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> Instead, it has stagnated: Amazon holds on to an effective monopoly on the discussion of new books This is the main point. It is the same thing that Oracle

> Instead, it has stagnated: Amazon holds on to an effective monopoly on the discussion of new books This is the main point. It is the same thing that Oracle purchasing MySQL. What once was a promising raising technology is nowadays stagnant. (Interest over time https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=%2Fm%2F05ynw,mysql https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=%...) GoodReads could help to find better books to read. But, Amazon likes the current state where Amazon recommends the books that are good for their business and not the best for the reader. 10 years ago, I would buy anything Amazon recommended on books. Nowadays, I do not use Amazon anymore as it just promotes books that, I guess, have larger profit margins or align better with Amazon strategy. It cannot be trusted as a recommendation engine.

pizza234 6y ago
> It is the same thing that Oracle purchasing MySQL. What once was a promising raising technology is nowadays stagnant. (Interest over time https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=% https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=%...) Connecting Oracle's purchase with the MySQL's market share is a long stretch. Even based on that diagram, the decline started earlier than the time Oracle came into play. The quality and pace of development of MySQL/InnoDB hasn't meaningfully changed (although one may subtly observe that with v8, they radically changed the release philosophy - patch versions now can introduce new features or break old ones). There have been low and high quality features developed, but that happens with any software. In order to get an idea of how MySQL was around 10 years ago, notice how by that time, MyISAM was (unfortunately) still something. A simple interpretation of the shift in market share is that PGSQL hasn't been ready for wide adoption (historically speaking, it's been considered for a long time the slow and cumbersome RDBMS), until, after a certain functional threshold, it entered a virtuous circle of improving and getting traction. Of course, it's also possible that people is taking distance from MySQL "because Oracle", but that doesn't constitute a technical ground.
Mediterraneo10 6y ago
Amazon was pretty much forced to buy Goodreads: the original business model of Goodreads before the Amazon buyout was making money from referral links to booksellers. While links were provided to several internet booksellers besides Amazon, like Barnes & Noble, already the vast majority of internet users were hooked on Amazon and only buying through Amazon links. Consequently, Amazon was paying Goodreads a huge amount of money in referral fees each month, and it made more sense for Amazon to simply buy the site and stop that. I agree that Amazon is nefarious and destructive, but I think any company in the same position would have bought Goodreads out.
- thewhitetulip 6y ago
  It's alright if they bought it, and it is a very bad social media. You'd think that they'd improve the app right? Facebook/Instagram should just add a books section to their main page as a challenger to goodreads, maybe that'll help?
  - LockAndLol 6y ago
    That's one of the best jokes I've read all day. Instagram and book reading. That cracked me up. Thank you
    - prepend 6y ago
      Imagine all the great pictures of yoga models holding Dune covers. I can’t imagine a more vapid collection of reading signaling posts.
    - SECProto 6y ago
      I have a number of friends who have posted a book they've enjoyed in their story after finishing. I've gotten a few recommendations and had a few good discussions from that. Social media is pretty dependent on how you use it - I have non-toxic experiences because I mostly only follow people I know on twitter/IG/FB. Turn off retweets (or equiv) for those who use it to spread negative bs.
- chrisseaton 6y ago
  > the vast majority of internet users were hooked on Amazon and only buying through Amazon links. Consequently, Amazon was paying Goodreads a huge amount of money in referral fees This doesn't make any sense. If consumers were already only buying through Amazon... why would Amazon continue to pay referral fees? The referral fee is there to get people who wouldn't buy through Amazon to buy through Amazon. But they were already buying through Amazon... so what's the point?
  - dageshi 6y ago
    They're saying that goodreads became an alternate front end to amazon for finding books but users used amazon (via affiliate links) to actually buy the book. Goodreads was better at helping users find new books they wanted than amazon themselves and so it made sense for amazon to buy them.
Finnucane 6y ago
In Amazon’s early days they had human genre section buyers who managed what was promoted. When I worked for an sf publisher in the 90s we’d see them at cons. They would come to our parties and we would spend their expense account money. They’d look at the books we recommended. It was very different.
- prepend 6y ago
  I once climbed some stairs with Jeff Bezos at a conference. We sat in the front row next to each other at a midnight Neil Gaiman reading and I got to witness the small talk between them. Bezos asked Neil if he had gotten the recent shipment of books and Neil responded that he had and that they were really thoughtful and he enjoyed them. I thought that Bezos must have the best book recommendations. And that since he and Gaiman were friends he was able to pick perfect books that even Neil Gaiman didn’t know about. That’s what I want. Unfortunately my plan to develop a relationship with Bezos to the extent that he buys me books has failed so far. So I look for more attainable methods.

pizza234 6y ago

> It is the same thing that Oracle purchasing MySQL. What once was a promising raising technology is nowadays stagnant. (Interest over time https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=% https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=%...) Connecting Oracle's purchase with the MySQL's market share is a long stretch. Even based on that diagram, the decline started earlier than the time Oracle came into play. The quality and pace of development of MySQL/InnoDB hasn't meaningfully changed (although one may subtly observe that with v8, they radically changed the release philosophy - patch versions now can introduce new features or break old ones). There have been low and high quality features developed, but that happens with any software. In order to get an idea of how MySQL was around 10 years ago, notice how by that time, MyISAM was (unfortunately) still something. A simple interpretation of the shift in market share is that PGSQL hasn't been ready for wide adoption (historically speaking, it's been considered for a long time the slow and cumbersome RDBMS), until, after a certain functional threshold, it entered a virtuous circle of improving and getting traction. Of course, it's also possible that people is taking distance from MySQL "because Oracle", but that doesn't constitute a technical ground.

Mediterraneo10 6y ago

Amazon was pretty much forced to buy Goodreads: the original business model of Goodreads before the Amazon buyout was making money from referral links to booksellers. While links were provided to several internet booksellers besides Amazon, like Barnes & Noble, already the vast majority of internet users were hooked on Amazon and only buying through Amazon links. Consequently, Amazon was paying Goodreads a huge amount of money in referral fees each month, and it made more sense for Amazon to simply buy the site and stop that. I agree that Amazon is nefarious and destructive, but I think any company in the same position would have bought Goodreads out.

thewhitetulip 6y ago
It's alright if they bought it, and it is a very bad social media. You'd think that they'd improve the app right? Facebook/Instagram should just add a books section to their main page as a challenger to goodreads, maybe that'll help?
- LockAndLol 6y ago
  That's one of the best jokes I've read all day. Instagram and book reading. That cracked me up. Thank you
  - prepend 6y ago
    Imagine all the great pictures of yoga models holding Dune covers. I can’t imagine a more vapid collection of reading signaling posts.
  - SECProto 6y ago
    I have a number of friends who have posted a book they've enjoyed in their story after finishing. I've gotten a few recommendations and had a few good discussions from that. Social media is pretty dependent on how you use it - I have non-toxic experiences because I mostly only follow people I know on twitter/IG/FB. Turn off retweets (or equiv) for those who use it to spread negative bs.
chrisseaton 6y ago
> the vast majority of internet users were hooked on Amazon and only buying through Amazon links. Consequently, Amazon was paying Goodreads a huge amount of money in referral fees This doesn't make any sense. If consumers were already only buying through Amazon... why would Amazon continue to pay referral fees? The referral fee is there to get people who wouldn't buy through Amazon to buy through Amazon. But they were already buying through Amazon... so what's the point?
- dageshi 6y ago
  They're saying that goodreads became an alternate front end to amazon for finding books but users used amazon (via affiliate links) to actually buy the book. Goodreads was better at helping users find new books they wanted than amazon themselves and so it made sense for amazon to buy them.

Finnucane 6y ago

In Amazon’s early days they had human genre section buyers who managed what was promoted. When I worked for an sf publisher in the 90s we’d see them at cons. They would come to our parties and we would spend their expense account money. They’d look at the books we recommended. It was very different.

prepend 6y ago
I once climbed some stairs with Jeff Bezos at a conference. We sat in the front row next to each other at a midnight Neil Gaiman reading and I got to witness the small talk between them. Bezos asked Neil if he had gotten the recent shipment of books and Neil responded that he had and that they were really thoughtful and he enjoyed them. I thought that Bezos must have the best book recommendations. And that since he and Gaiman were friends he was able to pick perfect books that even Neil Gaiman didn’t know about. That’s what I want. Unfortunately my plan to develop a relationship with Bezos to the extent that he buys me books has failed so far. So I look for more attainable methods.