[HN Gopher] Show HN: I made a books recommendation app based on ...
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Show HN: I made a books recommendation app based on your mood
Hello HN, I noticed that I often looked for new books, depending
on my mood (e.g., if I'm feeling tired, I want to find books
that'll help me fix that and improve my sleep). So, I created my
1st indie project, BooksByMood. BooksByMood will help you find
your next read based on your mood w/ - Books averaging 4.09/5 on
Goodreads - Each book comes with an explanation of why it's
selected for your mood - 18 moods to explore I hope you'll enjoy
using the website, Cheers!
Author : gaelgthomas
Score : 131 points
Date : 2024-03-26 13:13 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (booksbymood.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (booksbymood.com)
| seanlinehan wrote:
| Site is nice! And it's super fast which is awesome!
|
| Why not link to Amazon with an affiliate link in there? Collect a
| few bucks :-)
| dhc02 wrote:
| Or bookshop.org
| greenie_beans wrote:
| yes, consider not using amazon. please consider using
| bookshop. see https://www.forbes.com/sites/meimeifox/2024/01/
| 26/bookshopor...
| akuji1993 wrote:
| Seconding this. OP turn the links into affiliates. Get paid for
| the work that you're doing, only fair.
| gaelgthomas wrote:
| Thank you! :)
|
| If I have to be honest, I started with this project to prove to
| myself that I can build something, ship it, and market it
| (bring traffic to it). This idea crossed my mind, but I didn't
| do it because I didn't expect I would have had enough traffic
| to make it potentially worth it!!
|
| Lesson learned for next time (or next update):
|
| - be more ambitious
|
| - do not doubt yourself and the internet's magic
| jc_811 wrote:
| Very cool! How are you doing the categorization? Eg API,
| scraping, manual, etc
| gaelgthomas wrote:
| Thanks for your message!
|
| That's an interesting question; this was a small challenge for
| some reasons.
|
| 1. Since this is my first project, I wanted to ship something
| clean but fast (scope down to one feature).
|
| 2. I initially wanted to use some APIs. TLDR: Goodreads closed
| its API on December 8th, 2020. OpenLibrary was not bad, but the
| data required to be more consistent. Google Books API was
| alright, but I would have also curated manually in the end, and
| sometimes some info could have been better. Maybe it's a
| personal feeling, but it's hard to have a good books API out
| there (probably due to Amazon owning Goodreads and making sure
| it's hard for competitors to have good data as they do).
|
| 3. I knew it'd be complex to satisfy everyone with the
| recommendations, but I can do my best. My best is to ensure
| that what is recommended is included, even if it's a small
| amount, and that the recommendation is well rated by the
| community (e.g., on Goodreads).
|
| 4. Then, I realized (again) that we're in the age of AI, and I
| could leverage that (at least for a 1st release and see how it
| goes). Based on that, I tried different prompts with many
| criteria until I found one I liked. By doing this, I could
| ensure the quality of what was curated.
|
| If it evolves in the future, this will definitely need
| improvement. But, for a first release, it does the trick!
|
| I hope it answers your question!
| frizlab wrote:
| This is nice! The design is cool, the site is fast, it's
| refreshing.
|
| I only have one question: why choose 4.09 for the rating value?
| (I do not use Goodreads, maybe my question is irrelevant.)
| jjice wrote:
| I'm also interested in this. I just clicked on "nostalgic", and
| it gave me Catcher in the Rye, which is listen on this website
| as being a 3.80/5, so I'm especially confused now. I then got
| The Great Gatsby, which has a 3.93/5.
| gaelgthomas wrote:
| Thanks a lot for your message! I really appreciate it,
| especially since it's my first time designing something myself
| like that (I know it's not perfect, but I'm happy with the V1,
| haha).
|
| That may be unclear, and I may have to update the small banner
| on the homepage. As mentioned, it's "an average of 4.09/5 on
| Goodreads". The calculation works as follows: sum of all unique
| books rating / number of books = average.
|
| I wanted to highlight that the website has books rated below
| 4/5 and above 4/5, but overall, the average rating on Goodreads
| is relatively high (= books recommended by the community).
|
| Is there anything I can improve to make it more clear? :)
| elicash wrote:
| This isn't a criticism, just an observation:
|
| I like media of all sorts that matches my mood. If I'm sad, I
| don't listen to music that cheers me up, I'll listen to the
| saddest stuff I can find. But this app's approach is really
| geared towards _managing_ your mood, so it 'll try to make you
| happy. Or if you're confused, it suggests books to improve
| decision-making. And if you're energized, it suggests you use
| that energy reading about running and getting healthy.
|
| Again, that's not a bad thing! Just a viewpoint that's embedded
| in the suggestions. Those choices are explained nicely, so people
| can decide if that's what they want.
| jagged-chisel wrote:
| This is helpful information. My humble input to OP is: the
| domain is fine, but go with "find books to help manage your
| mood"
| elicash wrote:
| Alternatively, consider mixing up a few of the suggestions
| for folks like me who like to wallow in their misery on
| occasion.
| ants_everywhere wrote:
| > I'll listen to the saddest stuff I can find
|
| This is one of the reasons I think this space is hard. You kind
| of want music that (step 1) first resonates with your current
| mood, and (step 2) then maybe takes you on a journey toward a
| better mood. And what journey you want depends on a bunch of
| factors. Am I just feeling blue, then maybe I eventually want
| to be cheered up. Am I mourning the recent loss of a loved one,
| then I'm going to be sad for the next N weeks or months, and I
| just want to be able to handle that in a healthy way.
|
| step 1 and 2 together are maybe easier for books, because a
| story can start off sad and you can take an uplifting journey
| with the characters. But it's a little harder for music,
| because a song typically has one mood. Maybe you can find an
| album with an emotional arc, but I think practically you'd need
| to generate a playlist with songs that match at the boundary
| and overall create a trajectory.
|
| But that's something you can only do when you know what the
| trajectory is in the first place, which is hard (as I mentioned
| above).
| FumblingBear wrote:
| I agree wholeheartedly.
|
| When I'm feeling down or depressed, I often want to engage in
| media that lets me wallow in those feelings as a cathartic sort
| of release. Would love some type of toggle that allows us to
| "match" a feeling or "improve" a mood. Sometimes we need a
| pick-me-up! But sometimes, I want to really sit with the
| discomfort of grief or loss and reading bleak books can help
| that resonate with me.
| gaelgthomas wrote:
| I appreciate your comment!
|
| And you put the finger on something right here. As you
| describe, I didn't see it as: "If I'm sad, I want to listen to
| sad music".
|
| When I built the app, I was really into that mindset of "How
| can this book help me when I'm in that mood?" (e.g., I'm
| feeling tired -> Suggesting "Why We Sleep" to fix your sleep
| and understand why sleeping is essential).
|
| Somehow, I'm happy because what I wanted to do becomes clear
| when you use the website (based on what you described, which is
| 100% correct). But that also means I could have worked my
| "marketing/copies" differently to reflect that more.
| bcye wrote:
| As an idea: why not make a filter for each mood, whether you
| want a book for that mood, or to "fix" that mood
| yaj54 wrote:
| to riff on that: two selectors: (current mood, desired
| mood) -> recommendations. desired mood could be sorted by
| most commonly selected desired mood for the selected
| current mood.
|
| (sleepy, rested) -> nsdr playlist.
|
| (sleepy, focused) -> Tony robins talk.
| groby_b wrote:
| +1 on the managing part not working for me either. If I'm
| tired, I don't want to read a book on how we sleep. I want a
| book to fade out to and fall asleep :)
| akuji1993 wrote:
| Site's nice, it's a simple idea with a simple solution.
|
| Some feedback if you want:
|
| - You're overdoing it with the shadows. Simple flat design looks
| cleaner
|
| - A little too many colors, that are not really aligned with each
| other. If you're not a designer, check out Tailwind colors and
| pick 1-2 you like that work complementary. Only use those and
| white/black/grey.
|
| - For further reading on color picking, read up about the
| 60/30/10 rule in color design
|
| - Since you've built your site with react, you could think about
| adding some simple animations (for example, when the books are
| switched on "next-book" button) by using Framer Motion. This is
| an opinionated thing from me.
|
| Cool project, good start in the indie hacking community :) Keep
| doing cool stuff. If you wanna connect, find me on Twitter:
| @icebearlabs
| gaelgthomas wrote:
| Thanks for your message! For sure, I will! What's happening
| here is definitely a huge motivation for what's next. I'm
| already looking forward to it! :)
|
| Your comment is gold!
|
| I will bookmark it and refer to it for my future projects. It's
| good to have feedback on the design so I can improve it next
| time.
|
| By any chance, do you have any design resources or books you
| would recommend for something getting started with that
| (ideally actionable)?
| uxamanda wrote:
| Refactoring UI is approachable and actionable
| https://www.refactoringui.com/
| aidenn0 wrote:
| > - You're overdoing it with the shadows. Simple flat design
| looks cleaner
|
| I'm not a designer, but I strongly disagree with this one.
| Given a choice between using something flat or something with
| shadows, I will almost invariably lean towards the latter. The
| one place I might eliminate shadows for on this site is the
| "info" callouts on each book page; I don't think shadows
| communicate anything there and all other shadowed boxes on the
| site are clickable, while this one is not.
| pyuser583 wrote:
| Why isn't "angry" and option?
| greenie_beans wrote:
| or "life is meaningless" or "existential dread" etc
| gaelgthomas wrote:
| That's a good suggestion! I tried to generate as many moods as
| possible for the initial version, but I may have missed some
| (even basic ones).
|
| It's definitely something to add. Do you have other mood
| suggestions in mind?
| mrweasel wrote:
| Neither is "horny" which I think would be an interesting
| option.
| pelagicAustral wrote:
| Not sure erotica suggestions will pair well sharing internet
| real-estate with books for feeling "enchanted"
| pelagicAustral wrote:
| I think, in my case, the last thing I want to do when I'm angry
| is read a book. If I'm angry I feel like going to the shop and
| buying a bottle of Japanese single malt and dive deep into the
| zen of getting pissed.
| Tervicke wrote:
| Interesting project what kind of technology are used in the
| backend what api's etc
| tharmas wrote:
| Yes, Im curious too. His Twitter account mentions Next.js and
| Vercel but I'm wondering if he's using an AgentAI to make the
| book selections etc.
| gaelgthomas wrote:
| Hello!
|
| If you want to see the detailed answer, I did it in another
| question below. Feel free to have a look at it!
|
| TLDR: Curations are made with AI using custom prompts and
| then double-checked + added manually. The main idea behind
| that was to ensure the quality of the curated content. IMO,
| for this type of project, having less choice if the curation
| is good is fine, rather than having something via an API with
| "inconsistent" data and less relevance.
| tharmas wrote:
| Thanks for your response Mr. Thomas; and congratulations on
| getting your idea launched into a real thing. Also, very
| nice job on the speediness of the site.
| leugim wrote:
| Why it's everything NYT Bestseller non-fiction? I'm not a big fan
| of NYT Bestseller non-fiction but I find myself much better with
| novels matching my mood. If it's something older or classic,
| better.
| Vaslo wrote:
| Good point here - and a lot is just left off the list if it
| doesn't agree with the editors "beliefs" even if it's really a
| bestseller in terms of sales.
| aidenn0 wrote:
| The "enchanted" mood appears to be all fantasy fiction.
| quantxx wrote:
| Nice topic to build a project but there's one immediate issue I
| see with the implementation- The books. It attempts at trying to
| "facilitate" or "drive away" your current mood by recommending
| books. Most people can't read books because they have an
| attention problem. Also imagine someone who does read them, and
| decide to pick up a book reminiscing about the youth just because
| he felt nostalgic at a particular moment in their life. What's
| next? How's he to find the drive to actually finish what he
| starts? If someone's emotionally pretty turbulent, what happens
| if he keeps starting new books and can't finish any, leading to
| feel a certain dread when coming back to the reading table
| because of all the unfinished quotas he has. This kind of feature
| will go well with someone more like Blinkist or Deepstash in my
| opinion with overall summary and immediate conclusion available.
| Then if the user likes the content at a glance, that would be the
| fuel they need to actually complete a book after they pick it up.
| Still, a cool project. I do read a lot and I'd probably pick some
| book recommendations as well.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| >Most people can't read books because they have an attention
| problem.
|
| huh?
| gnrlst wrote:
| Mood is too coarse of a filter - I have a _feeling_ in mind that
| I want the book to help me amplify, not an overall mood. E.g.
| feeling adventurous vs. "excited".
| lifefeed wrote:
| I'm enjoying this. But a book is big time investment, I'd love to
| see short stories here.
| Finnucane wrote:
| >18 moods to explore
|
| Examining the schedule for January 3, 1992, he saw that a
| businesslike professional attitude was called for. "If I dial by
| schedule," he said warily, "will you agree to also?" He waited,
| canny enough not to commit himself until his wife had agreed to
| follow suit. "My schedule for today lists a six-hour self-
| accusatory depression," Iran said. "What? Why did you schedule
| that?" It defeated the whole purpose of the mood organ. "I didn't
| even know you could set it for that," he said gloomily.
| ShitHNDorksSay wrote:
| Awwwww! You made an(other) APP! That's sooooo coool!
| whereismyacc wrote:
| I appreciate this but I think a mood is too fleeting for the time
| commitment of a book?
|
| The site itself is very nice.
| Dansvidania wrote:
| came here just to say this. How fast are you people reading? :D
| rosalindlee wrote:
| I love it!
| marzetti wrote:
| Just tried 'lonely' and it returned Olivia Laing's The Lonely
| City, which I read a few years ago and loved... I'm now going to
| read it again.. thanks!
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