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Winners of the $10k ISBN visualization bounty

annas-archive.org

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Re: Winners of the $10k ISBN visualization bounty

#11

Post by rahimnathwani »

spondyl wrote: post #9
rahimnathwani wrote: post #4

This is amazing. One thing I found odd. I searched for 'Stubborn Attachments' which worked. On the same bookshelf there are several other Stripe Press books. One of them is called Zero to One Hundred, by Stephanie Friedman. When you search that book on Amazon, it has a different title, which I guess is reasonable as the book hasn't been published yet and they may not have finalized the decision: https://a.co/d/bQX5CN…

I don't think it's the tool that's the issue, I think it's the book itself? If you search the ISBN on the web, you'll get "Zero to One Hundred" with the cover of "Built to Grow" and vice versa. There's also "Experiment, Build, Scale" which is the book that the visualisation shows, also with the same ISBN attributed to the previous two. Experiment, Build, Scale seems to be the only book of Stephanie's that is in Googl…

Sorry I didn't mean to make it seem like I think the tool is at fault.

I just think it's interesting that the book title shows differently on the shelf depending on whether you reach it via an ISBN search, vs. if you discover it by panning from a nearby book.

Re: Winners of the $10k ISBN visualization bounty

#18

Post by kaladin-jasnah »

vessenes wrote: post #5

Public request: anybody here who hates Anna’s and wants to make a principled complaint about it? I love it and the idea of it so much, but I imagine some feel differently and I’d like to hear your best takedown shot.

Their download wait time is upsetting to me because I'm impatient and cheap (else you have to pay). At least they have the libgen links now.

I don't hate Anna's Archive though.

Re: Winners of the $10k ISBN visualization bounty

#19

Post by TomK32 »

Fascinating. It allows for some interesting observations when you as I zoom in on this one (sadly no direct links to coords/zoom level) https://archive.anarchy.cool/maps/isbn.html You can find publishers like Hueber Verlag[1] in the eastern part of the German language section. They spread their ISBN numbers in a pattern with something like 1360000 between them (I know, ISBN having a checksum leads to gaps in the numbering), which generates a repetitive pattern with plenty of empty space. It is so wasteful on this huge chunk they have.

Are there no rules on how publishers have to assign their numbers? Just so they could hand back an unused block if they don't need it any longer.

[1] I can see how publishing learning material in 30 languages can give people "ideas" when assigning ISBN numbers https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hueber_Verlag

Re: Winners of the $10k ISBN visualization bounty

#20

Post by matthberg »

The winning submission [0] was discussed on HN recently [1]. It's highly impressive from both technical decisions and graphic design viewpoints, it somehow elegantly visualizes 2 billion books (in a way that resembles a bookcase no less).

[0]: https://phiresky.github.io/blog/2025/visualizing-all-books-i...

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42897120

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