Mooches per day doubles suddenly
September 4, 2007
I don’t yet know what to make of this, but the mooches per day has doubled for 3 of the past 4 days. It’s too soon to see if it’s a trend, but this is a HUGE amount more usage of BookMooch, all of a sudden.
We were coasting at 1000 book mooches per day for a long time, went to 1600/day when I sped the server up two weeks ago, and now usage is way, way up. Maybe it’s the school year starting?
(sorry about the long flat line in the chart above, that’s when the statistics collector wasn’t working)
And here is the past few days of detail, zoomed in:
If this keeps up, that would mean 90,000 books exchanged per month!
BookMooch Blog 
It would be interesting to see if certain books that were previously available in inventories suddenly got snapped up during this peak (to support your back to school theory). For example, was there a run on “A Tale of Two Cities” or something like that? What about textbooks? It would be really interesting to see most mooched books for a given time-period.
As a Mom, I waited until I had our current required reading list, then I listed the reading books from past school years yesterday: two were snapped up immediately.
I sent out 5 books on Thursday and I have 6 more to send now too. I thought it was because I had just gotten back from vacation. Maybe that has something to do with it – everyone’s vacation ended and all those books read poolside need new homes.
Probably has something to do with the school year starting. I’m an English major and I looked up all of my required texts on here before going out and buying them and I managed to find a few to mooch. I’m sure I’m not the only one doing this.
Well I know my requests have really spiked,
People coming home from travels, school starting, the speed increase, and the ever growing popularity of Bookmooch could all be factors!
As recent discussions in the forum attest, delays seem to have increased too, so lets all be patient with our fellow moochers as some are not accustomed to sending so many books.
Mark W
I hadn’t thought about the back to school, but I do know I wish I had know about bookmooch prior to getting my fall textbooks. Here I thought the rise was just because I was new and listing my inventory at about 100 books a day!(kidding)
Women’s World magazine did a small info ad about 2 weeks ago. This could be a very good reason for the recent upswing of book mooching. I know thats how I found out about it.
Completely away from the theories – this gave me a laugh because I first read John’s heading as 3000 “smooches” a month – ha, I need coffee 🙂
Has anyone else found it more difficult to access this site lately? It has really slowed down a lot for me – but maybe it is just my server/connection?
I’m not sure what to make of it either, but woohoo! (Sorry, I’m a HUGE BookMooch fan…got a little excited there…) I just sent out 29 books in the last week or so and have 9 more to go, so I’m definitely seeing a spike of activity just with my inventory alone. Maybe the BookMooch cards have something to do with it??
That’s awesome! I certainly think it has something to do with the school year starting… I almost didn’t even list my textbooks because I didn’t think anyone would mooch them, but I’ve had four mooched already!
I just read about book mooch in a national woman’s magazine. That could have attracted a lot of people at once. It sure is fun! It would be nice if we could trade cds and dvds too!
Mooch on Y’all!
Rosemite
i found out about bookmooch through the womans world magazine the other week. I immediatly joined and liked it so much i recommended it to the people on my myspace and live journal. ive gotten at least 2 people that i know of so far that have already joined. I love bookmooch!
I saw bookmooch featured in a national magazine and that’s how I discovered this awesome community of book lovers!
Has the increase in mooching corresponded with an increase in new members?
That’s wonderful! And it explains why BookMooch has been so slow again for the last couple of days.
-Taneli T
I’ve had a large increase in mooches in the past few days–and only a couple new books.
I’ve been mooching a lot too, though. 🙂
I know for a fact, that a small article in Woman’s World Weekly about Book Mooch was just ran in a recent issue. I’m sure this had something to do with a recent “jump” in mooches. That’s how I found out about this site myself.
I am situated in Australia and I have noticed a slow down of pages loading mid mornings which probably is due to the time difference with the United States?? I have recently joined Bookmooch and in the past week I have introduced four new members and with that thought…….. Just imagine the increase if each member introduced even one person…….whoa!!!
Hi
Here’s an anecdote: I heard about bookmooch in a magazine I get called Vegetarian Times. I read about it and sent out an e-mail to all my friends who like to read. We all know how exponentially these e-mails are passed along… just a thought.
An article appeared in the Australian reades digest about two months ago and that’s where i saw it. It would be interesting to see a country by country analysis to see if the increase is world wide.
I have just sent out another five books today.. I absolutely love this site and recommend it often. I enjoy chick lit books and have found many books on here that you do not find in our local bookstores!
Ah, okay then, the WWW article (like the IWW but without the socialism? 🙂 helps explain part of it then — I was was just noticing that almost all my new moochers were women, good to know why!
I have been telling all of my friends about this site since I read about it in Woman’s World magazine. Perhaps as more people discover it and use it, the mooches go up! I love this site. I have been telling EVERYONE. 🙂
I just sent out 16 books at once. The most I’ve carried to the post office at once so far has been about 5. Being that I have a postage budget; I had to delay sending them out to let my budget catch up with my requests.There are alot of reasons for the spike. But, as I’ve always believed; Word of mouth is the most powerful form of advertising. News articles help, yes. But it is the members themselves who are getting the word out at such a rate. Why? Because everybody knows that when you have a good thing; it is our nature to want to share it with others!
So are users of the WWW Webblies then? 🙂
Kirk
I would have to agree with the advertising theory… I’d never heard of Book Mooch until my mother called and said she’d seen an article on it in a magazine.
Since I found book mooch last month, I have told dozens of people! I tell EVERYONE about bookmooch! This is such a wonderful idea how could it NOT catch on! I think word of mouth is always the best spreader of good news! I do wish there was a way to weed out the “possibly innactive” accounts!
This is the best, I’ve used nearly all my cards especially in Ebay items I send out. I spread the word wherever I can and I travel a lot so it’s going all over Europe.
The Vancouver public library is closed due to a strike, and I’ve suddenly started mooching like crazy as I’m out of stuff to read. I’ve been mentioning the site to a lot of people, both local and far away.
How do you obtain Bookmooch cards to send out?
I’ve been “guilty” of putting Bookmooch cards in with a select few of my Amazon sales ~ just the ones I think would enjoy BM ~ and recently ran out of the 800 or so cards. John, if you want to set me up again, I’ll keep spreading the word to my customers.
some of my books have been mooched more often lately also. I have been telling people about bookmooch also. thanks
I believe it was listed in Woman’s World!
I read about bookmooch.com in a magazine very recently and then I logged on and joined. Maybe more publicity??
I think bookmooch.com is AWESOME!
I wonder if people are starting to do more over here because Paperbackswap has started implementing fees?
I have started mooching more because more of my wishlist books are on here. I was doing frugal reader for a long time, and now I just have a ton of credits on there unused, as the books I want to read to not seem to be posted on there, they are posted here. I wonder if others are experiencing the same things.
I did not get a notice about fees on paperbackswap . . . hmmm . . . I could not find anything on their web site either?
I read about it in a magazine…….just recently received a Rick Steeves book I needed. I’m telling my kids about this site …it’s GREAT!!
I’ve been on Bookmooch for about a month now, and I’ve happiiy sent out 5 books. Several books from my wishlist have become available, but I never seemed to be on email at the right moment, and therefore haven’t “won” the mooches (and I’m on email a lot). Has there ever been consideration given to sending the available email first to members with a high sent/mooch ratio, and others 24 hours after that ? It’s a little frustrating to give and give and not be able to receive.
I learned about the website from a friend. I love it. I have tons more books to put on the site. I’m a working mom with three kids, if I tuck a book in my purse, then when I am waiting to pick up my kids from the various activities they are in, I pop out my book. I work at a post office so it it very easy for me to send the books. I didn’t know which books to put on the site. I have tons of children’s books, I didn’t know ya”all wanted them.
I learned about bookmooch from a small article in Woman’s World magazine. Maybe that is what caused a mooching explosion!! =)
My last mooch sent me some cards and I’ve been passing them out to my reading friends. I’ve been a member for awhile now and love it. I’m in a slump right now as far as sending books goes. Guess I’ll have to dig around in my attic for more boxes of books!
Love the idea of trading CD’s and DVD’s. Where
can I get Bookmooch cards?