4 ms·

There's also the movement towards doing away with paper books altogether and charging prisoners, by the minute, to rent e-books. https://americanlibrariesmagaz

by tyingq 4y ago

There's also the movement towards doing away with paper books altogether and charging prisoners, by the minute, to rent e-books. https://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/blogs/the-scoop/prisoners-pay-to-read-prison-tablets/ https://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/blogs/the-scoop/prison... https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/jan/13/us-states-move-to-stop-prisons-charging-inmates-for-reading-and-video-calls https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2020/jan/13/u...

ceejayoz 4y ago
> In December, the West Virginia Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation launched a pay-per-minute ebook policy, which charges inmates five cents (4p) per minute of reading. The fee equates to roughly an hour of prison labour. "Rehabilitation", indeed.
- leetrout 4y ago
  It is all a giant scam and the general public including me is complicit
- Ekaros 4y ago
  I wonder when that monetization model comes to other devices outside. Just imagine how much companies could make if it costed money to use your smartphone, tablet or computer...
  - SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
    I mean, we used to pay per minute to use our cell phone. I think it's proven that it's harder to sell to a (literally) non-captive audience.
- hansvm 4y ago
  Wait, that's over-priced even for the general public. That's around $25 to read an average Harry Potter book -- even nice sets of books 1-7 go for less than $175 new, where you get to keep the bloody book. You can buy the whole ebook series for Kindle outright in the $60-$80 range.
  - 0xcde4c3db 4y ago
    Yes; the point is to extract money from their friends and family on the outside. They've been similarly price-gouging phone calls and basic hygiene/personal care supplies for ages.
    - notch656c 4y ago
      Well we couldn't have people ordering or sending books. Those could have drugs in them, and every possible step needs to be taken to make sure no one has drugs. Prisoners need a locked-down e-book system so that they don't get dangerous content, like maybe certain religious materials. The general public doesn't want to bear the cost of administering that so best to have some corporations bid for the rights for their captive audience. The high cost to the prisoner keeps prisoners safe by limiting exposure to thoughts of those outside prison, which causes disorder. We also must ensure compensation of the e-book administrators for the costly efforts of maintaining hundreds of megabytes of plaintext.
      - tyingq 4y ago
        The incarceration system in the US varies wildy by location, and even prisons within the same system. I'm very skeptical that this sort of heavy handed approach is needed anywhere at all, but at the very least it would only be a few places. There are already 3rd party charities that would supply books with a reasonable process to vet the item before it gets into the prison.
        notch656c 4y ago
        My post was satire but I don't think any vetting process can effectively and economically stop fentanyl and LSD from being impregnated in paper books and making it through.
        klyrs 4y ago
        I understand that it's still much easier to cut a deal with a prison guard.
patrec 4y ago
Now this seems an infinitely better issue to get upset about (and attempt to rectify) than anything mentioned in the original article.
- aaomidi 4y ago
  Prisons, being an extension of the government, have no job picking and choosing books over moral outrage.
  - dragonwriter 4y ago
    Prisons, being largely a vehicle through which government acts to express society’s (or at least, the ruling class’s) moral outrage, act perfectly on-brand when picking and choosing books over moral outrage.
  - patrec 4y ago
    The main job of prisons is enhancing public safety. Firstly by holding dangerous people behind bars and secondly by bettering those that can be bettered and preparing them for a successful post-prison life. They might not do a very good job with the second of these tasks (and indeed make some offenders more dangerous), but I don't see why, in the pursuit of it, government should not take a view towards what books would be very likely to do more harm than good. If you don't accept this why not? And if you do, what better criterion than "moral outrage" do you propose? Keeping people you want to re-integrate into society away from what most of society would see as morally outrageous does not strike me as a priori unsound. Maybe violent Neonazis are easier to re-integrate if they don't read Mein Kampf whilst in prison?
jccalhoun 4y ago
Even before covid, some prisons eliminated in-person visits and instituted some proprietary and predatory-priced video calling https://www.npr.org/2016/12/05/504458311/video-calls-replace-in-person-visits-in-some-jails https://www.npr.org/2016/12/05/504458311/video-calls-replace... and even phone calls are super expensive https://www.npr.org/2022/10/23/1130782415/incarcerated-people-pay-about-5-dollars-for-a-30-minute-phone-call-a-new-bill-wa https://www.npr.org/2022/10/23/1130782415/incarcerated-peopl... I'm sure covid has been used to accelerate the end of in-person visits.

by tyingq 4y ago

ceejayoz 4y ago

> In December, the West Virginia Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation launched a pay-per-minute ebook policy, which charges inmates five cents (4p) per minute of reading. The fee equates to roughly an hour of prison labour. "Rehabilitation", indeed.

leetrout 4y ago
It is all a giant scam and the general public including me is complicit
Ekaros 4y ago
I wonder when that monetization model comes to other devices outside. Just imagine how much companies could make if it costed money to use your smartphone, tablet or computer...
- SketchySeaBeast 4y ago
  I mean, we used to pay per minute to use our cell phone. I think it's proven that it's harder to sell to a (literally) non-captive audience.
hansvm 4y ago
Wait, that's over-priced even for the general public. That's around $25 to read an average Harry Potter book -- even nice sets of books 1-7 go for less than $175 new, where you get to keep the bloody book. You can buy the whole ebook series for Kindle outright in the $60-$80 range.
- 0xcde4c3db 4y ago
  Yes; the point is to extract money from their friends and family on the outside. They've been similarly price-gouging phone calls and basic hygiene/personal care supplies for ages.
  - notch656c 4y ago
    Well we couldn't have people ordering or sending books. Those could have drugs in them, and every possible step needs to be taken to make sure no one has drugs. Prisoners need a locked-down e-book system so that they don't get dangerous content, like maybe certain religious materials. The general public doesn't want to bear the cost of administering that so best to have some corporations bid for the rights for their captive audience. The high cost to the prisoner keeps prisoners safe by limiting exposure to thoughts of those outside prison, which causes disorder. We also must ensure compensation of the e-book administrators for the costly efforts of maintaining hundreds of megabytes of plaintext.
    - tyingq 4y ago
      The incarceration system in the US varies wildy by location, and even prisons within the same system. I'm very skeptical that this sort of heavy handed approach is needed anywhere at all, but at the very least it would only be a few places. There are already 3rd party charities that would supply books with a reasonable process to vet the item before it gets into the prison.
      - notch656c 4y ago
        My post was satire but I don't think any vetting process can effectively and economically stop fentanyl and LSD from being impregnated in paper books and making it through.
        klyrs 4y ago
        I understand that it's still much easier to cut a deal with a prison guard.

patrec 4y ago

Now this seems an infinitely better issue to get upset about (and attempt to rectify) than anything mentioned in the original article.

aaomidi 4y ago
Prisons, being an extension of the government, have no job picking and choosing books over moral outrage.
- dragonwriter 4y ago
  Prisons, being largely a vehicle through which government acts to express society’s (or at least, the ruling class’s) moral outrage, act perfectly on-brand when picking and choosing books over moral outrage.
- patrec 4y ago
  The main job of prisons is enhancing public safety. Firstly by holding dangerous people behind bars and secondly by bettering those that can be bettered and preparing them for a successful post-prison life. They might not do a very good job with the second of these tasks (and indeed make some offenders more dangerous), but I don't see why, in the pursuit of it, government should not take a view towards what books would be very likely to do more harm than good. If you don't accept this why not? And if you do, what better criterion than "moral outrage" do you propose? Keeping people you want to re-integrate into society away from what most of society would see as morally outrageous does not strike me as a priori unsound. Maybe violent Neonazis are easier to re-integrate if they don't read Mein Kampf whilst in prison?

jccalhoun 4y ago

Even before covid, some prisons eliminated in-person visits and instituted some proprietary and predatory-priced video calling https://www.npr.org/2016/12/05/504458311/video-calls-replace-in-person-visits-in-some-jails https://www.npr.org/2016/12/05/504458311/video-calls-replace... and even phone calls are super expensive https://www.npr.org/2022/10/23/1130782415/incarcerated-people-pay-about-5-dollars-for-a-30-minute-phone-call-a-new-bill-wa https://www.npr.org/2022/10/23/1130782415/incarcerated-peopl... I'm sure covid has been used to accelerate the end of in-person visits.