Goodreads Librarians Group discussion

Hi!
I reversed a cover update for this book and was sent a message by the author wondering about it. As it has been brought up before, I know that covers shouldn't be replaced unless the book was never published with that cover... but in this case the default cover is from back when the book was available for free at feedbooks.com (http://www.feedbooks.com/userbook/119...)

Does that make a difference or is that also considered a published cover and should stay as it is?

I understand the confusion from authors that wish that the new edition's cover was the default one, so I'm asking about this particular case.

No, it would still be considered published (on a side note, I actually have the old edition with the old cover myself.) and as such should not have the cover changed.

Andrea wrote: "is that also considered a published cover and should stay as it is?"

Yes.

Thanks for the quick response.

I think that this isn't the last time that we'll be hearing about this sort of issue (now that many successful self-published books are getting picked up by traditional publishers and getting cover-makeovers).

Hi!
Someone has changed the cover and edited my librarian note for this book (where I asked not to change the cover) and replaced it with
"Please do not change the cover. It has been updated with the new cover on 9/28/2012 per publishers request."

I thought that adding a librarian note would be enough. I'd reverse the change (again), but I think it's best to just report this here...

The editions in question are:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/94...

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11...
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13...
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13...

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/98...

Thanks for your help

Hi!
I haven't received a response, but I guess that I should undo the cover changes again myself? I was posting here as I want to try to prevent this from happening again...

I am reversing those changes and adding another note.

The user is not accepting messages - so rivka will need to pick this up

Edit: Can you check the editions please

Paula wrote: "Edit: Can you check the editions please"

One was missing and I reversed the change on that one.
Thanks for your help. Hopefully rivka will take note of this so that we stop going back and forth.

I think Paula's note is pretty clear...lol.

Just read it... yes, I hope it's pretty clear (more than my previous "Please don't change it" note).

Beth wrote: "I think Paula's note is pretty clear...lol."

it was stronger but decided slightly more diplomacy should be used :)

Paula wrote: "The user is not accepting messages - so rivka will need to pick this up"

Message sent.

Taryn-does it have romance? wrote: "I was specifically asked to remove the old covers and update them with the new ones, per publishers request. The author was unable to update her own covers, so I did it for her. "

I was also contacted by the author when I first reversed the cover-replacement and I let her know that when there's a cover change we create a new edition for the work. There are several new editions with the new cover (paperback, ebook, Kindle, etc).
Old editions shouldn't be edited/updated even if they are no longer available...

Taryn-does it have romance? wrote: "I'm not accepting messages unless I am friends with you, which is why you couldn't contact me.

I was specifically asked to remove the old covers and update them with the new ones, per publishers r..."

You need to re read the librarians manual since that is directly against GR policy

Taryn-does it have romance? wrote: "I was specifically asked to remove the old covers and update them with the new ones, per publishers request."

Irrelevant. As Paula said, please re-read the manual. Librarians who repeatedly violate established librarian policies, regardless of whether the request came from the author or the publisher, lose librarian privileges.

Hi! I have recently noticed that when you do a search for this author's books, the default edition for Thoughtless, Effortless and Collision Course isn't the most shelved one, in each case it's one with a more recent cover.

The ability to manually change the default edition is something that was mentioned in the feedback forum (personally, I thought that it was a good idea) and
I was wondering if (given that we know that the publisher was pushing for the newer cover to be featured) this was a beta of the feature or if something else is going on...

Andrea wrote: "The ability to manually change the default edition is something that was mentioned in the feedback forum (personally, I thought that it was a good idea) and I was wondering if (given that we know that the publisher was pushing for the newer cover to be featured) this was a beta of the feature or if something else is going on..."

Sounds like a recipe for chaos.

Andrea wrote: "Hi! I have recently noticed that when you do a search for this author's books, the default edition for Thoughtless, Effortless and Collision Course isn't the most shelved one, in each case it's one with a more recent cover."

No one knows what's going on? I might go ask over at feedback...

It's not just you, Andrea, I'm seeing the same thing with most shelved version not being the default one for books you pointed out. Not sure what's up;.

I just posted this in Feedback, but I'm posting here as well, for clarity:

This is a policy or feature change on our part. Goodreads Authors can now choose which edition they want to be the default edition for their books. Goodreads Authors (and Goodreads Employees) are the only people who can use this feature, and they can only do so for books on which they are the primary author.

This doesn't change which editions are available or which editions are on your shelves, it simply moves one book to the default position.

Any chance of getting that type of alteration added to the edit logs?

Patrick wrote: "I just posted this in Feedback, but I'm posting here as well, for clarity:

This is a policy or feature change on our part. Goodreads Authors can now choose which edition they want to be the default edition for their books. Goodreads Authors (and Goodreads Employees) are the only people who can use this feature, and they can only do so for books on which they are the primary author.

This doesn't change which editions are available or which editions are on your shelves, it simply moves one book to the default position."

I'm so glad to hear this! I hated having to tell authors that not only could we not replace old covers with new ones but they also had to wait awhile for the new cover to become the default one. I'm glad they don't have to wait anymore. Hopefully this will cut down on some of their frustration.

Patrick wrote: "Goodreads Authors (and Goodreads Employees) are the only people who can use this feature, and they can only do so for books on which they are the primary author."

I would love to see the Author FAQ (http://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/1...) updated with the new instructions on how to change the default edition.

I can definitely pull out of my head a decent sized list of books that have had attempts (that I later reversed) to "update" the cover because someone wished that the default edition had the newer cover. It would be good to know if said list would be of help (to notify the authors of this new feature) or if this is more of an under-wraps-let-them-discover-it-on-their-own sort of thing.

Older book covers should still not get deleted or overwritten, right?

(An alternate cover edition can be made default/primary by the goodreads author; but, we're still supposed to handle bookcovers like always which means not deleting a bookcover someone already shelved.)

I'm presuming change was made to make sure newer editions would show up first (if authors/publishers so set) for when "shoppers" hit the buy links and for all the indie books that frequently change covers.

Debbie R. wrote: "Older book covers should still not get deleted or overwritten, right?"

Absolutely correct.