6 ms·

US library system, once the best in the world, faces death by a thousand cuts

47 points by edward 3y ago

36393774 3y ago
[flagged]
ITB 3y ago
How much do libraries matter now? Hard to say they matter as much as several decades ago.
- ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
  There just has been a whole distrust with academia and places of learning due to corruption, bureaucracy and political ideologies as the central organizing force. It's so sad. Instead of courageously chasing truth, hiding behind these things is easier. Universities, libraries are some of the best things humans have come up with. Libraries also fall in a similar place. We need to rebuild the trust and value in the populace to chase objective truth without having to commit to any ideology.
  - dartos 3y ago
    I mean sure, but why would Joe random citizen ever go to a library when Wikipedia exists? Seems like libraries are _only_ for academics and record keepers now. Makes sense they’re facing issues
    - ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
      Because again we have not made learning fun. It is no longer cool to be learned.
    - bagful 3y ago
      A Wikipedia article is at best a shallow introduction to a subject that wouldn’t fill out one chapter in a cheap paperback; and at worst a fact-hoarder’s opiate, an indiscriminate mass of motivated opinion and decontextualized facts that really only serve as edutainment. I used to think the internet democratized information, and then I learned about books. Article-readers don’t know what they miss out on; in its current form, the internet primarily serves to make people feel informed. I find that far more insidious than censorship.
- userinanother 3y ago
  [flagged]
- derstander 3y ago
  > How much do libraries matter now? Hard to say they matter as much as several decades ago. Why wouldn’t they? Is the idea that a person can get any content a library might offer online (and for free, if willing to pirate it)? I can’t disagree with that, though if you’re not ok with pirating things then I think the value is enormous. I think libraries are more than just the sum of the books, CDs, and DVDs on the shelves. In my experience they often have discounts to area activities (e.g., museums), offer classes and activities across the age spectrum (from story time for children to tech help geared toward the elderly or just the tech disinclined), and provide a nexus for community. I think folks that haven’t been to a library in awhile would be pleasantly surprised with what they offer nowadays — though of course I only have personal experience with libraries across a few states in the northeast. It’s totally possible that I’m spoiled and don’t even know it.
  - 4death4 3y ago
    > Why wouldn’t they? Because their primary purpose was to provide open access to literature and information, which is now widely available thanks to the internet.
    - galdosdi 3y ago
      > open access to literature and information, which is now widely available thanks to the internet. Citation needed. If you don't have money and aren't willing to pirate, what you can get on the internet is quite limited. There's Wikipedia and Project Gutenberg. A lot of the most reliable knowledge is still locked up in books, because the internet is disproportionately used for entertainment, advertising, etc
      - 4death4 3y ago
        Most information was locked up in the hay day of libraries as well. It’s not like your local library contained every book that has ever existed. But, back then, if your library didn’t have it then you had almost no chance of even knowing it existed. There is simply vastly more information available, for free, on the internet. I’m actually surprised you’re asking for a citation. I would be very interested in seeing evidence that more information was available in libraries than is currently available on the internet.
- meristohm 3y ago
  Fair question so I upvoted. Your life experience may well be very different than mine. My first memorable taste of freedom in a public space as a child was in a library; my parent left me in the kid section and I was so happy about that, exploring the space and the books. I have not stopped feeling joy and wonder upon entering a library. So much potential! So much to explore! Public libraries allow me and my family to access so many more books than we can reasonably pay for, paid for collectively with tax money, which benefits so many people: job training, access to educational and entertainment media, access to a public restroom, access to a librarian who can help answer questions, and a generally calm and quiet space to simply exist.
- _lvbh 3y ago
  Yes. When I was a kid, my family couldn’t afford electronics and internet access. Used to stay in the school library every day until 7 pm to read. I’m much more well off now but there are probably still multitudes of families where libraries are the only source of free learning materials.
renewiltord 3y ago
The whole digital lending thing is screwing them. I can’t imagine that the poor are using that more than the rich. With Libby you can do it so easily.
- galleywest200 3y ago
  > I can’t imagine that the poor are using that more than the rich. With Libby you can do it so easily. I am not sure what you mean by this. The poor use libraries all the time, and the wealthy can just buy a digital copy if the wait-list is too long.
  - renewiltord 3y ago
    Oh I imagined ebooks were more commonly used by wealthier people. Okay, happy to just accept being wrong about this.
- firesteelrain 3y ago
  My mom is very poor and uses Libby for lending all the time align with paperback. Our local county libraries will even deliver books to your local city hall.
tomohawk 3y ago
It's more likely been killed by social media addiction and SV companies disrupting book culture. Seratonin addled brains have a hard time paying attention long enough to get through books.
jessenaser 3y ago
So we need to make a digital archival format for e-Books that: 1. Has a version without DRM 2. Has versioning if authors update or revise their books or editions 3. Is standardized instead of platform based Then their counterargument is, well, if you have a DRM-free book, can't you just share it to the whole internet? Yes, and you could scan a book with a phone, and even use OCR, and do the same thing. That isn't a DRM problem, that is a monetization problem. A problem that needs solving, but DRM isn't going to help you out, unless you want to get rid of physical books, which also would be a bad situation.
- musicale 3y ago
  The suggestion is a good one (I like the versioning idea) and it is correct that DRM does not prevent unauthorized distribution. In fact, US copyright registration already requires submitting a copy to the Library of Congress either as a physical copy or in a standardized, DRM-free format (with the possible exception of encrypted PDFs, for which I assume the password would be required?) [1] However, LoC could go even further by becoming a digital lending library, or a compulsory licensing regime could be enacted for public libraries in general. [1] https://www.copyright.gov/eco/help-file-types.html https://www.copyright.gov/eco/help-file-types.html
perihelions 3y ago
Libraries are the best they've have ever been in the history of civilization. Library-denialists pretend SciHub and LibGen and friends aren't "libraries", or are somehow inferior libraries to the authentic, irreplaceably-traditional experience of bicycling 90 minutes to the inner-city mold barracks where nodding hobos guard rubbish bins of yellowed paper—the approved, compliant source of knowledge. The wealth technology has created is staggering, like Andreessen was ranting about earlier this week in that emotional essay. Any human on the planet (almost) can flip through any book or paper ever written (almost), instantly at any moment—from their couch, from the back of a horse on the Mongolian Steppe, anywhere. An invisible cathedral of books spans the globe, and we're always standing before its glowing altar. A planetary-scale library. This is a wonder of the modern world and we ought to be glorifying it, extolling the ingenuity of human technology and the greatness of its civilization.
- OfSanguineFire 3y ago
  SciHub and LibGen is great. However, in my own field and adjacent ones, they are nowhere close to having complete coverage of publications from before the era when a publisher’s own digitized edition could be taken and uploaded; so many basic publications that are paper-only are missing. I myself have scanned tens of thousands of pages in order to fill in LibGen, but I have still barely scratched the surface. And while the non-fiction/scientific-papers side of LibGen can seem impressive, the fiction side is meagre. Literature in languages other than a few of the world’s major languages is missing, and poetry is especially badly represented even for major languages. In many places a real library offers some kind of inter-library loan service that can get you all those things that you won’t find – and perhaps will never find – on LibGen.
  - perihelions 3y ago
    - "and perhaps will never find" That's cynical. All it takes is a bit of political change, and a national government could make an initiative to scan everything in every public library in their borders, straight to LibGen. As a national prestige project. Like the US Library of Congress, or that import customs policy the Library of Alexandria had. I think will happen one day. It's common-sense philanthropy for human civilization. We're just temporarily stuck in a dark age.
QuarterReptile 3y ago
It seems like you would need some cultural consensus about the function of libraries for them to stage a comeback without inifinte scope creep. Are they infrastructure to support bestseller book clubs? Collective pricing structure for Libby? internet cafes? Places that should have a wide range of generally useful reading material? Places where you should be able to find classic literature? Places that focus on supporting upcoming writers? Places to run child reading programs and hand out low quality picture books to kids?
- spease 3y ago
  Yes. The underlying purpose of public libraries is to support an informed citizenry and society. They provide an opportunity to acquire knowledge to anyone who wants it, irrespective of their economic standing. Removing them would have the effect of further reducing social mobility. Even if we took steps to ensure that every person has a digital device, there will still be value in having a physical sanctuary dedicated to that purpose for people who need to share their living space. Compared to a university, libraries lie on the extreme DIY side of the spectrum. It’s free, but they’re less labor-intensive. If I were to rework the library system for the 21st century, I’d focus on making it more useful for people retraining because of AI altering supply/demand for careers. The only constraint I’d put on it would be to keep it universally accessible. Charging and screening enrollment is for public colleges and universities that additionally provide a service to assist in acquiring knowledge. Actually, I’ll go one step further and suggest that a hackerspace / makerspace like TechShop or Hacker Dojo could enrich the surrounding community in much the same way as a library does. They’re just focused around loaning access to modern tools and technology rather than books.
- RecycledEle 3y ago
  Here is the mission for libraries: Libraries are places for students to learn on their own. Libraries provide books, digital resources, maker spaces, guest speakers, clubs, and more to help students learn on their own. Some of those resources can be used in the library, and some of them can be checked out on loan. Please do not prevent others from learning or a librarian will correct you. Source: I am a teacher this is what I hear from my students.
- 3y ago
RecycledEle 3y ago
I am guilty. I do not use my local library. I download books or, very rarely, buy a paper book and scan it.

47 points by edward 3y ago

36393774 3y ago

[flagged]

ITB 3y ago

How much do libraries matter now? Hard to say they matter as much as several decades ago.

ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
There just has been a whole distrust with academia and places of learning due to corruption, bureaucracy and political ideologies as the central organizing force. It's so sad. Instead of courageously chasing truth, hiding behind these things is easier. Universities, libraries are some of the best things humans have come up with. Libraries also fall in a similar place. We need to rebuild the trust and value in the populace to chase objective truth without having to commit to any ideology.
- dartos 3y ago
  I mean sure, but why would Joe random citizen ever go to a library when Wikipedia exists? Seems like libraries are _only_ for academics and record keepers now. Makes sense they’re facing issues
  - ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
    Because again we have not made learning fun. It is no longer cool to be learned.
  - bagful 3y ago
    A Wikipedia article is at best a shallow introduction to a subject that wouldn’t fill out one chapter in a cheap paperback; and at worst a fact-hoarder’s opiate, an indiscriminate mass of motivated opinion and decontextualized facts that really only serve as edutainment. I used to think the internet democratized information, and then I learned about books. Article-readers don’t know what they miss out on; in its current form, the internet primarily serves to make people feel informed. I find that far more insidious than censorship.
userinanother 3y ago
[flagged]
derstander 3y ago
> How much do libraries matter now? Hard to say they matter as much as several decades ago. Why wouldn’t they? Is the idea that a person can get any content a library might offer online (and for free, if willing to pirate it)? I can’t disagree with that, though if you’re not ok with pirating things then I think the value is enormous. I think libraries are more than just the sum of the books, CDs, and DVDs on the shelves. In my experience they often have discounts to area activities (e.g., museums), offer classes and activities across the age spectrum (from story time for children to tech help geared toward the elderly or just the tech disinclined), and provide a nexus for community. I think folks that haven’t been to a library in awhile would be pleasantly surprised with what they offer nowadays — though of course I only have personal experience with libraries across a few states in the northeast. It’s totally possible that I’m spoiled and don’t even know it.
- 4death4 3y ago
  > Why wouldn’t they? Because their primary purpose was to provide open access to literature and information, which is now widely available thanks to the internet.
  - galdosdi 3y ago
    > open access to literature and information, which is now widely available thanks to the internet. Citation needed. If you don't have money and aren't willing to pirate, what you can get on the internet is quite limited. There's Wikipedia and Project Gutenberg. A lot of the most reliable knowledge is still locked up in books, because the internet is disproportionately used for entertainment, advertising, etc
    - 4death4 3y ago
      Most information was locked up in the hay day of libraries as well. It’s not like your local library contained every book that has ever existed. But, back then, if your library didn’t have it then you had almost no chance of even knowing it existed. There is simply vastly more information available, for free, on the internet. I’m actually surprised you’re asking for a citation. I would be very interested in seeing evidence that more information was available in libraries than is currently available on the internet.
meristohm 3y ago
Fair question so I upvoted. Your life experience may well be very different than mine. My first memorable taste of freedom in a public space as a child was in a library; my parent left me in the kid section and I was so happy about that, exploring the space and the books. I have not stopped feeling joy and wonder upon entering a library. So much potential! So much to explore! Public libraries allow me and my family to access so many more books than we can reasonably pay for, paid for collectively with tax money, which benefits so many people: job training, access to educational and entertainment media, access to a public restroom, access to a librarian who can help answer questions, and a generally calm and quiet space to simply exist.
_lvbh 3y ago
Yes. When I was a kid, my family couldn’t afford electronics and internet access. Used to stay in the school library every day until 7 pm to read. I’m much more well off now but there are probably still multitudes of families where libraries are the only source of free learning materials.

renewiltord 3y ago

The whole digital lending thing is screwing them. I can’t imagine that the poor are using that more than the rich. With Libby you can do it so easily.

galleywest200 3y ago
> I can’t imagine that the poor are using that more than the rich. With Libby you can do it so easily. I am not sure what you mean by this. The poor use libraries all the time, and the wealthy can just buy a digital copy if the wait-list is too long.
- renewiltord 3y ago
  Oh I imagined ebooks were more commonly used by wealthier people. Okay, happy to just accept being wrong about this.
firesteelrain 3y ago
My mom is very poor and uses Libby for lending all the time align with paperback. Our local county libraries will even deliver books to your local city hall.

tomohawk 3y ago

It's more likely been killed by social media addiction and SV companies disrupting book culture. Seratonin addled brains have a hard time paying attention long enough to get through books.

jessenaser 3y ago

So we need to make a digital archival format for e-Books that: 1. Has a version without DRM 2. Has versioning if authors update or revise their books or editions 3. Is standardized instead of platform based Then their counterargument is, well, if you have a DRM-free book, can't you just share it to the whole internet? Yes, and you could scan a book with a phone, and even use OCR, and do the same thing. That isn't a DRM problem, that is a monetization problem. A problem that needs solving, but DRM isn't going to help you out, unless you want to get rid of physical books, which also would be a bad situation.

musicale 3y ago
The suggestion is a good one (I like the versioning idea) and it is correct that DRM does not prevent unauthorized distribution. In fact, US copyright registration already requires submitting a copy to the Library of Congress either as a physical copy or in a standardized, DRM-free format (with the possible exception of encrypted PDFs, for which I assume the password would be required?) [1] However, LoC could go even further by becoming a digital lending library, or a compulsory licensing regime could be enacted for public libraries in general. [1] https://www.copyright.gov/eco/help-file-types.html https://www.copyright.gov/eco/help-file-types.html

perihelions 3y ago

Libraries are the best they've have ever been in the history of civilization. Library-denialists pretend SciHub and LibGen and friends aren't "libraries", or are somehow inferior libraries to the authentic, irreplaceably-traditional experience of bicycling 90 minutes to the inner-city mold barracks where nodding hobos guard rubbish bins of yellowed paper—the approved, compliant source of knowledge. The wealth technology has created is staggering, like Andreessen was ranting about earlier this week in that emotional essay. Any human on the planet (almost) can flip through any book or paper ever written (almost), instantly at any moment—from their couch, from the back of a horse on the Mongolian Steppe, anywhere. An invisible cathedral of books spans the globe, and we're always standing before its glowing altar. A planetary-scale library. This is a wonder of the modern world and we ought to be glorifying it, extolling the ingenuity of human technology and the greatness of its civilization.

OfSanguineFire 3y ago
SciHub and LibGen is great. However, in my own field and adjacent ones, they are nowhere close to having complete coverage of publications from before the era when a publisher’s own digitized edition could be taken and uploaded; so many basic publications that are paper-only are missing. I myself have scanned tens of thousands of pages in order to fill in LibGen, but I have still barely scratched the surface. And while the non-fiction/scientific-papers side of LibGen can seem impressive, the fiction side is meagre. Literature in languages other than a few of the world’s major languages is missing, and poetry is especially badly represented even for major languages. In many places a real library offers some kind of inter-library loan service that can get you all those things that you won’t find – and perhaps will never find – on LibGen.
- perihelions 3y ago
  - "and perhaps will never find" That's cynical. All it takes is a bit of political change, and a national government could make an initiative to scan everything in every public library in their borders, straight to LibGen. As a national prestige project. Like the US Library of Congress, or that import customs policy the Library of Alexandria had. I think will happen one day. It's common-sense philanthropy for human civilization. We're just temporarily stuck in a dark age.

QuarterReptile 3y ago

It seems like you would need some cultural consensus about the function of libraries for them to stage a comeback without inifinte scope creep. Are they infrastructure to support bestseller book clubs? Collective pricing structure for Libby? internet cafes? Places that should have a wide range of generally useful reading material? Places where you should be able to find classic literature? Places that focus on supporting upcoming writers? Places to run child reading programs and hand out low quality picture books to kids?

spease 3y ago
Yes. The underlying purpose of public libraries is to support an informed citizenry and society. They provide an opportunity to acquire knowledge to anyone who wants it, irrespective of their economic standing. Removing them would have the effect of further reducing social mobility. Even if we took steps to ensure that every person has a digital device, there will still be value in having a physical sanctuary dedicated to that purpose for people who need to share their living space. Compared to a university, libraries lie on the extreme DIY side of the spectrum. It’s free, but they’re less labor-intensive. If I were to rework the library system for the 21st century, I’d focus on making it more useful for people retraining because of AI altering supply/demand for careers. The only constraint I’d put on it would be to keep it universally accessible. Charging and screening enrollment is for public colleges and universities that additionally provide a service to assist in acquiring knowledge. Actually, I’ll go one step further and suggest that a hackerspace / makerspace like TechShop or Hacker Dojo could enrich the surrounding community in much the same way as a library does. They’re just focused around loaning access to modern tools and technology rather than books.
RecycledEle 3y ago
Here is the mission for libraries: Libraries are places for students to learn on their own. Libraries provide books, digital resources, maker spaces, guest speakers, clubs, and more to help students learn on their own. Some of those resources can be used in the library, and some of them can be checked out on loan. Please do not prevent others from learning or a librarian will correct you. Source: I am a teacher this is what I hear from my students.
3y ago

RecycledEle 3y ago

I am guilty. I do not use my local library. I download books or, very rarely, buy a paper book and scan it.