On September 20th, Goodreads.com dropped new policies regarding their review criteria and what is allowed on user-created book shelves. This news was placed in their feedback group and was not announced to all of the 20 million readers and authors Goodreads welcomes.
Goodreads staff weren't in office all weekend and the policy thread now boasts over 3,000 comments. Most users are extremely unhappy about the changes and Goodreads has been sparse in providing additional details and clarifications to these changes. Bloggers and other forms of media are feverishly spreading the word and some authors, like Jennifer L. Armentrout, are chiming in their reactions:
Since its inception, Goodreads was always a fun place where readers could go to find more information about books and authors. The site has a social media component and readers contribute heavily to the content. People with Librarian status spend thousands of hours updating book pages, people write thousands of reviews on a a daily basis, and many participate in group discussions, comment, and even create virtual shelves to help catalog the books they have read or are interested in.
In the past, it was acceptable to include some details about the authors in the user reviews. The virtual shelves could be named whatever the user wanted, with exceptions on abusive shelf titles. Goodreads had always given users the option of flagging items they find inappropriate.
In the past two years, more author behavior issues have occurred at an alarming frequency. It was not uncommon for shelf titles such as, "Badly Behaving Author," or, "Will Not Read Due To Author," to be found on Goodreads. Readers would create this kind of shelf after authors harassed them, spammed the site, or other questionable behaviors. There had been high tensions between some authors and some readers for quite some time. Goodreads users created these shelves to help warn other readers to be wary of a certain author, or as a reminder to themselves to stay away from the author. Many have likened this practice to boycotting other business for bad practices.
Now, this is no longer allowed on Goodreads and many people are vehemently against the new rules shown above. Many users are calling this censorship and are upset that Goodreads isn't doing more to protect readers from disgruntled authors. Of the 3,000+ comments on the policy thread, there have been many valid questions proposed, none of which Goodreads staff addressed. The staff seem to be almost completely absent from the heated discussion.
To make matters worse, Goodreads staff began to delete user content before the changes were announced. This didn't allow the users to change or backup their data, thus, all of their work is lost. Staff has since apologized for this action.
On Monday, September 23rd, a Goodreads staff member named Kara stated the following:
This seems to have angered users even more, with readers stating that Goodreads staff are attempting to police their thoughts:
In light of the new changes, there are a considerable amount of users contemplating leaving Goodreads in search of a new, more reader-friendly environment. Many users, even Top Reviewers, are backing up their Goodreads data and exporting their reviews to other book sites, such as BookLikes.com.
When it comes to more details about the new policies, the jury is still out of office, along with Goodreads staff. As of 1 PM on Tuesday, September 24th, no notice of policy changes wasn't emailed to all Goodreads members and discussion in the Feedback thread continues without staff.
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