Fans of British Writers discussion

On Sept. 20, Goodreads initiated a controversial change of policy on what kinds of reviews and shelf names are considered acceptable to post. Because it was announced only on a thread in the Goodreads Feedback group, most members have not yet heard about it, so some Goodreaders have asked group moderators to post a mention of it in their groups. Here's the link to that thread: www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1499741-... . The announcement is the first post; those following it provide additional understanding of the controversy, but it's a very long thread to read in its entirety (well over 5,000 comments the last time I checked).

Werner, I'd seen something in a news thread or two outside of Goodreads, so I had an idea that something was brewing here. Last week, I searched on the topic and came across this Salon article discussing it. I thought the journalist did a pretty fair job of identifying the issues and covering various sides.

Yes, LeAnn, that's a really good article! Thanks for posting the link here, and for sharing it with me earlier.

Werner, have you heard about the dust-up at the Scientific American blogs? As usual, I saw a post about it but didn't follow a link to read the whole story. But this blog post by a SciAm blogger alludes to the main issues and reactions.

It's not exactly the same thing as what's going on here, but I do think that they're related. What do you think?

LeAnn, interesting link; thanks for sharing it! No, I hadn't heard anything about this story, which basically involved Scientific American deleting a blog post by a Dr. Lee, one of the paid bloggers who blogs on the magazine's website, because she mentioned some unethical behavior by personnel of a rival website by name, and there was a fear that if her facts were incorrect, Scientific American could be sued. (Her facts were subsequently proven correct.)

Until recently, I would have thought this was a small-scale instance of what's going on here at Goodreads on a larger scale; because I genuinely thought that Amazon was probably concerned about being sued if a BBA denounced in a review claimed to have been falsely accused. When I floated that theory on a thread in another group, however, one member asked his wife, who's an attorney, about it. The crucial difference in the two situations is that one deals with PAID content, while the other does not. Because Scientific American pays Dr. Lee to blog for them, she does so as their employee, so they're liable for any civil penalties for what she says. Goodreads users, however, are not paid; Goodreads simply creates an open-to-the-public network that anyone can join for free. Goodreads users are not legally seen as agents of Goodreads; they are their own free agents. They're liable personally for what they say, but Goodreads itself has no legal responsibility or liability for what they say of their own volition. (Hope I've explained that distinction, and the reasoning behind it, clearly!) So whatever Amazon thinks it's doing with this policy change, it is NOT protecting itself against legal liability for false accusations --it has none to protect against.

Yes, I gleaned that difference about legal liability for a paid blogger by SA. That difference doesn't seem to have occurred to most of those who got upset about SA pulling the post. Alsos, for a paid blogger, she apparently had little oversight and maybe not enough guidelines about what she can and can't post as a representative of the magazine.

It's rather distressing to think that many readers assumed a discriminatory reason for the post being yanked. It's also distressing that the bad behavior of the offending contact at the other Web site was ascribed to discrimination. Such behavior is unacceptable toward anyone, but I wonder if it's especially easy to do in an online environment.

On another note, I read the comment thread of a review posted here on Goodreads recently. I'm afraid to say that most of the commenters had elevated the intentions of all readers and reviewers to purely noble ones, thereby asserting a moral superiority to their freedom to critique both novels and authors. I think that an honest examination would show that not all reviewers and readers have such noble intentions and generous motives (as I believe the same is true of writers and authors). It would be ideal (though perhaps unrealistic) to hope that with great freedom would come an equal obligation to be equally civil, respectful, and careful in the words we speak and write, whether public or private.

LeAnn, you bring up a good point about the moral obligation to be civil and respectful of others, whether we're reviewers or authors (or both) --and you're quite right that there are those in both groups who clearly haven't been well-intentioned, and fall far short of that obligation. Before the new policy was ever thought of, Goodreads already had Terms of Service that forbids posting things that are "abusive," "racially or ethnically offensive," "harassing," "humiliating to other people," and "profane." These standards aren't some kind of unethical "censorship" (although some have suggested that they are); rather, they're civilized precepts that promote healthy and friendly discussion of opinions about books, which is what the site exists for. Troll behavior doesn't deserve any rights or privileges in an online community, and shouldn't be accorded any. Site administrators should distinguish between that kind of thing and legitimate reviewing; and the distinction isn't rocket science. So MY opposition to the new policy definitely isn't based on an "anything goes!" mentality! Unfortunately, for some, it may be. :-(

Werner wrote: "LeAnn, interesting link; thanks for sharing it! No, I hadn't heard anything about this story, which basically involved Scientific American deleting a blog post by a Dr. Lee, one of the paid blogge..."

Your comments give a clearer understanding of liability to publishers when writers give opinions. As a freelance writer, reviewer or author, I need to become aware of: writing content as a paid and unpaid contributor as to public forums opinions. Thank you, Werner.

Glad it was helpful, Charlotte!