Nice viewpoint, though I can't agree with this part.
“If I’m reading a truly, actively bad book, I’ll throw it out,” he says. His wife will protest, but he points out that he’s doing a public service: “If I don’t throw it out, someone else might read it.” If that person is one of the many committed to finishing a book once started, he’s actually doing harm.
Sell the book or donate it to a public library. That way you get some of your money back and if the book is no good this will, over time, be reflected in its price on the second-hand market. Simply discarding it will actually raise it's price and thereby distorting the market through raising it's price and thus it's suggested value.
What I do with books that are no good but worthless to sell as their price in the low single digits, I put them in a moderately frequented area with a note saying "take me home!". Then I don't feel guilty about throwing away a perfectly good book, donating crap to a library and I don't waste my time with inefficient ways to earn money. Oh and I get a nice warm feeling knowing that someone has the satisfaction of getting a book he or she wants for free or this person gets enjoyment from throwing a bad book in the trash.
I've just finished my finals, and, after six years of college, I am faced with this fact: I have accumulated one heck of a lot of books, most of which I haven't read yet.
An app, or at the very least an algorythm, on how to manage them, make a reading list, and go about reading them, is something I really wish for, but I have no idea how to approach this problem in a time-efficient, productive way, and I wouldn't want to reinvent the wheel.
Do any of you have the same problem? What are your solutions?
The main post will be gradually updated and amended as the discussion progresses.
EDIT: For Mac Users, it appears that Delicious Library is a great solution. While looking for alternatives, I found this web app, libib, which seems very promising.
EDIT 2: I've spent most of the day cataloguing all of my stuff on libib, which is incredibly efficient... as long as the ISBN is readily-recognized. This doesn't work so well with rarer books and older books, but they're a small enough minority that I can delcare a smashing success.