Library Thing

I may have gotten carried away for a little bit on the Library Thing... There is a similar app on Facebook called "Visual Bookshelf" that I've used before, and really enjoy. I love an excuse to remember books I've read, and oftentimes I find myself rekindling relationships with authors I had forgotten. As I'm writing, I keep remembering things I want to add to my Library Thing list, so I keep bouncing back and forth when something piques my memory. I'm a very visual person, so I really like that there is a cover image displayed when one searches for a book. There have been a couple of times that I've started with a memory of what the cover looked like, then a little bit about the plot, and from there either struggled to piece together either the author or title, or sometimes, in a flash of brilliance, remember the whole thing!

I think I'm going to do a quick comparison of both Library Thing(LT) and Visual Bookshelf(VB) to give you an idea of the things I like and don't like about each and why. Both serve the function of allowing the user to keep a record of the things that he/she has read. As I said, I really like this. Not only does it keep me from acciddently repeating books (it's happened a couple of times that I've gotten a few chapters in to something and started to realize that I've already read it), but it helps, as I said above, me to rehash things I've read and jogs my memory about authors that I had forgotten. As far as the interface goes, VB has a much more polished look to it. Very clean and user friendly. LT is a little more visually rough around the edges. It kind of reminds me of the St. Pete Library's catalog, Polaris. Both of these are functional, but it looks like they were designed by book-people, not computer people. LT does allow the user to search for books in a number of ways, which I do really like. VB, unless I'm mistaken, just searches Amazon.com, while LT let's the user choose among hundreds of different databases. I also like that in LT, the user can "catalog" a book if he/she can't find it. VB allows for books to be added, but not in as detailed a format as LT. Both try to match a user's interests with those of users with similar collections. Both allow users to review items when they are added to the collection. The biggest differnce, I feel, is that VB is designed by computer people...by that I mean there is a way to also keep track of albums, restaurants, etc in the same format, in the same application. LT is clearly geared more for librarians, or bookish types. Both are excellent concepts, as they allow for readers to keep a collection, compare it with others, and get new ideas for further reading. 

I'm not sure that I'll keep up with LT as much as I do with VB, mainly because VB is a part of Facebook, something that I interact with fairly frequently. Not to say that I'm going to immediately write LT off, but I may forget about it in a busy patch in which I don't get much reading done.

Beginnings

Having completed steps 1 & 2, I'll be moving right along to 3. I perused our list of 23 things, and found that while I'm familiar with most of them, I haven't actually used many of them personally. So, I'm looking forward to getting to play around with some of these "things" and seeing what I can do with them! 

Of the 7.5 life-long learning habits, I believe that I am best at the first. I'm very good at setting goals and deciding upon the appropriate courses of action to follow to reach these ends. My problem is a mix of numbers 2 and 3. Once I  make a plan, sometimes it's too easy for me to find reasons to put off implementing it. Instead of overcoming challenges, I use them as an excuse to avoid working towards a goal. There are a handful of goals that I've repeatedly set (like running, brushing up on my Spanish, spending more time on the beach, etc.) that have all fallen by the wayside because other, "more important" things have come  up. Going through the 7.5 habits has made me look at this pattern, and maybe putting this down in writing, and then keeping up with it will help me to stay focused.

That's all for tonight. It's been raining all evening, so now it's time to walk the dog.