Goodreads Interviews discussion

Hi, Candy, thanks for agreeing to this interview! Since your true identity is hidden, feel free to say what you really think about people, no matter how cruel those things might be. Especially if they're about Caris.

As an opening question, how long would you say you've been involved in Goodreads as a community? Did it take you a while to start feeling like it was a community, or did that happen right away?

Perhaps we should start a little more basic than that. Based on your own, personal definition of "community," do you believe Goodreads qualifies?

You say they're all people you interact with to varying degrees. Would you say you interact on a semi-regular basis with everyone on your friend list? Most of your friend list? What do you see as being the uniting characteristics of those who you DO want to be in regular contact with? Is it mostly based on personality, reading habits, non-book interests?

So, when you first started on the site, did you have any friends from real life who were already on goodreads?

When it comes to interacting with people on Goodreads, do you find that the noobs are easy to spot? If so--or if not--what seem like noobish things for people to do on Goodreads? What makes people stand out as either rude or inexperienced?

When someone I don't recognize friends me, I've started checking to see how many reviews they've written. To me, that's the easiest way to tell how invested someone is in the site...and, if you don't write reviews or participate in conversations, I know I'm not going to get anything out of the friendship other than a longer feed email.

What about the reviews people write? Do any certain kinds of reviews stand out as being written by people who don't really know how Goodreads works yet?

Also, assume you're reading a review by someone you DON'T know. Are there certain choices or ways of reviewing that would make you suspect the reviewer was well-versed in the goodreads community?

No problem; I've been having a hard time keeping up with all of the interviews at once. I hope you don't mind that we may take longer than the week I said it would? It looks from the other interviews that are farther along like it takes roughly 30 messages total to get through the questions.

Okay, new topic: think back to the first set of friends you made here on goodreads after joining the site. I'm thinking of the people you interacted with quite a bit, not LITERALLY your first friends.

How many of those people are still active on the website? How many of them have drifted away? Do you know the reasons why any of those who aren't here anymore left?

Wax philosophical on why people keep returning, and also why people decide to leave the site.

With the friends who are still around, do you interact less because your interests have grown farther apart? Why has your interaction with them lessened?

Also, how often do you normally log onto goodreads? How much time would you estimate you spend on goodreads?

It sounds like you do a lot on Goodreads. What goes into managing your group? How large is it? Also, what do you do as a Goodreads Librarian? What kind of responsibilities does that come with?

What is the most fun thing you can remember happening on Goodreads?

HAHAHA, epic! Did you get a lot of pissed off people? People who loved them? What did you get?

That's excellent. I've now looked at the image above like four separate times, and it's still making me laugh!

Okay, next question: what is the least fun, most sucky thing you can recall happening on goodreads? On a scale of one to ten, one being dropping something and needing to pick it up, and 10 being the life of a child in an Edward Gorey book, how sucky was this experience?

Likewise, on a scale of entertainment, where would you place the most fun experience on goodreads?

Haha! There's just something about Palin, isn't there? Insane people who don't know anything about politics seem to gravitate toward her like flies to feces, and everyone else--including a lot of conservatives--just wish she'd go back to helicopter hunting and leave politics alone.

Okay, last question: How anonymous do you feel it's possible to be on Goodreads? Obviously, THIS avatar is especially anonymous, but do you know people who maintain a high level of anonymity with their real profiles? Does this affect their interactions on the site?

Thanks a bunch for your time, Candy :) I really appreciate you taking the time to talk with me about all of this stuff. I'm in the process of posting things online now, but I'll tell you once the finished version is up there....now, it looks kind of like a house being remodeled.

Thanks, and I'll see you around when you aren't wearing your sugary pseudonym!