>I can’t figure out how to separate my books into shelves (to be read, reading, finished reading). Can I?

Not yet.  Tim Spalding, the founder of LibraryThing, is working on a “Collections” feature (date of release is not yet known) which will then allow you to separate your books into different collections.

Thanks for your input!

Apparently, the average was $26 (slightly more than the suggested amount of $25). The yearly membership is $10 but once your year is up you won’t be able to add anymore books. I went for the lifetime, and I’m still using the service 2 years on.

Because there are no annoying ads on the site and it helps defray the costs of running it. Think of it as a bookclub with a one-time joining fee. It’s well worth it, and sometimes I feel a bit sheepish that I didn’t pay more given all the value I’ve derived for the site. If you have a largish library like I do, weeding out the duplicates (say, the cost of 2 paperbacks) more than makes up for the 25 bucks I paid for the lifetime membership.

Others find that the free advance reviewer copies of books they’ve received via LibraryThing’s Early Reviewer program more than “makes up” for the joining fee, but I should note that you don’t actually have to be a paid member to receive copies of ER books — anyone, paid or non-paid — can join the program for free.

The point is, LibraryThing is so full of awesomeness that all these monetary calculations never factored in for me. The sheer joy of using the site and storing my books alone affords a lot of value for me — certainly more than the measly $25 I shelled out.

As someone who NEVER pays for anything on the internet, I found myself not hesitating when it came to LibraryThing. It’s the best bit of money I ever spent online!

The extremely rich features of LibraryThing are, to me, unmatched by any other website. “Shelves” imo are pretty poor compared to using tags; book data is also better displayed and manipulated on LT than elsewhere. What’s striking is that functionality is constantly being upgraded on LT and not a fortnight goes by without developments on the feature front. Shelfari is a poor clone by comparison. (Also, its spamminess is annoying.)

“I certainly want to catalog more than 200 books (which is the limit before it costs money), and that seems an oddly low limit. Why limit it?”

To whet your tastebuds, I think. Give you a taste of 200 — people then tend to find that they’ve been sucked in and want more!

“What are the benefits to that service over the others, since the others are free?”

No ads. Passionate members. Highly interactive (if you so choose) and dynamic. Not one-dimensional like so many other sites where the book data you put in just sits there — there’s stuff you can actually do with it! Also, the more you put in (say, contributing info on everything from tags to user covers to your favorite local bookstores) the more you get out of it has been my experience. It makes one’s catalogue and bookdata “complete” in a satisfying way — and the best part is that others are contributing as well, so you’ll find bits of interest from others almost immediately as you start exploring books or bookplaces that you share. There’s something for everybody.

There’s a great bed of metadata — much of it user-contributed — to work with, since there are now almost 30 million books entered. This gives great recommendations, for example. The main “benefit” thus, is that it is by far more feature-rich than any other book cataloging site than I know of. It’s a booklover’s booksite in the same sense that a chef can be a “chef’s chef” — driven more by love of books (or analogously, cooking) and therefore wonderful for that very reason. That’s my perspective on it anyway (as a moderately dedicated but quite passionate user of the site).

I have only been on LibraryThing for a few months, but I purchased a lifetime membership to keep track of books I own. (The Early Reviewers program is nice, and I particularly love the local feature that lets me see what book events are happening nearby. I think goodreads is easier to use, though.)

I’m happy with both services. I like the way they allow me to organize my reading life. :o)