Anon

...well, that’s a pop culture ref I don’t get! Happens more and more as I get closer to middle age.
 
With older stories at least, unless someone goes looking for a specific fetish or specific fandom (and not even then if it’s a very popular fandom with a ton of stories) people just aren’t going to see them as they are with the latest update stories. I’ve had a couple cases where an old story suddenly started getting reviews again, but both were because of them being linked/referenced elsewhere by somone else delving more deeply and greedily than usual (Thanks JRRT) in the archives.
I suspect you’re right that readers who don’t finish a story are less likely to review it too, but not just because of hotness, but also when they don’t like it – While I almost always review stuff I’ve read and liked, even if I didn’t finish reading it, if I’ve hated something/can’t think of any positives/didn’t get far ‘cos it sucked, I’m much less likely to leave a review because pure negativity with nothing contructive is no use to a writer*, and I am not great at constructive criticism. Plus, “Christ, this is fucking dull, I’ve had more fun reading the bleach bottle while sat on the shitter, Ms E L James” is probably pretty subjective.
*I mean, most writers. I used to love getting to share the non-story-reviewing flames in the old flames thread before having to delete them on account of the site’s no flames rules.