The Extra Cool Group! (of people Michael is experimenting on) discussion
Pertaining to the project
>
Votes: How do you think about them?
date
newest »
newest »
message 51:
by
Aleksandr
(new)
Nov 29, 2010 12:05PM
No. I state my opinion - previous reviews or feedback on reviews doesn't influence me. The reviews are as much for me to keep track of what I thought than they are for outside consumption.
reply
|
flag
I love lots of votes, but I love votes and comments best. Still, I don't write reviews with any particular audience in mind. Hi Aleks!
As someone who doesn't vote, i'm just wondering: Do you get anything for votes? Is it useful for anything besides ego-building?
You get nothing. ...besides that ego-boost you mentioned.
I think votes also changes your review's placement on the book page. Cause I've noticed generally books with more votes tend to be higher on the page and books with less votes tend to be lower down.
Ala wrote: "As someone who doesn't vote, i'm just wondering: Do you get anything for votes? Is it useful for anything besides ego-building?"It's just that nice little pat on the back I wish I'd get at work occasionally.
I don't really pay attention to votes. I just write reviews they way I like reviews to be written. As far as audience goes, I always imagine a person deciding if they want to read this book or not-mostly because that's the only reason I read them.
Past votes do not influence my votes or lack there of.I consider my audience to be my friends. Maybe also anyone who is checking out a book that I am one of only a handful of people who have provided a review for.
"Do votes you've received in the past, or assumptions about what readers on here value, affect your decisions about how to approach a book review? "I know people like the funny stuff, and so do I, so a lot of my stuff is like sketches for a book review comedy show. But I don’t do pictures of cats with amusing captions. But I do something a lot of people don’t, and it probably gets on people’s nerves a bit – like a criminal revisiting the scene of the crime I rewrite some of my reviews, which must bounce the same ones into the update emails and people must think I’m fishing for votes. Which I am, but I don’t want people to think I am.
"Who do you perceive as your audience when you write on goodreads?"
A small-ish circle of people who have liked my stuff in the past & whose stuff I like. I like to think that we know who we are, but I don't think we do!
I also find myself re-writing a lot, often when someone Likes a long-forgotten, tossed off review from a few years ago, and I am reminded of its inadequacy. But I always uncheck the "add to update feed" box as I worry about completely burying my real-world acquaintances, who are largely much less GR-active, in old reviews. I guess it's more important to me to have those reviews in the database if someone looks up that book, than to make sure anyone in particular sees it.
Before this topic i didnt even know how much votes i got for my reviews this year. Because even its nice friends of mine like some of my reviews i dont care really.Its self expression for me,there is no big approach when i write reviews. I just try to write fair reviews for the authors i read no matter its classic fiction 300 years old or a new book. I write reviews only for myself to see what i rate and what i dont think is good enough.
More on votes : I resent the fact that some throwaway reviews of mine including a couple of one or two-liners have got more votes that a monster review which encapsulated several of the great truths of human existence with style. But then, check out this one, not by me :http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
Seven words, 441 votes!
Ahahaha. Damn, I should actually start paying attention to reviews. I'm missing out on some good stuff, apparently.
Wow, that's a pretty high word to vote ratio! That almost has the compactness of one of Hemingway's famous 6 word stories.
That's gotta be the all time word to vote ratio, must the the goodread equivalent of Blair Witch Project.
Paul wrote: "More on votes : I resent the fact that some throwaway reviews of mine including a couple of one or two-liners have got more votes that a monster review which encapsulated several of the great truth..."There are good one-line reviews, but that is not one of them (despite the vote count). The grammar of it bothers me, seems wrong:
Nothing happened in this book. Especially editing.
Really it should read: ....especially not editing.
Or: particularly not editing.
You get my point.
Just plain wrong!
;-)
I want to add that after I read a book I'll often go through and read the reviews of friends and people I follow. If I like their review, I'll click the ol' like button.Granted, I don't always have the time to do this.
Ryan said: "I focus on writing introductions that will hopefully get people to read what I wrote"I feel the same way, you have to catch them with something early to get them reading. That being said, I don't give votes much weight. The most popular things are rarely the best. I can hardly criticize Stephanie Meyer as a fad, discounting her legions of fans, only to turn around and claim that my 'likes' are any proof of my quality.
I actually used to be in the top 25 best reviewers, though it was a long time ago. I was curious what I should be doing to ensure my position so I checked out some of the people above me. A few were good, but many were just a bunch of two sentence reviews on popular books. I kept writing lengthy literary reviews and I dropped off the list quickly enough.
Philip said: "Reviews are a creative outlet that help me think through issues in the books"
That's about how I feel. I already had these thoughts swimming around, GR is just a place where I can commit them to posterity. It lets me look back on them and refresh myself on what I thought and what I knew.
Any attention I get on top of that is nice; actually, it's usually its angry, misspelled, and pointless, but that's humanity. The 'dislike button' hardly seems more impersonal than a lot of the comments I get. Forcing them to actually make a comment doesn't make them any more lucid.
In the end, my review has to stand on its own as a piece of writing, and votes (or their lack) won't change that.
The human condition includes insanity. There's no escaping it. To Michael's question - I don't much care when I write a review whether someone will 'vote' for it or not. If it's helpful to someone. wonderful. Look - it all starts in English class, where you're encouraged to analyze literature, to pick it apart, to try to see what makes it tick. And then, in that same class, you're told how wrong you are.
On GR, there is no teacher, no exam grades, no sucking up for a good score on that term paper on Shakespeare's use of scatological references as metaphor.
It is liberating, to give an honest opinion of a work. Not a nasty, uncivil opinion, but an honest one, whether it's gut instinct or carefully considered. I've never paid attention to who votes for what. So I'm probably barking mad.
Votes are these little egoads that prick me when I'm not watching.
It's nice to know that people read my reviews and enjoy or find them helpful, and I won't deny that. We all need validation, right? Or most of us insecure people do. :) Anyhoo, I believe you should be true to yourself, so I write my reviews according to that creed.
I actually got more votes when I ranted on a review, I seriously don't know why people love them lol
Joyzi wrote: "I actually got more votes when I ranted on a review, I seriously don't know why people love them lol"rant meaning ramble or rant meaning bash? or rant meaning a rambling bashing?
I love a good rant.In fiction and nonfiction.
It's a great form for stories as well as reviews...
That's what I thought, but I figured I'd ask since I've heard it used in the soap-box rambling way as well.Laura Miller says that everyone loves a good negative review because it shows the author breached a contract with the reader.
