That's true, but I don't think it's a huge problem. Listening to an audiobook typically takes at least five hours. Usually you can tell whether you're happy wit

That's true, but I don't think it's a huge problem. Listening to an audiobook typically takes at least five hours. Usually you can tell whether you're happy with the narration within a couple of minutes. While you say "a dump of audiobooks", it is certainly not that for the readers who put in a considerable amount of work for each and every title. And it is certainly not that for the listeners who can listen to books not otherwise available. I don't think reading or listening to books at random (or based on average community score) makes sense. If you pick books based on trustworthy recommendations, most problems go away. Then just see where that book is available; if it is on Librivox and it's good enough, great. If not, get a commercial edition or a hard copy. I've only listened to a single audiobook from Librivox. It was a book that has no commercial counterpart. The quality was mediocre but I was really happy to be able to listen to that specific book. On the other hand, I had to stop listening to another commercially produced book (that I also wanted to listen to) because I couldn't stand the narrator, so I do see your point of view.