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April 16, 2007

Paperback Swap

Over the weekend, Kat and I signed up for an account over at paperbackswap.com...and so far, I think it will be a really great resource.

I've been wrestling with (and by "wrestling" I mean "thinking about very infrequently") how to handle a limited amount of bookshelf space, coupled with the a desire for more books...plus the knowledge that most books we have will probably never be read again.

I had tried several ways to "move my books on," mostly through selling them on ebay or Amazon. For a while I was trying to set up swaps through BookCrossing, but the process (at least when I last attempted it...probably years ago) was too painful: if someone wanted one of your books, you had to nose through their selection and see if, by chance, they had anything of interest to trade with you.

I was happy to see that Paperbackswap (which my fingers always want to type "paper back swamp") is much more automated. Basically, you post books for the whole of PBS to potentially pull from...if some user has one of your books on their wishlist, they are alerted and they can choose to request it from you. In transacting books this way, you earn "credits," which go towards you requesting a book in turn.

In the course of 2 days, we've mailed out 3 books we will never read (you have to foot the media-rate postage), and i've got the hardbound "Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy" trilogy on the way.

I have to say that the interface is pretty...daunting (there seems to be an insurmountable amount of buttons, tabs, and weirdly expanding "don't click back or you'll lose your place" widgets), but overall, I think it is pretty cool.

Clampants | April 16, 2007 08:34 PM