48 ms·

That sensitivity to privacy seems to be a US phenomenon? At least, I never noticed that in Germany.

by qznc 10y ago

DocTomoe 10y ago
You need to understand that privacy in the US is on a whole different level as compared to privacy laws in Germany. What appears to be an admirable effort by librarians to Americans would still be a gross violation of privacy over here. For instance, did you know that Apache logfiles are technically forbidden over here because they contain IP adresses which can be traced back to individual users? Now, during my Student years in the early 2000s, I jobbed in a large University library in southern Germany. Systems were compartilized and there were organizational firewalls between departments so people without a need to know had no way to determine circulation records of or by anyone.
jbaiter 10y ago
I work as a developer at a German library and privacy is taken very seriously here. We're not allowed to store full IP addresses in the logs (they have to be truncated to /16). Google Analytics is out of the question (we have to use self-hosted Piwik), as are direct social media buttons, we have to use wrappers that only load the JS after a user clicks on it, and even that has to be approved by the "Datenschutzbeauftragter". Even external links have to be explicitly marked as such so users know when their Referral information is leaked to other websites.
- qznc 10y ago
  That mostly is just implementing EU law. Good to know that it is taken seriously. Maybe others are more relaxed about it.
analog31 10y ago
Unfortunately, librarians are a rare breed. The typical mentality in the US is to keep records of everything, and try to legislate the use of those records (e.g., discrimination laws), which is hopeless.
tom_mellior 10y ago
Same here. When just checking out books it's usually OK (although even then I prefer self-checkout machines), but when asking for help when searching for something, or requesting that they buy something, I've never met a librarian that just said "ok". They feel compelled to make some disparaging remark about my interests. Every. Single. Fucking. Time. "You're not even supposed to notice" patrons' interests? I wish.

That sensitivity to privacy seems to be a US phenomenon? At least, I never noticed that in Germany.

by qznc 10y ago

That sensitivity to privacy seems to be a US phenomenon? At least, I never noticed that in Germany.

You need to understand that privacy in the US is on a whole different level as compared to privacy laws in Germany. What appears to be an admirable effort by librarians to Americans would still be a gross violation of privacy over here. For instance, did you know that Apache logfiles are technically forbidden over here because they contain IP adresses which can be traced back to individual users? Now, during my Student years in the early 2000s, I jobbed in a large University library in southern Germany. Systems were compartilized and there were organizational firewalls between departments so people without a need to know had no way to determine circulation records of or by anyone.

jbaiter 10y ago

I work as a developer at a German library and privacy is taken very seriously here. We're not allowed to store full IP addresses in the logs (they have to be truncated to /16). Google Analytics is out of the question (we have to use self-hosted Piwik), as are direct social media buttons, we have to use wrappers that only load the JS after a user clicks on it, and even that has to be approved by the "Datenschutzbeauftragter". Even external links have to be explicitly marked as such so users know when their Referral information is leaked to other websites.

qznc 10y ago
That mostly is just implementing EU law. Good to know that it is taken seriously. Maybe others are more relaxed about it.

analog31 10y ago

Unfortunately, librarians are a rare breed. The typical mentality in the US is to keep records of everything, and try to legislate the use of those records (e.g., discrimination laws), which is hopeless.

tom_mellior 10y ago

Same here. When just checking out books it's usually OK (although even then I prefer self-checkout machines), but when asking for help when searching for something, or requesting that they buy something, I've never met a librarian that just said "ok". They feel compelled to make some disparaging remark about my interests. Every. Single. Fucking. Time. "You're not even supposed to notice" patrons' interests? I wish.