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Book discussions
Planned
Oct 3, 2021
Allow for users to engage in discussions about a book on the page for a book. This could be a threaded discussion like Reddit with upvoting downvoting. Or it could be grouped into discussions, questions and summaries – or something like that.
Comments
We're pausing this issue for now. We still want to do it, but we've realized there are a number of steps towards this we can implement one after another (better rich text editor, notifications in the app, comments on things). We'll work towards those parts first and then move on to discussions.
Adam Fortuna much as I'd love to see this happen, I'm very happy that you are taking the time to do it right!
We're planning Discussions now! There's still a lot we need to figure out, but we started researching this recently. We won't move forward with implementing this until we have an idea that readers love.
We don't yet know what this feature will look like, but we do think it'll be focused around individual books (and also series, authors, and genres). And that it'll allow for conversation about a book in a way that lives on for years, not just days.
We're looking for feedback on our ideas for this! Reach out to me at adam@hardcover.app if you'd be open to an hour chat. We have some prototypes we'd like to share and get your feedback on.
Just chiming in as small counterpoint, I prefer the modern Reddit-style presentation to a wide-open discussion forum. Narrower Q+A posts sound more engaging to me personally.
FWIW (very little) personally, I hate the reddit style discussions. It's like message boards from 1998. I would prefer something more forum/thread based, such as Xenforo (I don't have any connection to them, I just like the software for forums). It's just easier to read and also find what you're looking for. Reddit's fine for a quick answer, but not that conducive to building a community. Just my 11 cents.