Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ditch Starbucks and work at the library

52tiger.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 217 posts

Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library

#161

Post by theBobMcCormick »

mberning wrote: post #30
alexophile wrote: post #6

In my (biased, but well-founded) experience, it comes down to a question of whether I'd rather be distracted by a cute girl or an old man getting reprimanded for looking at dirty pictures. [bg: I really like libraries - worked at one in the suburbs in high school and have since moved to the city, which exaggerated the weird bits] One thing that's worth noting: if you're on a college campus, a great place to find some…

I came here to post this very thing. When I was working downtown I decided to go to the library during my lunch break. To my surprise there was almost nobody in the library actually reading. However, there were people on every single computer workstation. Glancing over the screens I could see a variety of pornographic images, facebook and myspace pages, and youtube. The library is a great resource, but I was complete…

Isn't it somewhat the opposite? It's not that "your tax dollars" are supporting that people browsing porn at the library. To prevent people from browsing porn, the library have to spend more of "your tax dollars" to either install filtering software or employ people to walk around and look over people's shoulders.

That's not even considering the far thornier problem that porn filtering programs can often block legitimate web browsing, such as looking for information about sex education, safe sex, STD's etc.

Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library

#162

Post by steveklabnik »

infocaptor wrote: post #99
edw519 wrote: post #29

Maybe we're lucky in Pittsburgh, but we have the best of both worlds at the main branch of the Carnegie Library. You can take a tour of where I work 2 or 3 days per week: http://www.clpgh.org/locations/main/tours/virtualtour/ It's fantastic. It was built by Andrew Carnegie in 1895 and most of it is original. I get inspiration from the 20 foot ceilings and hand made ornamentation everywhere you look. They simply don't…

vow, another pittsburgher. I once used the North hills library and it was really productive. Will have to check out the moon library.

There's a bunch of us around here.

Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library

#164

Post by steveklabnik »

dhimes wrote: post #137
alexophile wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was under the impression that the only way to use "broad" non-pejoratively is in reference to the actual breadth of something. That being said, sometimes it's safer to study abroad from afar.

Yes, you can't say it any more... It actually fell out of favor long ago, but originally it wasn't considered all that bad of a term IIRC (I was pretty young).

It wasn't considered all that bad of a term at the time, but then again, at certain points in history it was socially acceptable to use a variety of ethnic slurs, so...

Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library

#166

Post by steveklabnik »

silentbicycle wrote: post #147
mberning wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see your point. From a different perspective, if the library weren't so complacent on enforcing the rules there would be a need for less workstations, less IT staff, less infrastructure, less management. I guess I look at people surfing porn and youtube on public computers and see that as a 'waste' of money as compared to how it was intended to be used.

If they're anything like every library I've ever worked for or visited in my entire life , they're probably too underfunded and understaffed to perfectly block people from using the public computers to do anything the local policy considers inappropriate. I highly doubt it's a matter of complacency.

In fact, most librarians I know (admittedly not too many) are even more "information should be free" than your average GNU hippie.

These are the places with a sign up in the windows that said "The FBI has not yet raided us," after all.

Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library

#167

Post by silentbicycle »

steveklabnik wrote: post #166
silentbicycle wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they're anything like every library I've ever worked for or visited in my entire life , they're probably too underfunded and understaffed to perfectly block people from using the public computers to do anything the local policy considers inappropriate. I highly doubt it's a matter of complacency.

In fact, most librarians I know (admittedly not too many) are even more "information should be free" than your average GNU hippie. These are the places with a sign up in the windows that said "The FBI has not yet raided us," after all.

That matches my experience. Those positions are not contradictory, though. It's about preventing a hostile environment for people who want to use the library, and keeping anybody from monopolizing public resources.

Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library

#168

Post by alexophile »

dhimes wrote: post #137
alexophile wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was under the impression that the only way to use "broad" non-pejoratively is in reference to the actual breadth of something. That being said, sometimes it's safer to study abroad from afar.

Yes, you can't say it any more... It actually fell out of favor long ago, but originally it wasn't considered all that bad of a term IIRC (I was pretty young).

Right, I think that's more because, at the time, it wasn't all that bad to refer to women pejoratively.

Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library

#169

Post by steveklabnik »

silentbicycle wrote: post #167
steveklabnik wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fact, most librarians I know (admittedly not too many) are even more "information should be free" than your average GNU hippie. These are the places with a sign up in the windows that said "The FBI has not yet raided us," after all.

That matches my experience. Those positions are not contradictory, though. It's about preventing a hostile environment for people who want to use the library, and keeping anybody from monopolizing public resources.

It's true. There's a difference between acknowledging that and getting righteous about 'my tax dollars going to some poor people looking at porn,' that's all I'm saying.

Re: Ditch Starbucks and work at the library

#170

Post by theBobMcCormick »

mberning wrote: post #92
JacobAldridge wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"but I was completely pissed off that my tax dollars go to support that." People who can't afford a few hundred dollars for their own computer and the monthly bill for internet access? If you're looking at porn in the library, it's because you can't do it anywhere else, not because you're abusing tax dollars. Would I like the poor, the disadvantaged, the isolated to be using the library resources my taxes pay for to…

This is completely and utterly asinine. Not only does this inappropriate use cause a hostile environment for people that legitimately want to use the library, but it lowers the number of available workstations for legitimate use. Just imagine your grandmother or little sister going down to the library to do some research and being uncomfortable in this environment. Think they are going to go back? No, of course they…

Would this be the wrong time to bring up the HN guidelines? (http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

Calling someone else's argument asinine seems to be exactly what the guidelines specifically ask not to do. eg:

"When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. E.g. "That is an idiotic thing to say; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3.""

Post reply on HN