Goodreads - and losing DMs & images > Likes and Comments

From the Moderator Group, one of its members who is following everything diligently.

This week GR announced (via DM and email) that they are removing DMs, and external links and images from messages in the "upcoming weeks". We don't know exactly which messages will lose links & images. Attempts at clarifying with goodreads support did not rule out groups!

💬💬 This thread is where we can share info, vent and suggest ways in which we can make our feelings known 💬💬



◼️KEY INFO ◼️

GRs Announcement is here:

"Hello Goodreads Member,

In the coming weeks, we will be making some updates to how messaging works on Goodreads.

What's Changing?
• Direct messages between individual members will no longer be available
• Images and external links will no longer be supported in messages

While direct messages between individual members are no longer available, you can still access your past messages from your inbox, Group moderators can still send broadcast messages to their group members, and you can still send group invitations to your Goodreads friends. All other public interactions, such as writing and responding to book reviews, remains unchanged.

-The Goodreads Team"

◼️ A Petition on change.org:
https://www.change.org/p/urge-goodrea...

◼️ A Protest Group with Resources: (It already has more than 1000 members
A form letter to send to GR and 2 GR email addresses, Suggestions for status updates, etc.
There is a summary of their links here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

If anyone is interested in following the discussion in the Moderator thread it's here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

There are a lot of posts there, so scroll to the second to last or last page if you don't want to read it all. It will help with things we can and can't do. Working around things.

This thread is an excellent idea, Brenda!

Thanks Rowan :) I hope it helps...

I know this is an unpopular take, and I'll genuinely miss parts of DMs too... particularly the quiet, friendly one-on-one chats.

But I also see some real upsides to losing them.

First, it cuts down on spam and awkward promo messages that I'm sure a lot of readers never asked for in the first place. I've received them myself, and others have told me they didn't like them either.

It could also nudge conversations back into public threads like this one. This can shape recommendations and discussions to actually help everyone, not just two people. That's probably something Goodreads thought of before removing DMs.

There's also less social pressure, meaning no unspoken obligation to reply. And to be honest, life gets busy. People engage when they want to, not because a message is sitting there staring at them.

That has to help groups like this.

So yes, I'll miss DMs, but I'm not completely convinced it's all bad either. It'll be good to see how others see it when the dust settles.

I disagree in part Chris. As a moderator, I receive quite a lot of questions from members, questions they don't want to ask in a public forum. Also, when I need to contact other moderators, from different groups, DMs are the only way to go. Without them, we are lost in our communications between groups, therefore that will eventually be lost. Perhaps there are fores and againsts, but I think it's a bad thing...