Bookcrossing: Let your old books go and make them travel the world!

We all love our good old books, however, it comes a time when you don’t want to read them anymore, so you put them on your bookshelf and never touch them again, which is pretty sad. Luckily for you, we at BlookUp are going to tell you about a nice way of getting rid of your dusty pile of books!

The name is BookCrossing, it is website that allows you to let go of your old books and make them travel! The process is pretty simple: You first need to label the book you want to “set free” and register it on the website using the BookCrossingID written on the said label. Afterwards, all you have to do is leaving it somewhere you know it will be picked up, it could be at your local café, a table or a bench outside at a park….be creative! Once you get back home, saddened by the loss of your old book, you can keep an eye on it by entering the book’s BCID.

What a lovely BookCrossing house! Photo by Leisha Camden on Pinterest.

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If you don’t feel like releasing your book into the wild you can join on of the BookCrossing’s forums, tweet using #bookcrossing or directly  @BookCrossing to let the fellow bookcrossers know about your book!

The person who will pick up your book can type this code on the website and mark your book as officially “picked up”. Your book’s journey starts here! If one day you stumble upon a book that shouldn’t be here for any reason whatsoever, keep it mind that it is probably traveling the world just like your old book is so watch out for the BookCrossing labels!

 

Don’t forget to join the BookCrossing community:

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Source and credits

Turn your blog into a book with BlookUp!

Are you part of the 250 million people who own a blog all around the world ? Whether you blog for fun or make a living out of it, BlookUp gives you the opportunity to turn your blog into an actual paper book.

Make your own blook and join the 12 000 other bloggers who did the same before you!

Printing your blog? But…why? There are a lot of reasons why you should print your blog, here are the main ones.

reading-book-computer

1 – First and foremost, to protect your content

As seen in the news recently, nobody’s safe from a bug that would ultimately delete our blogs.

Unfortunately, we cannot predict what will become of our blogs in the next 5, 10 or 20 years. By then, it is likely that a lot of data will disappear.

2 – There is nothing like a book.

There is something exhilarating in holding the result of countless hours of writing, you should try!

 Once you will receive your blook, you will experience the feeling of flipping through the pages full of articles and pictures, feel the authenticity of the paper under your fingertips and you will ask yourself. “How come I didn’t make my blook earlier?”.

3 -It adds extra value to your work

Printing a blog allows its author to experience it on another perspective.

Very few are those who take the time to dive into their archives full of old pictures, stories and memories.

You will realize what a year, or even a lifetime worth of writing looks like. 

With a book, you see your content in a new light, rediscover your articles and relive your best moments in pictures!

You add something truly unique to your work when you make a book, something that makes you proud and arouses admiration of others. Because making the book of your blog is a unique experience, after all, you are making YOUR book.

Making your blook is a creative process, the bloggers who decide to make theirs customize the cover and page layout thus bringing to life what used to be a digital object and turning it into a  book everyone can share and enjoy. 

The result of this process is truly priceless ! Because blogs are often personal, they are about families and friends, they require a lot of time and dedication to put into them, whether it be for the writing, posting on social media, or even interact with the readers.

The more the authors put time into their blog, the more they want to keep a written record of it. In a world where everything tends to be over-digitized and the content ephemeral, there is something truly special and almost relieving in putting aside the internet for a while and immortalizing your blog in the form of a book.

4 – It is the best way to keep it close to you!

There is nothing like a book to read through your blog posts again and again, sharing anecdotes and remembering some events. All while being comfortably seated on your couch! Say what you want about tablets, kindles and laptops, but nothing matches the authentic experience of a book…plus it is waaay more convivial!

5 – You can share it with the people close to you!

Share your blook or offer a copy to your relatives and your friends and see how they experience your blog page after page. Everything is real and authentic, they will be holding in their bare hands the result of your work and it is more pleasant than having to read the articles on a computer screen.  Also, remember that not everyone in your family (take your parents or grand parents as an example) is comfortable with using devices like a tablet or a laptop, and for them what you call “blogging” is something they might not understand. Luckily for them, BlookUp has THE solution: offering them a printed copy of your blog!

6 – You can sell it!

Your book can have a real monetary value if the content you wrote interests other people. BlookUp, gives you the possibility to make your blook “public”, this way it will appear on the BlookshopYou can sell it at the price you want and tell you friend to check it out on BlookUp and order it online! Who knows, this might be the beginning of your career as a writer that just started!

What will my book look like?

Electric blue paper-wrapped bookWith BlookUp you can make all kinds of books. Here are some tips to help you getting started:

First you have to create your blook by choosing among all the platform the one you want to import your blog from and selecting your favorite articles, or by defining a time period (“Articles from 2016…”  or a theme. You can also choose to only keep the pictures and make an album or remove all of them. Here are all the different formats and platforms you can choose from:

  • 15×15 cm (Instagram only)
  • 15×21 cm and 20×27 cm (blog book formats)
  • 15×14,8 cm and 21×29,7 cm  (PDF only)
  • 19×26 cm (Facebook only)

You  can order a single book if you want to! You can print as many books as you want and benefit from an excellent manufacturing quality thanks to on-demand digital printing. 

Print the books of your Facebook and Instagram!

blook-facebook-first-pageIf you do not own a blog you can always print a book out of your Facebook page or Instagram. Nowadays people like to share everything they do on social media. And while we tend to create more and more content online, BlookUp  takes it the other way around by Immortalizing your digital content in form of paper books.

The Facebook book is available in an exclusive format (20×26 cm) and lets you choose between 2 different layouts (2 or 3 columns). You can choose a time period over which you want to import your content from. BlookUp automatically imports all the content you published on your Facebook page  automatiquement tout le contenu publié sur votre compte Facebook (statuses, photos videos, places you visited, comments…) then you can choose the types of content you want to appear on your blook as well as the number of comments.

That’s exactly the same with Instagram! You can choose the pictures you want to keep along with the time period. Your book will be printed in a 15×15 cm format.instagram-blook-opened-flowers

How can I create my book? Is it complicated?

You can start by importing your blog (Go ahead, you can do that for free!) by clicking on the platform you want to import content from. Then all you have to do is to register and go with the flow!

As we previously mentioned, you can customize your blook in a lot of different ways (Types of content, font, page layout, cover, etc…) Once you are happy with your book, you can order it and you will receive it within 15 business days.

They tried it and they loved it!

Grisélidis, founder of Yes We Blog.

griselidis-yesweblog

“You spend hours writing articles for your blog, taking pictures and editing them. But even though it is a thing in the digital world, you still can’t touch it. It’s not like a good old book you’d be reading at the parc. Having your blog on a book format adds another dimension to this little place of the internet that we love and take care of. I also think that it is a very cute and friendly way of sharing what we do with people who are not very familiar with web-related stuff. Believe it or not, but there are still quite a lot of people that are not so interested in the internet.”

Marion Legras, globetrotter and blogger

marion-legras-photo-blook

“Our blog contains all the 367 articles about the 19 countries we visited and more than five times as many pictures we wanted to keep in the form of a series of books dedicated to this dream come true. It was very important for us to keep a written record of our memories abroad, that all our writings and pictures will not be forever imprisoned behind a computer screen or lost somewhere inside a folder. These books allow us to dive into these wonderful memories at any moment and there is nothing that can match this feeling!”

Pauline Savary, author of “Pauline savary’s daily

pauline-savary-daily“It is an interesting project with a lot of advantages. Whoever is looking for a job and wants to keep a tangible record of his/her blog (assuming that the said blog is relevant for the job), easily readable and enhanced by the paper format and/or with exclusive content, will certainly be intrigued. Blookup will prove interesting to professional bloggers, fashion bloggers and photographers who are very focused on design and visuals. It is also a good idea to offer it a gift. As for the commercial aspect of the books, that remains to be seen…”

Sandra, nerdy mom, author of “Le blog d’une maman geekette

sandra-maman-geek

Blookup is a great way of keeping track and promoting your blog. It can be offered to your parents or grand parents and can also be an excellent memory for  wedding blogs.”

Print the book of your brand’s Facebook page!

Turn your brand’s Facebook page into a book with BlookUp!

As a Community manager or Social media manager, the role you play in the online communication of your brand, company or even association is central. Whether you operate within a communication agency or inside your own company, Facebook is a major tool that you use on a daily basis; which implies that you constantly need to keep track of what you do on the page.

That’s exactly what BlookUp offers you. Currently leading the book of blog market in both France and Europe, our platform now targets digital marketing and social media professionals/experts with a physical record allowing them to keep track of their company’s presence on Facebook.

A brand new way of promoting your company

Immortalize your interactions with your fans, your best events or marketing operations, your most popular photos and posts, keeping a written record of your work year after year or even surprise your collaborators, customers and partners by offering them the book of your company’s Facebook… For all these reasons, this product is made for you! BlookUp gives you the opportunity to get your hands on your company’s or brand’s own book. Because there is nothing like a book to record your interactions with your community and keep them close to you.

How does it work?

You can create your book in a few clicks: All you have to do is to sign in to BlookUp.com, choose a Facebook page for which you are the admin and the time span over which you want your book to be about. After having successfully imported the content, the book organizes all your posts, videos, photos, places visited as well as the comments on your page into an smooth layout. This layout remains customizable, which means you can select which type of content you want to keep, change the color of your theme, front and back covers and visualize the changes in real time.

All that’s left for you to do is ordering it online, the book will be shipped within 8 business days at the location of your choice.

What are you waiting for to print and get your hands on the book of your company’s Facebook page ?

 

Dogs and Humans finding trust and confidence by reading

We already know that reading for ourselves has several beneficial effects. Escaping to other universes brings us solace, discovering other cultures opens our mind, we can learn, imagine, travel, ease our mind.

 But we don’t often read to others and communicate those feelings. Thus making reading a solitary hobby and, above all, a very “human” hobby.

But can reading be used to both build confidence in children and help abandonned dogs to trust humans again?

This strange-sounding question is what started the Shelter Buddies Reading Program, created by the Humane Society of Missouri.

Helping Dogs Relax !

The idea is to ask children and young people (between 6 and 15 years-old) to volunteer at the shelter in order to practice their reading and public speaking skills by reading one (or more!) book(s) to lonely dogs waiting in their kennel.

They freely decide which book(s) to read and the dog they want to read it to, they sit in front of him or her and initiate the first contact.

Girl sitting on the floor reading to a dog

Jo Ellyn Klepacki, assistant director of the Missouri Humane Society explains that the goal of the program is to get the dogs to move from the back of the kennel to the front, as dogs staying near the front of their kennel get adopted more quickly than the others. Knowing this, it’s easy to understand how slowly adjusting them to the presence of kind humans can help them trust people again and find a new loving home faster.

Boy sitting on the floor reading to a dog

“We started this for two reasons”, Klepacki adds, “Dogs in a shelter environment exhibit a lot of signs of anxiety and show stress signals, so we wanted to do something to comfort them. We have a lot of children in our area who are really engaged and they ask, ‘How can I help?’” 

Children sitting in front of dog kennels reading to them

The program benefits both dogs and the young volunteers, who are able to practice their aloud-reading skills in a safe and nonjudgmental environment. Thus also helping to tame their fear of audiences. The shelter encourages them to generally interact with the dogs as well, by talking to them and by passing them treats if they make their way to the front of the glass.

The program is a success, and you can still become a Reading Buddy now if you want to help!

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Source – Photos credits: Humane Society of Missouri, abcnews and twistedsifter

Index Update: New fonts and Index Options

NEW FONTS TO PRINT YOUR BLOG!

A font board Your blog has its atmosphere, its personality, and its paper version must absolutely reflect it? After several weeks of testing and researching, we finally found the fonts you needed to make your blook more unique and extraordinary!

In addition to Arial and Times New Roman, choose THE font that will have the honor to represent the spirit of your blog among the 7 new proposed:

Economica, DejaVuSans, Lato, Free Serif, Noto Sans, Noto Serif and Courier New

QUESTIONING THE INDEX…

blook-example-table-of-contentsNot everyone needs a table of content in his or her blook, and we have been asked several times to make this feature optional, or to have the possibility to place the index at the beginning of the book instead of the end.

Weel, starting today, choose to keep your index or not, and to place it before or after your main content!choice-table-of-contents

Bookstore recycling,​ used books all around!

With World Book Day coming the day after tomorrow, there’s something that has to be said! Cultivating oneself is often expensive. Once you start stacking books in your arms, prices can add up very quickly without you noticing it until the very end!

Even if choosing the pocket format can help, accessing the book market at full price sadly isn’t for everyone. This is where the used books market comes in!

Recycle Bookstore is one of many actors of this market today, but started proposing used books over 40 years ago (1962)! Its concept is to sell thousands of books at low prices, from many different universes and about a lot of topics: Art, Science-Fiction, History, Science, classic literature, gardening…

campbell-recycle-bookstore

san-jose-recycle-bookstore

Campbell’s kid section (above) and San Jose’s Art, History and Photography section (below)

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The books proposed at the Bookstore  are donated or traded, so there’s always new ones to chose from.

Two bookstores are open, one in San Jose and one in Campbell (both in California), and both are pretty well-rated on Yelp! Of course, they propose different books on certain topics, but that’s one of the things that make those shops special!

What are the other things, will you ask?

Well, they also propose some DVDs and CDs, rare, signed or limited-edition books, friendly staff and… Cats.

recycle-bookstore-grey-cat

recycle-bookstore-ginger-cat

Those cuties aren’t for sale, but you can enjoy their company while you wander around and browse the shelves looking for your next literature treasure!

So if you happen to drop by San Jose or Campbell, and if you’re not allergic to cat fur, don’t forget to check out those awesome book stores!

How to keep your blooks longer: Update!

A more flexible archiving system!

a hand taking a book out of a digital library

Your feedback is always valuable to us and thanks to it, we understood that for our users, creating a blook project is a long-term project. The creation of a book is quick in itself, but the most important is its personalization: You want your blook to be unique, and we can only agree with that!

This personal touch, you want to be able to bring it at your own pace, without feeling rushed.

Thus, in order to avoid the loss of books carefully layouted by our users, our archiving system has been revised!

Non-Ordered Blooks

  • Will be deleted only the blooks that reached the 3 months (90 days) limit without being edited
  • Any modification (new cover, change of title, modified article, etc) will restart the 3 months period from the date of the modification
  • The date of last modification is displayed in the blook’s informations, alongside the creation date.

Ordered Blooks

  • Blooks ordered at least once are always kept for 3 years and are definitively deleted after this period if they have not been ordered again
  • Any new order of a blook will restart the 3 years period from the date of the last order
  • The date of the last order is displayed in the blook’s informations, alongside the creation date

How to save your already created book Click on the image to see what’s new in your account!

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We will continue to send an automatic mail 7 days before the suppression of the blooks in order to warn you of the remaining time and ask you to modify your book if you wish to keep it longer!

So if you have a blook project waiting on BlookUp, the time to save it is now!

The book of your Facebook: Choose your Content!

A few months ago, we asked you to share your thoughts about our new product, the book of Facebook, and your opinion really mattered to us!

Our inquiry pointed out that for our users, one of the main key points to a well-done Facebook book was to be able to select the types of content that truly reflected their social adventure. Today with BlookUp, you are the only one to decide what you want to keep from your profile, administrated page or favorite Fan page!

Are you a photography master? Choose to keep only your albums! Do you usually write long, motivating tirades? Choose to transform your publications into a book worthy of the name!

A book with Facebook content

How do I choose the contents I want?

Create a new blook or edit a Facebook book that you already began a few days / weeks / months ago. Then go to the 2nd step of the customization process!

Here you’ll find again the usual layout choices (2 or 3 columns). As well as the possibility to reduce your publication interval in order to better target your contents (within the interval that you already chose during Step 1) and the possibility to choose them properly!

choice-contents-fb-book

You can select one or more type·s of content, and decide whether to keep the index or not!

If you chose the option “Import Comment” in step 1 but are having second thoughts and rather remove them. You just have to set the “maximum comments” on 0.

Warning ! The maximum comments you can get depend on the popularity of the page or profile you are trying to import. You can therefore vary from blook to blook!

So, are you ready to personalize the book of your favorite social network with BlookUp?

Chose your best content!

And turn your Facebook experience into a beautiful paper book with 15% off thanks to the MARCHBLOOK coupon code, valid until 14/03/2017!

life-dog-blog-blook-melody-sofa

Interview: Melody, life with a dog and a blog!

This week, we have another diary-like blog to share, and we’re sure you will like it!

Melody lives her life with this blog to update, and an ADORABLE corgi dog to pet and care for. She talks every now and then about travels, fitness, or just her getting through life with amily and friends… And of course, her dog.

Life with a dog and a blog - Melody and Gatsby on the sofa again

The cutest couple ever reading their blook on the sofa!

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First, tell us about yourself ! You, your passions, your hobbies, your projects… 

Hi, I’m Melody Pendlebury and I am a really indecisive, mess of a person but I try my best. I am a senior at the University of North Florida as an Elementary Education major. It seems as if I’m ready to graduate and start my career, but honestly, I have a quarter life crisis daily. One thing that’s pretty unique about me is that I’m married. This is shocking to a lot of people because I do look like a 12 year old pretending to be an adult, but I’m actually still young but 22. Even though some people think this is the craziest thing in the world, I’m still a normal 22 year old person and a normal married person trapped into one body. Obviously I’m very passionate about my dog, hence the name of my blog. I am also very passionate about health and fitness. This doesn’t mean that I eat healthy all the time or have a rock hard body, because I like to keep life fun and try not to be too serious. This blog is my first attempt at writing something that I actually want people to read and I still get nervous about every article. I post. Futur projects that I you can expect to see in the future are probably going to be more exercise tutorials and recipes. I love writing about things that interest me and am hoping I’m writing about things that interest other people as well.

What is your blog about? Why? Do you have other blogs? If so, what do they talk about? 

I think my blog (https://lifewithadogandablog.com) is a little scattered brain. If I had to say what the main content of my blog was, it would probably be health and fitness. Other than that, I like to write about vacations I’ve taken, how I have saved money on various things, some lifestyle tips, all while trying to fit my dog into everything. This is the first blog that I have ever written other than my numerous diaries that I never let anyone read growing up. I hope to build and improve my content in the future.
Life with a dog and a blog - Melody and Gatsby rad their blook

“Remember that time when…” -“Oh no, you printed that too?”

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Why did you want to turn your blog ” life with a dog and a blog”  into a book?

in today’s world everything is digital. This isn’t a bad thing because hey, lets save the trees, but sometimes its nice to have a physical copy of something. Since this is the beginning of my first blog I thought it would be good to have something for me to read and show people and hopefully something I can use to reminisce in the future.

How did you find out about BlookUp? 

I found out about BlookUp because their blog followed my blog. I was curious about who they were and started to check them out. I loved how simple and accessible the website was and the the product was something I absolutely loved.

Life with a dog and a blog - Melody and Gatsby on the sofa

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What are the positive and negative points of the making of your blook? 

Making my blook was super easy. All I had to do was press a few buttons and bam, it was finished. The only negative things I could possibly think of about making my blook was that there was not a lot of templates to choose from. This could also be a positive as well because you don’t have to overthink it and you always come out with a beautiful blook.

Do you enjoy the final result? What does your family and friends think about your blook ” life with a dog and a blog “?

i LOVE the the final result! It was so cute and unique and it was awesome to see my blog come to life. My husband also loves my blook and insists that we keep it on the coffee table.

Life with a dog and a blog, cover

Yeah, that’s a geat coffee table decoration!

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Would you recommend BlookUp? 

I would definitely recommend BlookUp to anyone I meet. It is such a unique item and not only can you make your blog into a book, but also your social media!

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Thank you Melody for trying our solution, for answering our questions and for your article on your blog! And also, many thanks to Gatsby for posing with style!

For more pieces of life, more fitness and more dog, also follow Melody on: 

 Logo Facebook Logo Instagram Logo Youtube

Print the book of your Facebook Fan pages!

The book of your Facebook Fan Pages - John Lennon, U2, Charlie Chaplin, Marilyn Monroe

Well, you already knew that thanks to BlookUp you could print the book of your Facebook profile, of your Personal and professional Pages… But did you know that you can also print…

The book of your Fan pages!

Do you like John Lennon, U2 or Kanye West? Did you hit the “like” button or have you already subscribed to the Facebook page of Charlie Chaplin, the Dalai Lama or Kim Kardashian?

Quickly and easily import all the contents of your favorite Facebook fan page, its publications, photos, videos, comments… Everything you like about your favorite star!

The book of your Facebook Fan Pages - John Lennon

How to create and order your fan book?

It’s very simple, and we even updated our presentation to make the selection of your pages more enjoyable!
Select the time period you want, customize the content, theme color, front and back cover, check your final preview… You like the result? Order your book online and receive it within 15 working days to the address of your choice.

Imagine having the Facebook book of your favorite music group, your favorite star or commercial brand in your hand! Imagine surprising a relative or a friend by offering him/her the compilation of the best anecdotes of his/her favorite star: It’s possible now, thanks to BlookUp!

Transform the Facebook pages you love into a real collector’s book!

And enjoy 20% off your order with the VALENTINEBLOOK coupon code, valid until 02/13/2017 so you can enjoy it until Valentine’s Day!

So what Facebook fan page will you print the book?