[1]: http://www.flickr.com/
[2]: http://del.icio.us/
[3]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tags
[4]: http://books.aetherial.net/wordpress/
[5]: http://www.librarything.com/catalog.php?view=kpmartin&shelf=shelf&sort=ratingREV
[6]: http://www.librarything.com/

I know my readers include both those who will yawn at this as old news, and those who’ve never heard of such a thing, but in the spirit of [flickr.com][1], [del.icio.us][2] and similar “social” web offerings, I went ahead and started to set up a [LibraryThing][6] [account][5].

Pretty neat stuff. You’re able to have a very nice catalog of all your books, and you can cross-reference with the other members of LibraryThing, seeing who else has that obscure “Gospel Worship” by Jeremiah Burroughs, and then browsing their library for similar books you might find interesting.

Also, the site uses keywords (or [tags][3]) instead of as well as categories, which means where a book may fall under one major category, you may think of it in more than one context. For example, a book on Fort Sumter may be rigidly classified “history”, but I can keyword it “history, South Carolina, Places I’ve Visited”, “American Revolution” and find it more easily in the ways I think about it.

I can use a barcode scanner (which I got off eBay for less than $20) to enter books into it with one swipe. (The barcode scanner also works with nice, non-web-based software like [Books][4].)

Anyway, [visit and peruse the beginnings of my library][5]. It’s fun. Many of the books that I’ve entered are actually books that I’ve packed away (there were entered by Kenny before they went into the box) so they’re not necessarily my favorite books, but it’s still kinda fun.