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Just in time for the holidays, I’m releasing a much requested feature here at Bokardo:

Social Design Reading List

Over the past few months, lots of folks have asked me for a social design reading list. I started putting one together a while back, but it’s a lot more work than I originally anticipated. It’s hard to put together a decent list of books on a subject that doesn’t quite exist while also keeping that list to books you’re familiar with while also making sure those books are good.

As you browse the reading list, you’ll notice a few things. One is that almost all the books are soft-cover and relatively inexpensive ($10-$20). I tried to include easy-to-read books that you can take with you while traveling or actually hold up in bed. Second, you’ll notice there are only a few books on social theory and design. That’s because there just aren’t that many! I have included a lot of other web & interface design/development books I have found value in, so this isn’t exclusively a social design reading list. And, of course, people building social web applications have to do all the other parts of design as well.

If you do know of some books that should be added to the list, please let me know either in the comments or by contacting me. So far I’ve kept the list to books that I know and have read (at least parts of all of them). I’m sure there are others, but I didn’t want to include all books about social media, I only wanted to include the very best ones.

Why did I do this as an Amazon astore?

I’ve never had advertising on Bokardo, and I am hoping to keep it that way. Your attention is precious, and I don’t want to change the motivations for which I post. If I was taking money from advertisers then my motivations would change, however slightly, to increase the frequency of posting and the number of clicks I could send the advertiser’s way. That’s not the relationship I want with either my readers or an advertiser. I believe that a writer should write when they have something to say…not because they need to keep advertiser’s happy.

Putting up an astore is a good compromise, I think. It provides value in the form of a reading list, and in exchange for sending customers to Amazon I get a small referral fee (~4%). To you, the book buyer, the experience is the exact same as if you went to Amazon directly. The same security, the same prices, the same everything. You can even have access to your wish list, which I find pretty cool. In no way do I know who you are or any details of your Amazon account. The transaction is completely opaque to me, even though it says “Bokardo Store” at the top of the page.

For those of you who are fans of NPR, this is the same Amazon referral program they use. And, like NPR, if you end up purchasing other things (like Holiday gifts) at Amazon after starting out in the reading list, I may get a referral fee for those as well. So every purchase that starts out on the reading list helps support Bokardo.

Going forward, you’ll see the reading list in the columns on the right side of Bokardo. I’ll be updating it regularly as I read more books and new books come onto the market.

Let me know what you think. Enjoy the reading list!