Archive for November, 2009

Monday, November 30th, 2009

SantaThing sign-up closes in 24 hours

SantaThing (LibraryThing’s version of Secret Santa) is open for sign-ups until December 1, 4 pm EST (about 24 hours from now).

We already have over 400 members signed up to participate, and tons of helpful suggestions posted! If you don’t want to be a Santa yourself, you can always help out by looking at the list of Santas and posting book suggestions.

To sign up, just go here and click “become a Secret Santa”.

Tuesday afternoon, we’ll match up Santas. We’ll let you know via profile comments who your Secret Santa is, and you’ll be able to pick books for them. Remember, if you signed up a gift recipient, you’re responsible for picking their Santa’s books. You’ll get a profile comment for each Santa you signed up.

Picking will be open until Saturday, December 12 at 10 pm EST.

We’re also planning a virtual soiree Saturday night and Sunday when the picking officially closes, to pick books for anyone whose Santa hadn’t picked for them. I imagine it will involve LibraryThing members cozied up with eggnog by a toasty fire with a kitten* at their feet, making sure there are books picked for everyone. If you’re interested, look for more information on the Talk thread for it.

* or whatever your preferred seasonal beverage, ambiance device and power animal may be

Labels: santathing, secret santa

posted by Sonya @4:05 pm 2 Comments »
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    • Tuesday, November 24th, 2009

    SantaThing and Giving

    In this year of a down economy, two developments with SantaThing, our “secret Santa for booklovers”:

    First, there was the Talk thread started by a member who got help last year to participate, when she needed it and, now that she doesn’t, wanted to pay-it-forward and help someone else. This started a chain reaction, with more and more members offering to pay for someone. Other members have been asking for help, for themselves or sometimes for relatives, either in Talk or privately. The whole thing is pretty awesome.*

    Today I was contacted by a member (who would like to remain anonymous) offering to pay for 20 SantaThings ($500), again for members who were planning to skip it because money was too tight. The money came out of the blue, and, despite the crescendo of giving, was quite a shock to us.

    So, if you’re interested in learning more about either giving or receiving SantaThing, read here.

    Second, with all this giving, we’re changing our mind. The SantaThing deal was $25 for $20 of books. The $5 was for shipping, and a little to cover staff time. But most of our shipping is now free. (We get it from from Amazon and the Book Depository, and Powell’s is doing us a favor.**) And we’re starting to feel seriously privileged to be involved in this!

    So—to heck with it—we’re getting rid of the margin. SantaThing is now $25 for $25. We’ll make a little money when people can’t quite fill the $25, and we’ll spend it on the countries and bookstores that don’t have free shipping. It’s the least we can do.

    You have until December 1 to sign up for SantaThing.

    Sincerely,

    Sonya and Tim

    Links: SantaThing; Talk thread.

    *I think “community” is an overused word online. Most “online communities” aren’t. All those sites with employees known as “community managers” tick me off particularly. We like to think we’re better than those sites, but, despite tons of friends, a marriage, occasional flash-mob cataloging, Legacy Libraries and even a group of members who now vacation together, I wouldn’t even say LibraryThing is a real “community.” It’s more of a large, long-running cocktail party with a lot of rooms and some good friendships. But I can’t help feeling cheered again by Clay Shirky’s Love, Internet Style. Shirky writes that, looking forward, “You will make more accurate predictions about software… if you ask yourself not ‘What’s the business model?’ but ‘Do the people who like it take care of each other?'” Well, you do. And it’s a pleasure to be part of it. — Tim
    **We have Amazon Prime, and the Book Depository has free shipping. We’re grateful to Powells for giving us free shipping for this effort. (Thanks to Darin for making it happen.)

    Labels: altruism, santathing, secret santa

    posted by Sonya @10:20 pm 7 Comments »
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    • Tuesday, November 24th, 2009

    November State of the Thing

    On Monday I sent out November’s State of the Thing, our monthly newsletter. Sign up to get it, or you can read a copy online.

    This month’s State of the Thing features a synopsis of our newest features, opening SantaThing, free books and the announcement that Abby is moving over to head LibraryThing for Libraries, and I’m taking over Early Reviewers and Member Giveaways, author chats, site questions and State of the Thing.

    We also have three exclusive author interviews:

    Gregory Maguire, is the author of the popular Wicked and many other novels for both children and adults. Maguire published The Next Queen of Heaven with the Concord Free Press, a revolutionary “generosity-based” publisher.

    Charles Cumming’s new novel, Typhoon, is getting a lot of attention (he’s touted as a successor of John le Carré). Cumming’s intelligent thriller starts with the 1997 British handover of Hong Kong to the Chinese, and moves through to the lead-up to the Beijing Olympic Games.

    Eugenia Kim is the author of The Calligrapher’s Daughter, a story that encompasses a enthralling personal story, the roles of gender and class, and Korea’s fight for independence and struggle with modernity.

    Eugenia is also participating in an author chat (as well as giving away a signed copy of her book) with LibraryThing members from now until December 6th.

    Next month, we’ll be interviewing Julie Powell and Masha Hamilton. Have a question for them? Post it here and we might use it in the upcoming interview.

    Labels: author chat, author interview, state of the thing

    posted by Sonya @5:00 pm 0 Comments »
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    • Tuesday, November 24th, 2009

    ConferenceThing at ALA Midwinter

    Announcing “ConferenceThing,” a free, mini-conference we’re organizing to coincide with ALA Midwinter in Boston.*

    When: Friday, January 15, 2010
    Where: South Boston, very close to ALA Midwinter
    Structure: Mixed conference/unconference
    Admission: Free

    We’ve wanted to do something like this for ages. Now that ALA is in Boston, home for Abby and Sonya, and a short drive from the main office in Portland, ME, we have the chance to do it—and do it up. We’ve chosen Friday, before the exhibitions open at 5pm.**

    What we’re planning:

    • “Higher-level” conversations about the topics we care about—Web 2.0, Library 2.0 and the future of libraries and books. Many librarians are ready to move past the basics. A lot of us now spend most of our time thinking about this stuff!
    • Learning, but no instruction. If you want to set up a Facebook page, get a book. If you want to talk about what works and what really doesn’t in library social media, show up.
    • Non-library people. The event will be open to everyone—LibraryThing members, librarians, etc. We’re going to bring some interesting bookstore and publishing people. We think we’re all in the same boat. And we’re drifting. Let’s talk about whom to eat first.
    • Some sort of LibraryThing meetup and ALA party. We’re looking around for something different. It might just be drinks at Bukowski’s, but we’re looking for something cooler. (We’re shooting for the Isabella Stewart Gardner, whose books LibraryThing members cataloged.)

    What to do

    *ConferenceThing is not affiliated with ALA Midwinter in any way, although we have the same tailor.
    **Friday is also when most of the special sessions are planned. We’re bumping up against a couple of events, including some by our friends in LITA. We’re sorry about that, but there weren’t any better options.

    Labels: ALA midwinter, Conferencething

    posted by Tim @10:11 am 2 Comments »
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    • Monday, November 23rd, 2009

    SantaThing has arrived!

    Now in its third year, I’d like to announce SantaThing!

    What is SantaThing, you ask? SantaThing is Secret Santa for LibraryThing members.

    The idea is simple. Pay $25. You play Santa to a random LibraryThing member, and find them up $20 worth of books, based on their library or a short description. Someone else does the same for you. LibraryThing orders the books and pays the shipping, and you get the joy of giving AND receiving!

    You can sign up for yourself, but you can also buy in for anyone else–LibraryThing member or not. If the person doesn’t have a LibraryThing account, make sure to mention what kinds of books they’d like, so their Secret Santa can choose wisely.

    Even if you don’t want to be a Santa, you can help by suggesting books for others.

    New and exciting twists this year:
    This year, we’re offering you the option of some independent (and for some people local) booksellers, and WAY more countries can participate (see the full list). For the first and second annual SantaThings, we used Amazon as our bookseller, and registration was limited to those living in the US, UK, and Canada.

    This is a huge new experiment, so please be understanding. We’re trying to make SantaThing inclusive for other booksellers, with the hopes that next year we can throw the doors wide open.

    In the United States, you can choose between Powell’s (Portland, OR), Harvard Book Store (Cambridge, MA), The Book Table (Oak Park, IL), and Amazon.com. In Canada, your choices are Chapters Indigo, The Book Depository and Amazon.ca. In the UK, you get The Book Depository or Amazon.co.uk. All other countries get to use The Book Depository.

    Here are the important notes:

    The sign-up will close Tuesday, December 1st at 4pm Eastern time. Once the sign-up closes, you’ll be able to use the same page to pick for your Santa.

    Picking closes Friday, December 12th at 10pm Eastern time. Once the picking ends, the ordering begins, and we’ll get all the books out to you as soon as we can. There’s no guarantee that we’ll have books out by December 25th, but we’re going to try our darnedest.

    Go sign up to become a Secret Santa now!

    Questions? Ask them in this Talk topic.

    Labels: santathing, secret santa

    posted by Sonya @2:25 am 8 Comments »
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