It's not you, it's your books
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
On the other side of the argument, you could argue its easier to understand the contributions of someone like Pushkin than someone like Fermi. But this too is probably true only on a superficial of level.
In Russia, sure. But the Pushkin example is completely atypical of our society. When was the last time you heard Pushkin mentioned among non-Russian non-specialists?
The obscurity of Pushkin is actually the point in this case. If she had said "He hadn't even heard of Shakespeare!" the implication would have been "He's a lout", which is quite different. "He hadn't even heard of Pushkin" is more along the lines of, "He doesn't pass the minimum test for my exacting, boutique tastes".
People are just different, and so is their taste in books. The idea of finding partners based on book preferences is interesting though. I would love a dating site where I could search for women based on their reading habits. I mean if I could search for women that liked Neal Stephenson or Bob Woodward I would be thrilled.
So could someone here please make it? Please...
And I'd love to use it if somebody gets it right.
Heard of this exact idea on popular media this week. Can't find the site though. So the idea while not original, is worth trying. How do you really know if a person is really reading the books they claim online though?
You could do it with music as well - make a small app that scans through your music library and uploads it. Then match with people that have the same taste in music. Would probably have broader appeal, since more people listen to music than read books.
Or has that been done too?
So if you're going to build this type of web-app, you might need to talk to Will Shipley :-)
That's not a good reason to not try something - because there is already a service. In fact I'd be surprised if there was not more competition. Music is a good one. I'll see if I can find the service ...
some time later ...
There is an interesting article now on just this idea ~ http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=149467
Any sites with an api, to tap into their data?
There might be legal issues with this approach though.
Agreed. Please make this!
A friend and I were talking about such an idea right around the time Friendster was making rounds... and after running through lots of issues and the one sticking point was honesty - perusing friends of friends on frienster, I ran into people I barely knew - but I was pretty certain that they hadn't read "Foucault's Pendulum" or "Infinite Jest", etc - they were listing books that were "hip" (within certain circles).
My conclusion was that Amazon needed to do this, they have a pretty full catalog of personality reflecting items for sale - and the key (in my mind) was that a purchase record was at least as important as a rating/review.
If you're talking about books my experience is the opposite, for me there is definitely a correlation between reading habits and girlfriend potential. It has however changed with the years, when I was 17 the first thing I would look at was a girls boobs, now it's more what books she's reading. So it might be related to age.
If you're hiring someone for your startup, that's probably not important to know, but if you're looking for someone to have a relatioship with it can be helpful.
But this brings up another question: why does there seem to be this general obsession with the consumption of this particular medium? I would say they're in love with the form, but they don't mention doing any writing. I would say they're in love with great art, but they don't mention any other forms. (Is it a NYC thing? Manhattan always seems downright foreign to me.)
Imagine asking the people quoted in this NYT article about the last manga they've read or the last modern symphony they heard or the last painting they made.
By the way, I mostly agree that books are overrated. The reason is that most books are not very complex. Text is the wrong medium for the ideas of their authors.
I'm not suggesting that people only read fiction for self-improvement or to make you better at conversation: there's nothing wrong with reading something for it's own sake. Is reading something for its own sake better than watching a movie or playing a video game for its own sake? Probably not.
One way to get over this feeling may be to keep in mind that the raw accumulation of knowledge is not really that valuable anymore - certainly less valuable than mental "agility" (for lack of a better term). In other words, we can look up any facts we need to know pretty easily, but being able to put order to those facts and make correct predictions based on them is a skill that takes practice. I think that some fiction may be better at fostering that skill than most non fiction - especially labyrinthine stuff like Neal Stephenson, Tolstoy, or Thomas Pynchon.
But more generally, I can't make my mind up one way or another about this. I've seen the kind of relationship the last part of the article talks about - very long term, very stable with interests like books, movies, music etc being completely irrelevant - so that makes me think its quite right. At the same time, there's gotta be some baseline - how can a music lover go out with someone that thinks highly of (say) Paris Hilton's music? Or a normal person with a objectivist? ;)
Adults who list Harry Potter as their favorite book (which is not the same as admitting Harry Potter is a fun read) by doing so fairly explicitly state that the universe of a children's book, however well written it is, is pretty much all the intellectual stimulation they care for.
Nothing wrong with them, most likely, but certainly not people I'd want to invest emotionally in. YMMV, of course.
"You can learn a lot about somebody by the books they've read. And I've always thought that if you read all the same books I read, you'll come to think like me, too."
If you pride yourself on having rad certain authors you're reading them for the wrong reasons. You don't read great literature because it's "Great Literature". You read it because it is good.
I suppose it's to be expected. Even in the intellectual world Sturgeon's Law applies. 90% of everything is crap.
(Btw, if you havn't you should read Theodore Sturgeon's More Than Human)
But she was the one that broke it off.
Now I'm marrying someone that I worked with in a bookstore.
I'll recommend it to everyone, but specially to those with some interest, and little knowledge, in Economics.
I need to read less about copywriting.
At least a reasonably interesting discussion ensued on HN. But other than that, I don't think those books are as big an issue in dating as the article tries to make them to be. Hm, except perhaps if you happen to be a "bookslut"? Impressive how they even manage to tailor the article towards the intended audience of their client (I presume).