Collaborative book reviews on Twitter

wossybookclub Hmm, wonder if this idea would work with the kind of books I’m currently reading, and have queued up to read, for doing reviews.

IT Pro reports that TV and radio celeb Jonathan Ross has launched WossyBookClub on Twitter where he has over 270K followers.

[…] His first choice, Jon Ronson’s non-fiction title, ‘The Man Who Stare at Goats’, is climbing up impressively at the bestsellers chart. The Amazon sales of the book rose incredibly by 7000 percent, after it was picked by Ross as his first choice for the book club.

Asserting on his innovative online book club, Ross quoted in his Twitter update, “If you want to join informal book club read Jon Ronson Men Who Stare at Goats by next weekend & we will chat about it”.

Although Ross described this book club as ‘informal’, but it will surely provide a boost to literary works, where users will post mini reviews on any of the selected book.

So Ross gets his followers (well, some, not all) to read the book in question and then they talk about it a tweet at a time.

A collaborative review.

Why not? Certainly far more dynamic than the static and subjective reviews you currently might read from, well, book reviewers. And possibly more interesting.

Wonder if it might work with three of the books I’m currently prepping (ie, reading or about to start reading) for reviews. I had in mind to record commentaries about each book that would be published as FIR Reviews podcasts.

I’m not sure if there’s enough desire for a load of people to rush out and buy any of the business books I currently have. So maybe I could do something like this:

  1. Record a 5-minute review on Audioboo and/or iPadio.
  2. Tweet the Audioboo / iPadio links
  3. Then chat via Twitter with anyone who wants to talk about the review, capturing the chat stream to a hashtag thus making it connected and discoverable.

Anyone interested in experimenting with a Twitter book review like this? Do you have a better suggestion? Or should I just stick with the traditional way of doing a book review?

I’m game for experimenting, though. Might do that anyway.


Neville Hobson

Social Strategist, Communicator, Writer, and Podcaster with a curiosity for tech and how people use it. Believer in an Internet for everyone. Early adopter (and leaver) and experimenter with social media. Occasional test pilot of shiny new objects. Avid tea drinker.

  3. David Phillips

    Well, I have a vested interest but I just love the idea. The idea of three or four networks (and channels) coming together is good.

    Chapter by chapter would be even more fun.

  12. Bryan Person

    I like the idea too, Neville, and I’d certainly be willing to give it a try. And if you wanted to create an FIR Reviews podcast out of it, you could also string together the audioBoos that we all put together. It’ll be collaborative podcasting, too!

    Bryan @BryanPerson

  13. Bryan Person

    I like the idea too, Neville, and I’d certainly be willing to give it a try. And if you wanted to create an FIR Reviews podcast out of it, you could also string together the audioBoos that we all put together. It’ll be collaborative podcasting, too!

    Bryan | @BryanPerson

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