Musing Monday...The Galactic Empire of Amazon

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 Monday is upon us once again, so let's look at the questions at Should Be Reading...

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Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits.
• Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
• What book are you currently desperate to get your hands on? Tell us about it!
• Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.
• Do you have a bookish rant? Something about books or reading (or the industry) that gets your ire up? Share it with us!
• Instead of the above questions, maybe you just want to ramble on about something else pertaining to books — let’s hear it, then!

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OK, a book industry rant this week.
Did you read about it?
I saw it in Friday's Shelf Awareness Pro and I must say, as a reader, as a book purchaser, I found it a little concerning. Rather sad.

Amazon is buying the popular book-focused social networking site Goodreads, which was founded in 2007 and now has more than 16 million members. The acquisition is expected to close by July.

I am a member of Goodreads and have been for years. But to tell you the truth, I no longer use it very much, much preferring the set up at Library Thing. But don't worry, LT has already, at least partially, been gobbled up by Amazon as well. 

The move also adds to the sense that Amazon is slowly buying up much of the book world. Over some 15 years, the company has bought AbeBooks.com, Audible.com, Brilliance Audio, the Book Depository, Shelfari, BookFinder.com, Lexcycle, BookSurge, CreateSpace, Mobipocket.com and (through AbeBooks) 40% of Library Thing.

I knew about Shelfari but Audible and the Book Depository and AbeBooks and all those others as well? Wow.

I like Amazon. I use Amazon. I buy stuff from Amazon.
But...do I want them to become such a huge force in the book world? They sell books, a LOT of books, they publish books, they are by far the biggest review site. They do it all.
NO! I do not want any one company to take such an overwhelming role.

Look, we all know that you have to take the reviews on Amazon with a grain of salt. Authors, publishers, companies hired by authors and publishers, stack these reviews. We have talked about that before. But I thought I was able to trust, at least to a larger degree, what I read on a site like Goodreads. You had to be a member. I could check out your books and if you had only one, this one your were reviewing, OK, that would be a bad sign. Bottom line...

The question is how a site that was prized for its independence and noncommercial cred will fare as a part of the Amazon empire.

Is Amazon going to use Goodreads in a negative way somehow, peppered with Amazon ads, Amazon 'recommendations', everything funneling us to an Amazon site? Well, there is some reason they spent a great deal of money to buy it, and I can't see even one that will be beneficial to those who have been using the site.
I guess we will see what happens, if some bad signs start to pop up. Personally, I am closing my Goodreads account and will just stick with Library Thing for now. 40% is better than 100% and Library Thing is about the best site that I know about at this point. LT is very open about what they do, how things are run and I have seen no change in that way of doing business since the AbeBooks/Amazon buy out.

Oh my, are those Galactic Stormtroopers I see coming done the road?
Ok, maybe not just yet, but keep your eyes open..lol

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