(suggestion) LibriVox Book Club?

Oxenhandler · Post by **Oxenhandler** » April 2nd, 2016, 7:39 pm

Would anyone other than myself be interested in a daily live chat for the purposes of discussing books recently released by librivox and recorded by soloists?

A book is chosen...
Date and time is set...
Section's are assigned...
Repeat.

Example:

Book: https://archive.org/details/john_brown_jm_1603_librivox

On Sunday, April 3, from 1 - 1:30 pm GMT we will be discussing Sections 1-4, approximately one hour of listening, of John Brown by W. E. B. Du Bois, published to Archive.org by Librivox.org, March 26, 2016. Run time: 1:00 of 11:27:56.

On Monday, April 5, from 1 - 1:30 pm GMT, we will be discussing Section 5, approximately 47 minutes of listening, of John Brown by W. E. B. Du Bois, published to Archive.org by Librivox.org, March 26, 2016. Run time: 1:45 of 11:27:56.

And so on until the entire book has been listened to and discussed.

If the idea catches on, it may be advantageous to have two chats, one for books of fiction and one for books of non-fiction. Choosing from new releases increases the possibility the soloist who has the material fresh in his/her mind may participate or lead the chat.

I don't know which (free) website is best equipped to serve as host.

Thoughts?

Post by **Availle** » April 2nd, 2016, 8:23 pm

We've had various suggestions about various types of book club on here, with various success. Here's two I can remember:

The most recent one, never came to anything:
viewtopic.php?f=24&t=58641

And another one that ran for a while:
viewtopic.php?f=25&t=46303

The only book club on here that seems to be doing well - and has so for a long time - is this one:
viewtopic.php?f=25&t=59267

As for your suggestion of a live chat:

1) time is an issue - we have readers from all over the planet. What may be a convenient early evening for you may be in the middle of somebody else's working day, or worse, in the middle of their night.

2) Daily? You mean people would have to listen to a section every single day and then talk about it on that same or the next one? Not that I know anything about this, but I am sure there are people out there who have something called "a life"

Obviously this is not for me, but if you set it up: good luck!

Edit: I dont' know why this is in the LOTE forum, so I'll move it over to the normal suggestions forum.

Oxenhandler · Post by **Oxenhandler** » April 2nd, 2016, 9:42 pm

Thanks for those links. Each proposal is different. msfry's is closest to mine. Putting aside the live chat, a thread with an assigned book and a schedule, might serve, if there is at least one other person interested in reading along according to the schedule. The daily schedule and check in will help me stay on task. Left on my own, I rarely listen to audio books and I've listened to few audio books to completion.

How about we try for Sunday, April 3, (that's today where I am) We, (me and whoever) will listen to "John Brown", Sections 1 - 4 and post comments (not about the reading but the content) and on Monday we'll comment on section 5. Do we need a topic thread to post the schedule? If it is necessary, is it possible? If it is possible, shall we call it, "Listener's Book Club"? Is it permitted to use the project threads of completed projects to post listener comments? If it's not possible to have a topic thread on the forum, I don't know where we'd post the schedule.

So far I've listened to sections 1, 2, and 3 and the first ten minutes of section 4 of "John Brown" and I assure you I wouldn't have if I hadn't come up with this suggestion. John Brown is fascinating!

Here's the link:

https://archive.org/details/john_brown_jm_1603_librivox

and Here's the project thread:

viewtopic.php?f=16&t=56518&hilit=john+brown&start=90

Oxenhandler · Post by **Oxenhandler** » April 3rd, 2016, 8:20 am

I've posted my comments after listening to sections 1 - 4 of "John Brown" by W. E. B. Du Bois in the completed project thread.

Link: viewtopic.php?f=16&t=56518&p=1226360#p1226360

Tomorrow, Monday, I'll comment on section 5. I hope someone will join me.

Please let me know If the LV admin's do not want completed project threads to be used for this purpose. I could post to archive.org, but I'd prefer to keep it inside LV and on the forum in order to encourage other volunteers to listen, a club of persons who know what it takes to complete a project.

Cori · Post by **Cori** » April 3rd, 2016, 11:38 am

I'd suggest starting a new thread for it in Off Topic.

Two reasons ... first, that those were working threads, and it feels odd to me to repurpose them this way. Secondly, you're more likely to get participants from a thread title that says 'Hey, new book club here!' or words to that effect. People do read posts in the Completeds, I'm sure, but not in the same way as Off Topic.

Oh, let me add thirdly, because some people (esp. BCs and MCs) set email alerts on threads that they're working on ... and may not take it off at the end (just in case an error report comes in there, perhaps.) It's not fair to fill up someone's inbox for a chat they may not want to be involved in.

Oxenhandler · Post by **Oxenhandler** » April 3rd, 2016, 2:15 pm

Cori, Thanks for your suggestions. I've taken them.

Link to the New and Different LV Book Club: viewtopic.php?f=25&p=1226454#p1226454