The past is a foreign country www.librarything.com/work/709369/...

It's happening! Bookish people, swing by @librarything.com this Friday 12-2pm Eastern. It'll feel like 1997 all over again.

This photo at OOB kills me. So young. What an obscene tragedy.

Typeface Monday: What do you think of Palatino?

This was the least surprising story ever, so I'm not sure I get to be right forever, but, hey, this Mainer saw it.

Today is the 150th anniversary of Portland, Maine's Great Fire of 1866—lit by a firecracker, the biggest US city fire before Chicago! portlandfiretours.com/2025/02/16/t...

Pointless, but pretty.

My new Maine dating website: PlentyofLobsters 🦞

There's a real need for new library tech. One might even say there's a vacuum.

Proposal for a Fiction Decimal System—"DDC for fiction," "BISAC as a shelf order." Genres make people mad, so let the 10-minute hate begin! www.librarything.com/topic/385147

Here's a crappy AI animation of a cat walking and then going to sleep. Where would I go if I wanted a similar—but better—NON-AI animation of the same? (And how much do such things cost?)

Got it again—and now, having lingered over it to take a screen shot, will probably get it a million times. Halp!

Birthplaces of authors on LibraryThing, linear and log. A remarkable graph. You'd expect authors to move to New York, the center of publishing, but it turns out just being born there is a huge help.

Okay, WITHOUT GOOGLING, can you guess the states based on their nine most popular authors?

I asked ChatGPT who invented the fielded wiki and it said… me. This is incorrect and irritating. I was inspired by the late Aaron Swartz's Infogami. I'm still not sure if he invented the idea, or was its first implementor; he may have been. Anyone got a better answer?

Here it is by popularity. Not sure this is easier, but you may know more of them.

Top authors in two groups that share an important thing. What are the two groups?

I'm trying to get Claude Code to code in a more "LibraryThing" style, so I had it do an extensive review of the current style, honed over 20 years. This is exactly right, and (IMHO) good advice for every coder.

LibraryThing members have not yet sorted Satisfying Sasquatch into Bill Nichols (2), along with "Rachel's New Master," "Amanda Joins the Family," etc., but at least it's not part of Bill Nichol's (1).

Also, can we talk about this cover? I know people complain about AI in book covers, and with good reason. I doubt we'll ever see a sasquatch like this again.

I found it—the best author-disambiguation fail! Bill Nichols, author of the field-defining "Introduction to Documentary," now in its fourth edition, also wrote, according to Amazon, "Satisfying Sasquatch."

Portland, Maine now has a MAGAZINE SHOP—a shop that sells just magazines. That's crazy, maybe? But it's got a great selection, and I wish them luck. If you come to town, check Bold Magazine Shop, 604 Congress, roughly in between The Green Hand Bookshop and Longfellow books.

Perils of dictating in work Slack.

Syndetics Unbound takes no position on whether the movie was good, but…

Someone on Facebook asked about Mortal Engines, so I posted it. hat's Teaser, Trailer, NYCC Trailer, Movie. The movie was… not good, so no sequel. Anyone want to know about any other adaptations?

At some point Christians need to choose—this or the sadistic cancer that so many now embrace.

Working on a blog post about how adaptations drive library patron interest. Check out these charts of the Hail Mary Project and Bridgerton.

Impossible task, but here is my "Five Books That Define You" list www.librarything.com/list/47509/t...

The decline of Facebook, as seen in the percent of @LibraryThing members who sign up using Facebook button—15.6% to 1%, 2014–2025.

5/ The website personal recommendations is one of the few places we've gone with identically-sized images, with cropping. The regularity of the display reduces cognitive load, when you're probably just skimming. But it's murder on picture books.