Much akin to reddit, the best thing about goodreads isn't the product itself so much as the communities that use it, and the resulting history of reviews/comments/etc. that build up over time.

The absence of these user generated reactions (for lack of a better catch-all) is a big part of why I never really managed to permanently migrate to Librarything instead. Though, given their devs are quite technical, one could hope they would consider connecting up with the fediverse some day too.

(I realise that many reviews on GR are worthless, but sadly if you're interested in some particularly niche things, it can be not only awkward to find the right version of a book on LT, but often enough there just aren't any reviews at all, or at least not enough to make it useful when a particular text is niche to begin with.

But assuming it federates in a way that's actually useful, this at least might mean a beginning that could lead to better alternatives. If someone has to make the first move, I'm glad this happened.