Show HN: TheLibraryMap – 100k Books in a Picture

Show HN: TheLibraryMap – 100k Books in a Picture(thelibrarymap.com)

12 points by davidm1729 5 years ago | 10 comments

davidm1729 5 years ago |

I discovered a few books that I loved on Twitter a few months ago by pure luck, and I find it weird that in 2020 we didn't have more than mouth to mouth, bestseller lists, and "you may also like" to come upon some of these gems.

The site is quite self-explanatory, a large interactive map with more than 100,000 books placed and colored by their similarity. Right now, it's completely based on an algorithm, and things like being written by the same author do not directly affect position or color.

Probably the most interesting feature, apart from the map, is that when clicking on a book similar books will be highlighted based on that. However, there are other features like the ability to create your own lists.

Any feedback will be appreciated. Thank you!

lmarcos 5 years ago | |

Nice project.

What do you take into account when computing the similarly of two books? Do you use metadata (genre, author, etc.) or something else? Note that I'm more interested in the data that is used rather than in the methodology.

davidm1729 5 years ago | | |

Thank you!

Some sites will show you "other users also saw..." information. This is a very raw form of similarity, but a good similarity score can be computed from that data. There is no metadata involved at all right now.

M1010101 5 years ago |

What a great way to find new books. Also those visuals are a work of art. In terms of features it would be nice to have a key and maybe a way to jump to a genre or theme.

davidm1729 5 years ago | |

Thank you so much!

What do you mean about having a key?

> a way to jump to a genre or theme

Yes! That's a good idea!

I'm also thinking about personalized visualizations based on your favorite books, maybe this could make it more shareable on social networks in order to get traction.

M1010101 5 years ago | | |

> What do you mean about having a key?

When I first looked at the page I wondered if the colors represented anything specific (fiction, drama, money, etc)

> I'm also thinking about personalized visualizations based on your favorite books, maybe this could make it more shareable on social networks in order to get traction.

Yeah it seems like you could generate quite a nice reading list. The first thing I did was search a few of the books on my shelf and see what was similar. Its a really nice way to explore books.

Apologies as I don't understand the technicalities behind this but I feel this system would apply well to a Spotify / YouTube browser. It would help you explore without their algorithms putting you in a filter bubble.

Best of luck!

jaxomago 5 years ago | | |

What were the size of the circles relating to? Popularity? Or sales?

athst 5 years ago |

How is this computed? It looks cool, but it's difficult to use as a book discovery tool unless you know more about why it considers one book related to another.

davidm1729 5 years ago | |

Well, that's the secret sauce ;)