Everything Booklikes & Leafmarks discussion

It would be interesting if people would post if they are still with Booklikes and/or Leafmarks and how after at least a year's experience they find these sites?

I drifted back when BL messed up my shelves when I import my books several times, I'm still a member though. Leafmarks I found boring but I do visit occasionally in the hope it becomes livelier.

I still have a profile and connections with people there, but I long ago gave up on Booklikes. I just never warmed up to it. I know a lot of people, especially those who like to blog, really love it. I want to stay in touch so at least so far I haven't deleted my profile, but I don't expect to use the site.

I like Leafmarks a lot and I'm keeping nearly duplicate records there and here.

I still find Goodreads to have the best design so far, though I'm looking for what Leafmarks might do with groups. For now, groups here at Goodreads are the best.

I'm barely reading or reviewing and feel I'm spread too thin on book sites. I'm also at LibraryThing and hope to eventually add my complete book record there.

When I start reading more, and hopefully reviewing, I'll also try to keep up with friends more, here and at Leafmarks. I shall see.

Leafmarks has become my favorite. I find it very easy to use and enjoy doing librarian work there. Booklikes has a fun structure so I'm only doing the bare minimum to keep my catalog up to date here but nothing else.

Randee wrote: "Leafmarks has become my favorite. I find it very easy to use and enjoy doing librarian work there. Booklikes has a fun structure so I'm only doing the bare minimum to keep my catalog up to date h..."

I wish LeafMarks did blogs, that was what I liked most about BookLikes. I really liked the site a lot actually, but book organisation is key to me and perhaps because my imports were so big, they were always messed up.

I abandoned BookLikes some time ago. It was just not for me. The social interaction with the main part of it being in comments seems to me very limited.

LeafMarks is still not there, but as a work in progress it is fun. They already implemented some of the features GR people asked for starting for ages and it only gets better.

For social interaction part nothing beats GR so far. While it has more than enough trolls, it also has a lot of interesting readers.

BookLikes is, prima facie, OK. But I still much prefer Goodreads.

I mostly use Booklikes, but I spend time here too for the groups, and the catalog is still a bit better. I was planning to update my catalog at Leafmarks, but I am waiting to see if they decide to delete fan fiction reviews or not. I can't be bothered with another site that deletes my reviews.

I like the way reviews are posted at BL, so I'll continue to post my reviews there (and a link to same on GR). But I just don't have the time to blog. I wish I did.

GR has many, many faults, but it still has everything I need and most of what I want.

Do not find either BL or LeafMarks as intuitive and easy to use as GR. Will keep profiles there but GR has the edge by a long way.

I find myself happier and happier with BL - they try incredibly hard to be responsive, but to also do a thing correctly. They have had some bumps, certainly. But they have librarians now and the book database is improving by leaps and bounds. I never though I'd like the blogging format, as I'm not a blogger - but I ended up loving the structure for reading others' reviews. They have lists and I find them much better than listopia here, because they can't be spammed. Still waiting on series information, although they have a release calendar now and that's pretty cool.

I really like LeafMarks as well, but it's been really quiet there and I believe Emily May is no longer part of the LM team, so I'm waiting to see what Jacquie does from here with the site. I hope she builds a team of support around her, so LeafMarks can continue to grow.

I'm no longer going to track my challenges here on GR, since they're the only ones that don't do re-reads and I'm not going to keep up my TBR list here any longer either. But I'm still here for my friends and the groups, which are far more active than anywhere else yet.

❂ Jennifer (reviews on BookLikes) wrote: "They have lists and I find them much better than listopia here, because they can't be spammed..."

How do the lists work?

I know that Emily was one of the founders of LM but I don't know what she ever did as it was always Jacqui I heard from. Do you know what her role was? Was Jacqui on GR?

Jacquie was (is?) on GR, yes.

I also almost always heard from Jacquie and Emily May never seemed that active at LM, especially after the very beginning. Hmm though. A team is definitely needed for this type of site. I do have hopes for LM though.

Petra X wrote: "❂ Jennifer (reviews on BookLikes) wrote: "They have lists and I find them much better than listopia here, because they can't be spammed..."

How do the lists work?"

The high points:

Each BookLikes member can create reading lists, compare books on the list with the titles on their shelves and sign up to a given list. If you find a list you like, you can check how many books you have already read from the list and sign up to complete it, as well as Like it and add all listed books to your Shelf page. The books will be added to a thematic shelf named after the List and will include the reading status if selected. The list can be edited/deleted only by the person who has created the list.

If you decide to create a private list, the listing will be visible only to you, other members won't be able to look at it or sign up.

When you create a list, you can choose the book order to suggest where to start or show the titles in whatever order you want.

They've added a description field to add a short summary of what the list is about and why these particular books have been chosen.

When you create a list you can search not only from the Book Catalog but also from your Shelf. This will help you to create a list with books you've already read and can recommend.

When you're creating a reading list, you can add a book genre or genres and tag it to help other book readers find it.

(I compiled all this from their posts on lists - they have improved upon them several times in the last few months, so it's possible I might not have included everything, but you get the gist of it. They've also said they are going to add the ability to comment on lists, or on individual books in a list, or both - I'm not sure.)

Thanks for the info. I don't use Listopia so I'm not really familiar with lists.

I've been mostly unplugged (year end work issues plus family health issues) so I'm positive I've missed a lot of updates and added features. That said, for me:

Please do import your goodreads data to all promising alternative sites even if not participating. Partly to create a backup for yourself; partly to improve the book databases. We built goodreads database and can build other sites' data as well. goodreads certainly is doing nothing to protect the integrity of data we added over the years.

goodreads I still don't trust goodreads with my reviews and data, not even just the book catalog. Not even all the fault of Amazon or goodreads as some of the nastier trolls, badly behaving authors, all the schills illegally not disclosing they are paid or otherwise connected to their reviews, etc. have had a hands in that—but, definitely the book-promotional agenda and failure of goodreads to support readers expressing their opinions, fixing bugs destroying book catalogs, censoring bookshelves/comments and discouragingr freely discussing books plus a seeming disinterest in discouraging gaming the site...

It was so much nicer here with millions of readers cataloging, discussing and sharing their reading experiences. A certain number of members on any site will attract commercial interest; but, goodreads has gotten to be where I only pay at attention to my friends, followed, and groups. The newsfeed is ridiculous. And my friend activity is dwindling as they defect to other sites or get completely discouraged into keeping theirs book info offline or on personal blogs. Old fart me may actually have to start following some blogs.

I abhor the day author Q&A got introduced and hijacked my feed (and I don't even blame the authors who were just nicely answering reader questions without being told by goodreads they were flooding the newfeeds so should limit how many at a time to answer). I sadly un-fanned/followed authors. I used to love using goodreads as a one-stop place to catch up on all the author news and blogs *sigh*

The way third party marketplace seller data from Amazon is allowed to destroy years of careful reader and librarians edits literally made me cry. I watched months and years of series research to get back of cover book synopses typed in get wiped out by "...like new condition with dustjacket..." text.

But, I still have good friends and active groups here. (I might eventually re-import at least the "read" books if goodreads fixes some cataloging bugs so that friends and potential friends can see my reads.). I'm not sure the groups are a priority yet for Leafmarks or booklikes.

As little as I currently think of goodreads, it does still shock me how willing they are to allow behaviors that destroy even book promotional features like the listopias. (Particulalry after amazons triggered so hard with tag drive and other issues on their main site.). Worries me that investing too much more time into goodreads could be useless because current powers that be might be perfectly happy to kill it off like Shelfari (only the kindle integratiin makes me think that isn't the plan; but, once upon a time Shelfari series and other info was also integrated inti kindle—a major selling point when I bought my first kindle because I liked their series info).

Booklikes . When goodreads died for me with the Sepember 2013 policy changes and earlier Amazon buyout indicating it would be turning more into then book promotion arm of amazon—like hundreds of my friends I joined booklikes. And intially had fun reconnecting and randomly finding new folk.

In 2013, I eagerly kept refreshing for the Thursday "candy" that happily added requested features. And had been eagerly awaiting the book database, series features and group features.

Well, like goodreads whose formerly unparalleled book database was made by members and volunteer librarians (many now in booklikes), I am sure that now booklikes has librarians the database will improve. It's not there yet for me. Admittedly, I have a lot of out of print books and currently mostly buy kobo and nook ebooks.

Well, book database sucked when first implemented. Worse, since implemented the only featurses of booklikes I can use are the dash board and a few URLs I saved (for example, I cannot click to see notifications but I can view at http://booklikes.com/notification).

I don't see groups any more due to the database bugs frying my menus but every Thursday candy seems to be ignoring groups completely. I'm not judging groups by activity since they won't attract much activity without better features (plus I'm probably not the only one no longer able to access).

I do like he way you write/post book reviews there. Although I can no longer get to the book pages to see, someone did tell me that the book pages now do show all reviews of a book versus just that edition.

Pretty much I now think booklikes is ignoring anything except upgrades to please book bloggers. Which I'm not.

I'm hanging in to see if they decide to address bugs and accommodate reader needs versus wanting to just be a book blogging platform — plus to try and keep in contact with friends there to see what sites becime their primary book site. Not all my booklikes friends are disappointed it is turning into a blogging platform so some may stay and keep me checking in sporadically.

Leafmarks. I love the very idea of it. I'm a librarian there. So far, better book database than corrupted goodreads one and should continually improve with funds spent on professional book data feeds (mostly the same, other than Amazon, that goodreads has used only they don't allow Amazon sellers to overwrite) and many long term goodreads librarians defecting to them.

It's still relatively new. First page keeps a good log you can read thru to see all the continual. improvements and feature adds. Judge for yourself how reader-oriented the updates are (admittedly much ffor privacy and display controls or librarian features that some readers may not care about but I like the options even though I've kept my stuff public and don't mind mature content). Those updates, the controls/options and features already available, better book cataloging than any other site and the "coming soon" updates are a very good indication to me that it is a site committed to readers.

Leafmarks already has features not available on other sites—particulalry in privacy options, book shelf featues for your own cataloging, challenges, ...

The "coming soon" alone keeps me excited about the site.

That raved, I do desperately need additional group and series features. Groups became (surprisingly as I was initially just trying to catalog books and track series here on goodreads) a big source of enjoyment for me here—and I'm not a bookclub person. I'm not sure they planned well for series options. There's not a good way to grow group activity without more group features. I sincerely doubt they initially thoughts out the series features (I'm holding off many librarian edits while some series issues get resolved). I moan about booklikes being a blogging platform versus book site, but I wouldn't mind seeing some blog features (or importing) added.

The Reading Room.. Uncle for now. When exploring sites post-Sept-2013, this one looked really close to goodreads. But the activity/membership levels just aren't there. Most of the social is just in the groups/clubs which, while more featurs than booklikes and Leafmarks, still don't seem very active. I have trouble selecting specific editions/covers and series stuff. Like any site, the membership and features could grow.

Fictfact. Whew, so glad I track series reads there. Works great; wonderful series features like "next book" and coming soons. Now that goodreads database is getting destroyed, best series info out there.

But, it is just for series tracking. I read a lot of series so I absolutely love the site. You can star rate a book. No reviewing; no cataloging non-series books, no selecting specific editions, almost no social features; no groups ... I think I love the idea of a no-review, very limited social options site because I doubt it will attracts all the bad behaviors sites with book reviews always seem to attract. You cannot comment on anything anyone does, message them, or get staff to remove your star rating—so no one can attack or be attacked.

From posts by fictfact staff in their goodreads group and email newsletters they may be adding standalone books as well instead of just series books.

I'm still looking for a blogging platform. I used to blog on Xanga which was very active, but it died. Blogging on BL was fun until some of the nastier members of GR had a go at me on behalf of some friend or other I offended. Some of the SPAs are dreadful people, but some of their opponents are too and look for opportunities for drama. I don't mix with those sort of bitchy drama queens in real life, and I don't want to online. So I went off BL blogging. Then BL totally messed my shelves with imports and that was that.

I am unhappy at the direction of GR which is more and more marketing elements and less and less concern for anything that doesn't bring in $$$. However, it still has the best reviews and my friends are here, so I can't see myself leaving. But I am keeping an eye on LeafMarks, I maintain my membership there but am not active. I have great hopes for it though.

I use both Goodreads and BookLikes, but am more partial to the former. With Goodreads, I very much like being able to interact directly with my Goodreads friends. Sometimes, we have rather lively e-mail exchanges. In BookLikes, that isn't really possible.

The plus side with BookLikes is that it's much easier to review my library there and make additions or modifications to it.

@Komet, *sigh*—I desperately wish booklikes would fix the bugs that make it no longer possible for me to use my library there. I have not seen my shelves (other than what I had marked currently reading or non-editable blog view) since they implemented then book database! The current bugs I have make it really hard for me to decide/judge the site.

Does anyone know how a BL member can become a Librarian there? I like to think I could help improve the layout and format of some of the books listed there.

KOMET wrote: "Does anyone know how a BL member can become a Librarian there? I like to think I could help improve the layout and format of some of the books listed there.

"

If I understand correctly - Anyone can make changes to book listings, but they are reviewed before they are added. So we all have some aspects of librarian status, but not others.

I have been on Booklikes and LM for a while.
I never use LM it was just to much for me to get a handle on so I have no idea what is happening over there.
Like others have said I still use BL for the blogging feature and them import my reviews here. There is still a lit of issues regarding cataloging of books for example I listened to a book on audio and it comes up as a paperback. Its is pain but I have so little time these days for reading let alone making library adjustments. Still BL I think still has potential.

Generally speaking I am still unhappy with all of it. GR used to be great for conversations and chatting about books and various things. Book reviews are nice but I miss the whole did you read this book can you believe this character did this or wow the author must really hate that character stuff like that.

Anyways I will continue to blog on BL and try and keep my group somewhat active here but for the most part this year I plan to join a local reading club and phase out most of my activity online.

I like Leafmarks a lot, since I hardly get errors on that site anymore, and I'm a librarian, so I can make changes to the database as needed.

I am still on Booklikes, but no longer post reviews or update my books there. For me, their improvements to the database and the ability to become a librarian just were too little too late. I just didn't care anymore, and I'd already invested a lot of time in fixing the listings on many of my books on Leafmarks.

Sarah wrote: "...just were too little too late. I..."

I hear you. Too late; still too error-ridden (booklikes almost unusable for me); and still not geared towards books and book/group discussions.

They certainly do seem to be trying to appeal to bloggers. I don't doubt that having librarians will improve the site because that's how goodreads grew.

Personally, my librarian efforts are going to Leafmarks.

I love doing librarian work at Leafmarks. I wish series capabilities would come along a little faster. I also wish there was some kind of script to run that would move things liked "revised" from the titles to the edition field. I wonder if that's just too difficult to do.

I joined BookLikes and blogged a couple times there, but haven't really done much there lately.

Leafmarks is my favorite and feels the most user friendly. While it is quieter there, I think that with time that will change. I'm not enough of a techie to tweak booklikes to suit my needs so I stopped reviewing there although still have a profile. I love how responsive the BL team is, but the whole blogging feel isn't my thing.

D.A. wrote: ".. I do desperately need additional group and series features...I'm not sure they planned well for series options ..."

I totally retract my series complaints! Recent updates really, really!, really improved. I'd rave on but too busy doing librarian edits on series I've been itching to do ...

I'm actually no longer using booklikes except to read blog posts from friends.

Just as well; because creating my own blog posts and liking other blog posts is all I have been able] to do.

Thursday's announcement of shelf improvements did me in because I have been reporting bug getting to my shelves (or basically anything except the dashboard with currently reading at right); I can like/reblog/comment. I can create a blog post.

I have drafts and templates in drafts I would really love to recover someday and discussion rooms I had been enjoying (and hoping the features for the rooms would improve. If they add an export it would be nice to get my data out.

The new series options at Leafmark are great. Jacquie has really been listening to what people actually want. The new "author follow" thing that's going on here at Goodreads is guaranteed to cut my participation to an even lower level than it has been (and that is pretty low). I had to unfriend a number of authors today because I was not willing to have it show that I "followed" them. The team here seems to do the opposite of what readers want, Booklikes and particularly Leafmarks are moving in directions I like.

Yeah; plus in goodreads I had to unfollow authors when they mplemented the author Q&A to see anything else on my feed (like ... gee, I dunno ... reviews and posts from friends...).

Not in any way blaming authors who were just nicely answering their readers — goodreads did not tell them it was set up so that if they answered for example 27 questions in a row all 27 showed on feed plus all likes of 27 questions plus all comments on 27 questions ... plus the next author's questions (with its likes and comments) ... then the next ...

Because I have authors still unfollowed, not sure what tweaks if any goodreads has made to the Q&A. A real bummer for me because I was using goodreads to read favorite author blogs here rather than subscribing to individually confusing in with other RSS feeds I use for other purposes.

Goodreads (or amazon) is seriously wanting to increase author interaction with readers so I think frankly the Q&A implementation was a huge misstep on their part. Not that adding Q&A for Authors in addition to their Q&A Sessions was necessarily bad, just the way they did it. Ditto for Q&A on book pages in addition to opening a book discussion...badly done.

I'm going to gag if I read one more goodreads staff member reassure an author that they are working diligently to improve how authors can reach readers here. Particularly in light of how often they respond to us readers marketing targets when we ask something ...

I'm here for some groups and some friends. I'm hoping they can eventually be lured to other sites. Group features need improving on the non-goodreads sites.

Leafmarks planned series features have me drooling ... off to edit more series over there.