I’m sure I’ve seen variants of this question already.
I have not concluded that pictures matter; I use them sparingly, but they don’t seem to act as instant clickbait.
What I have concluded from upvotes—and these are fairly common conclusions—are:
- Anything mentioning anything Indian gets lots
- Anything mentioning American politics gets lots
- Survey questions get lots
- Fluffy banter-y answers get lots
- Scholarly specialist answers don’t get lots…
- … but they get more than you might think.
And:
- I’m not particularly fussed by which kinds of answers get the most upvotes. I’m not above gamification, but the upvote lotto is so random, it does not serve as an effective motivator for me.