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Thumbs down to Goodreads changes - giveaways, fees

Posted: Mon December 18th, 2017, 2:32 pm
by Baylou
I do find Goodreads a really useful site for finding books, tracking my reading, compiling my to read list, etc. And I like to enter the giveaways, even if I haven’t won very often.

But in 2018 they’ll be making the giveaways eligible to US residents only. This bugs me. If they want international people to use Goodreads, international people should also be able to participate in giveaways, period. Yes?

They do say something vague about how in future they might have international giveaways again, but that’s no guarantee.

I also understand that they will Start charging authors/publishers fees for listing giveaways on Goodreads.

Do you use Goodreads? Will this turn you off or at least peeve you?

-asking from Canada, where I won’t be eligible for the giveaways any more

Re: Thumbs down to Goodreads changes - giveaways, fees

Posted: Mon December 18th, 2017, 9:43 pm
by Misfit
US Goodreads user here. I hadn't heard about this, but then again I can't recall the last time I entered a giveaway. There are threads in the feedback group where it's been noticed that after a few wins when one first signs up, and then it dries up and who knows who are those folks winning. I also don't like to have the review required/expected responsibility and have stopped accepting ARCs, even with Amazon Vine. I have plenty of owned books, and for the new stuff my library gets everything.

Re: Thumbs down to Goodreads changes - giveaways, fees

Posted: Tue December 19th, 2017, 9:47 am
by Vanessa
I use Goodreads but rarely enter the giveaways. You’d think it would be related to whoever is doing the giveaway, which country it’s from. Or are all the giveaways from the US?

Re: Thumbs down to Goodreads changes - giveaways, fees

Posted: Tue December 19th, 2017, 7:18 pm
by Baylou
Vanessa wrote:I use Goodreads but rarely enter the giveaways. You’d think it would be related to whoever is doing the giveaway, which country it’s from. Or are all the giveaways from the US?
Vanessa, to date authors from anywhere could post books for giveaways and specifics what countries are eligible to enter. But not only readers in USA will be eligible to enter.

Re: Thumbs down to Goodreads changes - giveaways, fees

Posted: Wed December 20th, 2017, 4:33 pm
by Vanessa
I wonder why they’ve changed the rules. It can’t be a cost thing if it’s direct from indidual publishers as that wouldn’t affect Goodreads. Is it something to do with licensing?

Re: Thumbs down to Goodreads changes - giveaways, fees

Posted: Tue July 17th, 2018, 2:09 pm
by Rowan
I enter giveaways often, but have only won twice and received a book once. I keep entering even though I know I won't win.

I think it's pretty ridiculous for them to charge fees to do a listing, unless it's just a few cents. If that happens, I can see a lot of authors moving away from using Goodreads to promote books and for anything really.

As for restricting giveaways to US readers only, perhaps what they should do instead is allow the person giving away the book to decide if they are willing to pay for international shipping. It's ridiculous to think that even shipping to Canada from the US (with whom we share a border hundreds of miles long) is tremendously expensive. But I don't think that Goodreads should be the ones doing the restricting. Or, if they do, offer something specifically for those outside the US. But I'm all for international exchange of books. Goodreads is looking more and more isolationist if they go forward with this.