When i tell you i felt this quote in my bones:

From the viewpoint of a private property economy, the “gift” is deemed to be “free” because we obtain it free of charge, at no cost. But in the gift economy, gifts are not free. The essence of the gift is that it creates a set of relationships. The currency of a gift economy is, at its root, reciprocity. In Western thinking, private land is understood to be a “bundle of rights,” whereas in a gift economy property has a “bundle of responsibilities” attached.

Because the book is speaking from the perspective of tangible objects/physical property right now, but it feels so, so relevant to community spaces/platforms too. Like with PB: the commitment the founders have to remaining independent and never touching ads or venture capital, the personal sacrifices they’ve made in order to make Pagebound a reality—even though nobody has to pay to be here or access the site, this is not nothing. it is not "free". It’s a gift from the founders to us, and just like any other gift, there is a bundle of responsibilities between both parties.

And personally, as someone who has been through the gauntlet of online community spaces revolving around my interests (with most of them failing or causing me to burn out in some fashion or the other), this thinking just resonates so, so much with me. Isn’t the idea of it just wonderful? To really, genuinely put your faith in something, and have that faith be returned tenfold?

Hello everyone!! Since taking over this quest a few weeks ago, I've made a number of new additions. Moving forward, I want to be more intentional about how I space out these additions so as not to overwhelm you all with notifications and more books to read. Given the nature of this quest, compared to other main quests, there aren't really "new releases" that I'm gathering to add over time (other main quests are intentionally created with a lower number of books so as to be added to over time and remain relevant and interesting! This doesn't quite apply in the same way to Classics quests since...well...they're focused on classics😅).

Main quests are capped at 100 books and I already have a list of classics to add that will get the quest to this number (special thanks to @mariangello, @CarnuSaga, and other users who made recommendations for helping me curate this---in my opinion---well-rounded list!).

So, what I want to know from you is, how would you like to see new additions to this quest spaced out? From my understanding, other main quests owners typically add a couple new books every couple months or so (but, of course, everyone goes about this slightly differently!). If I were to add 3 or 4 books every other month, I would be making new additions to this quest through August 2028. Alternatively, if I added 3 or 4 books every other week, this quest would be full by the end of the year (that is a lot of books in a relatively short timeframe, but given that I already have a pretty set list of books to add, I wanted to see what y'all would think about this). Another alternative would be to space it out even more, such as ~2 books every other month.

Personally, in the specific context of a Classics quest, I'd rather have a full and set quest than just be waiting years for additions that have been published for 100 years, ya know? That might just be me, though! I don't want to overwhelm you all with additions and notifications, so please let me know what your opinions are on this, if you have any!

[Posted 23 June 2026]

hi everyone,

i saw @vulpix post about if you could design your own avatar, what would it be? it got me thinking that it would be really cool if pagebound had an art contest a few times a year for people to create their own avatars and the community could vote on the top 5, or something like that. the contests could have an overarching theme or specific thing to draw, or just be a free-for-all! i think PB is really about community and getting all of us involved in different ways, so i think this would be a cool and new way to do that :)) i would love to hear everyone’s thoughts on this!

I can't think of a more English gentlemen thing to do than call yourself a magician when actually all you do is sit around with your friends and discuss a handful of magicians from >200 years ago. This whole concept is so funny to me.

why is valentina literally just susan from HR i cannot lmao