A new Rating System that improves User Experience

jrell

jrell

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Hello everyone!

I just had an experience where someone gave my novel a 1-star rating without even reading past chapter 1, and it got me thinking: why? It felt a bit harsh, and I realized that ratings can be quite subjective and emotional. Perhaps, the person had a bad day due to some other reason, like a cat pooping in their shoe or whatever people are dealing with these days. Or is my writing just bad? I don't know. And this is not a normal situation where writers have no idea how their novels are doing.

Here's the thing: the current system feels limiting for both readers and writers. As a reader, users may interpret each star differently. What might be a 3-star rating for one person could be a 5-star rating for another, which results in novels being hidden by this invisible star-made wall, where they skip the content they might like because of the rating. And as a writer, one bad rating can be disheartening, and I'm sure many writers here can agree with this. So, I've got a feature request that could make things better for everyone involved.

What if we had a "Recommend/Don't recommend" system similar to the one used on Steam? This way, instead of assigning a numerical rating, readers could express whether they recommend the novel or not. Or we can call it "Like/Dislike" if you'd like. You like it, you hit like. No room for mixed signals. It would be more straightforward and less prone to impulsive, overly negative ratings.

A binary system will make the rating more representative, as readers are more likely to provide feedback when they only have two options. More to it, with clear user preferences, it will be easy to develop a personal recommendation system that suggests novels tailored to each user's individual tastes.



The technical aspect. Transitioning from one to another is easy: move 4-5 ratings to likes, 1-2 to dislikes, and ignore 3. In theory, it can be done even without changing the database structure, just by calculating it on the frontend side. New ratings are saved as 1 or 5 stars and displayed as likes/dislikes. It will give us an option to quickly switch back if necessary.
 
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There is no way this will happen, and I will be honest your rating isn't even bad. Some people will just one star for no reason, and there is no helping that. You can always send the one stars to @K5Rakitan. She is German, you see. One star ratings give her power.

People will read anything above a four star, and people will even read below a four star. I used to have a criteria of stars before I would read on SH, and it was 3.7 or up. NU was even less than that. I would read anything from there that was 3.4 or higher. Though I don't do this anymore.
 
Assurbanipal_II

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jrell said:
Hello everyone!

I just had an experience where someone gave my novel a 1-star rating without even reading past chapter 1, and it got me thinking: why? It felt a bit harsh, and I realized that ratings can be quite subjective and emotional. Perhaps, the person had a bad day due to some other reason, like a cat pooping in their shoe or whatever people are dealing with these days. Or is my writing just bad? I don't know. And this is not a normal situation where writers have no idea how their novels are doing.

Here's the thing: the current system feels limiting for both readers and writers. As a reader, users may interpret each star differently. What might be a 3-star rating for one person could be a 5-star rating for another, which results in novels being hidden by this invisible star-made wall, where they skip the content they might like because of the rating. And as a writer, one bad rating can be disheartening, and I'm sure many writers here can agree with this. So, I've got a feature request that could make things better for everyone involved.

What if we had a "Recommend/Don't recommend" system similar to the one used on Steam? This way, instead of assigning a numerical rating, readers could express whether they recommend the novel or not. Or we can call it "Like/Dislike" if you'd like. You like it, you hit like. No room for mixed signals. It would be more straightforward and less prone to impulsive, overly negative ratings.

A binary system will make the rating more representative, as readers are more likely to provide feedback when they only have two options. More to it, with clear user preferences, it will be easy to develop a personal recommendation system that suggests novels tailored to each user's individual tastes.



The technical aspect. Transitioning from one to another is easy: move 4-5 ratings to likes, 1-2 to dislikes, and ignore 3. In theory, it can be done even without changing the database structure, just by calculating it on the frontend side. New ratings are saved as 1 or 5 stars and displayed as likes/dislikes. It will give us an option to quickly switch back if necessary.
Click to expand...
:blob_neutral: Calm down. Times have never been better on scribblehub. It is way less toxic than in the past. The ratings have never been higher.
 
TsumiHokiro

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jrell said:
Hello everyone!

I just had an experience where someone gave my novel a 1-star rating without even reading past chapter 1, and it got me thinking: why? It felt a bit harsh, and I realized that ratings can be quite subjective and emotional. Perhaps, the person had a bad day due to some other reason, like a cat pooping in their shoe or whatever people are dealing with these days. Or is my writing just bad? I don't know. And this is not a normal situation where writers have no idea how their novels are doing.

Here's the thing: the current system feels limiting for both readers and writers. As a reader, users may interpret each star differently. What might be a 3-star rating for one person could be a 5-star rating for another, which results in novels being hidden by this invisible star-made wall, where they skip the content they might like because of the rating. And as a writer, one bad rating can be disheartening, and I'm sure many writers here can agree with this. So, I've got a feature request that could make things better for everyone involved.

What if we had a "Recommend/Don't recommend" system similar to the one used on Steam? This way, instead of assigning a numerical rating, readers could express whether they recommend the novel or not. Or we can call it "Like/Dislike" if you'd like. You like it, you hit like. No room for mixed signals. It would be more straightforward and less prone to impulsive, overly negative ratings.

A binary system will make the rating more representative, as readers are more likely to provide feedback when they only have two options. More to it, with clear user preferences, it will be easy to develop a personal recommendation system that suggests novels tailored to each user's individual tastes.



The technical aspect. Transitioning from one to another is easy: move 4-5 ratings to likes, 1-2 to dislikes, and ignore 3. In theory, it can be done even without changing the database structure, just by calculating it on the frontend side. New ratings are saved as 1 or 5 stars and displayed as likes/dislikes. It will give us an option to quickly switch back if necessary.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry to say, but this is how things are. Ratings are a bitch. Everyone gets them but you. What do I mean by that? You don't get to choose what others think about your novel.

You should understand something, some people just don't give a damn to waste their time to read more of your novel, and they feel like they should rate your novel for having wasted their 10 minutes of life. Is it fair to the author who has put way more than just 10 minutes? I sure do not think it is fair to the author, however I do think it is fair to the person who has read it and to other readers. Maybe some of them would share their same opinion and think it is a valid opinion to have.

In fact, some people might see the rating and think, "Does this novel actually deserves this? It surely doesn't sound like it" and instead vote now. Others might even instead write a review trying to redeem the disgrace you have just gone through. But to straight deny them the ability to rate is something you should never do.

Have you never yourself felt the urge of declaring to the world that a novel was so full of rubbish, in your view, right from the first sentence? And have you never acted on that impulse? If not on a novel, think about other places, the internet is full of places where you can review something someone has made for you.

Also, the system you are trying to suggest also has the same flaws that you complain about. People would just read the first chapter and decide "Not recommend" and then proceed. In the end, a change of the system, as proposed by you, does not solve your problem. In fact, such said system has a problem: people sometimes just don't want to neither recommend nor not to, but they are limited to only these options. It is a very restrictive system, where there is either 0 or 1, and people who do not agree with said system are often left for wanting of a better alternative. Which would be the grading system instead of a binary one.
 
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Corty

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RepresentingWrath

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TsumiHokiro said:
I'm sorry to say, but this is how things are. Ratings are a bitch. Everyone gets them but you. What do I mean by that? You don't get to choose what others think about your novel.

You should understand something, some people just don't give a damn to waste their time to read more of your novel, and they feel like they should rate your novel for having wasted their 10 minutes of life. Is it fair to the author who has put way more than just 10 minutes? I sure do not think it is fair to the author, however I do think it is fair to the person who has read it and to other readers. Maybe some of them would share their same opinion and think it is a valid opinion to have.

In fact, some people might see the rating and think, "Does this novel actually deserves this? It surely doesn't sound like it" and instead vote now. Others might even instead write a review trying to redeem the disgrace you have just gone through. But to straight deny them the ability to rate is something you should never do.

Have you never yourself felt the urge of declaring to the world that a novel was so full of rubbish, in your view, right from the first sentence? And have you never acted on that impulse? If not on a novel, think about other places, the internet is full of places where you can review something someone has made for you.

Also, the system you are trying to suggest also has the same flaws that you complain about. People would just read the first chapter and decide "Not recommend" and then proceed. In the end, a change of the system, as proposed to you, does not solve your problem. In fact, such said system has a problem: people sometimes just don't want to neither recommend nor not to, but they are limited to only these options. It is a very restrictive system, where there is either 0 or 1, and people who do not agree with said system are often left for wanting of a better alternative. Which would be the grading system instead of a binary one.
Click to expand...
supremely based birb :blob_shade:
 
RepresentingPride

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What could help is add a certain amount to read before having acces to the rating. Like for exemple, you need to read 10k words of a novel to be able to rate. The only downside would be that new story won't have any rating until they reach 10k words.
 
TsumiHokiro

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Sleds said:
What could help is add a certain amount to read before having acces to the rating. Like for exemple, you need to read 10k words of a novel to be able to rate. The only downside would be that new story won't have any rating until they reach 10k words.
Click to expand...
I think you are also missing the point. A novel is not static. Not any more at least. If it was in a time where you could never edit your novel things might have made sense. And another thing: how do you go making sure people are reading 10k words? Just because they have left their screens open on the page does not mean they have read your chapter, they might have just opened it and went do something else.

And then, as you have said, to make only novels of 10k words able to be rated, you would cut how many % of the stories on scribblehub? This does not seem to be the right approach to the problem as well. In fact, there is no issue here, from what I understand.

People who expose themselves, like any artist, a writer is one, of words, should be expected to deal with criticism. If they can not deal with it, why are they exposing themselves in the first place? If you want to write only for your 3+ readers, then go and find a select group of people who think like you and do not post it in a public place, where you will be subject to the opinion of people of all sorts. Most of them, people who do not care for what you are writing.
 
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