Comparing LT and Other Book Sites

The recent frequent LT down times got me thinking about alternatives to LT, which I haven't done since joining LT, because my experience here has been an enjoyable one.

During last night's downtime, I checked out goodreads.com. To my surprise, the number of reviews (of the few books I checked) is about 10 times that on LT, which means goodreads has far more members than LT.

Have you used goodreads or other book sites, how do you like them compared to LT?

I don't use GR much, but I think it's generally seen as more accessible. Basically, LT is for hardcore cataloguers who care a lot about bibliographic data, and GR is for people who just want to keep track of what they and their friends are reading. The average person is more likely to want a reading tracker than a library-quality catalogue, hence the success of GR.

LT does seem to have a longer tail than GR, though. You're more likely to find obscure scholarly books here, which again reflects the fact that the two sites appeal to different audiences. The LT page for The Heavenly Writing, for example, shows at least some user content, while the GR page for the same book appears completely empty.

Looks that way:

LT: 1,193,555 members

GR: 3,600,000+ members

I think LT is more about indexing while other sites are more about the social aspects of networking around books and reading.

Looks like they don't think much of Dragon Magazine though:

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3072871.NOT_A_BOOK

heh Their CEO and founder is a tech head first and then a reader:

http://www.goodreads.com/about/us

Heck only one of their staff has a background in print. They're all tech heads. Not complaining but it's an interesting bit.

If you want a look at what other people have said about this question, here are a few threads discussing it:
(Warning - the first two are pretty long.)

http://www.librarything.com/topic/75597

http://www.librarything.com/topic/79553

http://www.librarything.com/topic/96022

http://www.librarything.com/topic/97560

http://www.librarything.com/topic/90354

>3 theapparatus:: theapparatus,

If they are tech heads, they should have fewer site down times.

>2 _Zoe_:: _Zoe_,

Good point about library-quality catalogue on LT. I think there're more librarians on LT as well, because when I ask questions at our local libraries, they often refer me to a LT site.

I checked a few classic philosophy books on goodreads.com, and found 10 times more reviews on GR than on LT.

For example:
Lucretius' The Way Things Are on GR vs On the Nature of Things on LT,

Søren Kierkegaard's "Fear and Trembling" on GR vs Fear and Trembling on LT.

I just checked GR to see if they have a copy of this fantastic review of St Augustine's "Confessions", comparing it to Usher's "Confessions", but their review section is annoying. It appears to combine ratings, additions to lists, and reviews all in one. At least, sorting by "newest" did that.

(Also, it does NOT have that review, that I could tell, which makes LT better, simply for having it.)

So I suspect that while there are "10 times more reviews on GR than on LT", that number doesn't accurately reflect the actual reviews.

I mean, for Lucretius, it says "showing 1-30 of 864" on the review bar, but 28 of those 30 (sorted by newest first) are not reviews.

ETA: I discovered that if you filter for "text only", you'll get rid of the ratings/shelf movement. That brings the number for Lucretius down to 54, compared to the 9 on LT, which matches the number of users a bit better.

Also, I can't figure out how to see how many people on GR have added the book to their shelves, but I suspect that 9 reviews for 1753 copies is comparable to 54 reviews of however many copies (at least 864). It doesn't appear that you have to rate a book when you add it on GR, though I'm not positive.

Furthermore, if you compare the number of reviews to the number of ratings, you get 9/128 and 54/864. On LT, that's 7% compared to 6% on GR. (For the Kierkegaard, it's 3% LT, 7%GR, though, so it's going to vary. Almost twice as many members of GR have added the book as LT members, though. There are 2094 GR ratings compared to 1753 LT copies.)

Ugh. Just clicked on one of those links above, and some kind of ad on the side of GR started playing an annoying video. At least we don't get that here.

I did have a GR account but the demographics over there just weren't working for me. I hated seeing one star reviews for classic novels with review comments that written in a language that is barely passable as English stating that the book was 'too hard to understand'. At least on LT, the proportion of quality reviews/mindless crap is a lot better. So while there are a lot more reviews on GR, I think there are actually the same number of good quality reviews on both sites.

I think it's a function of the fact that LT doesn't just look like a facebook page about books, where all the comments, reviews, ratings, shelf movements are in one 'stream' (another thing I hate about GR).

While perhaps the LT interface could do with an overhaul (I don't necessarily think it does, but I hear what others are saying), I'd hate to see it end up looking like GR.

Or maybe it could just be that I have a thing against GR because the list of 'best novels of all time' includes Twilight.

Oh, and I love the LT 'will you like it feature'.

re msg 5, I clicked on the GR link for "Fear and Trembling", and the first review shown is an attack on "pathetic" members of the site. I think it's the first time I've actually been thankful for the review-flags LT has. We don't have to put up with seeing that kind of stuff all the time.

Goodreads is a social site, first and foremost. It's obvious from the get-go. LibraryThing is focused more on book data, book statistics, actual books, not just "so-and-so read that book too!" and stuff. I don't like social sites, for the most part. I did try Goodreads, but it was so focused on the other people, the social parts, and not on book-details.

>4 staffordcastle:: staffordcastle,

Thanks for the links to the related threads.

What I find interesting and confusing is the recommendations. I have a decent idea how they work on LT, but I couldn't find that feature on goodreads.

Does anyone know how to get book recommendations on GR?

> 9: Heather19,

I read that first review too, and another person's follow-up comment that expressed the same feeling you had. I like GR's comments on review feature very much.

>11 booksontrial: Yeah, it's too bad people don't think LT's overall higher standards would extend to review discussion as well.

>10 booksontrial:: You need an account.
When in your account go to the home page.
On the right you'll see a "my profile" area in which you will find a link to book recommendations for you.

>13 kevmalone: But there are no book-to-book recommendations?

>12 _Zoe_:: _Zoe_,

What do you mean?

>13 kevmalone:: kevmalone,

Thanks for the tip. I just set up an account earlier today, and "don't have any pending recommendations." How does GR make recommendations for you?

15, there have been long discussions/debates about wanting review-comments on this site. A lot of people are very firmly against it, concerned it would lead to abuse and name-calling and just more stuff that needs policing.

(Zoe, I'm starting to cave. Sometimes I realize how cool review-comments could be.)

That's encouraging :). Now for the other 100 people who voted against it.... ;)

>16 Heather19:: Heather19,

I'm one of those who think review-comments are essential for a book-centric site. Speaking for myself, I'd much prefer a negative but constructive comment to a "dumb" thumb, though I appreciate the support of those who thumb the reviews.

> 16, 17, 18

Er, so how do we convince Tim?

Maybe working on everyone else first would help. If there were no huge debates about it, Tim might be willing to listen more....

*plots*

I'd take a simpler approach: If you can't move the mountain, move away from it. :)

If you can't move the mountain, move away from it.

No way!

Message 8: TineOliver- Its also on the worst books list and I bet if LT had lists it would be on both here too.

>15 booksontrial:
"How does GR make recommendations for you?"

I've only played with GR a bit, but as far as I could tell GR only does personal recommendations. So if you have "friends" on GR you can give each other recommendations. But there are none of the statistical recommendations that LT does so well.

GR will make recommendations when you enter a book onto your bookshelf

I bet if LT had lists it would be on both here too.

Lists at least are something that I'm optimistic we'll see in the next year or so.

As for review comments, I've realized that my first error was in focusing on my long-term ideal of opt-out comments. I think I'd have done much better asking for opt-in comments initially, and then revisiting the issue a year or two down the line.

no, if you can't move a mountain, move around it.

Sorry - been off for a while

>14 _Zoe_: I've not found any book-to-book recommendations. As far as I can tell >24 eromsted: has it right. If you have a book you can recommend it to your friends/contacts. That's it

>15 booksontrial: The only book-to-book recommendations I see are sponsored ones, based on books I have in my GR library.

So you all know - I added around 40 books to GR last year to see what all the fuss was about. I haven't "friended" anyone there - hence only auto-recommendations I guess.

I find it difficult to navigate the GR site, and the information delivered is certainly not as concise as LT's. That being said, there are a lot of reviews out there, not all of them like that mentioned by >9 Heather19:.
Reading them I feel that some of the reviewers would add benefit to, and gain benefit from, the LT family. It's a shame we can't distribute flyers outside the GR storefront. :)

>25 majkia:, 28

I've added about 40 books to GR as well and I still get, "You don't have any pending recommendations." And the "sponsored books" advertisements don't seem to have anything to do with what's in my library.

Not that I care about this that much. I have no intention of switching, or even really using their site. I'm just curious.

>29 eromsted: and anybody else who is curious about GR,

You can transfer your entire LT library to GR in a few minutes using the import/export tool.

To get member recommendations would take some time and effort though.

You can transfer your entire LT library to GR in a few minutes using the import/export tool.

Really? From what I know about good reads (at least how they were) if it wasn't/isn't in the amazon catalog you can't add it. You can't add your own covers, and books with out ISBNs might or might not be found. These are all important things for me and the books I own.

>28 kevmalone: One recommendation I got (i.e. not a generic book ad) says

Since you liked Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife, you might be interested in her new book, Her Fearful Symmetry: A Novel.

(Touchstones purposely excluded)

I had given the first book a rating in GR. I note that Audrey Niffenegger is a GR author.

ETA: Gah - Author Touchstones not working again.

>31 readafew:: readafew,

Good catch! I was focusing on the batch processing aspect of the transfer, but, it's true that some of the books fall through the cracks during the transfer, and some books you have to add manually on both LT and GR anyways.

31> You can't add your own covers, and books with out ISBNs might or might not be found. These are all important things for me and the books I own.

Of course, given limitations on LT's export tool, it's not like you can transfer your covers to GR anyway. Some of the other limitations of the export tool would probably bite you, as well.

>31 readafew: readafew : You can't add your own covers, and books with out ISBNs might or might not be found.

Books can be added manually to the GR database and covers can be added as well, but your account membership needs to have a 'librarian' classification in order to make changes to the existing GR database.

To obtain the librarian classification, you need to have a minimum of 50 books shelved in your account and you need to submit an application request. An admin of the site will activate† the classification (I think within one or two business days).

The GR method of adding covers to books doesn't have that handy 'pull image from URL' that LT has; the image upload method is the only way to go.

GR has a stricter policy on listing books and only books than LT does, which constrains your ability to manually add works like short stories and magazines.

† ETA: Typo.

>26 _Zoe_:: _Zoe_,

What's the difference between "opt-out" and "opt-in" comments?

>35 MyriadBooks:: MyriadBooks,

Thanks for the informative post. Do you have to be a librarian to be classified as one on GR?

I'm still trying to figure out how book recommendations on GR work.

> 36: Not _Zoe_, but just in case she's not on line for a while:

In practice there is very little if and when you decide to go for them. But "opt-out" means you get them unless you indicate you don't want them, while "opt-in" means you'll only ever get to see them if you ask for it. So "opt-in" is less pushy.

>38 Nicole_VanK:: BarkingMatt, dank u :)

>37 booksontrial: booksontrial : Do you have to be a librarian to be classified as one on GR?

Nope, that's just the GR classification term. Anyone can apply for it.

ETA:
I'm still trying to figure out how book recommendations on GR work.

I'd be no help to you for that, I'm afraid. :( I like LT's take on recommendations so much that I've never really explored GR's.

>30 booksontrial:: booksontrial You can transfer your entire LT library to GR in a few minutes using the import/export tool.

I have 4800 books here on LT which took me almost 6 months to catalogue. I tried uploading them to Goodreads which took a few hours but found more than half were rejected. I deleted my account there after that.

I prefer LT. I've been here since 2006 and it's like a comfortable armchair for me now.

>23 susiesharp: Sorry, probably wasn't clear enough that the Twilight comment was sarcastic.

The rest of my post was intended as it reads.

I keep searching for reading groups and there are a couple on GR that I'm hanging out in.

The one thing that doesn't work that well on LT, IMO.

I've seen a few attempts at it on LT, but then even the ones on GR don't get all that much participation. At least not for the sorts of books I'm interested in.

#32 I got that exact same-worded recommendation for Her Fearful Symetry that you got. I don't remember where I reviewed Time Traveler's Wife but I gave it a good review, either here or there. I've been trying to figure our a way to transfer my reviews back & forth from one site to another.
I like both sites but use LT more. I'm not really interested in recommendations, but I do use reviews.
If someone wants to rate a review, but not go into a lot of detail, couldn't you just use a number system, 4* or 2

> 43

majkia,

Have you throught of starting your own reading group here on LT? That's the beauty of this place to me. If you have an idea, you are given the tools here with which to make it work. In starting your own group, you can elect to keep it private or make it public, manage how it's run, and even use the wiki pages(s) to get group interactivity.

At least not for the sorts of books I'm interested in.

If it's *your* group, you get to pick the books in which *you* are interested.

ETA: Just out of curiosity...in which reading groups do you participate? How would you improve them, if you could?

> 32

Since you liked Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife, you might be interested in her new book, Her Fearful Symmetry: A Novel.

To me, that's a no-brainer rather than a thoughtful recommendation. I very much like LT's member recommendations.

Check out the 22 member recommendations on the same book here at LT.

#45:

Well, it occurs to me, that the real problem with reading groups is to keep everyone on the same schedule, what with some fast readers, others of us are slower. Or we already have books begun that we are committed to finishing before we can jump into something else.

On LT I did read a couple of SF books in groups, but not that many ppl post comments and discussion dies off quickly.

On GR I'm in a couple of reading groups, An SF/ Fantasy group, and another fantasy group. There have been some interesting discussions there, so I'm sticking around. But the problem is they want to read two books a month. Several are nominated then polled for each group read. Some appeal, some don't.

So I'll read the ones I'm interested in, but again, the reading is so spread out, half are about to start, half already finished.

I guess to improve the reading groups, I'd give a longer lead time between when a book is selected and before discussion begins. I'd consider breaking the books up, with discussion on perhaps the first 50 or so pages (or so many chapters) and so on, rather than on the entire book at once, when dealing with the tomes in the field.

An LT thread for a book (as has been discussed for new features), that is long-standing, would at least give one a place to go for discussion, even if it had died off when you yourself got to it, but with LT many threads will revive if others show renewed interest, so that's a possibility I guess.

Hope that makes sense, as I'm pondering as I write.

I keep meaning to start a new thread about book discussions when I have a chance. It seemed like a lot of people wanted *something* to be done to improve book discussions on the site, but it was pretty evenly split between a discussion forum for each book and touchstones that distinguish between mentions and discussions. Personally, I think both would contribute a lot to the site (along with review comments, of course). A single thread for each book is the one idea that I don't really like, because I just don't think it would be workable in the long term.

> 47

it occurs to me, that the real problem with reading groups is to keep everyone on the same schedule

Well, not everyone is on the same schedule. A way to deal with that is to divide a book into separate threads for separate chapters. You can always partipate in a thread about any chapter you've already read, but you won't be exposed to spoilers.

not that many ppl post comments

I've think it's better to post questions about content rather than just wait for spontaneous discussion.

But the problem is they want to read two books a month. Several are nominated then polled for each group read. Some appeal, some don't.

If I were you, I'd just stick to those discussions about books I want to read and simply not participate in those in which I have no interest.


So I'll read the ones I'm interested in, but again, the reading is so spread out, half are about to start, half already finished.

I would dislike that as well.

I'd give a longer lead time between when a book is selected and before discussion begins. I'd consider breaking the books up,

Both sound like good ideas.

By the way, those are just my thoughts, but I could not really join a reading group myself. I can only read what I want to read when I want to read it. Reading groups would make me utterly berserk! :)

> 48

Here's an idea:

For each work (and taking place on the work page), each member could contribute one discussion question. The question could either be about one chapter (which would be named) or about the work as a whole. All members could then jump in with responses whenever they would like.

We could also have comments on reviews. :p

I explored GR a bit more and found their "quotes" feature much to my liking. You can add favorite quotes to each book and author. Why don't we do that here?

> 51 You can add favorite quotes to each book and author. Why don't we do that here?

FWIW, you can add quotes to works here.

>52 sqdancer:: sqdancer,

Thanks. I didn't even notice it. :) The quotes at GR are searchable, which makes it a more popular and useful feature.

They're searchable here too: http://www.librarything.com/commonknowledge/

54> Well, sort of. The results aren't all that great. Example:

http://www.librarything.com/commonknowledge/search.php?q=I%20have%20but%20one%20...

I have yet to figure out how to get it to search for an exact quote. It seems to match on ANY of the words. Maybe I'm missing something.

ETA: Nevermind. You have to add double quotes around it. I DID actually try that, but I didn't realize the lack of results was due to no one ever putting in "I have but one life to give" in any of the quotes, rather than due to error.

>54 DaynaRT:: fleela,

I read that page, but it's still not clear to me. If I have a quote, how do I find the author and the book that it belongs to?

56> Click in the search, enter the quote (with double quotes around it for an exact match), choose Quotations from the dropdown box and click Search. Then click on the book. The author will be listed there. No, there is no result screen showing the author AND the title on the list of results.

ETA: And just to bring it back to the original point, it's a very unpolished search interface for something like quotations. It's part of the greater changelog for CK entries. The whole thing is quite techy.

#57 - doesn't that show the author of the book it appeared in? It may be (and in most cases probably is) the author of the quote, but it doesn't have to be? If someone had included a quote from a book of quotes, Jarman would appear as author even if it was a Shakespearian quote?

Yeah a better search and explore UI for CK would be great. However it isn't a trivial change, and I guess that there are quite a few other calls on developer time too.

58> Ah, that's true. I was thinking you were looking for quotes from specific books, not just quotes from a person in general, included in a book of quotes. LT really isn't set up for that kind of thing. People have suggested adding a Quotes field to the AUTHOR CK (rather than WORK CK). But usually the counter-argument goes "but shouldn't the quotes be in the WORK CK anyway?" And that's mostly true, though you'd miss Nate Hale's famous last words (funny thing, I actually got the quote wrong. It's "one life to lose", not "one life to give". Still no hits found either way.) You could then say "well, lets include a Last Words CK field", but then you'd probably miss a bunch of Mark Twain quotes that weren't actually in his books.

>60 brightcopy:: brightcopy,

Which is why I prefer GR's way of handling quotes. You can add them to both authors and, if you know their origin, books

61> Right. As I said, people have suggested it quite a few times.

>51 booksontrial: booksontrial:

I really like how the GR quotes can be favorited and saved. I enjoy being able to read a randomized smattering of my favorite quotes every time I visit my GR profile page.

I'm surprised no one has pointed out yet another fault in my example - Nathan Hale (at least, THAT one) isn't an author, so they would never show up on LT and would therefore have no quotes field anyway...

Is there a LT group on GR? Should we start one?

>63 MyriadBooks:: MyriadBooks,

That's nice. I'll try that too, once I've collected enough quotes.

>44 MarianV:: MarianV,

On the GR site, they say you can import/upload your reviews. I tried it last night using their sample file as a template, but it didn't work.

65>

Is there a LT group on GR? Should we start one?


I don't think that would be well-received. Certainly I wouldn't be happy if a bunch of GR evangelists started a group on LT trying to convince everyone to go there instead. Live and let live.

>65 booksontrial:, 66:

Perhaps it would work if the group was titled along the lines of:

People who like both LT and GR -- *heads hanged in shame*

I've often wanted author quotes -- it's not just the unattributed stuff from books, but interviews, essays, so forth.

And I've often wanted to be able to "favorite" quotes.

Sigh.

Is there a LT group on GR? Should we start one?


I fail to understand why you'd want an LT group on GR.

>69 SqueakyChu:: SqueakyChu,

Fair question. :)

If I visit or move to a new city, one of the first things I'd do is to look up friends and acquaintances there. They would show me around and make it easier for me to settle down in the new environment. That's the idea for a LT group on GR.

I'm assuming that some LTers are curious about GR and interested in exploring / using GR alongside LT, a LT group on GR would hopefully help make the move easier for them.

Sorry to disagree, but I simply don't think that's necessary. Are you serious?!

>71 SqueakyChu:: SqueakyChu,

I understand that you feel an allegiance to this website that Tim developed. I like it here too, as I've stated at the very beginning. It's certainly not my intention to convert people to GR. I only began exploring it myself two days ago. If there is something I'm serous about, it is the freedom of choice and the wherewithal to exercise that freedom.

I've nothing against freedom to move around book sites. I'm also a registered member of Goodreads, although I don't use it very often. However, isn't your idea a bit analogous to setting up a Borders kiosk inside of a Barnes & Noble?

>73 SqueakyChu:: SqueakyChu,

It's more like setting up an Italian's quarter in New York City. Having never been to NYC, I have no idea what it looks like. :)

"I don't think that would be well-received. Certainly I wouldn't be happy if a bunch of GR evangelists started a group on LT trying to convince everyone to go there instead. Live and let live."

I actually have the impression an LT group there would be much better received than a GR group here. At least by the other users if not the admin. It seems a lot more laid-back at GR...

There's a Typepad tag on Wordpress.com

http://en.wordpress.com/tag/typepad/

Not a big deal.

By unpopular demand :), here is the link to the LT group on GR.

http://www.goodreads.com/group/show/38508.LibraryThing_Transplant_Commuters

>44 MarianV:: MarianV,

I finally figured out how to transfer reviews from LT to GR, and why it didn't work the first time.

In the LT export file, for some reason, the reviews are under the column header "your tags", instead of "review". After I changed the header to "review", and removed the double quotes, I was able to import all my reviews to GR.

I believe that's because of a bug where if you don't have any tags all the remaining columns are shifted over one. I think Tim fixed it this morning though. See http://www.librarything.com/topic/99039#2210489.

I am on GR too. Just joined the new LT group there.

>81 FicusFan:: FicusFan,

Welcome to the group and feel free to introduce yourself. :)

I recall trying to import to GR and having it drop like 1500 items.

I tried importing my library back into LT, ten hours ago and again just now, but got the SAME message:

"Finishing estimate: between 1 hours, 19 minutes and 2 hours, 13 minutes. There are 458 books in the queue ahead of you."

ETA: The import finished in 10 minutes, but the message is misleading.

Now it says, "There are 797 books in the queue", adding my 339 books to the total in the queue, even though they have been imported already.

>83 theapparatus:: theapparatus,

How many books in total did you try to import? Did those 1500 books have ISBNs?

I think it was around the 6k mark. Probably was ISBNs as a number of my works were earlier than 1980ish. I don't think it was 1500 of them though.

>86 theapparatus:: theapparatus,

Murmurs (Msg41) had a similar problem importing relatively large libraries.

If I had a large library file, I could do some testing and try to figure out the problem or report the details to GR staff.

Not a biggie. Thanks though.

If only we could make the commute between LT and GR (and other books sites) easy and hassle free, many people would want to take advantage of the various unique features on both sites. It should be a collaboration, not competition.

Imagine

"You may say I'm a dreamer. But I'm not the only one."

I probably should just keep my mouth shut, but then I rarely do that. YMMV and that's fine by me.

But, LT and GR are businesses. I don't know many stores selling the same kinds of items that have a "collaboration." Personally, I've chosen to be here after investigating other sites and this is where I want to be. It seems wrong to me to go into Jack-in-the-Box and rave to all their customers about the food at Carl's Jr. It makes me uncomfortable. I'm not saying what you are doing is wrong, I'm just saying why it makes me uncomfortable, and possibly others.

>90 MrsLee:: MrsLee,

Personally, I've chosen to be here after investigating other sites and this is where I want to be.

Some may not have the time or wherewithal to investigate other sites, and that's where a support group might be helpful.

I'd like to think that what we're doing is analogous to Consumer Reports, i.e., to provide information on various book sites / businesses, so that book lovers / consumers can chose the sites that best fit their needs.

It seems wrong to me to go into Jack-in-the-Box and rave to all their customers about the food at Carl's Jr.

Years ago, you could get phillysteak only at Jack-in-the-Box, not Carl's Jr. Customers who like phillysteak would want to know that.

How about making an LT-GR Commuters group on LT, and putting your export/import advice there? Although I think this is promotional(1), we have many happy site- and company-specific promotional groups on LibraryThing—BookMooch, SwapThing, NYRB, etc.

I'm sure there are members who'd be interested in that and, speaking for the site, I'd be glad to centralize information about the transfer. We understand and want to support people who use other sites, even partially-overlapping ones.

1. Not the least because imports can really only go one way. LibraryThing has access to far more books than GR, which only uses Amazon and an unidentified service (Ingram, I think), and our CK data, like quotes, is Open Data and theirs is closed data.

>92 timspalding:: timspalding,

First of all, I admire what you've accomplished with LT. You and your staff should be proud of your achievements. Being somewhat of a programmer myself, I could imagine how hard it is to build and maintain such a large and complex database and meet the requirements and expectations (both reasonable and unreasonable) of over a million users. It's no small feat.

Having said that, I hope we can discuss this without rancor. I like the design and data structure of the LT database. However, a better design does not always translate into a better product from a user perspective.

Case in point, the quotes. I've been on LT for almost two years and never knew they existed in the CK database, whereas on GR I started entering quotes only a few days after signing up, because it's a prominent and popular feature there.

As I see it, the data-centric LT gives users more direct access to and control of the book data; OTOH, GR is more user-centric and provides more user friendly interface and environment.

How about making an LT-GR Commuters group on LT

That would be only fair. Many GR folks could benefit from LT recommendations. AFAIK, the recommendations on LT are the best among the various book sites I've looked into. However, I've taken enough heat merely broaching the subject in this thread, and don't want to be more unpopular than is necessary. I created the LT group on GR out of personal need.

That's the distinction between book-level data in your catalog (Your Books tab) and work-level data in CK. How could the UI present CK data to make it more obvious that it's there?

Why not add it to the site search page? Or a work-level "advanced" search page, where the user can search by each individual field?

If it's not easy to find, it doesn't exist. :)

>How could the UI present CK data to make it more obvious that it's there?

That may help these "Not a review" review folks like leaving.

edit: For the "Visitor groups" bit up there, looks like we have at least one here that pertains to another site:

http://www.librarything.com/groups/bluebeta

There is a CK search but it's not very good and you have to know about CK already to find it. Adding it to the Search tab is a good idea but Tim probably won't see it in this thread. Why don't you post a thread to suggest it in the Recommend Site Improvements group?

>97 jjwilson61:: jjwilson61,

I have a sneaking suspicion that UI (for data export, query and retrieval) is not high on Tim's priority list or design philosophy.

As a user, I have a choice, either make unsolicited suggestions on site improvements and hope they'll be implemented some day, or accept and use LT as what it is, a data-centric cataloging site, and find another site with the desired UI features.

I have a sneaking suspicion that UI (for data export, query and retrieval) is not high on Tim's priority list or design philosophy.

Do not confuse philosophy with priorities. From what I've read, Tim fully supports exports working 100% correctly and completely. But from what I've seen, he just never gets around to it because he always sees things he thinks are either more important to most users, low hanging fruit that can be done rather quickly, or just projects that he thinks will be fun to code.

I have a sneaking suspicion that UI

Sneaking suspicions would be more effective if you used terms correctly. UI has nothing to do with data export, query or retrieval. User interface means "user interface." There is no such thing as a "UI feature."

You have repeatedly expressed your preference for and promotion of Goodreads, in the general talk area for LibraryThing. I have suggested you make a Goodreads group here, and contain promotion to that group. You have said this would be only fair. Would you like to do it, or shall I?

>99 brightcopy:

I'm unclear what we're missing? LibraryThing has an API to its CK data. We have an export feature that exports data unavailable to other systems, like Goodreads. We can import from them, and others. People move stuff back and forth all the time.

From my perspective, what w'ere missing is a full and unrestricted API to book data. We don't have it because it would clearly violate the Amazon terms. I regret that, but it's for a reason. Amazon's stated penalty for abuse is the removal of all Amazon data from the system. It's clear that, put simply, Goodreads violates the Amazon terms left and right. Maybe they'll get away with it. Maybe they won't. As a user of Goodreads, I'd be afraid. I have no illusions Amazon will help LibraryThing, but Goodread's main competitor—in look, audience and philosophy—is actually Shelfari, which Amazon owns completely.

>100 timspalding:: timspalding,

User interface is the interface between the user and the system, i.e., the CK database in the case of LT, which includes data import, export, query and retrieval, etc. Google "UI feature" and you'll find 127,000 entries.

You have repeatedly expressed your preference for and promotion of Goodreads

Not once have I expressed preference for Goodreads. Some of their features, yes, but not GR the site in general. If LT has those features, I would have done the same for LT, as I did promote LT's recommendations.

This thread is for comparing LT and other sites. I don't see why it should be contained to a group promoting Goodreads. The only reason I mention GR is because that's only other site I'm using right now, and can speak from recent experience.

>101 booksontrial:

No, really, CK is not a "user interface." CK may be described being a feature with a user interface. The UI of CK are the various parts of the site where you can change CK, the way it looks on the screen and so forth.

Some of the confusion may arise from the fact that CK is not the LibraryThing system, as you seem to be writing, but a very specific subset of that system. CK is a specialized data store, structured as a fielded wiki. It powers series, awards and a number of similar pieces of data. It is a "global" data store, separate from your books and indeed from all other data on LT.

Anyway, I'm still unclear on what aspects of data import, export, query on retrieval you are advocating for. I think perhaps, since we are disagreeing on technical terminology, we should discuss "things" instead.

As a user, I have a choice, either make unsolicited suggestions on site improvements and hope they'll be implemented some day, or accept and use LT as what it is, a data-centric cataloging site, and find another site with the desired UI features.

I've frequently clashed with Tim about philosophical issues, particularly the whole concept of recording books "read", and resolved just to use GR for that because it supports reading tracking in principle. The problem is that GR is just so inferior in so many other ways that that resolution never lasts long. So I stick with unsolicited improvement suggestions, and occasionally Tim does listen ;)

100> I'm unclear what we're missing?

http://www.librarything.com/topic/99308

Covers (and I don't mean Amazon hotlinked ones - I'd settle for at least the ones I could upload. And I'd settle for even an LT URL). CK fields such as Series (there's a field for "series" in the export, but it's not CK series), Canonical Title, Work Title/Author, etc. Other authors (again, there's a field, but it's always blank).

You only very recently added collections as a field, and I know we appreciate it. But collections have been around for how long now? I think that does address the "priorities" point.

Basically, if I can see something listed as a column under Your Books, I'd think that should be possible to get in the export. You'll probably just say "use the CK API", but that's really the answer to a totally different question.

Also, CSV is some weird red-headed stepchild. It's lacking most fields that tab-delimited has. And the "ratings" field is always zero. I'm not sure why you even have a link to it on the export given the quality. I chalk it up to their just always being things you'd rather work on.

And I'm not just talking about export in terms of Goodreads. In fact, for me, I'm DEFINITELY not talking about GR since I don't even use that. I'm talking about export, plain and simple.

104>

I understand CK fields not being in the export, though. They're collective data. The data in the export, and in my catalog (yes, Tim, I'm an old fogey) is MY data. It won't change unless I change it -- that's not true for CK.

105> I understand that, but I don't agree with it. As he's said, he already makes the CK data available. So now we're just quibbling with how hard it is for the user to get to it. Hence User Interface. I'd just prefer removal of all the hoops and stumbling blocks so it's easy to export exactly what is shown in Your Books.

>104 brightcopy:

The question is what HE thinks is missing. What ways can LibraryThing supply more data to improve his Goodreads experience?

107> Well, that's ONE question. I think what I think is missing is a perfectly good one, too! ;)

>107 timspalding:: timspalding,

*putting on Gandalf's hat*

"Do not take me for some salesman of cheap GR site! I am not trying to rob you. I'm trying to help you."

*removing the hat*

>102 timspalding:,

I thought mistakenly that CK data and all the user data were stored in one system, maybe one large relational database, and suggested (in Msg. 95) adding the CK fields to the Site Search page. Now I know they are stored separately, which makes it harder to have an integrated user interface to query and retrieve both sets of data in a seamless manner.

104> Other authors (again, there's a field, but it's always blank).
Not true, my exported file shows other authors that have been entered in my catalog.

110> Is true. Here's a couple of examples:

http://www.librarything.com/work/5827/details/57024991

http://www.librarything.com/work/3366761/details/54856485

For both of these (and every other book in my catalog), other authors is absolutely and completely blank.

I have an idea that this may have something to do with the switch in how Other Authors was handled, which was before my time and I'm only vaguely informed of. It's not before your time, so I wonder if the Other Authors you are seeing weren't the "old style" and that the column doesn't work for anyone entering Other Authors on a book today.

111>

No, rbott is right, it is not always blank.

It is blank for those books entered after the switchover to the new other-author system (the latest entry date for which I have "Other Author" data is Oct 18, 2007) but that's not "always", and telling rbott he's wrong about his own data is rather odd.

112> I believe that's what I just said.

I guess I misunderstood, then. I thought the exchange was:

104> "The 'other authors' field is always blank."
110> "No, it's not, I see data in the field in my catalog."
111> "Yes, it is always blank (followed by justification of why rbott's seeing something else doesn't matter or isn't important or real)

I agree it's a problem that it doesn't include the new-format "Other Authors", but it is just plain not true that it's "always blank". Would "always blank for books entered since 2007" satisfy you? It's not like that's much of an improvement in the situation, and has the virtue of being true.

Okay, let's enter that as a bug, if it's not already. I'm not bug-ifying this thread.

114> I guess I misunderstood, then

Yes, I think you did. If rbott is offended by how I put anything, I'll be happy to apologize to him/her. I'm not too worried about others who are becoming offended on their behalf.

116>

I wasn't offended. I was saying you were incorrect.

117> And I'm saying you can't see the forest for the trees. A bug caused old data to show up under Other Authors, but anyone entering a book today will have nothing but blanks show up under Other Authors.

It's like if I'd posted a week ago saying "The reviews field in the tab delimited export shows your review" and you'd posted "Nuh uh, it doesn't show your review if you leave a tag blank!" You're looking at things in a very nit-picky, black-and-white manner. It's absolutely possible for both rbott and I to both be right, we're just talking about different things.

As Tim said, the handling of Other Authors is buggy. I'm glad to have brought that to his attention (again). I don't really see how the tangent you've decided to go off on is in any way productive.

ETA: I entered the bug. It's under import/export. I suggest renaming this category to Art Vandelay.

You're looking at things in a very nit-picky, black-and-white manner.

In my mind, "always" (which is the word that started this whole mess, that you introduced) is intrinsically black-and-white; perhaps you have a different interpretation of the word (i.e. "most of the time" or even "always for people who meet some set of criteria".)

When I enter a new audio book, I often find the other authors field filled in with the correct narrator. I guess my always is different from the universe's.

120>

We're talking about the export -- when you download your catalog as a tab-delimited file -- not the import from your source of choice.

eeek. sorry. I didn't notice how off into the weeds you got.

119> I'm just going to excuse myself now and give you and the horse some privacy.

119> In my mind, "always" (which is the word that started this whole mess, that you introduced) is intrinsically black-and-white;

Yes, but to brightcopy it always was blank. It's only to someone who has been here a lot longer that it would not be. So "always" may be intrinsically black-and-white but the domain that it applies to may not be.

Another feature comparison: Personal (private) Message (brightcopy's thread in "Bug Collectors" reminded me of this)

When I first started using LT, I was (and still am) annoyed by "Your comments" feature on my profile. It feels and looks more like an answering machine than a conversation. You have to click back and forth between profile pages to carry on or retrace a conversation buried among many other conversations.

Most other sites (including goodreads) have inbox for each user, just like a regular email, which allows you to keep private and uninterrupted conversations.

125> Yeah, there's been a few RSIs for it.

>126 brightcopy:,

What's RSI? Repetitive Strain Injury?

127> More or less. Its secondary name is Recommended Site Improvements.

I find the website, GoodReads, annoying on a visual level.

I'm also signing up for GoodReads, I know I'll be on two cataloging sites but I do not mind. My brother is signing up for it, and if I familiarize myself with that site as well I'll be able to help him with his page if he has any questions easier.

>130 punkeymonkey529:: punkeymonkey529,

You and your brother are welcome to joint the LT group on GR:
http://www.goodreads.com/group/show/38508.LibraryThing_Transplants_Commuters

If you have any questions about the site, just post your questions to the group, and we'll try to help out. It's quite easy to use and I've enjoyed it so far.

LT seems to be populated by far, far more archivists, librarians, serious collectors, and scholars. I would have enjoyed GR when I was in 6th grade, but now that I'm an adult, and my curiosity and desire for discussion/ inquiry has led me to believe LT is where it's at.