Eilonwy > Status Update

No idea! I can't see my past challenges any more either, which is a nuisance.

Lots of discussion here, Eilonwy:

https://www.goodreads.com/user_status...

I responded there, but in a nutshell: Amazon has been slowly stripping the site of features as I believe it moves to either a shutdown of GR or a swallowing of the site. Before this, a major feature they eliminated was our ability to sort our friends list by "last online," etc. This is a much worse change, though, that seems to indicate they want to take GR from a social media site to simply a book-reviewing arm of Amazon.

Elimination of groups will probably be next. :[

Caroline wrote: "Lots of discussion here, Eilonwy ..."

Thanks for that link! I hadn't thought of a number of those reasons, positive and negative (but mostly negative, grr).

I wonder what Otis and Elizabeth Chandler think of what their once-great invention has become? I know it's hard to say no to millions of dollars, but it's also got to be hard to watch your baby get turned into bathwater by its buyer.

This happened to another book-oriented site that was my first introduction to social media, way back in 2003. From 2003 to 2008, it was the single best user interface discussion forum I've personally been on right through today. But Amazon bought it in 2008 and removed a number of features. Two years ago it was stripped of everything that had made it easy and pleasant to use. A few of us still check in for old times' sake more than anything else, but it's essentially dead.

GR is starting with a much larger user base, but I'm really afraid it's going to end up as another empty wasteland.

It's so sad. These two reading-oriented sites brought me into contact with so many people, worldwide, who I've enjoyed so much and would never have met any other way. I'll really grieve if they both disappear.

I’m with you guys. Another awful decision from Goodreads/Amazon. Eliminating comment notifications, eliminating that option to sort through one’s friend list by “last online” or “most recent update”, and now getting rid of messaging. It feels like they are actively trying to kill the social aspects of the site. The big question is why? When I was more active on Goodreads and regular chatting books with folks it resulted in me buying and reading more books!

Seems like strange call to tank your own website but I’m guessing it will all be down to some shortsighted cost-cutting. I’m sure Goodreads got a new guy in charge of managing it during the last round of executive changes at Amazon. That has not been going great as there was a bunch of employees axed over the summer. Now we get more feature cuts and the site seems to have a lot of issues. Amazon are probably wasting all their server space on that new A.I. version of Alexa!

It sucks, but I’m in too deep with over a decade of reading history on Goodreads so hopefully they don’t fully pull the plug on the place…

Gavin wrote: "The big question is why? When I was more active on Goodreads and regular chatting books with folks it resulted in me buying and reading more books!."

Exactly! I've bought books for Buddy Reads because they weren't available at my library, or just because I really really really wanted to read a book after seeing a friend review, because I know if they liked it, I probably will too. I don't care nearly so much about reviews from people I haven't interacted with, so why cut those connections?

Gavin wrote: "Another awful decision from Goodreads/Amazon. Eliminating comment notifications, eliminating that option to sort through one’s friend list by “last online” or “most recent update”, and now getting rid of messaging. "

And they got rid of being able to easily find the comments from everyone reading a book at the same time, too. I've picked up a good number of friends because we started a conversation through that feature. It still exists, but you have to already know it does, and then take a few steps to get there. It's really clunky now.

Eilonwy wrote: "Thanks for that link! I hadn't thought of a number of those reasons, positive and negative (but mostly negative, grr).

I wonder what Otis and Elizabeth Chandler think of what their once-great invention has become? I know it's hard to say no to millions of dollars, but it's also got to be hard to watch your baby get turned into bathwater by its buyer.

This happened to another book-oriented site that was my first introduction to social media, way back in 2003. From 2003 to 2008, it was the single best user interface discussion forum I've personally been on right through today. But Amazon bought it in 2008 and removed a number of features. Two years ago it was stripped of everything that had made it easy and pleasant to use. A few of us still check in for old times' sake more than anything else, but it's essentially dead.

GR is starting with a much larger user base, but I'm really afraid it's going to end up as another empty wasteland.

It's so sad. These two reading-oriented sites brought me into contact with so many people, worldwide, who I've enjoyed so much and would never have met any other way. I'll really grieve if they both disappear."

I think Otis and Elizabeth had to know Amazon would change things in ways they wouldn't necessarily like. Maybe they didn't expect it would go this far, though. Who knows? I remember back when Amazon bought GR in 2013 the assumption from the tons of us complaining in the Feedback group was that Amazon would strip the site and then shut it down. We were just expecting that to happen soon after the purchase, not these many years later.

At first I was thinking that book-based social media you started on in 2003 was Shelfari, but you said your site closed down two years ago, and Amazon shut down Shelfari a long time ago. What was the site? If you don't want to say, that's fine!

Gavin wrote: "The big question is why? When I was more active on Goodreads and regular chatting books with folks it resulted in me buying and reading more books!"

I think shutting down GR was always Amazon's plan, if not a priority. At this point, Amazon makes more money from purchases of items other than books, so it doesn't matter to them that GR can lead people to buy books. :[ GR is just not a money-maker, while at the same time it requires time and attention from (some) employees.




"Seems like strange call to tank your own website but I’m guessing it will all be down to some shortsighted cost-cutting. I’m sure Goodreads got a new guy in charge of managing it during the last round of executive changes at Amazon. That has not been going great as there was a bunch of employees axed over the summer. Now we get more feature cuts and the site seems to have a lot of issues. Amazon are probably wasting all their server space on that new A.I. version of Alexa!"

Sounds right. (I saw that new Alexa feature [Alexa home, or something...] and was surprised because my understanding was that Alexa ended up being a flop and was something the company was retiring. I thought sales dropped precipitously when it was revealed that Alexa "spies on" users. I unplugged mine right away after that news came out.)




"It sucks, but I’m in too deep with over a decade of reading history on Goodreads so hopefully they don’t fully pull the plug on the place…"

I think they will, sadly. Export your reviews to store on your computer or, if you want to continue with book-based social media, import to another site like The Story Graph or LibraryThing.

Eilonwy wrote: "And they got rid of being able to easily find the comments from everyone reading a book at the same time, too. I've picked up a good number of friends because we started a conversation through that feature. It still exists, but you have to already know it does, and then take a few steps to get there. It's really clunky now."

What a bummer. It sounds like you used it more than I did. I checked it a handful of times, and I'll bet most people here didn't even know that feature existed. I've been so surprised by how many GR users don't know about many of the site's features, some of which aren't hard to find.

I wish they hadn't deleted our "favorite authors" list on the side of our profiles. I liked that little personalization and always looked at which authors other users had chosen. It was "fat," so I understand why GR cut it, but it was something that made the site that much more fun and pleasant.

Caroline wrote: "At first I was thinking that book-based social media you started on in 2003 was Shelfari, but you said your site closed down two years ago, and Amazon shut down Shelfari a long time ago. What was the site? If you don't want to say, that's fine!"

The site was ABE Books forum. They're a used-books-seller aggregate site based in Canada. Back in the very early aughts they ran a site called BookSleuth, where people would send in descriptions of books whose titles and authors they couldn't remember, and every week or so someone at ABE would post up all the recent requests, and then you could send in suggestions about what you thought a book was, and then a week or so later the responses would go up. Then in autumn of 2003, BookSleuth was converted into a proper discussion forum, and it was amazing to be able to talk to all these people who had been playing the sleuthing game. I figure ABE saw it as a good way to sell more books, and it certainly was for a few years, as I rounded up books people recommended to me and old favorites I hadn't been able to find before.

That Forum was very fun, although not really a place for cataloging books or anything. But we did many of us post reviews and have discussions about books we'd read or were reading.

It fizzled quite a bit both from the Amazon buyout and the emergence of Facebook. I never liked Facebook very much so I stuck with ABE Forum. It does still exist, but it's now very, very small and was switched to a pretty terrible user interface in 2023. I assume Amazon will close it entirely ion the next few years.

There were so many great internet discussion places as recently as 10-15 years ago, but they have all fallen to the need to make money, with no real desire to support community.

Oh, I didn't know ABE books had forums. There's a group like that one here called "What's the Name of that Book??" (or something like that) that's one of the few regularly active ones. I'm so sorry you lost your forum. Two groups I was in way back when (that hosted parent-related discussion, not book discussion) are now defunct, and I don't know why. They were needed and helpful!

"There were so many great internet discussion places as recently as 10-15 years ago, but they have all fallen to the need to make money, with no real desire to support community."

That's so true. I think all we have now that's strongly humming along is Reddit, but that site is a crap shoot that can also be crap. I believe they have a sub-reddit devoted to Goodreads, but when I checked it, it was brimming with negativity or people asking elementary questions about how the site works, so I didn't find it worthwhile.

Eilonwy wrote: "Caroline wrote: "At first I was thinking that book-based social media you started on in 2003 was Shelfari, but you said your site closed down two years ago, and Amazon shut down Shelfari a long tim..."

Yes, I really miss the discussions we used to have back in the day, and the meets we used to have as well. I haven't noticed anyone organising one recently. I expect that's because all of us old forumites just find the site as it currently exists just too difficult to navigate!

Seasons greetings,
2mb

Barbara wrote: "Yes, I really miss the discussions we used to have back in the day, and the meets we used to have as well. I haven't noticed anyone organising one recently. I expect that's because all of us old forumites just find the site as it currently exists just too difficult to navigate!

Seasons greetings,
2mb"

LibraryThing has a group dedicated specifically to meeting up. Of course, you need to make yourself known on the site first via discussion in other groups there. It's called "LibraryThing Gatherings and Meetups." Meeting up at book festivals appears to be the most popular. Is that where your meet-ups usually were? (I'd think it's too noisy and busy at those to get to know anyone, and also, what do you do after you meet up? Just walk around together as a group the whole time?) Meeting up one on one is my preferred.

I don't think GR has a similar group, interestingly.