Social Networking for Bookworms

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.libraryt
hing.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 <cwfmac.com> wrote:
>> A Wall Street Journal [online] article about the
LibraryThing.com
>> phenomenon
>> http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB115109622468789
252-
>> 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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