27. This One Next

Today we'll look at another Reader's Advisory tool called This One Next. You can enter a book, a cd or a dvd and it will suggeset items you might like.
You can start with just a title and it will try to guess which one you mean

You'll get a list of suggestions with a link to see even more
You can enter an email address to get even more customized results

23. gnod

There are so many new tools for book lovers, ways to connect with your friends, write and read reviews, but what if you just want a good old fashion recommendation?

Today we're gonna look at a Reader's Advisory tool that's not just for books, but movies and music too!

Start at the home page Gnod.net

We'll start with the books option. You have 4 choices when looking at this page, the "Map of Literature" is my favorite. Type in one of your favorite Authors

Then you'll get this visual display of similar authors, the closer they are to the original author the more like they are supposed to be.

You can do the same with movies or gnovies

Again, the closer it is to the movie you entered the more like it it is. There are some other search options where you put in 3 authors, movies or bands to get different results. There are also some discussion forums.

11. LibraryThing Revisited

I know many of you enjoyed our lesson on LibraryThing in Learning 2.0. There has been a lot happening at LT since that post so I thought we'd take a look at it again.

What's the same?

• Costs $25 for a lifetime membership. Really not that much
• Can catalog 200 books for free

Some stats:

• Over 313,000 users have signed up
• Over 20 million books have been cataloged
• Users have applied over 26 million tags to their books

What's new or what we didn't cover last time:

LibraryThing for Libraries - basically it allows you to mine LibraryThings wealth of information for your Libraries' catalog.

What does LTFL do?

LibraryThing for Libraries enhances your catalog in three ways:

• Book recommendations - these show high-quality "recommended" or "similar" books.
• Tag clouds - tags are descriptive terms about the book, and function as descriptors and points to search from, which is more powerful and flexible than searching using an OPAC alone. ?read more about tags?
• Other editions and translations - links to related editions and translations of the same work (a "FRBR-like" concept).

Basically rather than relying on your patron base to tag, review and rate. Libraries get access to the collective input from LibraryThing users. Examples of Libraries using LibraryThing for Libraries

LibraryThing Local - If you've been using your LibraryThing account you might have noticed a new tab recently - "Local" This new service kicked off March 3rd and as off writing this post (3/8/08 10:30 am central time) over 13,000 venues and over 1,100 events have been added.

LibraryThing Local is a new sub-site devoted to finding, mapping and describing the world's bookstore, library, book fair and festival—as well as all the readings, signings, lectures and other events they host.

Go take a look at your account. I've added MRRL and our major upcoming events, see if you can find it and "favotie" it. What other ways could Libraries use this?

LibraryThing on your Cellphone - if you have a cell phone with web browsing capabilities this little feature lets you access your account from your phone. Handy if you're like me and have a want to buy list of books a mile long and can't remember which one you've actually already bought when you're standing in the bookstore.

Some more links:

• LibraryThing Blog so you can keep up with what's happening at LibraryThing
• Thingology - LibraryThing's other blog
• My LibraryThing
  

7. Goodreads

Goodreads was developed for Book lovers as a way to keep track of what they're reading, what they've read, what they want to read, and what their friends are reading. You can get recommendations from people you know and read their reviews. Goodreads is free and there is no limit to the number of books you can add to your lists.
To get started

1. Go to the Goodreads website
2. Click "get started"
3. Enter your name, email address and desired password
4. You'll be promoted to enter your email password, this is so Goodreads can check your address book and connect you with people. You can skip this step if you choose. More and more social networking sites are providing this option to help you locate people you know.
   
1. If you enter your email password, Goodreads will provide you a list of friends who have accounts and you can check which ones you want to be "friends" with.
   
2. It will also give you the option of sending an invitation to friends who don't have an account.
   
5. Start adding books!
   
6. There are 2 default "shelves" sort of like tags or subjects they are "to-read" and "currently reading" You can create your own "shelves" books can belong to more than one shelf.

Like many social networking sites you can set your profile options to be as public or as private as you want. You can be as active in the groups, discussions and reviews you like.

Some fun things

1. You can import lists from your Amazon wishlist or any site you can export your book list from such as LibraryThing.
   
2. You can create a widget to put Goodreads on your Myspace page
3. You can add a Facebook application to add Goodreads to your Facebook page
4. You can create a widget for your blog.
   

Additional Links

• About Goodreads