That this started on Goodreads doesn't surprise me at all.
I use the site regularly, but I put it in the same category as most single topic 'communities' - something I'll use (reference), but know better than to engage with.
Basically, I find that such places tend to end up heavily steeped in their own customs and hierarchy which are dominated by the sort of super users and relationship-driven mobs that the author ran into.
At least Amazon finally acknowledged the toxic elements of the Goodreads community [1]. It's surely a tough problem.
What I really wonder is what exactly causes a community to end up that way? Every successful community has a struggle with growth and groupthink, but some get particularly bad. Is it a failure in moderation or are some topics and demographics just more susceptible?
I use the site regularly, but I put it in the same category as most single topic 'communities' - something I'll use (reference), but know better than to engage with.
Basically, I find that such places tend to end up heavily steeped in their own customs and hierarchy which are dominated by the sort of super users and relationship-driven mobs that the author ran into.
At least Amazon finally acknowledged the toxic elements of the Goodreads community [1]. It's surely a tough problem.
What I really wonder is what exactly causes a community to end up that way? Every successful community has a struggle with growth and groupthink, but some get particularly bad. Is it a failure in moderation or are some topics and demographics just more susceptible?
1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodreads#Criticism_and_controv...