Goodreads has no incentive to be good

Post by newaccount74 » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 6:33 PM UTC

senko wrote: post #171

matricaria wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Goodreads is only good (eh, decent?) as a database of books you've read. All the other functionality is pointless and or broken. Why would you need a service to keep track on what you read? I have a text file with a list of book and some notes about every book. Works perfectly for me.

Why would you need a list at all? If it's worth remembering, you'll remember you've read it, and if you want to refresh your memory what better than to reread?

Post by creer » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 7:14 PM UTC

Loughla wrote: post #165

dimaor wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

personally, having a list of books helps me keep up the reading habit. usually I have months of reading, followed by months of not touching a book. having a list in notion reminds me to continue. in addition having a list of books I want to read (ghost library in japanese?) reminds of the things I don't know yet or haven't read which in turn helps keeping the reading habits.

Thank you for the response. A list of prospective books to read is something I believe everyone should have. It was the list of books already read that didn't make sense. I hadn't considered it as a motivator to pick back up the habit.

Post by kjs3 » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 8:39 PM UTC

mhermher wrote: post #207

Paul_S wrote: post #10

Goodreads is only good (eh, decent?) as a database of books you've read. All the other functionality is pointless and or broken. The recommendation system is a joke and is obviously used to promote nonsense instead of giving you personalised recommendations.

For me, it's more of a database to keep track of books I want to read in the future . I can't read everything immediately after reading a recommendation or seeing it mentioned somewhere. Mostly I use goodreads to organize this list. It ends up getting into the "read" list after, but that part isn't as important. And when I am approaching an empty stack of books to read, I go on there and try to pop from the top of th…

Post by Bellend » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 8:50 PM UTC

hinkley wrote: post #154

larperdoodle wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you don't just track books you've read, you also track books you want to read, which is much harder to remember. I also tag them to indicate if I already own them and in what format (physical, epub, audio). Saves me from purchasing duplicates when I'm at the used book store.

> you also track books you want to read https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsundoku I know exactly what books I want to read.

Post by Bellend » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 8:51 PM UTC

cafard wrote: post #49

hospitalJail wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure why people like it so much. My aunt-in-law is high pressuring me to use it. I have my library listing all the books I checked out. I have a pdf/epub reader that has a history of the books I read(although a new phone will probably wipe that out). For a while, I was merely writing down my books in a dedicated notebook, but I realized that it didn't really matter, if a book was important, I remembered it. I…

I use a Google Sheet for the neighborhood book club list. It is handy for reference--did we read X , and if so, who picked it? The group has been going for something like 18 years, after which even the very good and the very bad can be forgotten.