Recommending a Good Book

There are many social networking sites that attempt to bring people together based on a common interest. Since this is a class for librarians, we will focus on social networking sites that bring together people with the same reading taste. In the last exercise, I linked to a recent article from Publisher's Weekly that talked about Facebook apps that focused on reading.

In this exercise, we will explore two standalone sites further. LibraryThing not only allows you to easily create an online catalog of your own, it also connects you to other people who have similar libraries and reading tastes. Add a book to your catalog by just entering the title -- It’s so easy that you don’t even need MARC record training to do it – or connect with other users through your similar reading tastes. There are lots of ways to use LibraryThing. You can even view your books on a virtual shelf, ,to display titles that are in your catalog or install a LT Search box on your blog.

LibraryThing for Libraries is a service that incorporates LibraryThing tags and recommendations into your online catalog. It is being used by the Danbury Library in Danbury, CT and the GMILCS consortium in Hooksett, NH

GoodReads is a site where you can rate books, track books you've read as well as ones you want to read, and see what your friends are reading.

Exercise:

1. For this exercise, you will explore one of these sites, either LibraryThing or Good Reads.
2. Create an account at the site of your choice and add at least three books to your account. If you go on to Good Reads, be sure to add me as a friend - http://www.goodreads.com/profile/kmlussier.
3. Post a comment at the bottom of this page with the address of your profile. (For LibraryThing, it is www.librarything.com/profile/username. For Good Reads, it is www.goodreads.com/profile/username.)