[Web4lib] Social Networking for Bookworms

[Carl Feucht]

Tim,

Hey! Wow! Are you ever Johnny-on-the-spot. Kudos. ;-)

My second paragraph was inspired by the below quote.

Quote: "LibraryThing developed socially as inevitable similarities  
cropped up in users' collections. Those overlaps, combined with a  
search algorithm crafted by Mr. Spalding, spawned LibraryThing's own  
book-recommendation engine, which can generate dozens of undiscovered  
titles for a member's consideration. Readers who own Harry Potter  
titles, for instance, might be advised to try the works of Madeleine  
L'Engle, author of 'A Wrinkle in Time.' "

Upon reading that, my imagination ran away from me, to a place where  
the local public library overlapped the LibraryThing user base. It  
dreamed that if local public libraries were to join LibraryThing they  
could begin to broadcast their latest acquisitions to card carrying  
LibraryThing patrons when the algorithm matched a users' tag cloud of  
interest, represented by what was already in their collection.

But, I suppose it could also just as easily work in the direction you  
suggest. An Acquisitions Librarian could correlate their local  
LibraryThing communities' tag cloud of interest to their collection  
strength [or weakness].

Something on the order of an Acquisitions Mgr. ruminating thus: "Wow,  
I just discovered 75% of my LibraryThing adults have 6 or more titles  
in Heroic Fantasy. But the library hasn't ordered a new title in  
Heroic Fantasy for twelve months. Maybe I ought to address that  
interest in the next order..."

So tell me, is either situation within the realm of the possible?

Carl

On Jun 27, 2006, at 1:35 PM, Tim Spalding wrote:

> Carl,
>
> Hey, I'm interested in what you mean in the second paragraph.
> Suggesting new items to people? For libraries to get?
>
> See the blog ( http://www.librarything.com/blog/) for me trying to
> downplay tag-mania. I'm an enthusiast, but not a wild-eyed one :)
>
> Tim
>
> On 6/27/06, Carl Feucht <cwf at mac.com> wrote:
>> A Wall Street Journal [online] article about the LibraryThing.com
>> phenomenon
>> http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB115109622468789252-
>> Bi4NTGvCqDjylkFiE9xJzb2LsYA_20070626.html
>>
>> Quote: "With the help of tags, genres become more precise and
>> refined: Where the science-fiction section of a bookstore is overly
>> broad, LibraryThing users can draw distinctions between 'steampunk'
>> and 'cyberpunk.' "
>>
>> I wonder, would the sites' 'local book-recommendation engine' be a
>> natural for a tie-in to the local public library New Items in
>> circulation shelf?
>>
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