Goodreads has no incentive to be good • Hacker News Board

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#81

Post by nindalf » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:08 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #72

I anything actually good anymore? - Goodreads: Broken recommendation system, meh UI, review wars - Google Search: Pointless - Reddit: Overtly user-hostile, poor UX, tiktokified - YouTube: Mainstream, ad-riddled, tiktokified - Yelp: Cluttered-UI, favors jerks, hostile to businesses - Gmail: Oh yeah we're gonna delete your emails if you don't log in after a while - Netflix: Shrinking catalogue, worse quality shows - In…

Absolutely. May I add one more?

- Hacker News: filled with old ~men~ people shouting at clouds, reminiscing about how things were better in the good old days.

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#82

Post by Brybry » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:09 PM UTC

Eumenes wrote: post #8

I've found Goodreads incredibly useful for discovering books and keeping track of them. Def need to read between the lines with reviews, esp. if there is a polarizing topic like mentioned in the article (glorifying Russia with ongoing Ukraine conflict). I recently read a book about Francisco de Orellana's exploration of the Amazon River in the 16th century - many reviews upset that the author wasn't using every other…

Same, especially if you tend to read books by the same authors.

Before Goodreads it was a huge pain to know when authors you liked were releasing new books.

And being able to track all the books in a series is really nice too.

I have noticed that Goodreads has gotten worse in this regard though. My to-read list with future books often lacks release dates (even years) now.

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#83

Post by sanderjd » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:09 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #72

I anything actually good anymore? - Goodreads: Broken recommendation system, meh UI, review wars - Google Search: Pointless - Reddit: Overtly user-hostile, poor UX, tiktokified - YouTube: Mainstream, ad-riddled, tiktokified - Yelp: Cluttered-UI, favors jerks, hostile to businesses - Gmail: Oh yeah we're gonna delete your emails if you don't log in after a while - Netflix: Shrinking catalogue, worse quality shows - In…

I find that grilling out with friends and family is good. Books are really good, lots of interesting stuff to learn on the non-fiction side (and I honestly think the new AI stuff is making it even easier to learn things!), still more interesting fiction that I haven't read yet than I could ever read in a lifetime, not to mention re-reading books I already love. Similar thing with movies and tv; just finished the new season of The Bear and rewatching the first season now and it's great. Video games are pretty great; playing the new Zelda game with my daughter right now. Really enjoying museums and zoos and parks and pools and these trampoline places (which didn't exist when I was a kid) with my kids. Hiking and skiing trips and road trips are still great (though harder since I had kids). Meeting new people who live in different places and have different experiences is great.

There's lots of great stuff! But yeah, none of it is really on the internet. Touch some grass!

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#84

Post by epiccoleman » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:10 PM UTC

hospitalJail wrote: post #22

dgb23 wrote: post #5

One of the good things about sites like Goodreads is that they are a great source for long winded rants. I'm someone who likes reading a good rant or complaint. I'm not sure why that is but I find them very entertaining.

Good point. I was so frustrated at how bad the book Atomic Habits was, (in comparison to Power of Habit). It felt like some 20 year old was explaining how to life a good life with all the experience 20 year olds have. Lots of idealistic ways to organize things. Lots of mental gymnastics to supposedly make you more productive. I did like the 'improve yourself 1% a day', but I did that with a spin bike and quickly got…

> I'm off all drugs, I can quit social media whenever I want(I'm only back because of LLMs), I quit video games, I made my evenings productive instead of hedonistic.

Good god, how scary. Thanks for the warning!

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#85

Post by barbariangrunge » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:10 PM UTC

a_bonobo wrote: post #3

It's the same with IMDB, isn't it? Toxic subgroups and communities 1-star bombing movies that haven't even come out yet. The wikipage on review bombing doesn't even list Goodreads but has many examples from IMDB: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Review_bomb#Films,_television_... So what could Goodreads do differently? It's true that the owners do as little as possible with the site, but that also means that overall the…

> the owners do as little as possible with the site

The owner is Amazon, isn’t it? They’re working on a full ui overhaul I think

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#86

Post by linuxlizard » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:10 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #72

I anything actually good anymore? - Goodreads: Broken recommendation system, meh UI, review wars - Google Search: Pointless - Reddit: Overtly user-hostile, poor UX, tiktokified - YouTube: Mainstream, ad-riddled, tiktokified - Yelp: Cluttered-UI, favors jerks, hostile to businesses - Gmail: Oh yeah we're gonna delete your emails if you don't log in after a while - Netflix: Shrinking catalogue, worse quality shows - In…

"Medium: The TEDx talks of blogging"

I just about coffee spit lol'd.

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#87

Post by imgabe » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:10 PM UTC

nindalf wrote: post #81

ravenstine wrote: post #72

I anything actually good anymore? - Goodreads: Broken recommendation system, meh UI, review wars - Google Search: Pointless - Reddit: Overtly user-hostile, poor UX, tiktokified - YouTube: Mainstream, ad-riddled, tiktokified - Yelp: Cluttered-UI, favors jerks, hostile to businesses - Gmail: Oh yeah we're gonna delete your emails if you don't log in after a while - Netflix: Shrinking catalogue, worse quality shows - In…

Absolutely. May I add one more? - Hacker News: filled with old ~men~ people shouting at clouds, reminiscing about how things were better in the good old days.

Get off my lawn

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#88

Post by ckardat123 » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:10 PM UTC

ravenstine wrote: post #72

I anything actually good anymore? - Goodreads: Broken recommendation system, meh UI, review wars - Google Search: Pointless - Reddit: Overtly user-hostile, poor UX, tiktokified - YouTube: Mainstream, ad-riddled, tiktokified - Yelp: Cluttered-UI, favors jerks, hostile to businesses - Gmail: Oh yeah we're gonna delete your emails if you don't log in after a while - Netflix: Shrinking catalogue, worse quality shows - In…

RateYourMusic is a pretty nice site for finding movies and music.

I wish that Goodreads was more similar to RYM.

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#89

Post by nindalf » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:10 PM UTC

mritchie712 wrote: post #69

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.

ChatGPT is the best book recommender I've used. Tell it a few books (even one book works) you like and it will give you solid recommendations.

It is good, but only for books published before the training cutoff date right? That’s sometime in 2021.

Re: Goodreads has no incentive to be good

#90

Post by ip26 » Fri, Jun 30, 2023, 2:12 PM UTC

the_af wrote: post #30

I must be out of the loop: I never knew that Goodreads mattered at all. I don't know anybody who uses it. I understand fake reviews in Amazon are a problem: if I'm shopping there, I do look at the reviews, especially bad reviews to see if there is anything wrong with the product. I will disregard reviews that don't make sense and only pay attention to things that matter to me, but it's possible that I'll be influence…

It was supposed to be a review site that wasn’t trying to sell you books, ergo it would be more even-handed.

I often read both Amazon and Goodreads reviews of a book; the perspective is usually different.