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To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

nytimes.com

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Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#131

Post by jazzyjackson »

3rdAccount wrote: post #59
philipps wrote: post #41

I can’t say enough good things about public libraries. At the MIT Media Lab we started an innovation exchange with US libraries to co-develop new STEAM education programs together (tinkering with electronics, building a “food computer”, using data to tell stories...). We found that libraries are wonderful collaborators. They are also one of the last places where people from all walks of life encounter each other in a…

Sigh...not a big fan of "STEAM" as opposed to "STEM". STEM exists because science, technology, engineering, and math don't get the focus they need in the standard US education system. There is also the arts of music, and drawing/painting/crafts, P.E., History, Literature that are still important, but take the focus away. If you say...well STEM is important, but let's not forget art, pretty soon you'll say well we als…

Frankly I think there are a lot bigger problems in the US schooling system that what are balance of ceramics:chemistry should be. (Besides, the chemistry teacher let me borrow lithium salts to spice up my ceramics glaze)

FWIW my art classes were basically "get familiar with the viscosity, stickiness, rate of evaporation, and rigidity of a new material every week" class. I'm much better able to reason about interactions between materials because of an hour a day making things with my hands.

I agree that libraries are the bomb.

Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#132

Post by jazzyjackson »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #107
flyinghamster wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Communism? When did communism enter the picture? This is in Illinois; the public library district is primarily funded by local taxes within its service area, and referenda on such were passed on multiple occasions. Some state and federal grants have also funded tech improvements. Its current land was purchased from the local school district in the 1970s. Overall, regardless of today's bullshit political climate on th…

Libraries are inherently anti-capitalist; they make knowledge available to all regardless of ability to pay. A system of community ownership of resources in order to benefit all members is the definition of "communist": that's where it enters the picture. >the municipally-owned water system charges significantly lower rates than a neighboring town's privately-owned water system // Which, as far as stereotypes goes at…

The capitalists are keenly interested in having an educated, well-rounded talent pool to draw labor from.

The libraries make no attempt to abolish the bourgeoisie, which I think was more to the point of communists than providing free literature.

Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#133

Post by fipple »

tehwebguy wrote: post #106
fipple wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t take my kid to the library because of the homeless people there. I don’t oppose government funds being used to provide daytime facilities for homeless people, I just don’t think it should be at the same location as the kids library.

I guess my other comment was rightly flagged so here’s a non sarcastic version: Why don’t you think it’s ok for homeless people to use the same library as kids?

I think it’s fine for a homeless person to come in for half an hour to peruse books and check them out. In that case the homeless population of the library will be roughly the same percentage as they are of the city overall.

That’s obviously not the case, homeless people are over 50% of the library’s population at any time of day since they stay all day while everyone else spends 15 minutes.

Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#134

Post by closeparen »

moorhosj wrote: post #113
fipple wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t take my kid to the library because of the homeless people there. I don’t oppose government funds being used to provide daytime facilities for homeless people, I just don’t think it should be at the same location as the kids library.

Is a "kids library" different than an "adult library"? I use the library in my neighborhood and am an adult, is that ok?

All the public libraries I've been in have a distinct adult wing and children's wing, though under the same roof. Aside from the collections, the children's wing is colorfully decorated with ample play areas, child-proofed computers, and higher noise tolerance. Parents generally feel comfortable letting their kids wander the children's section unsupervised.

Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#135

Post by boomboomsubban »

arandr0x wrote: post #71
boomboomsubban wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What method do you use to browse books? Library sorting is already basically an algorithm that seems fairly easy to set up digitally. The only obvious difference I see is a larger pool of books to draw from.

It's not the method (my method is pick a shelf and look at titles, and yes, it's doable online), it's that: 1) online there's just too much stuff. Libraries culling a ton of inventory serves the purpose of the really bad books being off the (real) shelf in relatively short order. Dig through Amazon's Kindle ebooks store to have an idea how much all-digital suffers from lack of this. As well as 2) I have developed, fr…

> 1) could be solved by an algorithm, but I write algorithms for a living and I don't trust them.

Seems like one that needs a largely random algorithm with some additional weight for recent and popular works. Amazon has a separate goal to a library, using their stores isn't a fair comparison.

2 requires pictures or facsimiles of book spines, not particularly tricky. This entire process is ridiculous though. The only way you can spot anywhere near 200 interesting books in a minute is if every book is interesting, what you're actually judging is likely a marketing decision, and you have no reason to expect your picks were particularly good.

3 is a copyright issue. Google books already has a surprising number of those books archived, and your chance of reading them would be far greater if they just required one random person to find the book and upload it. Even still, in 20 years the digital libraries will be overflowing with people you can't meet talking about experiences you can't encounter.

Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#136

Post by closeparen »

zanba38 wrote: post #10
skookumchuck wrote: post #7

I appreciate the librarians because they're one of the very few people who stand up against ubiquitous government surveillance. It's nice to have a place where I am not profiled based on what I browse.

I don't understand this comment. Are librarians politically aligned in the US? If so, why? Also, if you are going to downvote, you might as well spend some time explaining why.

Librarians have a similar professional reverence for their patrons' privacy as doctors do for their patients and attorneys for their clients.

The legal status of attorney-client privilege and medical privacy are both thoroughly enshrined, but there's no corresponding protection for borrowing records. Librarians are often in the news for protecting them.

Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#137

Post by housingpost »

jhbadger wrote: post #103
housingpost wrote: post #2

I love the idea of libraries, but where I live most of them are almost as bad as public transportation. People fighting, being loud, people on drugs asking for money, so it's difficult to get comfortable to sit and read. Sadly you have to go to the suburbs to get a quiet library where you don't get hassled. Amazon certainly isn't the solution, but neither is having libraries be the daytime homeless shelter.

Is it actually your experience of these things or is it just what you've been told? As somebody who lives in a big US city which my Midwestern small-town relatives sees as "scary", I use public transit daily and the library weekly. There aren't really any druggies or panhandlers on the buses or trains or libraries. There are some on the actual streets, and that's unfortunate, but not nearly the degree that all the "u…

It's my actual experiences in two of the United States' largest cities. It's not like Escape From New York, but it's more than enough to make it hard to get into any kind of reading or work. Maybe you're used to it, but as someone who uses public transportation only half a dozen times a year it's off-putting in either situation.

Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#138

Post by echion »

eftychis wrote: post #120
tehwebguy wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI HS is “high school” which is only 4 years long

I got that. Although not clear if they meant senior high school or what not. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_the_United_States It is a bit unclear to me when someone says high school in the U.S. if they imply junior or senior or none of the above.

"High school" is the universally-accepted term in the US, and means four years before university. "Junior" high school is not a universal term, though exists in some areas. "Senior high school" is a term I've never heard before, appears uncited on that wikipedia page, and were I to say it to anyone I know they would look at me funny.

Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#139

Post by arandr0x »

boomboomsubban wrote: post #135
arandr0x wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not the method (my method is pick a shelf and look at titles, and yes, it's doable online), it's that: 1) online there's just too much stuff. Libraries culling a ton of inventory serves the purpose of the really bad books being off the (real) shelf in relatively short order. Dig through Amazon's Kindle ebooks store to have an idea how much all-digital suffers from lack of this. As well as 2) I have developed, fr…

> 1) could be solved by an algorithm, but I write algorithms for a living and I don't trust them. Seems like one that needs a largely random algorithm with some additional weight for recent and popular works. Amazon has a separate goal to a library, using their stores isn't a fair comparison. 2 requires pictures or facsimiles of book spines, not particularly tricky. This entire process is ridiculous though. The only…

Yes, I think all three issues won't be issues in 20 or 30 years. I fully expect my children to grow up being able to "spot" digital titles the way I do with spines, and looking at the physical books roughly the way I looked at my grandma's physical ledger-book. (Edited: Although I think you misunderstood me on 3. I am willing to pay for those books, provided the price is sustainable considering the quantity I am consuming, and they are not in English, which may qualify what I meant when I say they largely don't exist digitally currently.)

I meant I can classify 200 books as interesting or not in a minute, obviously not find 200 interesting ones. It takes me 15 minutes to find 4 or 5 books I actually want to read.

One unfortunate side effects of books moving to digital (although, to be clear, books moving to digital is not remotely a bad thing in itself) is that they are getting longer. There is fewer and fewer pressure on authors to limit the length of newer books that are unproven, with the result that people who don't know how to speed read are seeing reading novels as more and more of a daunting thing, which I think is sad.

Re: To Restore Civil Society, Start with the Library

#140

Post by pbhjpbhj »

int_19h wrote: post #126
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Libraries are inherently anti-capitalist; they make knowledge available to all regardless of ability to pay. A system of community ownership of resources in order to benefit all members is the definition of "communist": that's where it enters the picture. >the municipally-owned water system charges significantly lower rates than a neighboring town's privately-owned water system // Which, as far as stereotypes goes at…

> A system of community ownership of resources in order to benefit all members is the definition of "communist" The definition of socialism is shared ownership of the means of production . A public park isn't socialism. A nationalized industry is. The definition of communism is socialism + post-scarcity, ostensibly making economic classes redundant.

I wasn't talking figuratively, that's literally the definition.
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