Web 2.0 Meets The Lazy Reader

People are lazy. It's a universal truth that one new Web 2.0 app is trying to capitalize on.  LazyLibrary is a recently launched "web service" that promises to deliver books to online readers that are never longer than 200 pages. 

That's right, if a book is longer than 200 pages, it won't make it into LazyLibrary's searchable database. I appreciate the concept that people are too busy to read, but this site seems to promote limited literacy at best.  They use Steve Martin's short novel "Shopgirl " as an example of a well written short book, and it is, but by limiting book length you risk losing out on other books that may miss the mark by just a few pages.

LazyLibrary offers the user a searchable database of short books, both fiction and non-fiction.That brings us to the aspect of LazyLibrary that makes it one of the more useless Web 2.0 apps I've seen: that's all it does. It brings you to a list of books matching your search criteria, which all have a photo of the book cover, an author name, a price and a link to buy the book from other web sites, like Amazon.

I wanted to write the creators of LazyLibrary to ask how exactly they thought this was a service anyone wanted or needed, but another glaring omission from their site is a contact page.  It seems they are at least somewhat aware that this so-called service is little more than a poor excuse for affiliate income glossed over with a fancy Web 2.0 "look" and a listing in a "new Web 2.0 apps" feed or two. 

I give LazyLibrary kudos for an attractive, slim Web 2.0 design and the simplest user interface I've seen yet.  But they lose all credibility by offering nothing more than affiliate links to short books.  There is no substance to this Web 2.0 pretender.