NEW YORK -- Amazon.com Inc., the world's biggest online retailer that got its start in bookselling, has agreed to buy book recommendations site Goodreads.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Amazon said Thursday that it "shares a passion for reinventing reading," with Goodreads.
"Goodreads has helped change how we discover and discuss books and, with Kindle, Amazon has helped expand reading around the world," said Russ Grandinetti, vice president of Kindle content for Amazon.
via HuffPost
More detailed report at PW
And at PublishersLunch:
The basics have been well reported within
minutes of Amazon's announcement on Thursday after the close the of market. In
what is widely recognized as a very smart move by the retailer, they have an
agreement to acquire Goodreads for an undisclosed sum. Started seven years ago,
the social network for books had been interviewing experienced publishing
executives in recent months as part of an exploration of selling books directly
from the site to their 16 million members. Goodreads and its staff of about 40
expects to remain in San Francisco and the deal is set to close in the second
quarter of 2013 subject to various closing conditions.
In a statement vp, Kindle content Russ
Grandinetti "Goodreads has helped change how we discover and discuss books
and, with Kindle, Amazon has helped expand reading around the world. In
addition, both Amazon and Goodreads have helped thousands of authors reach a
wider audience and make a better living at their craft. Together we intend to
build many new ways to delight readers and authors alike."
What Happens Next
The Goodreads blog makes it clear what some of the pathways to "delight" readers are likely to include:
The Goodreads blog makes it clear what some of the pathways to "delight" readers are likely to include:
"Our members have been asking us to
bring the Goodreads experience to an e-reader for a long time. Now we're
looking forward to bringing Goodreads to the most popular e-reader in the
world, Kindle, and further reinventing what reading can be."
As eBookFriendly first posted,
Amazon has quickly gone from the last purchase option list in the Goodreads'
drop-down to the first one listed.Goodreads had stopped
using the Amazon book data API just over a year ago as their stated terms
became "more and more restrictive," licensing data from Ingram and
supplementing it.
Now Goodreads co-founder Otis Chandler
writes, "For all of you Kindle readers, there's obviously an extra bonus
in this announcement. You've asked us for a long time to be able to integrate
your Kindle and Goodreads experiences. Making that option a reality is one of
our top priorities," Chandler said.
Also telling is that Chandler's post about
the acquisition to Goodreads members doesn't ask for open comments on the deal;
rather, it asks: "Please let us know – what integration with Kindle would
you love to see the most?"
One likely possibility that Chandler described
to the LA Times is to let Goodreads users add a Kindle ebook file to their
Goodreads Shelf. Indeed, that's one of the integrations that
many Goodreads members mention in their comments. Users also asked to
cross-post reviews to both Goodreads and Amazon; to integrate Goodreads with
Amazon wishlists; to share to Goodreads from within Kindle ebooks.
Separately, Chandler tells
paidContent, "I think, short-term, the thing we're most excited about is
actually bringing the book into Goodreads and enabling people to just start
reading right there from the Kindle Cloud Reader. We've never had a good book
preview feature."
Users' Concerns
At the same time, many Goodreads members posted disappointment that Goodreads was forsaking its independence, and concern that feature changes might weaken their attachment to the site. Some users asked that any Amazon and Kindle integration be optional rather than automatic. Many wondered if Amazon's policy on acceptable reviews would be carried over to Goodreads, and others asked if they would still own their Goodreads reviews.
At the same time, many Goodreads members posted disappointment that Goodreads was forsaking its independence, and concern that feature changes might weaken their attachment to the site. Some users asked that any Amazon and Kindle integration be optional rather than automatic. Many wondered if Amazon's policy on acceptable reviews would be carried over to Goodreads, and others asked if they would still own their Goodreads reviews.
More Likely Changes from the Outside
Goodreads had emerged as a significant independent influencer of book discovery and purchases, and publishers had increased their support of the site through pre-publication giveaways, ads and other programs. For some houses that support may change.
Goodreads had emerged as a significant independent influencer of book discovery and purchases, and publishers had increased their support of the site through pre-publication giveaways, ads and other programs. For some houses that support may change.
Goodreads' reviews api is also widely used,
as an alternative non-commercial source. Those reviews are currently featured
on the ebookstores of Kobo, Sony and Google, as well as sites like USA Today
(and they are integrated on our own Bookateria title pages). Chandler tells
paidContent "we're not going to shut off" the feed to Kobo, but you
can logically expect a number of the core api users to start looking for other
solutions.(A self plug: we have significant databases of professional book
reviews and years of archived bestseller lists available for license.)
Other Communities
Amazon already owns another online book community, Shelfari, and they have a minority stake in Library Thing, acquired when they bought AbeBooks. But Bowker is another minority owner of Library Thing, and founder Tim Spalding remains the controlling owner. His blog contains some interesting thoughts. For starters, he writes: "People keep reporting that Amazon has 40 percent [of LT]. That's simply not true—it fails to take account of our second funder, Bowker." He also vows, "As I've said before, I don't want to sell. LibraryThing wasn't set up as a startup that would get flipped. And our business—split between .com and the library side—always made us easier to partner with than buy."
Amazon already owns another online book community, Shelfari, and they have a minority stake in Library Thing, acquired when they bought AbeBooks. But Bowker is another minority owner of Library Thing, and founder Tim Spalding remains the controlling owner. His blog contains some interesting thoughts. For starters, he writes: "People keep reporting that Amazon has 40 percent [of LT]. That's simply not true—it fails to take account of our second funder, Bowker." He also vows, "As I've said before, I don't want to sell. LibraryThing wasn't set up as a startup that would get flipped. And our business—split between .com and the library side—always made us easier to partner with than buy."
Spalding believes the Amazon Goodreads
purchase is good for Library Thing: "we gained a lot of friends
today." Among his thoughts: "We need to make common cause with the
publishers and booksellers the Amz/Goodreads move leaves out in the cold. I'm
hoping some come to us." He suggests they might in turn support independent
booksellers by "releas[ing] our data to indies for free." At the same
time, it's clear that for LT to fill the void and rise to the occasion, somehow
they need to access significantly more resources: "We have limited but
real development resources, and a TON of work to do. LibraryThing has a very
large codebase and feature set for a company with only a few developers."
And at Publishing Perspectives:
Amazon Acquires Goodreads, Twitter Shock Ensues
Amazon.com announced on Thursday that it would acquire Goodreads, a social networking site for readers and book recommendations. With 16 million members and 23 million book reviews on the site, Goodreads is hub for avid readers and one of the leading sites where publishers promote books.Goodreads CEO Otis Chandler appears regularly at publishing conferences to present data on how Goodreads users share, recommend and buy books. With a limited number of sources for focused data like this, Chandler’s willingness to share this valuable data is a boon to many book marketers and publicists.
It’s safe to assume that Amazon.com also gathers a lot of data about book buyers, though the online retailer has been reluctant to share much of it with publishers. Following the acquisition, will Goodreads become subject to Amazon’s tight-lipped policy?Moments after the news broke, Twitter erupted with reactions from publishing folks, readers and authors.
And from Shelf Awareness:
Amazon Buying Goodreads: Industry Reactions
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. Goodreads' headquarters will remain in San Francisco, and its management is expected to stay in place. As the leading social networking site devoted to books, GoodReads has been considered an important element in addressing the "discoverability" problem that grew with spread of e-books and Amazon and the collapse of Borders: How would readers discover books if fewer of them were visiting the best source for learning about new books, bricks-and-mortar bookstores?
In one fell swoop, Amazon, whose algorithms for recommending books have shown limited effectiveness, now owns one of the major tools built to address the problem it created.
On the Goodreads blog, CEO and co-founder Otis Chandler said the site "will continue to be the wonderful community that we all cherish. We plan to continue offering you everything that you love about the site--the ability to track what you read, discover great books, discuss and share them with fellow book lovers, and connect directly with your favorite authors--and your reviews and ratings will remain here on Goodreads. And it's incredibly important to us that we remain a home for all types of readers, no matter if you read on paper, audio, digitally, from scrolls, or even stone tablets."But judging from the reaction of booksellers, publishers and some Goodreads users, the process may not be so easy. The overwhelming feeling expressed yesterday on Twitter and Facebook was surprise and disappointment. @NextGenAuthors tweeted us: "Hey, your April Fool's edition doesn't come out until Monday!" Many indies and their fans promptly cancelled their accounts.
The question is how a site that was prized for its independence and noncommercial cred will fare as a part of the Amazon empire. As one person commented on Otis Chandler's own blog on Goodreads: "I liked/would prefer a community of readers not backed by someone with motives to a) unrelentingly mine my data and b) sell me stuff."In response to Chandler's comment that "We truly could not think of a more perfect partner for Goodreads as we both share a love of books and an appreciation for the authors who write them," Jarek Steele of Left Bank Books, St. Louis, Mo., wrote on his blog: "Really, Goodreads? You've forsaken all the other opportunities to partner with independent bookstores, Kobo, even Barnes & Noble & the Nook? How about iPad? Also, who at Amazon has a love of books or authors?"
The Amazon record concerning book world companies it's purchased isn't encouraging. While some non-book purchases, like Zappos, have remained independent and fared well, some book purchases are either merged into Amazon World or left to die on the Internet vine, such as Lexcycle and, most tellingly, Shelfari, which, like Goodreads, is a social media site focused on books.Only last year, Amazon and Goodreads had a public fight that led to Goodreads choosing to use Ingram data instead of Amazon's because of Amazon's requirement that its data not link to another retailer. There was no word on how this might change.
Goodreads has also been marked by a kind of openness that runs contrary to Amazon's penchant for secret. Otis Chandler has spoken at many conferences, giving details about site usage, and Goodreads shares information with publishers. It's likely all that will change very soon.
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.Wired summed up this feeling well, beginning its story on the Amazon purchase of Goodreads with this: "Amazon looked back to its roots in bookselling and forward to its future as the global overlord of all reading and writing by announcing its plan today to purchase social reading site Goodreads."
Forbes called the move a slap in the face of publishers, writing that it's no coincidence that the deal came seven weeks after Penguin, Hachette and Simon & Schuster launched Bookish.
"It's a brilliant move by Amazon," Mike Shatzkin of the Idea Logical Co. told the Wall Street Journal. "If you are a book marketer, the two places you think about the most in terms of online marketing opportunities are Amazon and Goodreads." He added, "It makes me question whether Amazon's competitors are awake. How could they let this happen?"
And in his inimitable style, Knopf's Paul Bogaards tweeted, "That's what all you morons get for sharing your books online."
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