Bookcrossing

Encyclopedia : B : BO : BOO : Bookcrossing

BookCrossing, BC, BCing, or BXing, is defined as the practice of leaving ("releasing") a book in a public place ("the wild") to be picked up and read by others, who then do likewise. The analogy is with the ornithological practice of ringing birds to track their movements.

There are no charges for participation but donations to keep the Web site going can be made via PayPal, Amazon.com and by other means. Bookcrossers who purchase items through the Bookcrossing supply store or BC Newsstand will temporarily receive small golden wing symbols on the sides of their screen names.

Contents

1 History
2 Process
3 Furthering the BookCrossing idea
4 Controversy
5 Related
6 External links

History

Ron Hornbaker conceived the idea in March 2001 [link] inspired by currency bill tracking. The website was launched around four weeks later, on April 17 2001. Since then, it has grown into a global movement: by July 5, 2006 the site had over 478,000 members (though it is estimated that only 10% of those registered are actually active[link]) and about 3,155,000 books registered. In August 2004 the Concise Oxford Dictionary added the word "bookcrossing", as defined above.

In 2004, BookCrossing featured briefly as part of a storyline in the Australian soap opera Neighbours.

In May 2005, BookCrossing.com won two People's Voice awards in the Webby Awards for best community website and best social/networking website. BookCrossing also featured in a BBC Radio project broadcast as [84 Book Crossing Road], which involved releasing 84 copies of Helene Hanff's book 84 Charing Cross Road around the world.

Process

Books are "set free" into public places...

To participate, first register a book on the BookCrossing.com web site. Registration produces a unique BookCrossing Identification number (BCID), which allows the book's movements to be tracked. Next, mark the book with the url and the BCID. The web site makes available bookplates with information about BookCrossing that can be printed out, marked wih the BCID and affixed to the book (usually on or inside the front cover). Finally, release the book. The person who finds or "catches" the book can go to the web site and make a note (journal entry), then re-release the book when he or she is finished. The previous reader (or, if the book has passed through multiple hands, readers) is automatically notified when a new journal entry is made, enabling him or her to see where the book has traveled and read the finders' opinions or comments (see below).

Furthering the BookCrossing idea

Contact between BookCrossing members (called BookCrossers) is facilitated through forums on the website, Yahoo Groups, e-mail lists (many countries have their own e-mail lists as well as a main international list), an unofficial "wish-list" system, local meetups and national conventions.

This has led to a number of different ways for books to be sent between BookCrossers. These include:

Trades: Where a BookCrosser swaps books with another member.
Random Acts of BookCrossing Kindness (RABCKs): Where a book is sent by one BookCrosser to another without expecting anything in return.
Bookrays and Bookrings: A group of people "subscribe" to a book on the internet and the book is mailed from one participant on the list to the next. The only difference is that books in bookrings will return to the original owner while books in bookrays do not. Instead, the last person on the list to receive the book decides whether to release it or to organise another bookring or bookray.
Bookboxes: Similar to bookrings and bookrays — each participant, except the original sender, should however replace a specified number of books with volumes of his own of the same genre.

Where a book is sent to a known individual then this is sometimes known as a "controlled release" in order to differentiate it from a "wild release".

Official BookCrossing Zones, which are sometimes called OBCZs or OBZs, are located in certain cafes, restaurants and other public places. These OBCZs contain designated locations, often bookshelves, where BookCrossers can catch and release books.

In mid-2005 BBC Shropshire radio producer Jim Hawkins began presenting a weekly BookCrossing update following the appearance on his show of BookCrosser Steve Lucas. The program has attracted a global audience.

...where they are then "caught" by members of the public.

Controversy

In 2003, BookCrossing was criticised by the author Jessica Adams who claimed that books were being "devalued" by the site as BookCrossing could lead to lower sales of books and, therefore, the reduction in royalties being paid to authors. Most BookCrossers dispute this argument however. They claim that the site introduces readers to authors and genres that they have not read before, that the site gets more people to take up or reclaim reading as a hobby, and that some members, having read a book that they have enjoyed, will buy extra copies to distribute through BookCrossing.

In March 2005, Caroline Martin, managing director of the publishers HarperPress, said in a speech that "book publishing as a whole has its very own potential Napster crisis in the growing practice of book crossing".

A related website is BookRelay. The idea of Relay is that there are lists of books that people want to send to new homes and interested readers. Each list has its own theme or restrictions, and only the book at the top of the list is available for trade. If a BookRelayer wants the available book, he or she picks a book from his or her bookshelf that fits the Relay category, offers the new book, and receives the accepted book in the mail. The relays are grouped into themes - some general, some specific - and books offered must fit the same theme as the books being accepted.

New variants of BookCrossing include Postcrossing and CDCrossing or DiscCrossing.

PhotoTag is the original idea on which BookCrossing is based. The difference is that PhotoTag uses disposable cameras which are passed on to friends and strangers and then returned to the original releaser when the film is used up. The photos are then uploaded to the PhotoTag website.

Geocaching is a similar system that uses Global Positioning System and the internet to lead users to a cache of "treasures". Some members integrate the two systems and BookCrossing books are placed in Geocaches.

Currency bill tracking is a similar system that tracks the movement of individual bills — a dollar bill or a five euro note, for example — according to their serial number. Wheresgeorge.com and whereswilly.com track U.S. and Canadian bills, respectively.

Re-usable fabric gift bags with unique identifiers may be purchased from [wrapsacks.com] and tracked in much the same way as books registered and released through Bookcrossing. The bags are used in place of less earth-friendly paper giftwrap. Since the bag is intended to be re-used by the receiver, its progress can be tracked as it goes from receiver to receiver.

ToyVoyagers is a similar project that tracks and photographs toys travelling on random journeys around the globe.

External links