Book title management with LibraryThing or Calibre? (= Online or Local?)

[halloleo]

I have some of the book titles I have read recorded in the online management tool LibraryThing.

Some other book titles I have in my local book database Calibre.

I do not care about the content convert features of Calibre. For me it is mainly a book title database. Similarly with LibraryThing: I don't bother about the social features. In both cases I use the tool only to store and browse my own book titles and look at my attached metadata like my reviews and the dates when I read the book.

Now I want to consolidate these two lists and go only with one of these tools forward. What makes more sense: Online or local?

[Terisa de morgan]

It depends. For me, local, as I think my HDDs and backup copies will last more than some sites (sadly), but in the end it's a personal decision.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by halloleo

Now I want to consolidate these two lists and go only with one of these tools forward. What makes more sense: Online or local?

Local.
It's impossible to assure a service will exist tomorrow or that you always have Internet. Also you can be arbitrarily banned from a site. For instance people have lost access to their Kindle Library on Amazon because Amazon decided to many physical items returned and closed the account. Passing note to random Kindle users: Do download to PC and remove DRM.

I've had server and disc fails locally in last 30 years, but only lost one file (1994 and misplaced floppy before backup*). I've 35 yo floppies, 30 yo video tapes and 20+ yo HDDs that are still readable.

Our fibre was down for two weeks (badly done connection in street), though fortunately I still had a microwave link. Mobile/Cell Internent access is unreliable.

Also privacy and security as well as up time. Major data centres have had poorer up time than my own computing in last 30 years, even including local power cuts, though laptops have a built in UPS

Edit:
[* Ironically the only Fan-Fic I ever wrote; it was for my son. I've older 5.25" floppies but no working 1.2M drive currently]

[halloleo]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Local.
It's impossible to assure a service will exist tomorrow or that you always have Internet.[...]

Good point! One argument against it appears in the following scenario: You are out and about on a weekend trip. In an unexpected discussion with a friend you want to check when you have read "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". With LibraryThing you can check easily; with Calibre you would need to expose your local Calibre server to the internet which due to my limited server security knowledge I'm not dare enough to do.

[BetterRed]

For me its local calibre libraries, csv catalogues on my phone and Surface Go.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by halloleo

Good point! One argument against it appears in the following scenario: You are out and about on a weekend trip. In an unexpected discussion with a friend you want to check when you have read "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". With LibraryThing you can check easily; with Calibre you would need to expose your local Calibre server to the internet which due to my limited server security knowledge I'm not dare enough to do.

As BetterRed said, for checking something outside your home you can create a calibre catalog in various formats and sideload/email/send via a cloud server to your phone.

I also keep my libraries local in Calibre + backup copies in Dropbox and on external drives.

[halloleo]

@Sirtel, @BetterRed, @Quoth and @Terisa de morgan Thank you for your perspectives. All very good to keep in mind.

I'll post here, what I'll do.