A prominent author's decision to pull her novel from publication after being "review bombed" highlights Goodreads's power and raises questions about its owner: Amazon.

📚 Time to switch to BookWyrm

EDIT: Fairly incredible that this article should appear on WaPo, which is owned by amazon.

    •  DJDarren   ( @DJDarren@beehaw.org ) English
      8•1 year ago

      Well for a start it’s owned by Amazon, so if you use a Kindle device then it can be really useful with its integration. I have a Kobo, so there’s nothing. They’ve locked all the integration away unless you buy into their ecosystem.

      On top of that, the review system just isn’t useful any more. As the linked article notes, books that have yet to be released can be review-bombed into oblivion by dint of being about something that a mob might not want. Or shitty books can be bot-reviewed into a 4/5 star position. I’ve fallen for a couple of well-reviewed books that turned out to be utter dog shit.