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this is a very stupid question about #1 New York Bestseller's List?

I always see books that say #1 New York Times Bestseller's List, and forgive my ignorance, but how does this work exactly? All books can not be number one? Or does this simply mean, the books or authors (I guess) were number one at one point? even for a day? I am sorry if I offend anyone but I truly want to know the way this system works.

Public Comments

1. sorry I can't help I want to know too
2. It means that at one point after it was published, the book became number one out of a group of books that have been purchased. The number one best sellers for the new york times mean that the newspaper must have covered sales and published them. I don't live in America so if I've got that wrong, sorry!
3. Bestseller means simply that the best selling books. It says nothing about how good it is or even how many people read it. Bestsellers sell the most copies. Exactly how each list tallies the statistics are "trade secrets" and some variations do occur (NYTimes and PW, 2 of the major lists, actually tend not to have the exact same order). However, for the most part it's pretty straight forward.
4. The list(s) itself are based on book sales from reporting stores. NYT varies the stores so there is some randomness to it and so publishers don't try to game the list by targeting specific stores. There's probably some additional algorithm that they use, but basically it is # of books sold per reporting store. As far as authors, hit #1 on the NYT list once and it becomes your new first name. So your next book will be by New York Times #1 Best Seller Author Name. And so will all your other books, even if they never crack the top 15.