Tim Spalding has a great post over at Thingology about self publishing sites (specifically LuLu):

Getting Real is an important book. It came along at exactly the right time, said something important. To the extent the greap web-app “explosion” of 2004-2007 had a book, this was it.

And it was successful. According to 37Signals the (paid) version has sold has 30,000 copies. It’s the number six seller on Lulu.com. Passionate, unpaid fans have produced translations into thirteen languages. Google records 166,000 mentions. Even on LibraryThing, where the book had to be manually entered and there is a bias toward the printed version, 37 members have listed it.

Did libraries notice? Not at all.

OCLC’s WorldCat records exactly three copies—MIT, California Polytechnic and the University of Nebraska. That’s three copies of one of the top tech books of the 00’s in most of the US libraries that matter. The Library of Congress? New York Public? Harvard? None of them. For comparison, WorldCat contains 619 copies of Solitary sex : a cultural history of masturbation.

Shocking!

Not only are there some great books published on sites like LuLu, but they’re usually more affordable - so libraries looking for great content for a lower cost should be paying attention.

I’d even add that libraries need to start pulling in digital resources as well. There are a ton of resources out there for free that libraries aren’t adding to their collections. Why? Either because they don’t know that they’re out there, or they just don’t have the resources or time to focus on them and their print collections.

It’s a shame but I do understand - I just wish there was a way to change things to get even more information to our patrons.

Tim Spalding has posted a bit of code to get free book covers for your OPAC by using Google. Godmar Back has given a different example for getting multiple covers at once. The Google Book Search API seems to have taken off with libraries & librarians!

Technorati Tags: google books, google book search api, book jackets

LibraryThing is now using the Google Book Search API and is providing users with a way to search within their books (if they’re part of Google’s collection):

The official Google Blog and the Inside Book Search Blog just announced the new Google Book Search API, with LibraryThing as one of the first implementors. (The others are libraries; I’ll be posting about what they’ve done over on Thingology.)

In sum, LibraryThing now links to Google Books for book scans—full or partial—and book information.

This is a pretty neat addition!! I’ll have to check it out in a year when I’m not so busy!

Learn more.

Technorati Tags: google books, google book search, librarything

Just the title makes me cringe! In this case, the word “rip” is used in the same way we use it when we refer to copying CDs:

Could the publishing industry get Napsterized? That was my first thought when I saw the marketing materials for the Atiz BookSnap, the first consumer device that enables you to “release the content” of your books by transforming the printed words on the page into digital files that can be read on computers and handheld e-readers. “It’s not a scanner,” proclaims a banner on the Atiz Web site. “It’s a book ripper.” Though ripping (which means transferring content from an external medium to your computer) does not necessary imply an act of piracy, I couldn’t help but wonder whether this was a sign of impending apocalypse on Publishers’ Row, a scenario that could end up with people file-sharing John Grisham’s latest they way they do now with the newest Vampire Weekend tunes.

Steven Levy writes about how this machine is still way too cumbersome and pricey for the average book owner, but worries that its existence is a sign of what’s to come.

While I’d love to be able to digitally search my book collection … I think I’ll wait for the API that merges data from LibraryThing (which has my entire collection cataloged) and the Open Library (which aims to have scans of every book).

When did this happen? I feel like I’m missing out on so much! I was adding a couple of new books to LibraryThing this morning and saw “status” so I said “what is that?” and clicked it. It’s a way to keep track of which books you’ve read and haven’t read! Finally - no more tagging books with “read” and “notread”!

Technorati Tags: librarything

I followed a link from Kimbooktu regarding a new way to store my books and found this post about the amazing staircase.

The flat occupies part of the shared top floor of an existing Victorian mansion block. Our proposal extended the flat into the unused loft space above, creating a new bedroom level and increasing the floor area of the flat by approximately one third. We created a ’secret’ staircase, hidden from the main reception room, to access a new loft bedroom lit by roof lights. Limited by space, we melded the idea of a staircase with our client’s desire for a library to form a ‘library staircase’ in which English oak stair treads and shelves are both completely lined with books. With a skylight above lighting the staircase, it becomes the perfect place to stop and browse a tome. The stair structure was designed as an upside down ’sedan chair’ structure (with Rodrigues Associates, Structural Engineers, London) that carries the whole weight of the stair and books back to the main structural walls of the building. It dangles from the upper floor thereby avoiding any complicated neighbour issues with the floors below.

Now I have to move again! I need a 2 story house so I can do this!!!

This via USAToday:

When you walk through the doors of Borders’ (BGP) new concept store, the place feels familiar. As with any big-box bookstore, you’ll find a coffee shop over here and some strategically placed leather chairs over there. And, of course, lots of books.

But follow the table of books snaking off to the right, and you’ll come face-to-face with Borders’ newest retail strategy: a digital center where you can download music or books, burn CDs, research family histories, print pictures and order leather-bound books crammed with family photos — with help from clerks who know how to do those sorts of things and won’t embarrass you if you don’t.

Now - I don’t fault Borders for trying something new - but why am I going to go to Borders to download content when I can do it from home on my couch in my PJs? I guess it would be something for me to do on those occasions that my husband drags me out to the bookstore to look at the latest RPG release - but I’ll be interested to see how successful this really is.

Technorati Tags: borders bookstore

A little bit of trivia for you from a photo on Flickr. I honestly can’t tell if this is a joke or if the person is serious - but if it’s real, this is kind of funny and very sad.

book rental?
Originally uploaded by Nick Triantafillou

It reads:

was just thinking. my sister does -alot- of reading, and spends like $1000 a year on just books alone. most of them she reads just once then never looks at again. is there any kind of like…video rental store but for books? would make things alot cheaper, plus once one person has read one the next person can get enjoyment from it etc

I mentioned almost a year ago that Borders was going to be splitting from Amazon.com - now I find a link to Borders beta via MoMB.

Technorati Tags: Borders bookstore

Tim Spalding has written a tiny little API to change ISBN10 into ISBN13:

A smart young programmer from a book-related company and I were talking. It turns out that, to validate ISBNs and get back both 10- and 13-digit versions he was submitting ISBNs to Amazon Web Services. That’s like calling NORAD to find out if it’s raining.* Nor did he seem likely to hunt around for an ISBN library for Ruby. After all, what he was doing worked.

So I made a quick, very stupid API, ie. http://www.librarything.com/isbncheck.php?isbn=0765344629

Technorati Tags: librarything, isbn

It took me a little bit to figure out what to do - but this is a fun idea. Library of Congress Classification, the game!

Via Thingology.

At the seminary we (meaning our Special Collections Assistant, Sarah) put together a book of pictures from one of our donors. She used a service called Blurb.com - I had heard of LuLu, but hadn’t heard of Blurb until she started this project. When book was printed and arrived at the library I was shocked at how professional it looked - then I looked at the price and was even more shocked!! The hardback book with dust jacket is 92 pages of images and text and costs more than $100.

I mention this because I thought the price might have to do with the layout of the book and the size that was chosen, as it turns out, I’m probably right because my cousin put together an awesome book of pictures from Sweden (also using Blurb) that is over 100 pages of images, but smaller in size and costs a little over $50 for the hardcover version.

Where am I going with this? Nowhere really I just wanted you all to know that if you’re like me and you’ve heard of LuLu but not Blurb, you might want to try out Blurb because it produces some pretty awesome results. (that’s not say that LuLu doesn’t - it’s just that I haven’t seen any print products from LuLu yet)

Technorati Tags: blurb, lulu, self publishing

The Library: Originally uploaded by teofilo

This is awesome! Kimbooktu posted this picture of a biker bar in New Mexico. How cool is that??

You can see what the book titles are here! I have to find this place - and buy a motorcycle

Looking for that perfect gift for the librarian in your family? I want this! It goes perfect with my book oriented desk-organizer.

Leather tissue boxes prove you can’t tell a book by its cover-look like a stack of valuable first editions! Have handcrafted leather “bindings” over wood, gold “pages,” hand-painted gold accents. Easy to refill-lift hinged lid. Boutique tissue box, 6 1/4″ x 6 1/2″H.

Just perfect for any librarian’s desk!

I mentioned TasteBook a while back and that I was disappointed to find that I couldn’t add my own pictures - well that has all changed! I got this email today:

With the new fancy e-book readers out it’s hard to resist the urge to buy one! I was chatting with a woman at an SLA event last night about the future of books. She told me that her kids (25 and younger) did not read. She had read to them their entire childhoods and none of them were readers. She worried that books as she knows them are going to go away. I told her I didn’t think so - there’s something about the smell and feel of a book that will keep people wanting to hold a book in their hand. That said I think that e-book readers are amazing tools that will serve a great role in providing research titles. Roy seems to agree:

One of the most interesting findings from my perspective, since it validates something I’ve been saying for years, is that they overwhelmingly prefer print books “when reading the whole book or extensive sections.” Comments included statements like “e-books are better for research and quick reference, print books better for cover-to-cover reading,” and “e-books are easier to search,” while “print books are easier to read”.

They also preferred, but by a much smaller margin, print books as being “generally easier to use for most of my research.” This finding, however, I suspect is a symptom of the relatively small percentage of books that are available as electronic books. As e-books become more widely available this particular finding could reverse. But again, the preference for print when reading the entire book may still factor into this statistic.

[update] for a bit of related humor see Stephen’s post on eBook Humour [/update]

I wrote about Amazon Kindle last week and thought that it sounded like a neat tool. Since then I’ve read many reviews from colleagues and experts and I’m still not sure where I stand. I do have to say that Mary’s post has pushed me more toward the pro side than any other.

I’m trying out an AMAZON KINDLE. Love it.

It’s clearly designed by people who READ. Delightful to read the newspaper, magazines, books, your own documents. You can read for hours comfortably. In fact, I believe that in many scenarios, I’d PREFER this, yes you read that right, I’d prefer the KINDLE to a real book or magazine. That surprises me, even though I was looking for the convenience of an ebook reader (dozens or hundreds of titles), I always expected to say, “of course the paper book is a better reading experience.” That may be changing. This not only rivals the paper experience, it surpasses it in many ways. It’s EASIER to hold than a hardback, easier to turn pages with one hand than a paperback or newspaper, and that’s all before the extra features.
…
Yes, I know about the DRM and privacy complaints, and I hear you. But you don’t have to use Amazon as your source of content. I’ve emailed myself open documents that I want to read (10 cents a document). I’ve also gone to manybooks.net to get a bunch of mobipocket (or .txt) titles for free and transferred by cable - free. No tracking of my reading there.

Sounds like a pretty darn cool toy - my only problem is the price - I’m not sure I want to pay $400 for a tool to allow me to read books and then buy the book as well - when I could just buy the book for $15 … in short, this is a technology I’m going to keep my eyes on and will probably give in to once its price lowers just a bit

Technorati Tags: amazon kindle

Last week I wrote about my impressions of David Weinberger’s Everything is Miscellaneous. Well, this morning (around 2am) I finished the book and am so impressed! I love books that make me think - and Weinberger really left my head reeling.

In my role as Metadata Librarian I not only have to work with metadata, but think about ways in which we can manipulate it to provide a better product for our patrons and that’s just what the third order of order is all about - well, not exactly, the third order of order allows the patrons to add value and I hope down the road to be able to open up our metadata to allow for user input.

But, back to the book. David mentions something I’ve heard in several presentations lately. The simple fact that the more “mess” you have the more valuable the data becomes. Basically if you have a tool like Flickr that keeps data from every picture we upload, results can be clustered in ways that are impossible in the first order world (the physical world). This is why LibraryThing is so amazing and the fact that they’re sharing their data with libraries is so great. By using data from LibraryThing, libraries have access to a much wider mess than they would ever be able to compile with their own patron base.

Throughout the book, Weinberger uses Wikipedia as an amazing example of how the third order of order has been successful. On page 208 he makes a great point:

The Britannica includes references at the end of articles to remind us that topics are related to other topics, literally afterthoughts. Wikipedia, on the other hand, is besotted with links…These links are not even bread crumbs, for with two clicks we well may be going down a path no one has trod before and that no one anticipated…In the miscellaneous order, a topic is anything someone somewhere is interested in. Anyone an pull a topic together by contributing to Wikipedia, writing a blog post, creating a playlist, or starting a discussion thread.

While librarians and researchers question the accuracy of Wikipedia (and rightly so) it cannot be dismissed as a powerful research tool. I like looking at Wikipedia and following the links to find additional information. As a librarian, I then go and research the topic further using additional tools to confirm accuracy - but if I hadn’t used Wikipedia in the first place I may not have ended up down the path I did.

Along similar lines, the value of tools like Wikipedia and the blogosphere is that it shares information in the words of the users - these sites include language that matches how the average person thinks and speaks. Weinberger used the example of the blogosphere’s reaction to Bush’s speech on immigration on May 15, 2006. After the talk the blogosphere exploded in comments and interpretations. Weinberger explains the speech as “Simple arguments, simple ideas, simple language.” and goes on to say, “That’s how politicians talk. But it’s not how we, their constituents talk.” (p.209).

Next, as I mentioned yesterday, Weinberger touches on the future of the ebook. He talked about how we could collect data from how people read books, the passages they highlight, where people read books and so much more using wireless enabled ebook readers (p.222) - and while it sounds like science fiction - we’re almost there. Kindle has the power of wireless technology - meaning that in theory, Amazon could connect to our readers and collect data. While this sounds scary and like a huge invasion of privacy - imagine the power that this data could provide. Some examples Weinberger has is that you could create a list of books that people most often read at the beach or a list of books people stopped reading 1/2 way through - how cool would that be?

So, like I said at the beginning - my head is reeling with information and I’ll probably have to read this book again to get a real hold on some of the theory involved, but I loved the book! I think it’s a great read for all librarians - but if I have to specific - Metadata Librarians in particular.

PS. In this article I linked you out to 9 other resources on the topics I was covering - what print product can do that??

Technorati Tags: everything is miscellaneous, david weinberger, metadata

Do you think that this name has some hidden meaning? Turning your paperbooks into kindling? Anyway, Amazon’s Kindle looks awesome!! My only problem is that it doesn’t read PDF. Now, while I’m not a student anymore, I always wanted an e-book reader so I could read my lecture notes which were in PDF format on a nice book-sized screen. I just read an amazing paragraph in Everything is Miscellaneous regarding the future of ebook readers. Weinberger talks about the power of having our ebook readers hooked to a wireless network keeping track of data about our reading habits and note-taking - it’s awesome and I’ll share more later (only 5 pages to go) - but Kindle sounds like a step in the right direction:

• Revolutionary electronic-paper display provides a sharp, high-resolution screen that looks and reads like real paper.
• Simple to use: no computer, no cables, no syncing.
• Wireless connectivity enables you to shop the Kindle Store directly from your Kindle"”whether you're in the back of a taxi, at the airport, or in bed.
• Buy a book and it is auto-delivered wirelessly in less than one minute.
• More than 88,000 books available, including 100 of 112 current New York Times® Best Sellers.
• New York Times® Best Sellers and all New Releases $9.99, unless marked otherwise.
• Free book samples. Download and read first chapters for free before you decide to buy.
• Top U.S. newspapers including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post; top magazines including TIME, Atlantic Monthly, and Forbes"”all auto-delivered wirelessly.
• Top international newspapers from France, Germany, and Ireland; Le Monde, Frankfurter Allgemeine, and The Irish Times.
• More than 250 top blogs from the worlds of business, technology, sports, entertainment, and politics, including BoingBoing, Slashdot, TechCrunch, ESPN’s Bill Simmons, The Onion, Michelle Malkin, and The Huffington Post.
• Lighter and thinner than a typical paperback; weighs only 10.3 ounces.
• Holds over 200 titles.
• Long battery life. Leave wireless on and recharge approximately every other day. Turn wireless off and read for a week or more before recharging. Fully recharges in 2 hours.
• Unlike WiFi, Kindle utilizes the same high-speed data network (EVDO) as advanced cell phones"”so you never have to locate a hotspot.
• No monthly wireless bills, service plans, or commitments"”we take care of the wireless delivery so you can simply click, buy, and read.
• Includes free wireless access to the planet’s most exhaustive and up-to-date encyclopedia"”Wikipedia.org.
• Email your Word documents and pictures (.JPG, .GIF, .BMP, .PNG) to Kindle for easy on-the-go viewing.

Want one? Well - it’s sold out already:

Due to heavy customer demand, Kindle is temporarily sold out. Because we ship Kindles on a first-come, first-served basis, please ORDER NOW to reserve your place in line. See availability messaging above for estimated in-stock date.

Learn more from Newsweek.

[update] From the user reviews on the Kindle page: “The most common complaint seems to be lack of PDF support. Yeah, pretty dumb. But easily handled. The Kindle supports MOBI files. It took me five minutes on Google to find the Mobi site, download their desktop software, and convert a PDF file to Mobi. Problem solved. ” - sounds promising! [/update]

Technorati Tags: amazon kindle, ebook reader, e-book reader

This weekend I saw/posted about the Sony E-book reader … now I read on Crunch Gear that it may not be as cool as it looks.

According to Gordon Meyer over at 43 Folders, the Sony PRS-505 eBook reader is pretty close to perfect until you try to drop a few PDF files onto it. “None of my PDF files were remotely close to readable on this thing,” he says. He then details several different cumbersome options for converting PDFs to more legible formats but ultimately ended up returning the device. This is disappointing for something that claims it's compatible with one of the most ubiquitous text formats around and the thought of spending $300 and then having to reformat and/or convert many of the files you want to read is silly. Does anyone have one of these that can speak to the PDF issues?

Oh well …

After CIL last year I briefly mentioned that WorldCat was going to have a new service (WorldCat Identities). Well, this just in from the Outgoing blog:

Over the weekend WorldCat Identities went into production. Personal authors now have a link to their WorldCat Identity page under the Details tab.

As Thom Hickey mentions, it’s still a bit messy because it’s in a WorldCat frame - like our OPACs are when we search WorldCat, but it’s still a pretty neat addition. Here’s the example that Thom gave.

[update] Apparently there is a short URL that you can use to access Identities (via Outgoing) [/update]

This is not a review - so much as it is a review of points that have stuck with me from my reading of Everything is Miscellaneous by David Weinberger. I’m not done yet - but I can’t hold it in anymore - and my husband is tired of listening to me rant about library-type stuff

Point one: Allowing users to write reviews:

When I was at the NFAIS Humanities Roundtable, I faced this very question. “Why would we want to let amateurs write reviews?” and “Publishers will pull their content if we let them do that!” It was for this reason that I found page 59 so funny!

[Greg] Hark remarks. “Publishers said you’re allowing users to say that they hate a book.” The response from Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s founder, as Hart recalls it, was: “It will sell more books…just not ones customers don’t like.”

This was in response to Amazon allowing users to review books in their store - and it’s perfect! My answer at the conference was another question. What’s to stop a professional reviewer from saying they hate the book? The fact of the matter is that the average reader cares more about what other readers think than what professional book reviewers think - at least I do!

Point two: Library catalog limitations:

Weinberger points out (on page 119) that when looking at a record in a library card catalog:

Generally you will not find how well the book sold, if it’s been banned in any countries, a list of the books it cites, the college the author attended, what the reviewers said about it, the full index from the back of the book, or how many times it’s been checked out of the library…

Now, while we aren’t using cards to store our data anymore (well most of us aren’t) we’re still following the same rules - and more importantly, we’re still thinking about how much time it would take for us to add that extra metadata.

This is the beauty of LibraryThing’s new Common Knowledge - while it doesn’t have all of these things it does have some and they’re adding new fields all of the time! I love it! One day I spent hours just filling in all of the info I could find on my favorite authors - not a great use of time - but so useful to someone searching for that book!

Point three: Knowledge is social:

Starting on page 144, Weinberger discusses our education system here in the U.S. and how we’re taught to work in silos. Students are made to sit and take tests to measure what they’ve learned:

The implicit lesson is unmistakable: Knowing is something done by individuals. It is something that happens inside your brain. The mark of knowing is being able to fill in a paper with the right answers. Knowledge could not get any less social. In fact, in those circumstances when knowledge is social we call it cheating.

When I was in college, I lived with my husband (boyfriend at that time) and we took many of the same classes - since we had the same degree. We would sit and do our homework together and yes, come up with the same answers. Most of the professors were okay with this as long as we could fill out those test papers on our own come exam time - all except one - but we won’t go there. Now, Weinberger guarantees that students are on IM, chatting while doing homework - which probably ends up with the same result - shared knowledge. This - in my eyes - is the way of the world! You learn so much more by sharing with others than you do sitting alone at your desk. This is part of the reason why I started this blog - I wanted to share what I was learning so that others could learn too.

Two more quotes from Weinberger in this section that made me interrupt my husband as he tried to read his book last night …

Memorizing facts is often now a skill more relevant to quiz shows than to life … One thing is for sure: When our kids become teachers, they’re not going to be administering tests to students sitting in a neat grid of separated desks with the shades down.

So true!! And:

One of the lessons of Wikipedia is that conversation improves expertise by exposing weaknesses, introducing new viewpoints, and pushing ideas into accessible form.

Long story short - knowledge should be shared! And in doing so learning will be more valuable.

More points to come:

I’m only 1/2 way through with the book - and I’m sure I’ll have more to share with you as I finish - if you haven’t read the book - I highly recommend it just based on the first 150 pages and the conversations that I’ve seen spring up from it!

Today I was in Borders on my way out the door with my Chai Latte (my favorite winter drink) when a techie toy caught my eye. It was the Sony Ebook Reader (PRS505/SC). I had read about these bad boys - but never seen one. As a librarian and a reader, I have dismissed ebook readers as no possible replacement for the real thing … but this toy is pretty darn nifty! The screen is such that there is no glare like off a regular computer monitor. The font can be adjusted so that anyone can read the page without struggling and the menu provides a way to bookmark pages. I also liked that it came in a case that make it so that you could hold the reader just like a regular book (only thinner).

I played with the page turning and the menu options and thought it could be a bit more responsive, but overall thought it was well worth looking into if more of my favorite authors become available on ebook … no let me rephrase that … I think I’d still buy my favorites in print just to complete the collection on my bookshelf - I’d probably use this for those impulse buys that I almost always give into … you know the ones - where the paperbacks are 3 for the price of 2? That’s always how I find new authors that might interest me.

Anyway, if you’re looking for an ebook reader, this is certainly a tool to take a look at.

I am a cookbook junkie! Just search by LibraryThing library to see. Anyway, I just found TasteBook, a site that lets you make your own cookbook. My husband gets annoyed when I print out recipes and keep them all over the house So this sounded perfect! I started playing right away. It looks like the book will cost at least $35 - which I guess isn’t too bad if I get to customize the book and make it my own … but I don’t completely! I still can’t upload recipe images and the extra fields don’t seem to want to format the way I want (they keep putting it double spaced).

Now, if you’re an Epicurious member you can link to your account there and you actually do get pictures … but only the ones from the Epicurious site.

I guess for now I’ll just stick to browsing the discount racks at Borders and Barnes & Noble - but if TasteBook upgrades anytime soon - let me know, because I’m intrigued.

Technorati Tags: cookbooks, tastebook

We all know about print on demand services like LuLu and Blurb, but what if you could go to the local coffee shop, library or bookstore and print your book on demand?

If former Random House editorial director Jason Epstein has his way, as early as next year people will be able to order books online in just about any language. And faster than you can say “Grande Caramel Macchiato,” they will be able to be pick up the finished product at a nearby bookstore, coffee shop or copy shop … The company recently received an infusion of cash, nearly $766,000, from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and has begun beta testing its Espresso Book Machine, which can print black-and-white text for a 300-page paperback with a four-color cover, and bind it together in three minutes.

Yikes! Sounds pretty nifty! And like a major change in the way we view our book stores…

Learn more at the Publishers Weekly site.

Along those same lines, Günter reports from the Open Content Alliance annual gathering that:

The OCA will experiment with scan-on-demand. If I understood correctly, the Internet Archive will offer a "Scan This" button which can be integrated into a local catalog. Once a user hits that button, it'll take them to a website where they can sponsor the digitization of an item for a cost-recovery fee. The OCA partner library then sends the book in question to the closest OCA scanning facility. The requester presumably gets notified, and the digital text becomes part of the OCA.

Also, very nifty!

Technorati Tags: books, publishing, digital publishing, print on demand