Hits are the number of times the story has been opened from a unique IP address. This does include everyone who has clicked on the story. It also includes every time a tab with the story open in it gets reloaded. So, if someone is like me and they keep dozens of tabs open for stories they plan to read—and the browser gets reloaded with those open tabs—the story will rack up hits. I’m personally responsible for dozens of hits on some stories.

IOW, don’t assume hits are from people who clicked away from the story.

In general, a kudos to hits ratio of 1:10 is really good. If it’s any lower, that becomes truly impressive. But, always keep in mind that as stories age, the hit count will increase while the kudos don’t simply from people coming back to re-read a story they can’t also re-kudos.