Goodreads Releases Statement on “Review Bombing”

Just this Monday, social reading site Goodreads released a statement announcing their dedication to ensuring that the book reviews left by members of the site follow their guidelines by being relevant to the book, not harassing readers or authors, and not attempting to deflate or inflate the rating of a book unfairly.

They list a function they implemented earlier this year that tries to circumvent “review bombing,” which is essentially when people leave negative reviews for a book with the intent to drop its rating. This is done without actually having read the book. To do this, Goodreads said it would temporarily limit ratings being submitted for books during times when activity for that book is unusually high.

“Goodreads has an obligation to defend the freedom to read and prevent practices on its platform that detract from reasoned literary discourse and pave the way for books to be disappeared before their authors and ideas even get a hearing.”

Suzanne Nossel , CEO of PEN America

Nonprofit literary organization PEN America applauded the decision, with CEO Suzanne Nossel saying, “We are gratified that Goodreads has taken steps to implement one of the crucial recommendations in our recent Booklash report, aimed at preventing reviewers who may not even have read a book from waging online campaigns to sink it. As a prominent platform for book discovery, Goodreads has an obligation to defend the freedom to read and prevent practices on its platform that detract from reasoned literary discourse and pave the way for books to be disappeared before their authors and ideas even get a hearing.”

In the announcement, Goodreads reported that its users posted 26 million book reviews and 300 million ratings to the site within the last 12 months — its impact on the book world can not be overstated.

Find more news and stories of interest from the book world in Breaking in Books.