If you post Content to the Site, unless we indicate otherwise, you grant Company and its affiliates a nonexclusive, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable and fully sublicensable right to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from, distribute, perform and display such Content throughout the world in any media. You grant Company and its affiliates and sublicensees the right to use the name that you submit in connection with such content, if they choose. You represent and warrant that (a) you own and control all of the rights to the Content that you post or you otherwise have the right to post such Content to the Site; (b) the Content is accurate and not misleading; and (c) use and posting of the Content you supply does not violate these Site Terms and will not violate any rights of or cause injury to any person or entity.

Shelfari I have tried to register for, it didn’t work. So scratch them. Maybe they are down or something, but that isn’t obvious.

Seems that it also has some absured American try and steal your copyright etc. type junk in the Terms and Conditions too. Why sign up for that? Particularly if some huge corporate partner of theirs decides that data is then theirs. Would they like my dog, too?

Anobii was painless to sign up for, so looks like it has potential as a backup. You can import a list from LibraryThing as well, it says.

SocialCatalogers
http://socialca...ogers.ning.com/

Blogged about
http://www.libr...le-who-make.php

Pragmatically, however, it does make sense to keep an eye on what’s out there (which I’m sure you’re doing). A major factor in success is strategy, and while there may be room for multiple winners in any given market, my concern for any startup facing a crowded market is that if you cannot achieve critical mass quickly enough and a few obvious winners (in terms of marketshare) don’t emerge, the possibility that a highly fragmented market develops is very good, making it hard to build a “great” or “standout” company even if you have a “good” company.

Good luck. Looks like an interesting service.

Pragmatically, however, it does make sense to keep an eye on what’s out there (which I’m sure you’re doing). A major factor in success is strategy, and while there may be room for multiple winners in any given market, my concern for any startup facing a crowded market is that if you cannot achieve critical mass quickly enough and a few obvious winners (in terms of marketshare) don’t emerge, the possibility that a highly fragmented market develops is very good, making it hard to build a “great” or “standout” company even if you have a “good” company.

Good luck. Looks like an interesting service.

First, we don’t focus on the number of other companies building “competitive sites”… we are focused on our users and the community. We have so much work to do to improve our site and empower richer interactions in our community that worrying about the x number of other sites out there is not a good use of our time.

Second, the design of Shelfari: The team has a strong preference for “clean designs”. Some of the most successful sites (MySpace) are far from “clean” so this isn’t to say you can only have a great site by having a clean design, it is just our preference.

In the long run we are just trying to build a great site & community that will enrich the literary experience of our users… so if you have a need that isn’t being met in this area please shoot us some feedback through the site, or to me directly.. Mark AT Shelfari.com