Traffic surges / scheduled downtime
If you're wondering why LibraryThing is a little slow, it's because traffic has surged. LibraryThing was picked as the Kool Site on the Kim Komando radio show. I regret to say that I'd never heard of Ms. Komando or the show, but apparently she's huge.
Anyway, more than 1,000 users signed up in the past three hours (a 10% increase!). Most are just checking it out, but the traffic is still pretty staggering. I suspect it will pass in a few hours, leaving a few hundred dedicated new-comers. To them: Welcome!
Anyway, more than 1,000 users signed up in the past three hours (a 10% increase!). Most are just checking it out, but the traffic is still pretty staggering. I suspect it will pass in a few hours, leaving a few hundred dedicated new-comers. To them: Welcome!
posted by Tim at 11:41 AM
19 Comments:
I was just heading over here to post about the Komando pick. I wasn't sure if I should post a warning or a congratulations though-- While she caters to a rather different community than, say, slashdot, mentions by her can result in something akin to the slashdot effect-- with both the good (new audiences, publicity) and bad (overloaded servers) that comes with it.
Anyway, though, congratulations...
Thank Molly. It's strange. The surge has been huge, but most don't catalog any books. Maybe people are getting it in newsletter form at the office, and not in a position to add books now. Maybe her readers always check out the cool site, even if they have no interest in the topic. LibraryThing is candy to 1%, and the candy wrapper to the other 99.
It's also strange because it hasn't made a dent in the blogosphere or led to any spike in Delicious. There are two worlds out there, and they're not connecting. Fascinating.
Molly, did you hear her or get the newsletter?
Today, I saw the Kim Komando reference via her newsletter.
I'll be interested to hear if the pattern of visiting but not uploading anything keeps up. I'm sure you're right that while LT is a godsend for obsessive bibliophiles of a certain variety, for most it's an oddity at best! At the same time, it would also make sense that some future users would check it out but not be in a position to actually start cataloging books until a later moment of free time.
I'm trying to remember how I initially came across LibraryThing, myself. I think I had initially read about it at crookedtimber.org--and was intrigued but didn't actually start using it. Then more recently lifehacker.com recommended it, reminding me to actually go check it out. And I've been happily adding books ever since...
Sorry, off topic:
While under 'power edit,' two of my books could not be viewed. Or rather, any information other than the tags was not visible. (The books were Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory/Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator and Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan - what a great essay that would make!)
Any reason why that should be?
ExVivre
Here's a bug report.
If I add books where the author's name contains no ascii characters, such as Japanese, or Arabic, the author names get no links and thus no pages. I guess because the names are turned into "id"s by removing all the non-ascii characters!
Checking out the site, yes, from Kim Komando! I'll add books later.....
One "M" in Komando.
Never heard of Kim Komando, but I'll check her site out. I wonder if she'll see a traffic spike? Anyways, congrats on the well-deserved notice you're getting for LT.
Passed the 900,000 book total, I see. Any guesses when the one million mark will be achieved?
Hi,
I was reffered by Komando & I've added some books. I love it! As soon as I read about it I was ecstatic, I love books, so this is GREAT!
I also found this site because of Kim Komando. I love her sites. I often find great things through her. She also has helpful hints.
Was just wondering whether the surge in traffic has anything to do with the problems I have navigating my catalogue.
Right now I can neither re-arrange the way my books are displayed nor go to any other than the first page. Pity as I was just in the process of hitting 500 registered books... :)
[Also to comments]
Shirasade: No, but there was a problem. It's fixed now. Thanks for the heads-up. Tim
a request for a feature: when I search my library for a phrase, I get every book that has any word in that phrase. This is true even when I put quotation marks around the phrase. So Homer and the Odyssey and "Homer and the Odyssey" will both net me every book I have that has either 'Homer' or 'Odyssey' in it. Could you change the search function so that when you put quotation marks around a phrase you only get books that have the exact phrase?
Time for a completely silly feature request.
It'd be nice (though not incredibly useful) to be able to graph the number of books with a certain tag over time.
I just think it might be interesting to see a graph showing the relative sizes of crap, shit, rubbish, trash, garbage and bollocks, for example. ;)
*chuckle* I don't think this is what you mean, but if I could track the acquisition date and date read of my books, it would be interesting to see what subjects I was buying and reading at what time.
But sticking that stuff in the comments field will work well enough for me, I suspect.
There used to be a way to mass-edit tags (like switch all tags of one name to a new name), but I can't find it now. Is it gone, or am I just not looking in the right place?
Also, a suggestion: It would be nice to have some sort of forum where we could ask these questions, so we wouldn't have to post them in the blog.
To anonymous above regarding mass-editing:
Search for the tag you want to change, select power edit, add the new tag, and remove the old tag. Quick enough for most uses...
Just wondering - is there an easy way to figure out if a user that has the same book as you has a cover for their book that you don't?
I seem to have a # of books without the right cover and it seems like the best way to get one would be to find another user with the right one and to clone that book.
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