Bookstagram has become an addiction. I love setting up photos, talking about books, & meeting wonderful people. While the community is mostly great, there are some aspects that I don’t really care for.

Shoutout for Shoutout Sessions
Ummm, if you love someone’s account, why don’t you just shout it out? It’s silly to make people jump through hoops for that. Not to mention, I just skip over those stories. Plus the ~opportunity~ of being seen by 71+K accounts? I can guarantee all those accounts aren’t watching the stories.
Loop Giveaways
I’m not following you and your 10 booksta besties for a chance to win a $20 Amazon card. That’s just ridiculous. I can understand it when companies or authors are hosting a giveaway and each one is contributing a prize. Even then, I’ll usually pass because I don’t want to follow accounts I’m not really interested in (cough*Fakecrate*cough).
Allowing Account To Become One Big Advertisement
Bookstagram should be used to promote books and products by companies you love. I just skip over accounts that are solely rep posts/partner posts/other posts that are required because of a contract.
I’ve had the great opportunity to rep for companies that I really love. That’s why you continue to see me posting, talking about them, & promoting them even when I’m not a rep and have spent my own money.
I’d like to see more people talking about companies and books when they don’t have an obligation to post about it.
Theme Dividers
If you do it well, your followers can see your new theme on your feed. It’s so frustrating to scroll through my feed to find 3+ junk/filler pictures with the ever so helpful caption of ‘~Theme Divider~’
Follow for Follow?
If you like an account, just follow them!
Actually asking for a follow back is so unbelievably tacky.
What are your bookstagram pet peeves?
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Ugh same for so, so much of this. I think the shout out for shout out helps brand new baby bookstas, but after you’ve been in the community for more than a month or so, they just get annoying. I basically refuse to follow accounts that have more than 5 thousand followers or so, because so many have turned into ad machines. I agree, let me know what YOU like, not what someone has sent you or paid you to advertise!
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Yes, yes! There’s too many ads going on. I always trust accounts more when they don’t do rep/sponsored posts all the time. To me, that indicates they actually like the product and aren’t just pushing everything sent their way.
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Not on Bookstagram but it reminds me of a blogger I see about on wordpress charging for reblogs etc … for the chance to be seen by over 100k followers. If any of those followers are like me, they are just rolling their eyes.
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Ew, I haven’t seen that yet. That’s stupid.
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I haven’t been on Instagram in a while simply because I don’t have the time right now, but I agree that this is all annoying. There are SO many giveaways I don’t bother to enter because the requirements are ridiculous. I honestly don’t care if you’re giving away $1000; I don’t want to follow 20 people and annoy my own friends by tagging six of them to enter. I agree it’s even less worthwhile when the prize is a single book or something. I don’t do many giveaways, but when I do, the entries are pretty simple. I get that people want to use giveaways as a way to promote themselves and get followers but…I also just want to give something away, and I don’t want to make people jump through hoops.
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I don’t bother with giveaways anymore either. Too many of them are just ‘purchasing’ followers.
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Exactly! I like to have a “follow me” option in the sense I like to give things to people who, well, actually read my content, but there’s also a difference between following once and required following of different people or just one person on ten different platforms! I’ll just go to the library or buy the book myself if I want to read it that badly!
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Totally agree. The library always has my back for free. No use in cluttering my feed with accounts I don’t care for.
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I agree with all of these! I think Loop Giveaways are the most annoying, lol. I refuse to follow them too.
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They seem to be getting more popular which is so frustrating!
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Your bookstagram photos are always stunning I wish I could compose a photo like you! I’m glad to see someone else despise these trends as well ESPECIALLY the loop giveaways.
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You’re too kind Dani! I’m so glad I’m not alone in my loop giveaway hatred. They’re everywhere now so I assumed I was the odd woman out.
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I agree with so much of this
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Thank you so much!
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[…] I love Bookstagram but there are defiantly some things that annoy me. I shared a few of my Bookstagram pet peeves. […]
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Omg! I cackled so much while reading this 😂😂😂 I have some of the same pet peeves.
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Great minds think alike, Merline! 😂
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I’ve definitely seen a lot of these, that’s why I usually don’t follow to many big accounts & I’m trying not to focus too much on the #’s when it comes to Bookstagram! I’ve heard of those shoutout sessions, but I’ve honestly never seen them! I wouldn’t be able to go through all that work though…like you said if you just like someones account, just talk about it! 😂 Great post!
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The shout out sessions are popular on the big accounts. It’s all about the numbers for them. 🙄
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Really? 😅 Now that I think about it, I don’t usually watch IG Stories so that’s probably why I haven’t seen them before. & yes!! I’ve definitely felt like Bookstagram is really focused on #’s and it makes the platform really frustrating sometimes 😑
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[…] in Bookland – Bookstagram Pet Peeves Powder & Page – Subscription Box Review: FairyLoot – December 2019 The Wolf & Books […]
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