Story Updates

[Talo Segura]

The number of story updates seems to have become rather small, only five, didn't it use to be bigger? I would focus on stories over forum on a story site, just my opinion of course, but the stories seem to be lost. Or perhaps there aren't that many being posted? Certainly you can search for stories, but I always just looked at the list on the right - story updates - and if a story I was following didn't have a new chapter, I'd look at any new story posted, then the others on that list. Wondering why you made the story list so small?

[drpaladin]

That is just the summary of the last five stories posted. If you click the link below that list, you will see all the updates.

[Thorn Wilde]

I think it was better as it was. People are less likely to click through to see more than to just click whatever's right there. This way, new chapters may only be visible on the forum front page for half an hour when lots of people are posting. This is a site for stories, isn't it? Doesn't seem to make much sense to make the stories less visible.

Edited to add: With how long the club forums thing is now, there's plenty of space in the side bar for a longer story updates list. If anything, you could make it longer.

Edited February 20, 2020 by Thorn Wilde

[Wayne Gray]

Just as a snapshot sort of experiment, I hovered over everybody's name on the Forum index page. For the 91 members online at the time 27 were on the Forum Index page, and were the greatest proportion of those logged on.

It's a single point in time, but I consistently go back to the Forum Index as my "jumping off" for anything else I do on GA. A lot of folks probably do the same thing, and ... yes ... it feels odd to limit the updated stories on the page most people seem to visit the most often.

I don't think people will stop going to the Forum Index as a result, which means updated stories will just have exposure for less time. Is the idea to encourage authors to post more often to ensure their work is listed? I'm genuinely curious.

Edited February 20, 2020 by Wayne Gray

[Ron]

3 hours ago, drpaladin said:

That is just the summary of the last five stories posted. If you click the link below that list, you will see all the updates.

Interesting! FYI — It never dawned on me that the words below the list of stories was a link at all. On my iPad it just looks like words alone and not a link to a further list. It’s the color or lack of a more distinctive color separating the link from the rest of the wording that fooled me.

[ReaderPaul]

I figured out quickly to click on the "Latest Story Updates" to see more stories.  But I had already been clicking on the "Stories" tab to see a fuller list of updates to stories..

The link to "Latest Story Updates" is in the same color as the other links normally are.  In certain light conditions, however, it can be difficult to see.

[Cia]

What you see on the Forums page is not what Guests see. When logged out, you can see the smaller list of updates in the sidebar widgets actually coincides with the forums and club listing almost perfectly in length. It's pretty expected that members will use the follow option and notifications or Activity Streams. We do like to feature stories, but GA is a community, not just a reading repository. 

[Thorn Wilde]

8 hours ago, Cia said:

What you see on the Forums page is not what Guests see. When logged out, you can see the smaller list of updates in the sidebar widgets actually coincides with the forums and club listing almost perfectly in length. It's pretty expected that members will use the follow option and notifications or Activity Streams. We do like to feature stories, but GA is a community, not just a reading repository. 

I get that, but I think this will have a detrimental effect on author exposure (I know of several authors on the site other than myself who feel like they're getting fewer reads than they used to already and I can't see this change helping), and surely the forums are for registered users and not guests in the first place, but I suppose it's not up to any of us. The community is absolutely important, and part of what many of us enjoy so much about GA, but it shouldn't be at expense of the stories and authors, should it?

Edited February 21, 2020 by Thorn Wilde

[Cia]

  People often feel that any change will be detrimental at first but if they look at the hard data, that isn't always true. If it can be proven that Authors are experiencing a significant effect, we always can revisit site decisions. Show us the data. Show us what the chapter reads were before the change and what they shifted to after the change. The data needs to be from stories that have been actively posting so the only change has been that aspect of the forum change. Not posting content consistently, changing stories, changing genres, etc... can also affect readership.

[Wayne Gray]

1 hour ago, Cia said:

  People often feel that any change will be detrimental at first but if they look at the hard data, that isn't always true. If it can be proven that Authors are experiencing a significant effect, we always can revisit site decisions. Show us the data. Show us what the chapter reads were before the change and what they shifted to after the change. The data needs to be from stories that have been actively posting so the only change has been that aspect of the forum change. Not posting content consistently, changing stories, changing genres, etc... can also affect readership.

Yes, as I said above, this seems driven to encourage posting often to stay on the updated stories sidebar. If that's the case, then fine. I don't see the logic for the shift working any other way.

There are a few prolific posters who will benefit from this change, the rest of us will be pushed off of the front page fairly quickly (yesterday the last story on the list when I looked had been posted three hours prior). Edit: Though today it harks all the way back to 7PM yesterday. So perhaps I caught it during a spate of updates.

I don't think the impact will be tremendous. It just seems odd, and designed to encourage quantity over quality.

Edited February 21, 2020 by Wayne Gray

[Thorn Wilde]

I wish to add that, as a reader, I've often relied on the sidebar. Precisely because of the community focus of the site, I'm more likely to just revert to the forum front page, glance at the sidebar, and click if I see an interesting title, than I am to go to the stories page and actively look. I'm sure I'm not the only person who does this. I don't see how this change is beneficial to anyone. If you could demonstrate that it is, maybe I'd be more at ease with it, but to me it looks a lot like change just for change's sake.

EDIT: Also, if you want to see how readership has dwindled, just look at the amount of likes on the weekly top stories now compared to earlier. Cause there are regularly stories with one like on that list, including right now.

Edited February 21, 2020 by Thorn Wilde

[Headstall]

I wasn't going to post on this topic because I've made my feelings known on this subject a couple of times already. I don't pretend to know what is right for GA in the overall. I trust the admin to make those decisions, as well as have everyone's best interests at heart. That said, right now there are only four stories on the list. There have been times when I have seen as many as twelve items/lines on the list (but there can be two or even three spots taken for a new story at any one time, and if there are two new stories... well... you get my point), so quite a difference. All I know is I get excited when I post a new work or chapter, and it bothers me to see my story disappear quickly from the update list. At any rate, usually it's gone by the next day. I don't have any data, so I can't back anything up, but I do know my readership does drop once the story disappears. Sure, I still get lots of views, but would I get more if it was on there longer? Again, I don't have data, but my perception after years of posting is that I would. If I post something about a story in a status update I will get immediate readership for a short period, but I don't like to do that. The thing is, the world moves fast, but actual writing takes time... and more often than not, out of sight, out of mind is the case. That is sometimes a tough pill to swallow. There's always a way to find a story if you are determined, or have the inclination and know how, but, in this day and age, we are used to everything being easy... just saying. Cheers!  

Edited February 22, 2020 by Headstall

[Carlos Hazday]

3 hours ago, Cia said:

Show us the data. Show us what the chapter reads were before the change and what they shifted to after the change. The data needs to be from stories that have been actively posting so the only change has been that aspect of the forum change

Not sure this premise is valid. Forensic data gathering isn't easy . An ongoing story may not suffer much from the abbreviated list, and popular authors can likely cruise along due to a devoted following, but new stories and newer authors I suspect will suffer. I know I've already missed a couple of updates on stories I was reading.

[Talo Segura]

Cia said: "What you see on the Forums page is not what Guests see. When logged out, you can see the smaller list of updates..."

I see five stories listed on the right of the Forums page, whether logged in or logged out, it doesn't change. I have always looked at this list to discover new stories and new authors. In fact I used to click nearly every new story, out of curiosity, and maybe make a discovery. I'm sorry, but I don't go searching for authors and stories. I did click the more story updates, it returns an unattractive data list of stories that I pretty much ignored. This is just me telling you my experience as a reader, it might not be everybody's.

I would like to see a story list with maybe the first line of the new chapter, rather like you do on the Forum side with say prompts or other stuff you put up that you want people to click on and read:

Prompt 818 and Prompt 819

By comicfan in Writing Tips 0

Boy, time flies when all you do is  work. We made it to another Friday, so, let's see if these new prompts...

The above is formatted to attract people to click, and it works. The main substance of the site is surely the stories people write, the community wouldn't exist without them. I do really miss that list of Story Updates that had around a dozen places featuring newly posted chapters. As an author, I'd like to see my new chapter featured for as long as possible (vanity, I know). I do find mostly that does happen on other sites. Which brings me back to the original point, if none of the five new chapters on the Forums page Story Updates interest me, having checked my notifications, a quick look in the Forum and maybe Authors club, then I'm off to a different site. There you have one person's view, habits, whatever, and that basically means the change to a shorter Stories Updates on the Forum page is a negative move, I can't really say it differently.

[northie]

I share the unease at the number of stories being reduced on the front page as seen on a laptop. But remember, on a mobile view, stories don't feature on the equivalent front page at all. Is the change related to how many people bypass the front page and go straight to Stories? If it's a space issue, I don't need to be told which clubs I'm a member of. 

In a related matter, the Club Forums now appear as a jumble. I hope that's not their final position. To me, it would make sense to have the Fan Clubs in a section on their own. I know I can select what I want to see, but I prefer to keep a broad view.   

[Dodger]

I also have a problem with this and I'm not convinced the new reading stats are right. I had some time off work recently and was bored enough to play around with them for a while. I can tell you nothing makes any sense, and the more you delve into it the more ridiculous it gets. There are stories that have been completed for years that are suddenly getting thousands of views a month, which they didn't get before the update. How can that be? With all due respect to these great authors and stories, I don't know of any members who are still reading them, and they obviously don't appear on the list of updates. Yet somehow they are being found by random, obscure visitors in their thousands and outperforming most of the ongoing stories that have regular updates. I'm not sure exactly how these figures are compiled, but I don't believe they are correct.

I know I'm going to have people on my case for daring to say this, but maybe this is the problem and not just the way the story updates are formatted.

 

[Thorn Wilde]

1 hour ago, northie said:

I share the unease at the number of stories being reduced on the front page as seen on a laptop. But remember, on a mobile view, stories don't feature on the equivalent front page at all. Is the change related to how many people bypass the front page and go straight to Stories? If it's a space issue, I don't need to be told which clubs I'm a member of. 

In a related matter, the Club Forums now appear as a jumble. I hope that's not their final position. To me, it would make sense to have the Fan Clubs in a section on their own. I know I can select what I want to see, but I prefer to keep a broad view.   

I agree about the club forums. They don't seem to be organised in any discernible way at all, neither alphabetically nor by update or club or content. 

Edited February 21, 2020 by Thorn Wilde

[northie]

5 hours ago, Headstall said:

All I know is I get excited when I post a new work or chapter, and it bothers me to see my story disappear quickly from the update list. At any rate, usually it's gone by the next day.

My feelings exactly, Gary.

5 hours ago, Headstall said:

The thing is, the world moves fast, but actual writing takes time... and more often than not, out of sight, out of mind is the case. That is sometimes a tough pill to swallow.

And just as true. Even more for us authors who don't have your dedicated base of readers. Or for someone in my situation, where I'm posting irregularly to a prompt collection as I write my next magnum opus off-stage.

[Talo Segura]

So I get what it is with the site. I'm probably not the brightest crayon in the box. Everything I want to see is under the STORIES tab: long list of updates and the stories featured with their summaries (if the authors don't make full use of summary, that's up to them). 

The only change I would make is the menu order. It seems logical to read: HOME / STORIES / FORUM  coming to the site you probably click HOME which has nothing on it except a big advert. Yes it has other stuff, but I never bothered to read it, the presentation is unattractive (sorry, but that's how I see it). So I immediately clicked the next tab in the menu, FORUMS and that's saved on my tablet and that's where I go. If it was STORIES as the next tab I think it would point people to the right place.

I know, I should read the ******* menu titles, but like a million other people I'm simply lazy and click tab number two on the right of HOME.

[Myr]

This is pretty straightforward folks.  In reducing the number of forums, there is a reduced amount of space for sidebar items.  When you log out and there are 15 stories listed in the update... this is what it looks like:

Please notice that it keeps scrolling some ways...

The vast majority of people in the stories section of the site all the time:

 

 

I've made some adjustments.  Now I'm going to make a statement: 

I track data pretty regularly on the site and make adjustments accordingly.  I'm going to do what's right for this site as I have been doing for 17 years and 5 months as of this post.  Since we've watched a dozen similar sites to Gay Authors come and go in this timeframe, can we agree that I have a clue as to what I'm doing? 

Because frankly, after a long week of work and other projects, I came here on Saturday morning to collect my statistic information and do the routine maintenance and see this post.  By the time I got to the end of it, my main question was this: "Why am I still spending so much time in my life dealing with this site when all people do is bitch bitch bitch?" 

So I spent an hour dealing with this and still haven't gotten my data for the day. 

I'm very sorry for making room to promote authors and not duplicate story promotion in yet another spot.  My bad.

[Cia]

19 hours ago, Dodger said:

I also have a problem with this and I'm not convinced the new reading stats are right. I had some time off work recently and was bored enough to play around with them for a while. I can tell you nothing makes any sense, and the more you delve into it the more ridiculous it gets. There are stories that have been completed for years that are suddenly getting thousands of views a month, which they didn't get before the update. How can that be? With all due respect to these great authors and stories, I don't know of any members who are still reading them, and they obviously don't appear on the list of updates. Yet somehow they are being found by random, obscure visitors in their thousands and outperforming most of the ongoing stories that have regular updates. I'm not sure exactly how these figures are compiled, but I don't believe they are correct.

I know I'm going to have people on my case for daring to say this, but maybe this is the problem and not just the way the story updates are formatted.

 

There are a VAST number of guest readers who search story content they want to read, find results off GA that lead them directly to a story on GA, come to the site directly to that story, and then read it. They could give a crap about the community, current authors, currently posting chapters, etc... In fact, if you think about it, that's probably how a lot of people who eventually do join and become community members found the site: a search (or someone else searched/found the site and shared). I will read old content I liked and saved/favorited (I have a whole bookmark folder that I prune when I get broken links all the time) from years past on other sites all the time as well because I've been reading online for 10+ years. So it makes perfect sense that stories that aren't current get reads, and there's nothing "ridiculous" about it. 

20 hours ago, Talo Segura said:

Cia said: "What you see on the Forums page is not what Guests see. When logged out, you can see the smaller list of updates..."

I see five stories listed on the right of the Forums page, whether logged in or logged out, it doesn't change.

As Myr pointed out, by reducing the forums, when logged out and having 15 different sidebar options, it creates a far different page than members might see if you have a different view. I wasn't talking about the number of Stories updates.  I see more forums as an admin than members do so my page looks different as well. Members have to realize we aren't all seeing the same page at the same time and, as staff with long experience trying to make the site as "current" to the usage our data shows us, we don't just make flippant changes. 

20 hours ago, northie said:

In a related matter, the Club Forums now appear as a jumble. I hope that's not their final position. To me, it would make sense to have the Fan Clubs in a section on their own. I know I can select what I want to see, but I prefer to keep a broad view.   

 

18 hours ago, Thorn Wilde said:

I agree about the club forums. They don't seem to be organised in any discernible way at all, neither alphabetically nor by update or club or content. 

This is a completely different complaint, which we ask that members put in different topics because if you bury multiple complaints in one topic, it can go unnoticed and then we get hit with "well, you ignored our comments here!"... I will address it, though, since multiple people seem to have the same misconceptions about the Clubs area.

1) If you look just above the clubs on a computer, they can be sorted by all sorts of things. Default is latest ACTIVITY. That doesn't necessarily mean you are going to see and notice the immediate post or content or membership activity that is bumping it on the list. You can also change it to Most Members, Most Content, etc... You can also choose to filter the clubs to just the clubs YOU are part of. 

2) If we force the filters and organize and bury clubs, then we are going to be making people click through to find the content they want just because YOU don't want it. Or to have people complain that we're censoring the clubs to what we think important. Or the clubs that are buried or filtered into a sub-forum would then be too hard to find and people would complain about that. So can you see why all the clubs are visible and we have filtering options available and expected for members to use instead of us having to micromanage your site experience? 

 

Unfortunately, I'll tell you what it feels like as a site staff member right now... You're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't. 

[Myr]

I just noticed the additional comment about Club forums...
If you are referring to this section:

 

Sorry. the forum software has an On or Off option for that section. I am hoping the new version that is releasing soon with new improvements/features corrects this.

[Headstall]

8 hours ago, Cia said:

Unfortunately, I'll tell you what it feels like as a site staff member right now... You're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't. 

@Cia @Myr  I'm sorry you're feeling that way, Cia. I appreciate everything you, Myr, and all the staff do... and frankly, I'm in awe of the dedication shown on a regular basis. Just for the record, I wasn't bitching, complaining, or criticizing, and I wasn't questioning the reasons for how things were set up... I was adding what I felt, as one of the many authors dedicated to GA, to the discussion. It was only my input, with no expectations, and I apologize if it made you feel bad, or that your efforts aren't appreciated. That is just not the case. I thank you for all you do. Gary

Edited February 23, 2020 by Headstall

[Myr]

11 minutes ago, Headstall said:

I apologize if it made you feel bad, or that your efforts aren't appreciated. That is just not the case.

I did not read your commentary that way, so please rest easy.

[Brayon]

I stayed out of this topic for the most part, as I like a nice clean forum, and the smaller Story Update side bar was perfect for the new setup. If an Author wants more readers, and viewers, then self-promote.

1. Make a discussion post in the Story Discussion Forum, or if you're a Purple or Crimson badge the Promoted Author Discussion Forum or your Fan Club if you have one.

2. GA has an internal blog that everyone can have one. Post about your stories there.

3. Status Updates.

4. Cross publish to other sites, and link back to GA.

There's also, posting quality work. All Authors, regardless of badge color, should be doing that. Ultimately, it's up to us to Post/Publish quality work, and let people know it's there. We shouldn't rely just on the side bar, and the latest story to post to be at the top of the list on the Stories Page.

@Myr, @Cia and the GA Staff, thank you for what you do here, and keeping this place running smooth.