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Like book shops libraries need to move with the times. Adding a DVD section isn't it. That just makes them like blockbusters. They should be local archives of

Like book shops libraries need to move with the times. Adding a DVD section isn't it. That just makes them like blockbusters. They should be local archives of local things, with content online. Plus free Internet terminals and wifi.

6d0debc071 13y ago
What sort of local things?
banachtarski 13y ago
No offense, but you've got it all wrong. Many libraries already are those things (local archive, online content, free internet terminals, wifi). As a person who made it through college by leveraging the library because I couldn't afford many books, I think libraries and bookstores both serve an important function. The local library in my town is also a meeting ground for many kids after school. As a kid, I read hundreds of books, multiple per week. Dahl, Dickens, Wells, Chrichton, King, Twain, Defoe, Card, Dumas, Prachett, Eddings, and heaps more. How could I have done this without a library? How can any kid these days get that much reading without a library (apart from their parents splurging on a kindle). Incidentally, adding a DVD section doesn't make them "like blockbusters." Blockbusters failed because it was a corporate entity that needed to generate revenues to succeed. Libraries are trying to maximize social value, not profit. I learned grammar when my foreign parents borrowed a VHS from the library as a kid to show me at home. And multiplication. I would want my kids to watch certain classics on DVD too. Lord of the Rings. The Prestige. 12 Angry Men. The Godfather. You clearly don't use or have a need for the library. But don't criticize what you don't know.
ams6110 13y ago
They need to do more than that. Local libraries of physical media are dead. They need to close up and take their significant tax burden off of their citizenry. Pre-internet, I used to use the library quite often. I probably haven't been inside one in 10 years now. Their time is past, they need to die.
- mjhea0 13y ago
  How about people that do not know how to effectually search the internet to get the social, economic, and political information to make informed decisions in their lives?
  - asperous 13y ago
    Even with effectively searching the internet I'd agree that with the exception of web/computer/programming stuff, it's impossible to find on the internet the kind of wide-variety, high-quality information the library has in such a distilled form.
- banachtarski 13y ago
  You don't read books I take it? Or perhaps you read on a very slow cadence? You should visit one sometime in the evening. You might be surprised how crowded it gets.
- mjhea0 13y ago
  http://www.ala.org/news/state-americas-libraries-report-2013/public-libraries http://www.ala.org/news/state-americas-libraries-report-2013...
- faddotio 13y ago
  Because link aggregators and blogspam will fill the gaping maw of content?
- tekalon 13y ago
  I compared my Amazon wish list (about a thousand books) to what was available in my local library. Just based on the few hundred at my library, I can potentially save a few thousand dollars. I have already saved a hundred or so just in the last few months after doing so. That makes it well worth my tax dollars going to my library system. The library has both physical books but ebooks, audio books, streaming video and of course the community services/classes.
- mindslight 13y ago
  I too would love for most functions of the government to pack up and close their doors. However, the problem with espousing this solution for every individual subject is that the amount of success is highly correlated to how much it means cutting public services (the purported reason for taxes) versus actually defunding the bureaucracy. Libraries and road maintenance are easily gutted while city administration and police push back hard to keep their pockets lined. So you're still being extorted for a similar amount but receiving much less in return. Eventually, people cry uncle and vote for higher taxes to bring back services and the cycle repeats. And this is at the local level where there's some sliver of accountability, possibility of moving, and taxes are relatively low! So let's just save the discussion of whether libraries are a worthwhile public service until that military-surveillance cancer is well in remission.
logn 13y ago
“The founding of libraries was like constructing more public granaries, amassing reserves against a spiritual winter which by certain signs, in spite of myself, I see ahead…” - Marguerite Yourcenar, Memoirs of Hadrian http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/680896-the-founding-of-libraries-was-like-constructing-more-public-granaries http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/680896-the-founding-of-libra...
tingletech 13y ago
http://dp.la/ http://dp.la/
JoeAltmaier 13y ago
Our library sold off its local history books, its local author collections etc. It keeps only popular stuff that gets checked out a lot. They have a point, have the stuff that people want; its just that I don't read that stuff so there's nothing in it for me. Kind of like a grocery store that sells only nachos and coke.

6d0debc071 13y ago

What sort of local things?

banachtarski 13y ago

No offense, but you've got it all wrong. Many libraries already are those things (local archive, online content, free internet terminals, wifi). As a person who made it through college by leveraging the library because I couldn't afford many books, I think libraries and bookstores both serve an important function. The local library in my town is also a meeting ground for many kids after school. As a kid, I read hundreds of books, multiple per week. Dahl, Dickens, Wells, Chrichton, King, Twain, Defoe, Card, Dumas, Prachett, Eddings, and heaps more. How could I have done this without a library? How can any kid these days get that much reading without a library (apart from their parents splurging on a kindle). Incidentally, adding a DVD section doesn't make them "like blockbusters." Blockbusters failed because it was a corporate entity that needed to generate revenues to succeed. Libraries are trying to maximize social value, not profit. I learned grammar when my foreign parents borrowed a VHS from the library as a kid to show me at home. And multiplication. I would want my kids to watch certain classics on DVD too. Lord of the Rings. The Prestige. 12 Angry Men. The Godfather. You clearly don't use or have a need for the library. But don't criticize what you don't know.

ams6110 13y ago

They need to do more than that. Local libraries of physical media are dead. They need to close up and take their significant tax burden off of their citizenry. Pre-internet, I used to use the library quite often. I probably haven't been inside one in 10 years now. Their time is past, they need to die.

mjhea0 13y ago
How about people that do not know how to effectually search the internet to get the social, economic, and political information to make informed decisions in their lives?
- asperous 13y ago
  Even with effectively searching the internet I'd agree that with the exception of web/computer/programming stuff, it's impossible to find on the internet the kind of wide-variety, high-quality information the library has in such a distilled form.
banachtarski 13y ago
You don't read books I take it? Or perhaps you read on a very slow cadence? You should visit one sometime in the evening. You might be surprised how crowded it gets.
mjhea0 13y ago
http://www.ala.org/news/state-americas-libraries-report-2013/public-libraries http://www.ala.org/news/state-americas-libraries-report-2013...
faddotio 13y ago
Because link aggregators and blogspam will fill the gaping maw of content?
tekalon 13y ago
I compared my Amazon wish list (about a thousand books) to what was available in my local library. Just based on the few hundred at my library, I can potentially save a few thousand dollars. I have already saved a hundred or so just in the last few months after doing so. That makes it well worth my tax dollars going to my library system. The library has both physical books but ebooks, audio books, streaming video and of course the community services/classes.
mindslight 13y ago
I too would love for most functions of the government to pack up and close their doors. However, the problem with espousing this solution for every individual subject is that the amount of success is highly correlated to how much it means cutting public services (the purported reason for taxes) versus actually defunding the bureaucracy. Libraries and road maintenance are easily gutted while city administration and police push back hard to keep their pockets lined. So you're still being extorted for a similar amount but receiving much less in return. Eventually, people cry uncle and vote for higher taxes to bring back services and the cycle repeats. And this is at the local level where there's some sliver of accountability, possibility of moving, and taxes are relatively low! So let's just save the discussion of whether libraries are a worthwhile public service until that military-surveillance cancer is well in remission.

logn 13y ago

“The founding of libraries was like constructing more public granaries, amassing reserves against a spiritual winter which by certain signs, in spite of myself, I see ahead…” - Marguerite Yourcenar, Memoirs of Hadrian http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/680896-the-founding-of-libraries-was-like-constructing-more-public-granaries http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/680896-the-founding-of-libra...

tingletech 13y ago

http://dp.la/ http://dp.la/

JoeAltmaier 13y ago

Our library sold off its local history books, its local author collections etc. It keeps only popular stuff that gets checked out a lot. They have a point, have the stuff that people want; its just that I don't read that stuff so there's nothing in it for me. Kind of like a grocery store that sells only nachos and coke.