Keystrokes :.

Last week, after the suggestion of a colleague, I bought a book. Now it’s the case that I found this book interesting and that I want to share it with a friend. Rather than a simple suggestion, since christmas is approaching, it looks like a nice idea for a gift. But wait, I had to order the book, and I don’t want to order (and wait for) another copy again.. I could give away mine, but I also like collecting books I read. So, thinking about this issue on the bus, I decided to make an experiment: I’ll sketch a table on the first blank page with my name in the first row and the name of my friend in the following. And then, why not adding some other lines? I’ll link this post for the people whose names will end up in the table, to read the rules of what i’m going to call …

1. Please, treat this book with care.
2. If you had this book as a gift, your name should figure in the table, in the last non-blank row.
3. If your name is not there, write it in the first blank row available.
4. When you finish the book, mark the second column if you liked the book.
5. When you finish the book, if there are still blank rows in the table, you are going to pass the book to someone else: choose one of your friends that doesn’t know any of the people listed in the table. Then write his/her name in the first blank row available, and give him/her the book as a gift, asking to follow these rules.
6. When you finish the book, if there are no more blank rows in the table, return the book to its original owner, that figure in the first row of the table. Contact information are there for this purpose.

So now, how many rows should be on the table? I guess a random number lower than 10 should be a nice tradeoff between the number of people that will get the book and the time in which theoretically it could return to its owner. I think i’ll start this experiment on christmas, giving the book as a present: it will not ruin the surprise, since my non-IT-nerd friends don’t usually read this mostly-IT-related blog, but just to be sure i’ll delay publishing this post till xmas . I’m looking forward to see if this book will ever come back and who will read it before of that. I’m sure that many tried something like this before, but I didn’t find anything during a 46-seconds google search on that. So here it is, who will live will see.

Cheers!