Judge a Book by the Reviews not the Cover

You shouldn't judge a book by its cover, but cover art sure helps us identify the book we're looking for.

Of coarse course that doesn't help us know whether we'll like the book once we find it. Usually we turn to someone else to help us figure that out. Someone like the publisher who puts nice summaries on the jacket flaps or a reviewer in a newspaper. But this is 2008 and I'm writing to a Web audience that is probably using an RSS feed to get this post. Which means you're probably a savvy bunch so all this talk of jacket flaps and newspapers is silly.

The fact is that readers on the World Wide Web often turn to Amazon.com to determine whether to buy this book or that book.

But what if you're headed to your local library? How do you find something to read? You can look at the staff picks once you get there. Or before you go you can search the more than 150 lists of books to read on WorldCat.org. Because, hey! If this person wants to read this book, then maybe you will too. But how do you, the Web-savvy reader, know for sure?

You look at the reviews of other WorldCat.org users!

And now you can read the Amazon review of this book and that book and many other books! And after you read the book you can rate it and review it here for other library users.

To read the Amazon reviews of a book on WorldCat.org, just find the book, scroll down a bit and click the Reviews tab. Then click back to the Libraries tab to see which library near you has the book. Find your library, click, log in and you're off!

And what about that scary movie you borrowed on Friday night? You can rate it and review it too. And soon you'll be able to see the Amazon reviews for it and other movies as well as music and games.

What more could you want!? No. Really. Tell us: What more do you want?