How does one lure in a library catalog worker and make them want to use their web site and service? By creating a social networking site where you can catalog books and talk about them. And this folks has been the latest bug to bite me.
Presenting LibraryThing: www.librarything.com
As I said before you can catalog your book collection and add tags to each book. You have a variety of researches (web sites) to use to search for your book. There’s Library of Congress, Amazon, Amazon Japan, many academic libraries, etc. There are also lots of message board groups to chat it up about books.
Here’s a video of a presentation that one of the creators of LibraryThing (Tim Spalding) did about Social Cataloging and LibraryThing. www.vimeo.com/7953189 This video presentation was geared to librarians, but it shows a lot of the features of LibraryThing. The whole video is under 52 minutes long, so watch it when you have the time.
You can catalog up to 200 books, I believe, for free. After that you can pay to become a monthly or lifetime member. The amount is basically up to you.
The advantage of cataloging your collection is that if you have a phone with internet access you can check your collection as you shop at bookstores. No more wondering if you already have something.
Also the site gives you both automatic and member recommendations for books. So you’ll have some ideas on what to check out next. And if that doesn’t help, search for tags that interest you and see what book titles come up.
You’ll find my profile here: https://www.librarything.com/profile/ccooney and my library here https://www.librarything.com/catalog/ccooney . Of course cataloging of my books will always be ongoing.
So if you’re interested, please check it out. Maybe the social cataloging bug will bite you too. Just don’t stay up cataloging and tagging books and lose sleep, especially on a night where you have to get up early to go to work the next day.