Reading and Ramblings of Fantastical Fiction discussion

I've been thinking about the different social networks and how they have really changed so much of society. Now we can connect with friends and family in an instant. Old friends can be refound and new friends made from those who have similar tastes and interests.

I was wondering how much you refer to Goodreads and Facebook. Do you use one more than the other? Are they used for different purposes?

For me, when I first joined Facebook I got on all the time, mainly to play the games. It began to consume my time and I didn't read nearly as much. I stopped playing the games because I decided they were really just wasting lots of time when I could have been doing something else much more productive, such as reading, which has been my favorite pasttime for years. Now I rarely log onto Facebook. The last time I got on was on my birthday - and that was pretty much just to read all my birthday wishes and thank everyone for them. I know my family is still on Facebook quite a lot and post things that I don't find out about because I don't get on anymore, but for me, I don't feel the need to get on and have status updates on whatever I'm doing or feeling like at the moment.

Goodreads, on the other hand, is a big draw for me. I love discussing books. I love talking to all sorts of people about books. I had hoped I could get some of my family and friends to talk about books with me, thus I have created this group. As it's turned out, my family doesn't get onto Goodreads nearly as much as I do. I've really enjoyed making new cyber friends from all over the world. It's great to see so many people reading the books I love. For me, Goodreads is a much better way for me to connect with people.

In real life I'm pretty quiet, unassuming. It's been nice to be able to get online and talk about things that I really enjoy.

What are your thoughts about this?

Hmm the Facebook argument. I don't use facebook anymore hardly at all. It's too much of a time waste too cluttered and too open. I have migrated most of my social stuff to Google+. My professional network is there, and I find that it makes me more productive rather than less. I also post a lot of stuff there and use it both in facebook fashion and in twitter fashion, where some of my posts are just open to the world.

My work also uses a service called Yammer, that I despise. I hardly ever go on there either.

Goodreads on the other hand is great for books. I use it to keep track of the books I read, but sometimes wonder if it too is too open. Sometimes I want to track my academic reading but most people don't want to know that I'm currently reading "Bayesian Modeling" or "Stochastic Methods" but people might want to see that I'm reading the New Brandon Sanderson. Goodreads should take a page out of Google's lessons learned and beef up on their privacy options.

The main reason that I don't go on is lack of time for any of these. I like the tools that make me more productive, and goodreads does that to help me keep track of reading lists, but socially speaking doesn't take up much of my time.

You always can have multiple books you're reading. I figure if it's a book you're reading or have read even if it is work-related then you can still put it on. I think it is interesting to see what others are reading no matter what it is. Doesn't mean I'll add it to my to-read shelf though.

I agree with Amelia, we might not have the faintest idea what your academic books are about and most likely will have no desire to ever read them (even if we could understand them), it is still interesting to see what others are reading.