Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Apparently Goodreads shot itself in the foot over the weekend and I only just learned about it.

For anyone who hasn’t heard it from others, Goodreads updated their policies on reviews, and then proceeded to delete reviews deemed in violation without giving notice.

I have no problem with the clarifications of policy (because they really don’t seem to be full-out changes), but the actions that have accompanied this announcement have me very worried. Thus I felt the need to say a few words.

The sheer fact that there was no clear notice given to the general Goodreads population (posting a thread and assuming people will look for it does not count – I only learned of it through fellow users) and then reviews were deleted without notice is a HUGE red flag. I’m all for stopping outright abusive behavior, but what I’m hearing and seeing is that perfectly good reviews are being thrown out with the bad(?). I saw one person who re-posted an (innocent) deleted review only to see it deleted again. To me, this is abusive behavior on Goodreads’ part.

In short, this royally sucks.

I’m an author, but I use Goodreads first and foremost as a reader. Frankly, I don’t trust Amazon’s book reviews. Their job is to sell books and they do that well, but I can’t trust their reviews to be honest. Moreover, I can’t trust that my reviews (as a reader or an author) won’t be deleted. I think I’ve posted maybe three reviews there, because it doesn’t seem like contributing my opinion would matter.

This is the beauty of Goodreads. Overall, I can trust that there’s a person on the other side of the words I see, giving their honest opinion (good or bad). I’m also free to agree or disagree with them, and they with me.

Given the events of the weekend, how are any of us to be sure that Goodreads will not in the future decide to start deleting any reviews as it pleases, for no given reason and without warning (as it has now done)? How do I know my words on Goodreads are safe? I don’t anymore.

I had to run and check the reviews I’ve written just to be sure none of them disappeared. None of the reviews I’ve written seem to be deleted (I don’t keep track outside the site), but I don’t exactly try to pull punches when a book ticks me off. I don’t intend to start, either.

In the announcement thread for the policy changes, Goodreads asserts that the only reviews deleted were not “book” reviews but “author” reviews. Having seen a few of the contended reviews, either no one is actually looking at these reviews before deleting them, or else Goodreads is not abiding by their assertions.

Hopefully, this will end up a case of just plain not thinking things through (giving the Goodreads team the benefit of the doubt), but so far Goodreads has not been very satisfactory in their response.

I don’t like the unhappiness!

(The announcement thread, in case you want to see for yourself, is here: http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1...)

(And I promise I’ll put up that post on gratuitous death soon! This just cropped up.)