carol. > Status Update

🫂

Same. Plus those older/regular friends are not appearing on my page and it's annoying the crap out of me (tired of asking GR to fix it)...

I see less updates from you after you accepting my friends request than before when I was just following you. Goodreads doesn't want to be a "social" network at all...
Also "historical connections and interactions somehow reminds me of stuff like Yalta and Potsdam conferences that book review banter. :D

ah, Sree, I miss the days when we actually could have real-time group conversations here through notifications. It was kind of amazing.

Sic transit gloria mundi

I keep telling myself I ought to actually write more reviews and such but somehow never get around to it. A pity, really.

I'm periodically doing the same. However, with the cancellation of the option to sort friends by date, it's been difficult.

Adina wrote: "I'm periodically doing the same. However, with the cancellation of the option to sort friends by date, it's been difficult."

whoa, I see what you mean. you used to be able to sort by last online, alphabetical order, and date. I used to use Last Online to find the people that had joined for a short time and then quit. Man, GR is the worst. Why remove that?

What? 841 friends are too many to keep track of? Maybe AI can help with that. ;)

David wrote: "What? 841 friends are too many to keep track of? Maybe AI can help with that. ;)"

ha! I tried chatgpt for my first time yesterday!

Actually, some of the friends list are people that used to be active/interactive and left without deleting their accounts. So it's kind of like an online memorial, when I used to be able to sort by date. Kemper, Ceriwen, Stephen were all wildly popular reviewers pre-youtube, instagram and have left. There's some that I was friends with in phases/groups that have since left. I can't quite remove any of those people, because it triggers some fond memories.

I had noticed Stephen stopped posting about a year ago. Did he ever share with you why?

carol. wrote: "Adina wrote: "I'm periodically doing the same. However, with the cancellation of the option to sort friends by date, it's been difficult."

whoa, I see what you mean. you used to be able to sort by..." The answer from “help” when I complained: “people were not using the function”. Yeah right, you meant to say that it was too expensive to maintain the database?

I support this, carol, although I did the same recently and found it made zero difference, :(. And it took so much time...

Just regard GR to be Amazon now. The bugs aren't errors; they're intentional changes. Don't bother reporting them. The site will never revert to its old sociable self because its goal is to sell books now, preferably the Kindle edition. It started moving toward that when Amazon bought GR in 2013, but the transformation intentionally happened at a crawl. We're there now, and just expect it will get even less personalized in the coming years. Ideally, we'd move en masse to The Story Graph (I can't recommend LibraryThing because Amazon partially owns it), but that site continues to need major development, which makes me doubt its long-term success.

Adina wrote: "The answer from “help” when I complained: “people were not using the function”. Yeah right, you meant to say that it was too expensive to maintain the database?"

They'll give you that canned response whenever they have no intention of reverting to old functions. If no one believes me, I say think back to the last time user complaints led to a rolling-back of changes. I think the last time that happened was before 2013 (aka before Amazon bought GR).

The site will never revert to its old sociable self because its goal is to sell books now, preferably the Kindle edition.

To Caroline's point, book giveaways are either Kindle or print. There are no other (competing) ebook options.

This is such a huge problem on GR. Just the general breakdown with all the bugs and glitches and STUPID decisions. Why get rid of being able to sort by date? And why do we now have to click "notify me" at the bottom of all our reviews to get a notification when someone comments? AND WORSE, go back and click notify me on allllll of our old reviews.

I'm not moving sites because I have waaaaay too many people I talk to on here that I consider dear friends, but Goodreads doesn't make it easy. This has always been a site that was mostly run by and loved by the users, so it's not like we are used to good customer service.

Left Coast Justin wrote: "I had noticed Stephen stopped posting about a year ago. Did he ever share with you why?"

NoI I've sent him a PM on this site, and I have his phone number, so I sent him a text. I think once each. I don't know what happened to him :(

Adina wrote: ".The answer from “help” when I complained: “people were not using the function”. Yeah right, you meant to say that it was too expensive to maintain the database?"

They're at the point of making shit up. It was literally one column that is automatically filled. If we ask for it, we can't get it because not enough people want it, and if we don't want it, it's shoved down our throats.

Caroline wrote: "Just regard GR to be Amazon now. The bugs aren't errors; they're intentional changes. Don't bother reporting them. The site will never revert to its old sociable self because its goal is to sell bo..."

I am going to make an effort to become more active on Library Thing, which amazon only has 40% or less (reports vary), according to a group deep dive. https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

I find StoryGraph unacceptable for interaction--it seems even more interested in pushing buying books.

Best of luck no matter where we end up and I hope our paths continue to cross!

Anne wrote: "I'm not moving sites because I have waaaaay too many people I talk to on here that I consider dear friends, but Goodreads doesn't make it easy. This has always been a site that was mostly run by and loved by the users, so it's not like we are used to good customer service.."

Yeah, this. Like, there are posts and reviews and comments and groups from 2010 for me. That's a crazy long amount of history.

David wrote: "The site will never revert to its old sociable self because its goal is to sell books now, preferably the Kindle edition.

To Caroline's point, book giveaways are either Kindle or print. There are ..."

I have always had suspicions about the give aways anyhow. Not a feature for me. In all my years here, I've never one one either :D

Hey, I hope I wasn't mistakenly removed. Or purposefully for that matter. I don't write on here as often as I'd like but I pay attention when you write.

If my head falls, no hard feelings :D

carol. wrote: "Yeah, this. Like, there are posts and reviews and comments and groups from 2010 for me. That's a crazy long amount of history."

2008 for me! My youngest daughter had just been BORN when I got on this site. I was in a brand new state with a newborn, a 3 year old, a 5 year old, and an 8 years old, and reading the reviews of people just like me who were into books was a lifesaver. My children are literally adults now, and I'm going through menopause with the same people who used to give me advice on the best diaper cream.
Too much history, girl.

Please... everyone, stop switching profile pics like they're underwear.
*waves*

Vivian wrote: "Please... everyone, stop switching profile pics like they're underwear.
*waves*"

haha~ agreed. Profile pics help me so much. Do you know, there's even more than one carol? 😁

Jennifer wrote: "I support this, carol, although I did the same recently and found it made zero difference, :(. And it took so much time..."

ugh, I'm afraid of that. I am finding that some of the people are supposedly already "top friends," and I still never see any of their updates.

Byayoi wrote: "If my head falls, no hard feelings :D"

My Sour Kitty? I recognize you :)

Anne wrote: "2008 for me! My youngest daughter had just been BORN when I got on this site. I was in a brand new state with a newborn, a 3 year old, a 5 year old, and an 8 years old...
Too much history, girl"

Whoooooa!

Charlton wrote: "Hey, I hope I wasn't mistakenly removed. Or purposefully for that matter. I don't write on here as often as I'd like but I pay attention when you write."

So kind, Charlton! Hope to see you around more :)

carol. wrote: "I am going to make an effort to become more active on Library Thing, which"

Are you implying LT has interaction now? Like, can you follow people and get a feed and all that? Maybe I need to go see what's changed. I paid for a full account there ages ago, but have never really used it after kicking the tires because all they ever had was some sort of old forum like groups.

GR's feed became my primary book discovery method after amazon sabotaged their own rec system, and I never had pre GR sources for the type of stuff I mostly read now, so watching them slowly murder GR has had me wondering how future me is going to be finding new books.

I feel nostalgic when I stumble across old conversations from the notification era.

Mir wrote: "I feel nostalgic when I stumble across old conversations from the notification era."

Definite zeitgeist to those.

I hope you keep me, Carol! I no longer do the friend culling, too much time invested and too many headaches. :) Wish you the best of luck!

It's somewhat reassuring to witness numerous individuals expressing their frustrations about the absence of notifications, knowing I'm not alone in this. I'm puzzled as to why the notifications have stopped functioning, especially since they were working perfectly just a short while ago. The most frustrating aspect is that I still receive notifications for polls and notes, yet I encounter problems with notifications for comments on my reviews, which are the most crucial part.

Daniel wrote: "carol. wrote: "I am going to make an effort to become more active on Library Thing, which"

Are you implying LT has interaction now? Like, can you follow people and get a feed and all that? Maybe I..."

oh, i'm implying nothing. ;) I uploaded my library there, but that's about it.

Marquise wrote: "I hope you keep me, Carol! I no longer do the friend culling, too much time invested and too many headaches. :) Wish you the best of luck!"

I do always remember your unique name! And we've been around together for a long time :D

Persephone's Pomegranate wrote: "It's somewhat reassuring to witness numerous individuals expressing their frustrations about the absence of notifications, knowing I'm not alone in this..."

You aren't alone.

GR may be increasingly frustrating, but I still like reading reviews and comments from my GR friends. I always enjoy your reviews when they turn up in my feed. I owe you a few good discoveries (e.g., Robert Jackson Bennett).

I tried doing it, but somehow can’t ever find enough time, and seeing old friends who no longer post brings back memories and I can’t bring myself to unfriend even if they haven’t been here for years.

Nataliya wrote: "I tried doing it, but somehow can’t ever find enough time, and seeing old friends who no longer post brings back memories and I can’t bring myself to unfriend even if they haven’t been here for years."

oh, 100%, even if I could figure out how to sort by date. I keep those people (who have left or disappeared) who I recognize instantly and have those memories. But along the way, I've gone through phases of accepting many requests from people who never really interacted or even posted. I'm scrambling to try and figure out how to maximize my time on this site, and I know that I see a ton of updates from a few people and no updates from others, despite being 'top friends.'

Fred wrote: "GR may be increasingly frustrating, but I still like reading reviews and comments from my GR friends. I always enjoy your reviews when they turn up in my feed. I owe you a few good discoveries (e.g..."

Thank you, Fred! I'm glad I could help discover some great books :)

I had to laugh at Anne's comment back on the 3rd page. Except to change the year to 2009 and ages to 8 and 10, the rest is true.
I don't have social media anymore. This place I use for tracking the reading for the 3 of us. I like a few things, I PM a longtime friend every so often. I don't want to go back to the woman who spent ours online when they were small and I was lonely. I think about maybe half of the few friends I have had all these years from here and other online spaces still post. But that's OK too.

My friends keep not popping up on my feeds and it is so annoying! Not ignoring you carol., but for some reason, the algorithm doesn’t want me to read your posts. Pout.

If only there was a better alternative. 😮‍💨

You haven't shown up in my feed for ages, as well as at least one other higher-profile friend. It's frustrating--our tastes differ (especially when it comes to "purple prose," hehe), but I've always enjoyed your point of view.

Edit to add: as an example, this very update showed up in my feed only because one of my other friends liked it. :/

Nataliya wrote: "I tried doing it, but somehow can’t ever find enough time, and seeing old friends who no longer post brings back memories and I can’t bring myself to unfriend even if they haven’t been here for years."

I've kept friends who I know are no longer with us on earth. A memorial of sorts. Jenny, who I'd had on the GR roster for a very brief time before she passed, and a gaming friend on my Steam friends list who died of cancer in her 30s.

Jen wrote: "My friends keep not popping up on my feeds and it is so annoying! Not ignoring you carol., but for some reason, the algorithm doesn’t want me to read your posts. Pout."

Exactly!!

Morphing_kashi wrote: "If only there was a better alternative. 😮‍💨"

Right? I have tried them all as they've come up... and folded. :(

I should probably learn how to use updates, but...oh, well. Here's to old Goodreads friends.