Since the rise of the Internet, there has been a subsequent rise in the glorification of certain pastimes or hobbies. Pinterest allows users to flaunt their crafty sides by letting users  post ever more insane art crafts (crochet your own coffee mug holder in only 3,486,391 steps), Tumblr opened up the gates for massive fandoms to be unleashed (clicking on an average Tumblr blog will saturate your dashboard with “Dr. Who” gifs.) Twitter allows users to post tweets pertaining to a variety of topics, ranging from inane personal information to merely trivial personal information. The one thing these sites have in common? They are all, essentially, social media sites.
     This is where Goodreads comes in. For those unaware, Goodreads is a site dedicated to building a community of book lovers who can share and recommend books. It’s like if Facebook were composed solely of readers who weren’t very active and only posted statuses relating to books. It’s very specific and pertains to a very special type of person, and after using it for about a year, I’ve decided it’s the worst social media site I’ve ever used. But it’s also my favorite.
     Let me explain. With most sites that claim a community and aim to have users “share,” well, anything, there is always a deluge of people who share absolutely too much. How many inane tweets by that guy from high school (you know, the one obsessed with snapbacks and Ed Hardy) can one stand before the “unfollow” button is clicked? What about Facebook? How many terrible status updates (“I love life” *insert poorly taken sunset picture*) can one stand before unfriending happens? There are only so many pictures of your cappuccino I can look at before I unfollow you on Instagram. It’s not personal, but when my dash starts to look like an advertisement for Starbucks I know it’s time to cut the cord.
     With Goodreads, it’s different. The site aims to focus on a niche (people who read, which these days counts as a niche), and for the most part, these users don’t really tend to interact with one another. If you sign up, it’s incredibly easy to never receive any messages, friend requests, comments, push notifications, etc. from anyone. Instead, the site allows one to browse recommendations and keep track of books read, an incredibly useful tool for seeing trends in what novels or whatever you read throughout the year. If one’s list is inundated with E.L. James, Nicholas Sparks and Danielle Steel, perhaps it’s time to reevaluate one’s reading material, and perhaps time to reevaluate life.
    Anyhow, this got me thinking. After using this site for a year, I came to the realization I wanted every social media site to be like this. With Goodreads, I have never been given a massive migraine after looking at some idiotic status update that makes me question how some people have access to computers. The site is so good at what it does (recommending and keeping track of books and reviews) and yet also so good at keeping comments and the headache aspects of social media at bay that I am constantly in awe at how I manage to use the site on a fairly regular basis without ever having involuntary spasms of disbelief. Essentially, what would make sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Tumblr better would be if the “sharing” aspect were turned down and the functionality turned up. Now this antisocial practice might be unpractical for Twitter and Facebook (which are essentially built upon the idea that everyone is stalking everyone else), but with Instagram and Tumblr I think both of these sites could focus on blogging or photography and create more features to showcase these, rather than turning the focus to direct messaging and the like.
     Thus, it is my belief that if other social media sites apply what I will term “The Goodreads Model,” then I believe I could probably go a full day without having a seizure after coming across duck-face selfies or pictures of food.