The StoryGraph challenge GoodReads with quality recommendations, unfocus on ratings

[4691mls]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I don't like reviews on GoodReads loaded up with GIFs. If I see a couple of those on a book, I assume the book likely isn't for me.

Originally Posted by tomsem

I must be reading the wrong sort of books. I’ve never seen a GIF-laden review.

I've seen some of those reviews. I agree with ZodWallop - if I see GIFS, I assume I am not the book's target audience. Ditto if the review is full of pictures of actors that the reviewers posted to represent characters in the book.

[rantanplan]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I'm curious: what was the error?

I far prefer LibraryThing to GoodReads. I used to be a regular user there that I sort of drifted away from when I moved to ebooks.

Unfortunately, LibraryThing will never be any contender for Goodreads as AbeBooks (now Amazon owned) owns a 40% share of LT.

[bookaho!ic]

Originally Posted by Quoth

I stopped adding books I read, wanted to read and reviews when I realised that Goodreads was an Amazon data capture tool. Amazon should never have been allowed to buy it, Mobipocket, IMDB, Book depository, Abe Books and others.

Also they are totally inflexible about content removal. As mentioned in the article, the site doesn't even work very well.

Like Amazon, they also conflate illustrators and colourists as book authors!

StoryGraph seems to be on a second incarnation and seems poor. Their selection screen for filtering recommendations is also poor, though the idea is reasonable and works well on the TV broadcast Guide, Digiguide, which is far better than Radio Times, RTE Guide, Sky Onscreen Guide / Search or Freeview/Freesat guide/search.

The best alternative would be for Amazon to be forced to divest of companies that they should never have been allowed to buy. But we certainly don't want to see Goodreads owned by any Social Media Company, Apple, Microsoft, Google or Oracle. Or any company owning online or physical bookshops.

I don't know what the answer is for an alternative. We do still of course list our new releases on Goodreads. But be warned, even if no copies are yet sold and the cover is changed before release, Goodreads will not remove the never used invalid cover.

Also Amazon refuses to remove listings for totally withdrawn novels. It's reasonable that they should keep listings for merely out-of-print novels.

What do you use then? i only use GR to log books i have read as i used to use a spreadsheet but its too much maintenance lol

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by bookaho!ic

What do you use then? i only use GR to log books i have read as i used to use a spreadsheet but its too much maintenance lol

I occasionally browse two or three physical bookshops, browse the many Charity shops in the City, except usually Oxfam as they are aimed at selling to rich people, sometimes the City's second-hand bookshop (many gone due to cheaper charity shops) check out recommendations from people I know, check PD sites for long gone authors, search for current authors I've read, sometimes add books I already know about to my Amazon Wish list. It's not long.

My TBR pile are ebooks already in Calibre or on reading devices not yet read and paper books I already have and haven't read.

[Uncle Robin]

So far, after about a week of using it, I like StoryGraph. It feels like a stripped down GR, no bad thing. I've already added 7 of its recommendations to my TBR list, around 35-40% of its "top picks" - a much better hit rate than GR ever managed.

[rantanplan]

Same here, in general they have some good reviewers at StoryGraph with a nice interface. I just hope that they implement book variants soon.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by rantanplan

Same here, in general they have some good reviewers at StoryGraph with a nice interface. I just hope that they implement book variants soon.

I've been impressed with the tenor of the replies I've had when submitting error reports/missing info to their help email. Friendly, a little apologetic and stressing they're trying to get it up and running and out of beta. They seem like a well-intentioned team, I hope it works out.

[astrangerhere]

I have enjoyed playing around with it. I, like a few others, have really liked some of the recommendations it has popped out at me. I also LOVE the clean interface. I would not mind converting to this as a tracking means if they continue to develop and improve.

[rantanplan]

I'd really love if StoryGraph had an API and could also access kindle API, kobo API or Tolino API to automatically integrate reading progress, book lists, maybe even notes (https://read.amazon.com/notebook).
Unfortunately, none of them really have an incentive to give StoryGraph access to their data ��

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by rantanplan

I'd really love if StoryGraph had an API and could also access kindle API, kobo API or Tolino API to automatically integrate reading progress, book lists, maybe even notes (https://read.amazon.com/notebook).
Unfortunately, none of them really have an incentive to give StoryGraph access to their data ��

Kindle definitely has no incentive, given that GR is part of Amazon's data-slurping package. The other two have very little incentive, but it's not entirely inconceivable that a case could be made for them to offer such access precisely because it could be an alternative to the Kindle/GR integration. I won't be holding my breath, but it's not beyond the realms of possibility.

[rantanplan]

Kindle doesn't even have a proper GR integration, it only works in the US.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by rantanplan

Kindle doesn't even have a proper GR integration, it only works in the US.

Well then, if Kobo has addressed one long-standing weakness by upgrading its dictionaries, perhaps an API for a GR alternative is a slightly less ephemeral hope than it may have seemed.

[Dazrin]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Obviously they are inconsistent. Or perhaps because the ebook exists but not paper?
Amazon specifically told us they would not remove listings.

Did they tell us they "would not remove listings"? I don't ever remember that. I DO remember them saying you would always have access to the books you get though.

And I think that is still true. There is one book in my library where the book no longer has a listing (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...w_myk_ro_title) but I can still get the book from my Kindle library and download it. That is all that I remember being promised.

[nashira]

Originally Posted by rantanplan

Kindle doesn't even have a proper GR integration, it only works in the US.

I'm curious what you mean by proper integration? My kindle has GR and I'm in Australia and it auto adds books/etc as I read them.

[Fiat_Lux]

Originally Posted by Quoth

There was a link on these forums to the number of books ordinary, avid and extreme readers can read before they die. If you actually have a life, it's a low number!

I didn't keep my sources, since I didn't think anybody else would find the numbers useful, and all I am interested in, is the numbers

Reading:

• 0: Modal number of books read by an individual that are not work related, in one year;
• 8: Median number of books read by an individual that are not work related, in one year;
• 17: Mean number of books read by an individual that are not work related, in one year;
• 1,600: Number of books read by the average individual, that are not work related, in their entire lifetime;

Volumes in a Library:

• 500: Number of volumes in a home library needed to increase a child's educational level by 3.2 years;
• 4,000: Number of volumes in a book mobile;
• 5,000: Number of volumes in a personal professional library;
• 15,000: Number of volumes in a middle school library;
• 18,000: Number of volumes in a high school library;
• 27,750: Number of volumes in a public library in the United States in 1955;
• 52,701: Number of volumes in a public library in the United States in 1978;
• 87,427: Number of volumes in a public library in the United States in 2004;
• 150,000,000: Number of items in the British Library;
• 155,000,000: Number of items in The Library of Congress;

I think the library size data is from scouring the American Library Association website.