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sun surfer · 02-04-2015, 03:45 PM

Most things in this club are voted on - as in every single category now in use (we had a poll to decide each category), plus all winning book selections. I know it's frustrating to some that older or more literary books often win here. I do think free factors in sometimes, and yes, I also think crossover from the lit club factors in. It will be a little long and it’s been a long time coming (I’ve had these thoughts for years now), but I’ll just lay my feelings on the matter all out on the table here, as now seems as good a time as any to do so:

I think it all has to do with the fact that this forum is off on its own so there's not many drive-by (or click-by, heh) votes (though those kinds of voters might not actually read any winners anyway and so may not be ideal to want more of) while alternately, since this club exists in the same forum as the lit club, it's inevitable that some lit club members do keep track of this club and vote in it, leading to more literary results. It should be noted though that some lit club regulars such as myself started off in this general club, so I don't feel we're infiltrating this club at all but rather we're just among the ones who have stuck around as other voters in this club have slowly dwindled over the years. Heh, I still remember a time when I first started here that the club seemed at least half made up of sci-fi/fantasy devotees (and we still have a healthy group of members that really like sci-fi/fantasy here). Anyone remember Hal Spacejock winning (and in a non-sci-fi month)? We didn’t have too much of an inordinate amount of winners in sci-fi/fantasy, but at that time we’d get nominations from that genre in almost every single month despite the real category. We even had to institute the six-month rule because a very small number of members (since it only takes three to get a nomination to the vote) kept voting in the same sci-fi/fantasy book over and over again month after month despite whatever the category was.

In other words, I think the current "problem" or "strength" (depending on your point of view) stems from the fact that we have a little secluded forum here that doesn't encourage the more casual members or new members so much and maybe even scares off some (but not all) potential new blood by its insularity. When I started, the book clubs were in the main reading recommendations forum. Threads would go pages and pages, sometimes 10, 20, or more, nominations would usually be over in a matter of days and polls could get over 50 and closer to 100 votes sometimes (I think there were a few months we even had over 100 votes). I don't think it's just the move to this forum that led to lower numbers; I also think the site itself has slowed a little from its heyday when ereaders were so new to most of us, so a move back there might not put us back to those kinds of numbers. But it's no coincidence that when we moved to this dedicated forum, participation fell (a lot) soon after.

I don't know if the “answer” (if we even need an answer) is moving the clubs back to a broader forum. I've mentioned it before and not got a great response, and perhaps it's for the best. I do think it would drum up at least a little more interest in the clubs, but maybe not much, and anyway maybe some members would rather not have too much of an influx of new or more casual members as we wouldn’t know how that would affect things. And the big thing is that it would be a big change and a lot of work for someone (a moderator/administrator/probablyTom) to do and it might not be worth it, plus I have a feeling some non-members wouldn’t like to see any book club threads back in the reading recommendation forum and its stickies again, even if we kept this book club forum as a vault and only put new monthly threads in the reading recommendations forum and moved older ones here each month. But, staying secluded in this forum, I tend to think we probably won’t ever see much increase in numbers again and should just strive for staying strong enough for a medium/small viable club, and that can be okay and good. The literary club also lost members in the move to this dedicated forum, but it levelled off and though it’s small (less than half the votes of this club many months) the lit club is doing well here and often has good, lengthy discussion threads.

Anyway, for us still here in this general club, we just have to make do with the group we have now, and unfortunately for those of you wanting newer or less literary books chosen more often, the group we have now seems to prefer the opposite many months (but certainly not all - we did just choose The Bat recently, for instance, and that is neither literary nor old). What we are getting is what we as a group want. For example, I’m hearing suggestions now about how we should try to make sure we get less public domain/free books, less literary books and less older books. Well, during our categories nominations when we went through month by month nominating and voting in new categories, I suggested two categories, I think multiple times, that never won a month - "contemporary" (so it would've ensured a new book would be chosen) and "not free" (so it would've ensured a book wouldn't be chosen because it's free). I'm fine with them not being chosen as categories as they were just two ideas among many good suggestions that people had, but the point is, the group as a whole had many chances to choose categories like these and chose not to.

So what we have now and what we are getting now IS what the group as a whole wants. I just think that people who prefer literary or older works tend to be less vocal overall and so that can distort the picture. Vote results tell the real story. But things do change year-to-year, whether subtley or drastically. If we change categories for 2016, any of you can suggest more defined categories, such as “Contemporary Sci-Fi” or “Non-Literary Fantasy”, or Non-Literary Contemporary”, etc. and see if you can drum up enough support for any of them be included. In my opinion, without this, in the current atmosphere here, we will almost always have many free/older/literary nominations each month. I do think I remember that someone tried something like it with Adventure last time in nominating “Pulp Adventure” or something similar, but it wasn’t voted in. I do understand the frustration some of you have since old or literary often wins here, and often edges out a newer or less literary choice by only a vote or two. I’m sure that can be annoying, and I might actually be for a month or two a year to be defined as non-literary and/or contemporary so that older or literary nominations are excluded at least a few months of the year for those of you who prefer that, but otherwise, as long as it fits the category at hand, since I do like old

, stodgy

, dusty

, boring

literary

books, I will continue to nominate or support them as I please.

02-04-2015, 03:45 PM	#26
sun surfer languorous autodidact ✦ Posts: 4,235 Karma: 44667380 Join Date: Jun 2010 Location: smiling with the rising sun Device: onyx boox poke 2 colour, kindle voyage	Most things in this club are voted on - as in every single category now in use (we had a poll to decide each category), plus all winning book selections. I know it's frustrating to some that older or more literary books often win here. I do think free factors in sometimes, and yes, I also think crossover from the lit club factors in. It will be a little long and it’s been a long time coming (I’ve had these thoughts for years now), but I’ll just lay my feelings on the matter all out on the table here, as now seems as good a time as any to do so: I think it all has to do with the fact that this forum is off on its own so there's not many drive-by (or click-by, heh) votes (though those kinds of voters might not actually read any winners anyway and so may not be ideal to want more of) while alternately, since this club exists in the same forum as the lit club, it's inevitable that some lit club members do keep track of this club and vote in it, leading to more literary results. It should be noted though that some lit club regulars such as myself started off in this general club, so I don't feel we're infiltrating this club at all but rather we're just among the ones who have stuck around as other voters in this club have slowly dwindled over the years. Heh, I still remember a time when I first started here that the club seemed at least half made up of sci-fi/fantasy devotees (and we still have a healthy group of members that really like sci-fi/fantasy here). Anyone remember Hal Spacejock winning (and in a non-sci-fi month)? We didn’t have too much of an inordinate amount of winners in sci-fi/fantasy, but at that time we’d get nominations from that genre in almost every single month despite the real category. We even had to institute the six-month rule because a very small number of members (since it only takes three to get a nomination to the vote) kept voting in the same sci-fi/fantasy book over and over again month after month despite whatever the category was. In other words, I think the current "problem" or "strength" (depending on your point of view) stems from the fact that we have a little secluded forum here that doesn't encourage the more casual members or new members so much and maybe even scares off some (but not all) potential new blood by its insularity. When I started, the book clubs were in the main reading recommendations forum. Threads would go pages and pages, sometimes 10, 20, or more, nominations would usually be over in a matter of days and polls could get over 50 and closer to 100 votes sometimes (I think there were a few months we even had over 100 votes). I don't think it's just the move to this forum that led to lower numbers; I also think the site itself has slowed a little from its heyday when ereaders were so new to most of us, so a move back there might not put us back to those kinds of numbers. But it's no coincidence that when we moved to this dedicated forum, participation fell (a lot) soon after. I don't know if the “answer” (if we even need an answer) is moving the clubs back to a broader forum. I've mentioned it before and not got a great response, and perhaps it's for the best. I do think it would drum up at least a little more interest in the clubs, but maybe not much, and anyway maybe some members would rather not have too much of an influx of new or more casual members as we wouldn’t know how that would affect things. And the big thing is that it would be a big change and a lot of work for someone (a moderator/administrator/probablyTom) to do and it might not be worth it, plus I have a feeling some non-members wouldn’t like to see any book club threads back in the reading recommendation forum and its stickies again, even if we kept this book club forum as a vault and only put new monthly threads in the reading recommendations forum and moved older ones here each month. But, staying secluded in this forum, I tend to think we probably won’t ever see much increase in numbers again and should just strive for staying strong enough for a medium/small viable club, and that can be okay and good. The literary club also lost members in the move to this dedicated forum, but it levelled off and though it’s small (less than half the votes of this club many months) the lit club is doing well here and often has good, lengthy discussion threads. Anyway, for us still here in this general club, we just have to make do with the group we have now, and unfortunately for those of you wanting newer or less literary books chosen more often, the group we have now seems to prefer the opposite many months (but certainly not all - we did just choose The Bat recently, for instance, and that is neither literary nor old). What we are getting is what we as a group want. For example, I’m hearing suggestions now about how we should try to make sure we get less public domain/free books, less literary books and less older books. Well, during our categories nominations when we went through month by month nominating and voting in new categories, I suggested two categories, I think multiple times, that never won a month - "contemporary" (so it would've ensured a new book would be chosen) and "not free" (so it would've ensured a book wouldn't be chosen because it's free). I'm fine with them not being chosen as categories as they were just two ideas among many good suggestions that people had, but the point is, the group as a whole had many chances to choose categories like these and chose not to. So what we have now and what we are getting now IS what the group as a whole wants. I just think that people who prefer literary or older works tend to be less vocal overall and so that can distort the picture. Vote results tell the real story. But things do change year-to-year, whether subtley or drastically. If we change categories for 2016, any of you can suggest more defined categories, such as “Contemporary Sci-Fi” or “Non-Literary Fantasy”, or Non-Literary Contemporary”, etc. and see if you can drum up enough support for any of them be included. In my opinion, without this, in the current atmosphere here, we will almost always have many free/older/literary nominations each month. I do think I remember that someone tried something like it with Adventure last time in nominating “Pulp Adventure” or something similar, but it wasn’t voted in. I do understand the frustration some of you have since old or literary often wins here, and often edges out a newer or less literary choice by only a vote or two. I’m sure that can be annoying, and I might actually be for a month or two a year to be defined as non-literary and/or contemporary so that older or literary nominations are excluded at least a few months of the year for those of you who prefer that, but otherwise, as long as it fits the category at hand, since I do like old, stodgy, dusty, boring literary books, I will continue to nominate or support them as I please.