Amazon.com to Acquire Goodreads

[latepaul]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

This thread is revealing an amazing amount Amazon hate.

You should read the threads on the Goodreads feedback forum!

The thing that leaves me shaking my head is the number of people who seem to have no idea that Goodreads is, and always was, a commercial business. Also it was a VC-funded business which means it would always be looking for a point to either float or sell.

I hope this link works without you needing to be logged into LibraryThing but it's Tim Spalding's take on the sale (Tim is the founder of LT).

Unless I'm quite mistaken, Goodreads was not hugely profitable as itself. With 30 employees, many of their engineers and in Los Angeles, he was probably burning upwards of $3 million/year on salary and benefits alone. When you do the advertising math, there's no way he was making lots of money--not the sort of money that justifies a $150m valuation. (I don't for a second believe the $1b number.) My guess is that he wasn't even cash-positive. A number of people in the industry share my assessment. Unless the company itself is very profitable and very, very large, there's no chance of going public, hence no way for the investors to cash out.

So he had to cash out. And he pretty much had to sell to Amazon

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Especially if it really comes with the stated degree of autonomy.
As Coker said, Amazon wins whether Sony and Kobo stay or leave; they don't have to do a thing.

Coker went just shy of nailing the coffin on Kobo and Sony.

However, he does feel Apple will gain market share this year.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Fbone

Coker went just shy of nailing the coffin on Kobo and Sony.

However, he does feel Apple will gain market share this year.

Most of the new ebook customers, in the US, for this year will be casual readers coming in via tablet.
Apple should do very nicely, as well as Amazon.
Nook shouldn't do too poorly but, yes, Kobo and Sony will have a harder time getting noticed by casual readers.

[booklover6]

I'm shocked that people are dumping their goodreads accounts over this news. As someone else said, nothing has changed yet! Compared to Library Thing, I greatly prefer goodreads. I did go into my LT account and attempted to import my books from Amazon. Unfortunately, the vast majority seem to have no covers. Perhaps that was due to the import function. But no way am I going to add over 8000 records one by one.

I'll stick with goodreads and my spread sheets.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by booklover6

I'm shocked that people are dumping their goodreads accounts over this news. As someone else said, nothing has changed yet! Compared to Library Thing, I greatly prefer goodreads. I did go into my LT account and attempted to import my books from Amazon. Unfortunately, the vast majority seem to have no covers. Perhaps that was due to the import function. But no way am I going to add over 8000 records one by one.

I'll stick with goodreads and my spread sheets.

I don't know what is going on with LT and the covers. I happened to be over there adding yesterday too (what with all the news and since they gave everyone a membership to upload more than 200 books). I could see the book covers when I hunted by author (Frank Tuttle yielded his library of books with covers.) I clicked to add each one and...they added fine, but the covers are blank on everything I added yesterday. No idea why. Gremlins.

[Xanthe]

I don't hate Amazon; quite the contrary. I didn't delete my books on Goodreads because of that.

But I already do reviews for them so there is no point listing duplicate information and doing similar reviews on another site owned by them, just under a different user name. I have better uses for my time.

[Xanthe]

I don't hate Amazon; quite the contrary. I didn't delete my books on Goodreads because of that.

But I already do reviews for Amazon so there is no point listing duplicate information and doing similar reviews on another site owned by them, just under a different user name. I have better uses for my time.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by Xanthe

I don't hate Amazon; quite the contrary. I didn't delete my books on Goodreads because of that.

But I already do reviews for Amazon so there is no point listing duplicate information and doing similar reviews on another site owned by them, just under a different user name. I have better uses for my time.

But... You don't *know* that the reviews will be duplicated. They might or they might not. All this sudden panicking over an unknown future is just plain amazing.

[bkirsten]

Originally Posted by jersysman

FictFact is somehow tied into Amazon as well. I mean they are the only advertisements that I see on that site.

Brian from FictFact here. We are only Amazon affiliates, Amazon has no direct connection to our site (we do host on Amazon AWS, but we pay them for that). We discovered that from an affiliate perspective Amazon does the best with our users (with Apple and Audible in distant 2nd and 3rd place) which is why it seems a bit more prominent on our site.

[booklover6]

I like FictFact! I think the data base is not quite as extensive as goodreads'. Also I don't think there is any social component there, not that I have seen.

Shelfari---logged in this afternoon, still don't care for it. Library Thing...not really my Thing.

[BearMountainBooks]

Originally Posted by booklover6

I like FictFact! I think the data base is not quite as extensive as goodreads'. Also I don't think there is any social component there, not that I have seen.

There is a discussion board there.
http://www.fictfact.com/discussions/

Mostly we have a "what are you reading <insert month>"?

There's some series discussions too now and then. It's a nice place.

[booklover6]

Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks

There is a discussion board there.
http://www.fictfact.com/discussions/

Mostly we have a "what are you reading <insert month>"?

There's some series discussions too now and then. It's a nice place.

Thanks, I'll browse!

[Kumabjorn]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

This thread is revealing an amazing amount Amazon hate.

I have always been a happy customer, so I'm quite surprised. Is the bad reputation limited to the U.S.? If so, what lies behind the displeasure?

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

I have always been a happy customer, so I'm quite surprised. Is the bad reputation limited to the U.S.? If so, what lies behind the displeasure?

Fear of their success.
Amazon knows exactly what they're doing and there is growing evidence that most of their competitors (except maybe Apple) don't.
The old ways are dying and those with vested interests are mightily afeared.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHa3D-musUw

On the goodreads side, the context is that the tradpub establishment has been pinning their hopes on bookstores as the indispensable path to "discovery" and now they hear Amazon may have dropped $150m on another path. And since Amazon usually knows what they're doing, they are getting that old sick feeling in the pit of the stomach.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/forreste...before-amazon/

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

I have always been a happy customer, so I'm quite surprised. Is the bad reputation limited to the U.S.? If so, what lies behind the displeasure?

Goodreads members and especially their librarians voluntarily spent many hours maintaining the site. Entering books, metadata, covers and series info. Plus all the reviews and ratings. Editing, editing, organizing and organizing. We're talking hundreds of hours each year all in sharing to make GR a success ... 16 million members and $150 million is evidence.

However, now that Amazon will soon own them there is little incentive for us to continue to do so. Will people volunteer their time to help Amazon earn more money? Some may feel a multi-billion dollar corporation can hire their own people to maintain their site. Doesn't feel like charity any more.