Idea: Amazon Book Search by Book Cover Image

Ever tried to recall the name of a book, but absolutely can't do it? The best you can think of is "well, the book was red...and the name was really big and gold"? The problem is actually not that rare.

My solution to this? Amazon Book Search by Book Cover Image

Here's how it works: you start to doodle a rough version on the book, and Amazon returns with all the book covers that mildly resemble your sketch.

Something similar was created for Flickr in 2006 called Retrievr. Check it out:


Success-ish!

Amazon has a bajillion book cover images in its system thanks to the ability for customers to add their own covers in addition to its own collection. In fact, Amazon's constantly innovative search and referral methods has influenced their overwhelming success.

If Retrivr could do it in 2006, Amazon can do it now. And perhaps better, especially as image search technology improves (as evidenced by Google's new project called Similar Image Search, which is super rad).

Weird: Tag Cloud from Amazon

I stumbled upon this buried in my Amazon account and realized that this actually accurately describes all of my interests in one pretty little box. Thanks for being a creep, Amazon. Let's hope I like the next book Mr. A recommends.

Okay the Military one is weird, but that's apparently because of Julius Caesar, The Atlas of the Real World, and 1491. Fair enough.