![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Advantages of Library Thing
A friend of mine just asked what the advantage of putting books in to Library Thing is.
So I thought I'd reply here as people might like to add their own thoughts as comments.
For me, the biggest advantage (and not one that I'd originally expected) is re-discovering old friends. As I enter each book (I rarely do more than five a day, and haven't done any in the last few weeks I've been rather under the weather) I give it a rating and often write a review. This forces me to think about the book, why I keep it, whether I like it. The result has been that quite a few books have been given away as I realise that I've grown beyond them (or that they were crap in the first place), but also that I've started to read books that I owned that I'd never actually gotten around to reading, and I'm also re-reading many old friends that had become forgotten.
In short, I'm getting much better value out of the books that I own as well as getting better recommendations for more books to read.
eg. I've just reread all my Francis Hodgson Burnett books - which I'd almost forgotten I had. Having finished those, I asked Library Thing what it suggested to follow " The Secret Garden". The suggestions included "Winnie the Pooh" which feels just like what I need right now.
Anyone feel like making me a 'book' icon? One suitable for thoughts about books, or reviews of books?
So I thought I'd reply here as people might like to add their own thoughts as comments.
For me, the biggest advantage (and not one that I'd originally expected) is re-discovering old friends. As I enter each book (I rarely do more than five a day, and haven't done any in the last few weeks I've been rather under the weather) I give it a rating and often write a review. This forces me to think about the book, why I keep it, whether I like it. The result has been that quite a few books have been given away as I realise that I've grown beyond them (or that they were crap in the first place), but also that I've started to read books that I owned that I'd never actually gotten around to reading, and I'm also re-reading many old friends that had become forgotten.
In short, I'm getting much better value out of the books that I own as well as getting better recommendations for more books to read.
eg. I've just reread all my Francis Hodgson Burnett books - which I'd almost forgotten I had. Having finished those, I asked Library Thing what it suggested to follow " The Secret Garden". The suggestions included "Winnie the Pooh" which feels just like what I need right now.
Anyone feel like making me a 'book' icon? One suitable for thoughts about books, or reviews of books?
no subject
Finding you've got more than one copy of a book and being able to get rid of the spare.
Using their 'series' facility to find out if you have any 'gaps' in a particular series. I'm finding this very useful with my detective collection.
Being able to export to Excel (okay, I'm an Excel junkie.)
Having your catalogue out of the house, so if you do lose your collection in a fire, you can collect on the insurance and have a basis to work out how much your books were worth.
Meeting up with people you aren't on LJ and having chats with them.
Suddenly discovering that new editions of books you need to replace have been published. Finding lovely covers of books when you didn't like the edition you've got.
Being able to search your catalogue of reference books by subject using tags. (You have to be firm about your tags, though.)
Frequenting the forums and trying to identify books for people.
Correcting other people's mistakes in the information sections. (I had the greatest fun unlinking all of Oliver Strange's Sudden Westerns, which some fool had made the database think was one book under different titles. I mean, I know they all have the same plot, but...
no subject
no subject
no subject
* I don't have to export from FileMaker Pro to HTML and clean up
* I can get those shiny cover icons
* I can still export to Excel and keep a local backup
* I get a lot more metadata about the books automatically without having to enter them myself
* The database itself is on a server, so I can update it from wherever I happen to sit connected to the Internet
The reasons I need an online catalogue are:
* I can look up our books and avoid buying duplicates
* It gives me a warm fuzzy feeling
no subject
no subject
no subject
I actually find the process enjoyable.
And it's not exactly expensive. When I reach the 200 mark, (over half way there now), I'll gladly give them £15 for lifetime membership.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
Except that it shows me that I'm missing my copy of 'Shards of Honour'.
Ow.
no subject
On the left hand side of the page there is a list menu. Click on "Common Knowledge".
Near the top of the page, if the book is part of a series, it will say something like "Albert Campion Series (4)"
Click on that, and you will get a list of books in the series and it should also show you which one of them you own.
There are other ways into this, and some series do not yet have an entry and it's up to us to enter them...
no subject
no subject
no subject