost no Halloween theme. What exactly were you looking for that isn't in my story? I've been flummoxed about this from the time the scoring began. It makes no sense to me, so I don't know what, if anything, to take from it. Likewise, the person or persons who obviously STRONGLY disliked my story (as evidenced by giving my story scores of 1 across the board) - I'd love to know why? Like Kyle, I think I can learn most from "negative" criticism or what is hopefully constructive criticism, so if those of you who didn't like it would be brave enough to tell me why, I'd appreciate it. I may not agree with you, of course, but I'd still like to understand. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyle Aarons Posted November 1, 2015 Report Share Posted November 1, 2015 (edited) Jack,First off, I will say this much. I gave #12 my highest marks and yours and one of the others was tied for my second highest marks. I fully enjoyed your story. This all but excludes me from giving you the feedback you are looking for.With that said, one thing I have learned with all the writing I have done to this point is that the perceptions of readers is all over the board. When I write something I think is very clear, it often times turns out to be just the opposite in the minds of some of those who give me feedback.If there is any one thing I can point to, it would be the opening. I had a hard time connecting to the lead character quickly. I just couldn't get him in my mind as I was reading until quite a bit later on. If there is one reason I gave #12 a higher mark than yours it was this. With Multi's 'A Different Tribe' I didn't feel I needed the close connection as I did with a your lead detective. While this is by no means the answer you may be seeking, it is the about the only thing which caused me to give your wonderful story a slight hit when compared to #12however, of the three I gave very high marks to, none of them made the top three, so I obviously don't see the same things as many others do Edited November 1, 2015 by Kyle Aarons Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynaira Posted November 1, 2015 Report Share Posted November 1, 2015 Congratulations to the winners! Thank you to all the authors who submitted stories, they were all wonderful and I enjoyed every second reading them all! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynus Posted November 1, 2015 Report Share Posted November 1, 2015 I am honored to have placed in the top 3. Although I didn't get a chance to read all of the stories, I know there were some great ones in there. I chose not to vote until I'd finished all of them, and since that didn't happen, I never voted, but I will say this to everyone who participated: Thank you for joining in on the fun. Everyone sure kept the contest interesting, and the votes seemed close the whole time. Thank you again for writing! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Schaeffer Posted November 1, 2015 Report Share Posted November 1, 2015 Kyle,Thanks for the great feedback. I totally get what you're saying. Thanks, too, for the high marks. I get what you are saying about the varied perceptions, but honestly, you'd have to be totally blind to not see Halloween in my story, so I think something else was a foot with a couple of readers. Oh well, this writing thing is so subjective, and nobody HAS to like what we do, right? Maxieplus 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zergrinch Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 (edited) Jack, although I ultimately found time to read only Stories 2 & 3 (I am sure Kyle wrote #3 the moment I saw the word "want-a-be" in place of "wannabe", and I don't think you wrote #2), I will only say this pertaining to subjectiveness. Edited November 2, 2015 by Zergrinch Jack Schaeffer 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Schaeffer Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 Jack, although I ultimately found time to read only Stories 2 & 3 (and I am sure Kyle wrote #3 the moment I saw the word "want-a-be" in please of "wannabe"), I will only say this pertaining to subjectiveness.http://i.imgur.com/FNEhZ.jpgHilarious! Thanks for sharing! That's exactly how it feels sometimes in this writing world. My best guess is I offended someone or maybe a couple of someones with my story. I'll never know unless they say so, however. Thanks for the laugh. It was perfect! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Norris Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 There is a distinct method to the madness in how we (the staff) wanted the readers to vote. We wanted each story to be evaluated against itself and not against the other stories.This is why we asked you to vote immediately after reading each story. The story you just read is what is in your mind at that moment. So you are more likely to evaluate the questions (in the voting poll), based solely (or mostly) on that particular story.If you wait to vote until after you have read them all, then you are more apt to be voting a comparison vote. That is, you are comparing the stories against each other, instead of the merits of the individual story. We wanted to get away from that.The questions were designed to give the author feedback on his particular story, not to compare his story to all the rest. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Schaeffer Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 There is a distinct method to the madness in how we (the staff) wanted the readers to vote. We wanted each story to be evaluated against itself and not against the other stories....The questions were designed to give the author feedback on his particular story, not to compare his story to all the rest.Al,Were that it was so. I'm guilty of reading all of them first before voting, but I didn't compare one to another. I did vote on the story as it was - I couldn't have possibly compared one story to another - they were all so very, very different from one another. I do think the scoring should be blind. I mentioned to Ken that human nature being what it is, we are less intimidated to be the first to mark something lower if we aren't the first to do so. Likewise, we generally don't feel comfortable being too far outside the "norm" so if, for example, I'm reading a story and I think the plot development is extraordinarily weak, I might be inclined to give it a 2. But if I see that everyone before me has rated it a 5, I'll first wonder what's wrong with me (and then I'll wonder what the other readers were smoking...grin.) That being said, the scores this time were all over the map, so I can't imagine WHAT people were thinking when they read these. They certainly didn't show any signs of "group think", so maybe I'm wrong.And I've been doing a fair bit of thinking, and I wonder if authors with a story in contention should perhaps be prevented from voting at all, or at least not on other competitor's stories. This avoids the appearance of evil, not that I think that necessarily happens. Having said that, I would be sad not being able to fully participate, so again, maybe I should still keep thinking on this...It is, in the end, a contest. And despite the "anonymous" authors, people who follow our work will often recognize our style and vote accordingly. I don't think there's anything to stop that. One other thing to think about - my mood at the time of reading a story could affect my scoring, which is why I waited until I had read all of them. I took notes to remember each story - what I liked, what I didn't, and then used that to finish voting. Actually, now that I think about it, I did some reading and voting, then stopped when you extended the deadline, giving me more time to adequately absorb the material. The extra time was a HUGE help to this contest. Some of the stories were quite long and I'm not the fastest reader.One more note: most of the stories received literally hundreds of views, yet relatively small numbers of actual votes. I wonder if that isn't the real challenge. How do we get people to actually VOTE?Just my $0.02. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zergrinch Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 @Al Norris: If the aim was not to compare the stories against each other, why call it a contest? That denotes a full on comparison. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyle Aarons Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 the contest aspect was the scoring of the stories to each other. the scoring itself was for that story only. This gives a way for there to be a contest without having people raking 1st through 12th. I like to scoring aspect and feel the overall scheme works very well, but you all have to give some credit to those who have to tally the scores. there is some hard work on that front as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynus Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 My reasoning for not voting until after I'd read them all was that I didn't want to only vote on some stories and not others and unbalance the total number of votes for each story. I intended to skim back through each one as I voted to make sure I refreshed myself first. It just didn't happen.I see your reasoning for wanting the voting to happen immediately after reading, however, though I apparently missed that memo. My apologies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Schaeffer Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 Cynus, they have a way to handle the inequities in the number of votes. I won't bore you with the details but each story essentially ends up getting an "average" score based on the number of votes that story receives. That's about as fair as you can make it, unless there's a way to "force" every reader to vote on every story. In the two contests I've entered, there were different numbers of votes for all the stories entered. Can't be helped, I don't think. The averaging thing works. Although, the more total votes your story receives with higher scores definitely ups your "average" and in the end your ranking overall. Vice versa if you get low scores. Me...I'd prefer if you don't like my story...don't vote! LOL! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynus Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 Yeah, I didn't think of things that way. I'm still trying to figure out how to juggle my personal life on top of working a full-time job and writing full time. I know this would have been solved by some careful reading on my part, but if I'm not reading carefully enough to see how I'm supposed to be voting properly, maybe it's a good thing I didn't vote! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeikor Posted November 2, 2015 Report Share Posted November 2, 2015 Okay, a few thoughts.I agree with Jack that the votes seemed to be all over the place on almost all the stories. I have a hard time understanding how a story that includes or even centers around Samhain, the origin of our Halloween, doesn't embody a Halloween theme.I have no problem being one of the writers and voting. I vote on the merit of each story even on those where I have figured out the author (and I am harder on myself than on others in general). I did not give any story real low marks on anything for they were all interesting and well written.On the number of views versus number of votes. I know for myself on a few of the longer ones I had to stop reading then come back to finish causing more views than my one vote. Also as one of the writers I checked the votes on my story several times to get a feel for how well I did this time with my writing.One thing I forgot in my earlier post- Thank you to Ken, Al and the others who work behind the scenes making our fun possible. Jack Schaeffer 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Driver Posted November 3, 2015 Report Share Posted November 3, 2015 Wow - I sure didn't expect to see my own story as a winner. Thank you to everyone who read it, and all those who voted it up. I honestly didn't see this coming as I watched the scoring - mine didn't seem that strong in comparison to a lot of others, but I never thought to count up the voters.I didn't know if we were supposed to vote on our own stories or not, so I didn't vote mine, and I'm sure that helped my score. I liked all the other stories and gave everyone high marks - all gold and silver stars, more gold than silver. I'm really glad the scoring was designed the way it was, as I wouldn't have been able to come up relative scores and actually declare one story 'better' than any other. This has been a dismal year in the life, with even more bad news coming last week, so thank you everyone for providing me with a bright spot. Jack Schaeffer 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Al Norris Posted November 3, 2015 Report Share Posted November 3, 2015 Oh Boy! Doncha just love it when I stir the pot!! Jack Schaeffer and Mark C. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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