discussion: why do shelfies get more attention than the average bookish photo?

recently, whilst on instagram, i was scrolling through some of the feeds of other book accounts and started to see a trend: every single picture of their shelves got nearly double, even sometimes triple the amount of likes they have on their other photos. same thing on tumblr, the shelfies often have more notes. why is that? well, thats what i'm here to discuss today.

so, the shelfie. a pretty picture of your bookshelf. you can find one on pretty much any book related account. each one is a unique shape and size, some with tons of books and some with just a few. what makes them so different from the average photo that they deserve more likes than, lets say, a picture of your favorite series? what makes shelfies so special?

here's my prediction: i think lots of bookstagram and booker people enjoy seeing other peoples shelves. it's nice to see so many awesome-looking bookshelves arranged differently than yours. i've seen it all: by color, by series, by size, alphabetical order, by author, horizontally, vertically, etc. there are tons of ways you can arrange them- i arrange my fantasy books by series & author, and my contemporary by size & color. 

sometimes you may even find inspiration from a shelfie and say "that's how i'm going to rearrange my shelves." (i am definitely guilty of this) people work hard to make their bookshelves look nice. i think its great that they get so much appreciation for it. i've seen a lot of bookshelves where the person has  added decorations, such as fairy lights, bookish merch, and character funkos. tbh, i wish my bookshelf had some decoration because right now, it's pretty boring.

to wrap this up, i guess what i'm trying to say is that shelfies have everything a booklover could want: nice shelves, pretty decorations, and of course, LOTS OF BOOKS! i think this is the reason they're more popular than other bookish pictures. and of course, everyone loves books! 

**please know that i am not hating on shelfies.** 
i absolutely think they deserve as much attention as there is work put into making it look awesome. lots of attention. in fact, they're probably my favorite type of bookish photo and that's why i'm writing this post! 

just 'cause this is a discussion about shelfies, i have to add a photo of my very own... :D

what are your thoughts on shelfies? why do you think they are more popular than the average bookish photo? let me know, i'd love to discuss!