291–300 of 493 posts
OMG... Did not know Amazon was the owner of Goodreads. There is practically no way you can buy a book online outside the Amazon ecosystem.
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> Why do you think that Amazon is concerned that a database is enough to threaten their business? Didn't the GP already answer the question you asked of them? >> It was a purely defensive move to prevent anyone else from acquiring or partnering with Goodreads, because their database of books and reviews could be used to instantly start competing with Amazon's book business. Amazon snuffed out that threat of competiti…
Weirdly I've rarely bought a book based on reviews on the selling site. I don't go to Amazon and browse for books, reading reviews. I go to Amazon when I've already determined from other sources which book(s) I want to buy. Maybe I'm in the minority.
Eh, Goodreads has always suffered from the same problem that plagues every other review system which uses "score out of X" ranking. Humans just aren't very good at ranking things on a normal distribution, so you invariably end up with every item (books in this case) being ranked somewhere in the 3.5-4.5 range (since Goodreads is out of 5). For IMDB the rankings all hover around 8ish. When in reality the average book…
Anecdotally this feels correct, the more common user rating distributions I see are an inverted bell curve - lots of 5's and 1's, not too many 3's.
But as far as the same problem that plagues every other review system goes, I would say the paid/fake reviews are the far bigger problem.
Goodreads wasn't "the future of book reviews", it was a good review site that might have innovated great new things or might not have at all. But regardless, Amazon should never have been allowed to acquire it -- it was incredibly anti-competitive. Amazon never wanted to do anything with Goodreads at all -- as demonstrated by the fact that it hasn't done anything. It was a purely defensive move to prevent anyone else…
The outcome we got is probably in the middle, badness-wise. Better would be an independent Goodreads with incentives to find features that fight spam and such. But it's hard to imagine them being able to make much money doing that, and them going under would be worse. And honestly I'd MUCH rather have a Goodreads that Amazon does nothing with than a Goodreads that chased growth from VC money or PE or whatever to try…
Goodreads wasn't "the future of book reviews", it was a good review site that might have innovated great new things or might not have at all. But regardless, Amazon should never have been allowed to acquire it -- it was incredibly anti-competitive. Amazon never wanted to do anything with Goodreads at all -- as demonstrated by the fact that it hasn't done anything. It was a purely defensive move to prevent anyone else…
I think there's another angle you're missing here - Amazon wanted to stop paying so much in affiliate sales. At their size, they were easily taking in tens of millions a year from all the Amazon affiliate links.
Now Amazon own it, they don't have to pay that out.
> But Goodreads allows any user, not just those who’ve received advance copies, to leave ratings months before books are released. Authors who’ve become targets of review-bombing campaigns say there’s little moderation or recourse to report the harassment. Writers dealing with stalkers have pointed to the same problem. "Problem": chicken-and-egg problem. Until it's actually published, there's little or no way for a r…
The thing is that it is a pretty easy to solve problem. Print advance copies with a QR code that contains a link to the publisher's site with a GUID in the params. The publisher would have a page, authenticated with the GUID, with authenticated links to private review pages. This allows for knowing the person had the advance copy. Just that line will kill 95% of review bombing. You can also use the publisher side to…
Goodreads wasn't "the future of book reviews", it was a good review site that might have innovated great new things or might not have at all. But regardless, Amazon should never have been allowed to acquire it -- it was incredibly anti-competitive. Amazon never wanted to do anything with Goodreads at all -- as demonstrated by the fact that it hasn't done anything. It was a purely defensive move to prevent anyone else…
Unfortunately that's exactly why so many startups get bought. Not to become part of the parent company's business, no, just not to become a competitor later. Would stronger (and enforced) anti trust laws be a solution? I believe businesses would just lie and say they are going to be part of the business but then just bury them anyway.
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Seems like this is culturally different for some things. And corporations can influence too. I have a friend who has four restaurants in Tokyo, and I've been several times there. If you keep attention to the restaurant reviews in Google Maps, Japanese people is very hard. They'd go like "The food is great, incredible service, surprising flavors, very good experience, best Spanish food I've had in a long time..." and…
100% it's cultural. In the Netherlands, companies brag about a 7 or 8 out of ten as proof of their amazing customer service. When I lived in America, it seemed the consensus of anything under a 9 is killing puppies. Coincidentally, NPS is entirely based on this fact. 8+ is required for a "happy customer". 7 is given a little wiggle room to win them back and under 6 is a lost cause.
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Unfortunately that's exactly why so many startups get bought. Not to become part of the parent company's business, no, just not to become a competitor later. Would stronger (and enforced) anti trust laws be a solution? I believe businesses would just lie and say they are going to be part of the business but then just bury them anyway.
After the acquisition has there been any other startup trying to duplicate the value prop of GoodReads? What are the barriers to entry for them?
Potentially good alternative is https://literal.club/ Not affiliated, just a happy user of the site.