9 ms·
Show HN: Books Paul Graham recommended on Twitter
- Jugurtha 6y agoThank you for the list. Can you walk us over how you did this? Maybe a post that goes into how this was done on 20.2k tweets, etc. Does that include replies as well? Does it include screen-shots of a book passage without a title?
- vhpoet 6y agoIt's actually a pretty boring technology. The script looks for some keywords in the tweet (replies included), and then we manually go over the potential book recommendation tweets. It does not include screenshots. I removed "every" from the title here, since I can't be 100% sure this includes absolutely every recommendation.
- wolco 6y agoThanks for the work. Boring grunt work yields great results sometimes. I wish there was a small version without descriptions. I want to see as many books as possible on my screen.
- vhpoet 6y agoYou can actually change the layout so you only see the titles and the covers. The button to change the layout is right above the list (note to self: make that more visible).
- scott31 6y agoThe guy is a living legend, not sure why he hasn't yet received a Turing award for creating Arc
- kirillzubovsky 6y agoLove the business idea. In theory, all the book scraping is automated through Twitter api and then compiled through Amazon API. The page basically self-assembles using Nextjs template and API data call. You get paid via referral purchases. It's genius. Curious: where do you get high-resolution book images. I wanted to add those to my own book list (https://kirillzubovsky.com/bookshelf https://kirillzubovsky.com/bookshelf) and haven't found a source with high res.
- vhpoet 6y agoIn reality tho, there's a lot of manual work involved haha. Thank you! I get the images from Amazon api https://webservices.amazon.com/paapi5/documentation/ https://webservices.amazon.com/paapi5/documentation/.
- kirillzubovsky 6y agoOh interesting, I'll take a second look. Whatever Amazon API I checked was only returning pixelated thumbs. Good luck with the product. Next up is "How I made a million bucks reselling books" blog post ;)
- vhpoet 6y agohahah thank you! definitely check out their API, it's a bit messy, but works.
- kirillzubovsky 6y agoCrazy idea, but it might work. Sometimes podcast guests recommend good books, and I happen to have hundreds of transcripts stored to some of the best podcasts (https://smashnotes.com https://smashnotes.com). I don't expose full transcripts to public, as I've learned that almost no one actually reads them, but I could scan for book recommendations and send them your way.
- vhpoet 6y agoThat'd be super cool, sending you an email.
- kirillzubovsky 6y agoBtw, I tried the API and it works! There's a small caveat, for anyone who might trying it too. If you have an active Affiliates account with Amazon, and you qualify for the API access, it won't be enabled even when you get your key-pair. The API will throw a generic error "Too many requests." You have to go to >Contact Us< section of the affiliate program and ask them to enable your access.
- adebelov 6y agoIncredible product. Love using it :)
- vhpoet 6y agoThank you so much!
- codingdave 6y agoI'm just always curious when I see it - is the monetization of the links something done as an afterthought, to get some cash from a project you were working on anyway? Or was it the other way around, looking for some side income and then came up with the project?
- vhpoet 6y agoIt was both. Started as a side toy to solve my own need, but the monetization potential got me to spend so much time building it.
- kbenson 6y agoI'll see your PG list, and raise you the latest fogus best things and stuff (of 2019) list.[1] 1: http://blog.fogus.me/2019/12/30/the-best-things-and-stuff-of-2019/ http://blog.fogus.me/2019/12/30/the-best-things-and-stuff-of...
- schrute 6y agoSlightly off topic but I couldn't help but notice this scam on Amazon for the book Paul Graham recommends about Microsoft, "Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire". https://imgur.com/dGiXl21.png https://imgur.com/dGiXl21.png
- AlwaysBCoding 6y agothat's a great reading list, thank you for doing this.
- vhpoet 6y agoThank you!
- JadoJodo 6y agoThis is great! I love the fact that it includes people like John Piper and Timothy Keller, but was disappointed I couldn't find more via the 'Pastor' tag. Is that a future feature? Edit: This comment addressed the site as a whole (though I like seeing PGs recommendations as well).
- vhpoet 6y agoThank you! Yea, we'll add the tag as soon as we have more of them. Do you have any people in mind? Give me their twitter usernames and I'll take a look.
- kogus 6y agoI think I'm missing something - I don't see any John Piper or Timothy Keller books in Paul Graham's list. As a fan of Desiring God (Piper), I'd love to hear PG's take on it. But I don't see it (or any of his other books) there.
- vhpoet 6y agoHe means the website also has John Pipers and Timothy Kellers recommendations (they only recommend one book each tho). https://www.readthistwice.com/person/john-piper https://www.readthistwice.com/person/john-piper and https://www.readthistwice.com/person/timothy-keller https://www.readthistwice.com/person/timothy-keller.
- simonebrunozzi 6y agoFirst, thanks for doing this - it's a useful list of books. Second: I don't think we should "idolize" Paul Graham. He's certainly an intelligent and cultured man, but there's no reason to think that his book suggestions are either amazing or current. I think a more diverse and organized review system can be a much better to discover great books, e.g. https://www.goodreads.com/ https://www.goodreads.com/.
- joedevon 6y agosure but I always love seeing people's book lists :)
- aluminussoma 6y agoThere is a lot of "idolization" in the this industry. Those who have accomplished much are sought out for their opinions on all types of subjects, 1) because they are influential, and 2) there is some belief that the methods which led to their success in one field are applicable in the other fields they ruminate about. I have no doubt Paul Graham has (or had) an anonymous account here. I'd love to see the responses to his comments there. I expect to see a bit of downvoting and people dismissing his (anonymous) ideas. PS: The website design is excellent!
- mandeepj 6y ago> I have no doubt Paul Graham has (or had) an anonymous account here. That's him - https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=pg https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=pg
- gchristenb 6y agoThis is so clean - good job - thank you. You should do this for other people. Not many, just good ones, like Paul.
- vhpoet 6y agoThank you! The website actually includes 1300+ people. Whose recommendations are you interested in?
- gchristenb 6y agoWhat!? Dope :)
- ngcc_hk 6y agoQuite an impressive list. Wonder whether he has read these all and not sure what is meant by monetisation. Just a book list?
- TurkishPoptart 6y agoGreat site. How did you make this?
- vhpoet 6y agoThank you! It's built on React/Node.
- commonturtle 6y agoVery interesting. Seems like a more sophisticated version of https://mostrecommendedbooks.com/ https://mostrecommendedbooks.com/
- losthobbies 6y agoHi, this is really well presented. Congratulations. I'm working on something kinda similar myself. It seems to be a popular niche. I am also looking at monetising via affiliates - is it a viable approach? Would you say that you could replace your full time job (if you have one)? Congratulations again.
- vhpoet 6y agoHey, thank you! Not to discourage you or anything but monetizing with affiliate book sales is a loong long way to replace a full time job. This post got to the HN front page (first time for me) and I'd be happy to make $15-30 today.. and this is the best day with thousands of visits. I started and continue working on this because it's a passion. I love books and I love seeing people buy books because of something I made. Good luck!
- superasn 6y agoOnce your site gets traction it should be easy to get sponsored listings which should add at least $2K to $4K per month depending on who is interested. Also not sure if you're already doing it but try to build an email list. That's where the real money is imo.
- vhpoet 6y agoWhat do you mean by "that's where the real money is"? I'm already building an email list, but not sure how exactly you propose monetizing it.
- superasn 6y agoThe thing about your email list is that you people who are voluntary subscribing to you have started to trust you a little and you know what they like. Now it's time to give them more value in terms of content, bonuses and other things which they are looking for to create loyality. After that you promote an existing product as affiliate (in your case it could be blinkist like site) or better create a product that is aligned with the interests of your list. Sorry I'm on a mobile so it's hard typing but here is a case study for you(1). There was another one from nomadlist you should lookup too. Good luck with your endeavours (1) https://www.matthewwoodward.co.uk/work/ideas/product-launch-formula/ https://www.matthewwoodward.co.uk/work/ideas/product-launch-...
- peter303 6y agoI miss browsing the new books shelf at our library (closed to in person access by covid).
- ryanchants 6y agoThe worst part for me was identifying a book on a topic that seemed interesting, and wanting to see the neighboring books on the same/similar topics were. It's been a key part of how I uncover branching topics. Or just books with titles/keywords that I don't know to search for. Luckily, they reopened for browsing recently.
- Konohamaru 6y ago"Woe to you when men bless you!" (Luke 6:26) The fact that everyone speaks well of Dr. Graham means he's on an extremely wrong path. Everyone spoke well of Fred Rogers (Hollywood made a biopic celebrating him) and he was proven to be beyond evil. He encouraged unspeakably shameful afflictions and never sought to heal sinners of their brokenness: instead he denied they were broken.
- muzani 6y agoThat is an unusual chain of thought. And there are plenty of speak poorly of Dr. Graham.
- contingencies 6y agoNote Library Genesis http://libgen.is/ http://libgen.is/ provides equal access opportunities for those unable to purchase or afford books, and can provide an unrestricted preview function for those considering purchasing.
- DoreenMichele 6y agoTo sidestep the ridiculous criticisms here about idolizing pg, you could reposition this ever so slightly as "A booklist paired with Paul Graham's tweeted opinions of them." Maybe find a more succinct way to say that, without the word recommend. Books recommended by him seems a little strong. People pay attention to what he says because of his accomplishments. But a lot of these tweets are fairly conversational and are not really in the format of "You should totally go read this book right now because I said so." Paul does not appear to be the author of this list. He likely had zero say in how it was titled.
- AlchemistCamp 6y agoIt doesn't much matter. Any time any of PG's writing, recommendations or accomplishments come up here, someone jumps in with the same generic warning against idolizing PG and derails the entire thread. Not only do I disagree with the idea that there's something wrong with taking opinions from very successful people, it leads to an incredibly boring discussion.
- DoreenMichele 6y agoI'm suggesting that language concerning how it is framed can help move that out of the way. It's a thing I've thought a lot about. There's no perfect solutions, but that doesn't mean nothing at all can be done to mitigate such things.
- AlchemistCamp 6y agoIf I agreed with the premise that his recommendations have no value, I'd probably look for framing solutions, too. Since I do value the recommendations of some people over a simple aggregated popularity score, I'm more interested in how to effectively communicate how unhelpful derailing every PG-related thread is.
- DoreenMichele 6y agoYou may be putting out the fire with gasoline. Some problems don't benefit from direct argument. There are better ways to address it.
- Whiteshadow12 6y agoThanks for doing this!, though this idea has been done often. I still think there's plenty of room for improvement, there was an app called ParrotRead that did something like this very well but they ended the project for unclear reasons.
- dynamite-ready 6y agoThis site is a great idea. Would be really useful for people working with those who don't usually read.