Friday, 15 May 2015

Friday Review: Woodpie( ver 2) - A Paper-Book Sharing Site



About two years ago I came across the site ‘Woodpie’, a site for the exchange of books. The idea was very interesting and so I explored the site and wrote my views and review on it.

After the initial week or two of use the site fell away and over time I forgot all about it. Then a couple of weeks back I received an email telling me Woodpie was all updated and new and shiny now.

I figured another review was due. I was also curious to see what the improved site looked like and how many of the issues I’d raised, had been sorted. :D

Welcome Page


The new welcome screen is clean and engaging. It’s well laid out with enough information to show that the heart of Woodpie has stayed the same through all changes. The site is all about book exchange.



And guess who’s testimonial was up there :D

Home Page


The first thing I notice after the home page is it simple clean lines. It feels nice on the eye and makes we want to explore more. A pinterest type layout that is easy to navigate.



This page tells you all about what other users of Woodpie are doing in a nice cards layout. It feels good to scroll through all those book covers and see which ones catch my eye.

The page also has little widgets/column’s with lists of popular books and popular people, to help you find books to read and make friends in the community.

‘Me’ Tab


The ‘Me’ section has all the books I’ve added placed on shelves. There is also options to check out the ‘Reviews' I’ve done, my 'Wishlist' and my 'Friends'.



The page looks clean and I like how it is laid out. The bio section with numbers of reviews, books and wishlist is a handy thing for a quick appraisal.

Editing the profile is also easy and intuitive. On your Woodpie profile you can currently list links to Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and your Blog. What you see in the Me is what everyone else sees too when they come to your profile.

The Friends section has three divisions - the people you are connected to,people who are connected to you and Facebook contacts. The first two work quite like the following options on Goodreads or Facebook.



Clicking on Facebook contacts lists out my Facebook friends with an invite button next to each profile. As of now the listing seems limited to 32 friends and the site can’t load beyond that. I would have also liked to see a search option so I could get past the letter A quickly. :D

Library


Clicking on the Library option takes you to a page filled with books. Here there are some excellent options to choose from. You can take a looks at all the books shared on Woodpie or look at just books in your city. You can also choose to view books from a list of 20 countries and active cities in it.


Trade


The Trade section has a listing of exchange offered made by you and to you. Since my trade section was empty I decided to try requesting a book and see how it worked out.



You can choose the book you want from your Wishlist section or click on any book in the Library. In your wishlist if a book is available (someone has it) you’ll see a 'Get It' note below the book details. The library of course has book that someone already has.

Searching for a book isn’t a great option as the results show all editions of the book and if you do not choose the same edition as other users, you will not be able to request the book.

Clicking on the ‘Get It’ option causes a drop down with the flow of getting the book. You first see a list of users who have the book. After you have chosen the user, you next have to choose the book you want to give in exchange on your list or books the user has requested. Finally before you confirm, you can suggest a place and time to meet up.



The exchange process is well laid out and simple. Once a exchange request is placed it shows up in the trade section. I would have liked to see options to mail or courier books too. That way I’m not limited to any city.

Adding Books


There are also two little buttons at the top to Add/Review Book and Invite Friends. Clicking on the Add button leads to a search box, and the results of a search give you a listing of various editions of the book.



The listing also has a lot of books related to your search topic. That’s means aside from the usual title, author and ISBN, you can also search by topic, though you may have to scroll through a lot of stuff.



Each book listing has options to add it to your library, request it or review it. If the book is already in your library, on your wishlist or reviewed the buttons will be depressed. The difference in the buttons being active and inactive is very slight. I'd have like it to be more prominent.

Invite Friends


The invite friends option leads to a page with three ways to find friends - Facebook, Email and Woodpie. The Facebook option here works well and lists all friends in a never ending list. Here too a search option would have been helpful.

The email section asks for a list of email ID’s. I would have liked a way to import email ID’s rather than type or copy paste them individually. In the preview email invite sent out goes from Anuradha Bajpai. I’d have liked to send the email out with my name.



The last option is to connect with users on Woodpie. This is a great way to find new book friends and create a new network of friends.

Apart from all of this in the top right hand corner you have settings and notifications. Settings allows you to choose what notifications you get and control Woodpie’s posting on your behalf on Facebook. Notifications is the usual listing of alerts. I would have liked to see date and time here tomato each alert more relevant.

Summary


Over all Woodpie looks and behaves way better than when I saw it two years ago. The usability and smoothness is good and I enjoyed going through the page. There are still some glitches to be smoothed out but nothing that majorly takes away from the experience.

The biggest drawback I see is not in the site but the concept. I don’t know how many people today want to metope and exchange books. That needs to the core missing piece I saw. There aren’t enough users right now and until the critical number is reached the site isn’t going to be very helpful.

That said, I would like to see a future for Woodpie as it would bring book lovers closer and revive paper books to some extent.

P.S. - I also hope they move their Social Links elsewhere. On a page with unlimited scrolling trying to click on links at the bottom of the page is a b*tch. :P

 
P.S. – Day Eleven of the 30 Day Blogging Challenge.

2 comments:

  1. Thank you Fatema, Your review of Woodpie.com means a lot to us. It is like a friend giving us honest opinion about Woodpie. You have seen the site when it was in the beta stage. You were among the first few users, and have seen Woodpie grow. Your appreciation encourages us to do better, and your critique motivates us to better the site. Thank you again for the sincere review.

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