I really like Gose (mostly because Goodreads looks awful) although I am often confused by the UX:
- When I rate a book, the rating always disappear when I reload the page.
- "I read it" vs. "I've read it" are confusing.
- Some books won't go away of the "Now Reading" list after clicking "I've read it"...
Maybe this is just me but it should definitely be more intuitive. Hope this helps!
@nspehler Hmmm... I hate to say you're right! Thanks for all this - I agree we need to improve the interactions around the book and the booklist management as well. Work in progress - should be better very soon.
SO yes this does help! Thanks for your time and support - and happy reading!
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I see you have thousands of ebooks to read for free. What's an estimate figure on that?
I just signed up for an Oyster Unlimited trial, and I'm a big fan of their model. The books in Glose's bookstore are considerably cheaper than Oyster's- but do you have complete ownership of them after purchase? Are they available to you offline once you've purchased them? Will they be pushed into my iBooks library so I can access them on all devices when I'm not connected to the internet?
I love the idea of social annotations while reading books - particularly difficult or philosophical work from authors like Dostoyvesky - but one of the reasons I'm switching to Oyster Unlimited, instead of just buying ebooks the traditional way, is because I probably won't reread most of the books I purchase. For that reason, the limited free ebook selection on Glose leaves me hesitant. But, I think for people who value the social aspect more than volume, Glose seems like a solid fit. Going to keep checking in with Glose :)
@stttories Hey thanks for your comments and questions!
- Yes on Glose you get complete ownership of the books you purchase. You can read them on all platforms and forever really. Also you can start reading any book for free to get a feel for the book before you make a purchase decision. With subscription services you don't own the books so you have to continue paying the subscription if you want to keep acces I think.
- About reading offline : on Glose we store the last 10 ebooks you've read (that means the last books you've opened) so that you can read those online on our apps.
- Free ebook selection : yes please tune in often as we are adding new free ebooks all the time and expanding our collection every week. Also, consider the free reading on paid books : on Glose you can really get deep into a story before having to buy the book.
- If you're an avid reader who reads like 10 books a month you should probably go for a subscription service. You take the risk of not finding the books you want since they distribute only half of the big publishers. Also the ebooks you will get there are only back catalog so you won't find the new releases you hear about in the press or the New York Times best sellers. (Back catalog means that the books have been out for 18 months at least). But if you don't care about novelty that much and wont mind paying every month and sometimes not finding the book you are looking for - subscription sounds good for you. I know I don't like paying for a service that won't have the only few books I'll be ready to commit too, namely new releases (the books people are talking about), but I'm sure some readers fit the subscription profile.
- About rereads : you value access more than ownership and I understand that. I know I like to keep my book collection and I like the idea of going back to past reads for inspiration. Also, I just don't like the idea of losing everything when I stop paying every month. Books are not movies to me : they are something I really want to own, keep, share etc...
Please keep on checking in with us! Maybe you will like a mix of different services in the end! We really appreciate your time and support here!
@akshay2104 Thanks a lot! We appreciate the warm support here! Please make sure you share any negative feedback as well - always looking to improve. Happy reading!
@nicoprincen@akshay2104 been reading since morning a few issues I would like to highlight ( I use an android btw):
a) When I try to post an annotation it gives me a message saying I am offline but then it posts the annotation multiple times.
b) Also when I highlight something the top bar with share option disappears quickly so I have to tap on the annotation again.
c) It restricts us to horizontal scrolling, I am used to vertical you could let the user choose ( maybe you do but I couldn't find it)
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