Do any of you use Library Thing? How do you like it?

[jane_pippin]

A friend of mine at work swears by it, and I'm thinking of signing up but it sounds like it would take forever! (For the unfamiliar, I think you enter in the books you own and it does all kinds of fun stuff like recommend other books you might like or connect you with other people who have similar tastes, and it looks like there's a way to get advance readers copies of certain books too, but I'm not 100% clear on how that works.)

Have you used it? Do you like it? What do you use it for?

I'd just like to get some more opinions before I take the time to do it. Although, the idea of spending some cold winter weeknds entering books online does have it's appeal.

Here's the site in case anyone wants to check it out: http://www.librarything.com/

[jemsan]

1. Never heard of it but it sounds great!!

Thanks!!

[jane_pippin]

2. You're welcome!

:hi:

[Lochloosa]

3. Cool site. Thanks

[Native]

4. Can't wait to check it out further - thanks!

[soothsayer]

5. lol, sounds like a convenient way for the feds to round you up for your terra-ist book collection

you long haired hippie commies

[jane_pippin]

10. Meh. I'm not too concerned.

Besides, from what I've seen in the news recently they're too busy listening to sexy conversations anyway. My boring literary fiction collection can't compete. :D

[Jim__]

6. Sounds like a great site! Thanks.

[RetroLounge]

7. I used to use it, but ran outta time...

Got too many books, too many new ones show up in my apartment all the time. It's crazy! It's an addiction, that's what it is. I had to buy an extra suitcase while in Pittsburgh last weekend to bring home the books I bought. Sad, huh?

Then of course, I've already spent a bit of time entering 12,000 books into Alibris and didn't have the heart to do it again for my own books.

But I liked the site. Library Thing, Shelfari, and a few others are pretty cool.

:hi:

RL

[pitohui]

8. just reading the original post made me tired

i have to enter the names of all the books i own? really?

somehow i don't think that's gonna work for me :-)

[jane_pippin]

9. I tried it out and it's actually pretty fast.

You just put in a title or author and it searches for it in their database which is connected to the Library of Congress, amazon, libraries, etc. Your book pops up and you add it. I was impressed as I thought it would be a complete pain.

[pitohui]

11. yeah but...do they understand how many books an older model like me really has?

i just can't type all that in

[jane_pippin]

14. Fair enough. I know a lot of bookstore people and librarians use it though

and there are some vast collections out there. I don't know how invloved I'll get with it, but it does seem like a good way to kill time on a boring winter day. My husband and I have worked in bookstores for the past decade, so we'll have plenty to keep us busy too if we do feel like entering every one of them. :)

[stuntcat]

13. it was worth it I felt

I used it as an excuse to organize.. now I know exactly precisely where every book in the house is :crazy: :crazy:

[jane_pippin]

15. Yeah I could see how you wouldn't want to use it

:)

I like it so far. I've heard of shelfari too but haven't checked it out yet.

[tigereye]

18. just bought some books through Alibris and wondered if you were on there!

[stuntcat]

12. it's helped me before

I have one: http://www.librarything.com/profile/stuntcat

My best friend lives in San Francisco and there's a BIG neat used book store I always go to when I visit, called Aardvark Books. I've used my Library Thing a couple of times when I was visiting to make sure I wasn't doubling books.

[jane_pippin]

16. That's a good idea!

I didn't even think to use it that way but that sounds incredibly helpful. I was looking at it from the "get recommendations" angle.

[bikebloke]

17. Looks good.

I've been writing down the books I've read into notebooks with a brief synopsis and rating since 1975. I'll give it go, but keep my hard copy.

There's a DVD collectors catalogue, DVDSpot, that just closed down, making people angry after all the input work people had done.