Bookification

The folks at LibraryThing lately have been trying to devise an open source classification system for books. Currently they're testing the top-level classes on the books of site members to see how well it covers the breadth of books and if there is any refinement needed, so now there is a table at the bottom of each work page which can be clicked to indicate the category you think the work belongs in.

There is no need to be a member for this; I tried a random work before logging in. Then I went and catalogued all the books in my LibraryThing library that I have read. That was fairly easy since I have put relatively little of my collection up there, until I can purchase a full membership, and nearly all of those are plain fiction. There was only one non-fiction book up there and the only others I hesitated over were Tuxedo Gin - am a bit doubtful about including comics as a separate category since that seems more medium to me than subject area - and the The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Fantasy. I suppose I should have put that under literary criticism since it is not itself fiction but... ah well.

But I am posting this because the project interests me and I want to support it to see how it goes. I want to encourage people, especially LibraryThing members, to go help test the system on some books.

ETA: The objections raised in the comments there make a lot of sense to me. Intend to poke around and see if I can find any good reasons why it should be so and not another way - although at least one earlier stated intent was to class books by how people searching casually would think to look, if I recall correctly.

Always end up checking more carefully for spiders

After it has been raining and some have been spotted darting across the floor, or crawling up my leg.

Urk

There's a case in Canada where it appears, absent testimony to bolster charges of abuse, a Mormon leader has been charged under a law banning polygamy instead.

lost_angelwings showed me some news about this last night, in which it was claimed prosecutors had been reluctant to invoke this law for fear it would get overturned when challenged. Naturally I found myself hoping it would be removed because of this trial, and hopefully these suspicions of abuse gotten to the bottom of more directly.

Unfortunately I did not realise just how strict the law in question is. Yet another obstacle forcing reconsideration of life plans, and more immediate reason to hope it is struck down.

This is fascinating

The article is mainly about dyscalculia and models of how humans count. However, what I found most interesting was the boxed out bit at the end.

It suggests that people growing up under different counting schemes will perceive numbers differently. In the particular example given, people whose language counts only up to five appeared to relate to numbers in a logarithmic way, rather than the linear number line English speakers typically default to.

I am always nervous reporting from sources like New Scientist; I tend to be especially worried there will be inaccuracies or misleading aspects... but I am not so dedicated nor so competent / resourceful as to be able to investigate all that interests me thoroughly, so I trust other sources to process and present information for me for the most part. Like with the previous post and many details which could have been scrutinised more closely.