Those aren’t reviews. Those are opinions, and they have their place and uses, but they do not substitute for deeply informed and engaging critical writing, which is a skill that takes time, practice, and experience to develop.
Life changes. Organisms/organizations need to adapt. I'm sure people go to crowdsourced info for reviews, like Goodreads, just like Yelp and others for restaurant reviews.
The diminishment of expertise in all areas is one of the saddest and most destructive beliefs of our time.
Plus, Goodreads is getting terrible. Most of the prioritized opinions are about whether there's anyone to root for or if the book's realistic. We need real criticism more than ever!
I will die on this hill. Arts criticism is itself an art, and bulletin boards and comment sections ain't it.
I was an intern at a weekly magazine for one summer and writing music reviews was the hardest task I was given. Saying something smart and funny and fresh in less than 50 words? Practically impossible!
I love Goodreads for logging all the books I read/want to read. The posted opinions of others who read the book are of little to no use.
They also don’t contribute to the historical record. Proper reviews tell future readers so much more than whether or not the book was good.
It's important to note that many of those reviews are fake.
the fucking gall
Made the mistake of reading some “reviews” of the fantasy novel I just finished on Storygraph and the amount of people saying it was bad because they didn’t understand really simple story beats was shocking. Crowdsourcing is NOT the same as real reviews.
I laugh we people assume the publishing industry doesn’t change and/or adapt. The amount of disrupters in the industry the past 30 years is overwhelming. But still publishing survives where most industries wouldn’t.
I do reviews sometimes. I've been most flattered when the author enjoys my review. I'm not a published author. I keep that in mind to stay kind and thoughtful
I don’t think people grasp the work that goes into reviewing a book. I’m decently well-read but I wouldn’t deign to review a published author when I’m not a published author. I have about 2% of what goes into it and even that is scary.
I've been saying the "Yelp-ificiation" criticism is one of the worst things to happen. The belief in the binary, and the idea that "everyone can do it" undervalues what is a literary form of writing.
Correct.
Depressing to see you getting this kind of response to a very valid point. As as much as I like Letterboxd it's not the same or a substitute for film critics like Mark Kermode, Kim Newman, etc.
I love reading professional reviews of TV and films after I've seen the thing. I like to know what I missed and to see knowledgeable people's thoughts. It's part of the experience for me.
I’m not interested in what 5,000 anonymous people think about a piece of art. I care about the thoughts of a few experienced, well-informed experts whose opinions I have come to trust.
I used to edit film, theater & restaurant reviewers. They taught me so much through the depth of knowledge that came through in their writing. One now runs the Out on Film festival and one is director of programming for Sundance. I was so fortunate to have that knowledge/experience on my team.
