Bad Suggestions

In an early post on this blog, I sang the praises of LibraryThing.  I’ve continued to use the site, and have been only increasingly pleased with the return on my twenty-five dollar investment in a lifetime unlimited membership.  A recent whimsical addition to the site is the UnSuggester.

With this new tool, you can look up a book and see which books are conspicuously absent from the shelves of LT users who own the book you are researching.  In other words, if you love The Mists of Avalon, you will not like Desiring God!  I’ve decided to put the UnSuggester to the test.  Results and commentary follow.  

First, a couple of books I read earlier this year, own, and have entered into LT (the six books whose unsuggestions are discussed are linked to their UnSuggester results – these results will change as LT’s database grows; discussion is based on unsuggestions returned on November 16, 2006):

At Swim-Two-Birds by Flann O’Brien - The top unsuggestions for O’Brien’s novel are filled with popular Christian books (e.g., The Purpose Driven Life, Wild at Heart, Blue Like Jazz), chicklit (e.g., many Shopaholic novels), and popfic – primarily by Stephen King.  I’ve read only two of the top twenty unsuggestions, and they come in at numbers nineteen and twenty.  One thing I note by looking further down the list is that a single person can dramatically modify the unsuggestions.  For example, I own Knowing God and Calvin’s Institutes.  These are the number thirty-one and fifty-nine unsuggestions respectively.  However, in both cases, I am the only LT user who also owns At Swim-Two-Birds.  If I did not own the books by Packer and Calvin, they would both be in the top ten unsuggestions for the O’Brien.  So, it appears that readers of postmodern Irish experimental litfic do not often crossover into chicklit, Stephen King, Christian self-help, and, bookpress excluded, theology.

Exegetical Fallacies by D. A. Carson – UnSuggestions for this work by Carson include a huge number of books by Terry Pratchett, who I believe is a fantasy author.  There is also a fair amount of litfic in the list.  Neither of these is unsurprising given that Carson’s work appears to be aimed at seminary students. 

Next, a couple of books I purchased but have not received or entered into LT:

 The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu - Many of the unsuggestions for Genji are works of Christian theology.  Among the ones that I own are Desiring God (unsuggestion number one), Grudem’s Systematic Theology (number three), and Tozer’s Pursuit of God (number five).  Knowing God, Don’t Waste Your Life, and Calvin’s Institutes are also in the top fifteen.  Chicklit and popfic are a couple of the other genres well represented in these unsuggestions.  Of course, many of these theological unsuggestions will sink when my copy of Genji arrives and is added to LT. 

Whose Bible is it? by Jaroslav Pelikan – A lot of fantasy and other fiction (including some cyberpunk and chicklit) returned as the unsuggestions here.  It does seem from the results here and above that fantasy readers steer clear of religious works, particularly Christian ones, and vice versa.

Finally, a couple of books I have read, but do not own and have therefore not entered into LT:

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers – The unsuggestions for this novel are almost exclusively works of Christian theology and Christian living.  They includes works by Sproul, Piper, Stott, Spurgeon, Vos, Bruce, MacArthur, Baxter, Schaeffer, and more.  My theory is that this novel, as one of the most popular on LT, is owned by so many people, that the unsuggestions are drawn from a somewhat isolated subgroup of libraries that share little in common with other LT users.  This, perhaps naturally, yields many seminarians (the top unsuggestions also include two greek new testaments; this seems to support my conclusion).

Foxe’s Book of Martyrs by John Foxe – Cyberpunk, fantasy, and chicklit.  All expected results given the results of the earlier books.

The UnSuggester is fun to play with, but the results become a bit predictable with time.  It will be interesting though to see the results change (or not) as LT continues to add users and books.  I promise to do my part to bring litfic and theology closer together!

The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism by John C. Bogle

John Bogle, founder and former CEO of the Vanguard Group of mutual funds, is perhaps ideally situated to criticize the problems in present day American capitalism.  In The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism, he moves past the common criticisms and argues for a return to “owner’s capitalism” from the “manager’s capitalism” that we know today.

In the first section, Corporate America, Bogle focuses on the legal and ethical failings so frequently in the news.  Enron and Worldcom are only the best known examples of an overemphasis on stock price rather than value.  While not all corporations are driven to deception, many if not most are not intending or accomplishing that which is in the best interest of the company.  One example of this agency problem is outrageous executive compensation.  Bogle points the way toward reform through more independent boards and voting of shares.

In the next section, Investment America, Bogle turns his attention to the domination of the stock market by huge financial institutions.  In this landscape, Bogle notes that the interests of individual shareholders are ignored as institutional investors cede their power to the corporate managers.  Two primary causes that Bogle identifies are conflicts of interest in intermediation and an overemphasis on the short term.  Suggestions for reform include a renewed dedication to dividends, and tax and dividend incentives to encourage long term investment.  In addition, Bogle favors increased investor access to corporate proxies and severe restrictions on option grants.

The final major section of the book, Mutual Fund America, addresses the structure of the mutual fund industry part of the problem.  As a rule, huge percentages of stock profits go to fund managers rather than stock owners.  And these percentages seem to not enjoy economies of scale, though they should.  Here Bogle tracks the decline of the mutual fund industry from a profession to a business. 

He also focuses on what he calls the “magic of compounding returns” versus the “tyranny of compounding costs.”  In a few eye-opening pages, Bogle demonstrates that funds often siphon in fees a high enough percentage to “essentially preclude[] not only superior returns but even mediocre returns . . . .”  Bogle states that these costs can take “three-quarters of the return that an investor could otherwise earn over an investment lifetime simply by buying and holding the entire stock market.”

Despite the grossly overstated title, Bogle’s book may be useful to others, like me, beginning to consider investment strategies.  It should also be useful to those who run public corporations and mutual funds – if they will take Bogle seriously and heed his warnings.