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A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

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Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#101

Post by ghaff »

Walf wrote: post #15
SMV279438 wrote: post #12

I was at UVU recently with some time to spare, looking for old bound magazines just for some browsing. Decades ago there were rows and rows of bookshelves, with these bound magazines, going back to the 1880's. It was so interesting to look through them. But now there was nothing, zippo, left of that. Just huge areas with completely empty shelves. Apparently it happened fairly recently, and the bookshelves hadn't been…

Yes, exploration, discovery. One doesn't stumble across items available on inter-library loan. I could not count the number of books I picked up and enjoyed, even if only for a short while, whilst I was studying at uni.

I agree to some degree. But I'd also note that some of the biggest libraries don't have open stacks.

Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#102

Post by webnrrd2k »

WillAdams wrote: post #28
fhdkweig wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Schools in poor towns don't have multiple levels or basements or even extra storage rooms. What you see is all you get. If there is enough space to have a room full of books, it would be better used as a publicly accessible set of stacks. The only real reason to have a librarian-only room is for books that are rare and valuable.

As I implied elsethread, the solution for that is better funding. Someone needs to take up Carnegie's mantle and finish the job which he began.

What's stopping you?

Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#103

Post by joshstrange »

gammalost wrote: post #18

At the risk of sounding a bit pretentious: I think the relationship a lot of people have with books can best be described as commodity fetisishm. People see some value in the physical books themselves. They are sacred, discarding them becomes a crime against knowledge. Sure I get it, the nazis burned books; but these libraries are in no way comparable to that

I think that’s a relatively fair take. Personally I prefer ebooks or audiobooks mostly because I can put thousands in my pocket/e-reader and carry it with me and I prefer the experience of reading a book on my reader over paper.

For me, books are closer to art than functional objects. I have a wall of bookshelves in my house that I love and I’m slowly filling them with my favorite books. I will probably never reread any of them (I’ll read the ebook version instead) but I like looking at them and I like being able to loan them out or for them to be a conversation starter.

It took me a while to be ok with that (treating books as art) but I’ve made my peace with it. I’m buy 99% used books from places like AbeBooks online or Half Price Books locally and I have no interest in “books by the foot” or similar. It’s more like my bookshelves are mini-shrines to authors or series that have been impactful to me.

Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#104

Post by ghaff »

kristjansson wrote: post #17

> the shelves were being cleared to make space—not for more books but for space itself. ... The new library has four floors. Two of them feature books Despite the frenzy of building at most American universities, the library is forced to serve dual purpose as space for study and collaboration as well as repository of printed material. The collection is not managed on merely its own merits, but subordinated to the oth…

Even going back decades, I recall major US university libraries served a dual function as having books, reference librarians, and serving as study and group work spaces. Maybe it's changed a bit but it's not new.

Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#105

Post by pfdietz »

fhdkweig wrote: post #13
bastawhiz wrote: post #10

My first thought is how accessible these books are. If a book hasn't been checked out in years, and there's another library in the interlibrary loan network that has a copy, there's no practical reason to keep another copy. If you can request a book and have it arrive in a few days, that's not an issue in any real sense, especially for books that nobody is checking out in the first place. I used to work in a library,…

40 years ago, my public middle school would periodically pick books that weren't checked out for a couple decades. They'd rubberstamp "discard" over the library's ownership mark and put them in a pile that said "free books" with the implicit declaration that those books were headed for the landfill. I ended up with a nice selection of books on nuclear energy and radioactivity including a nice non-fiction Asimov book…

In the town where I live, surplus books from the library, and donated books, are sold twice a year over several weekends. As time goes on at these events the price drops, until on the last day it's $1 for a paper grocery bag full. Those that remain go into a dumpster for pulping and recycling.

It's quite an event with long lines to get in and is loved by all. The money raised is used to buy more books for the library.

https://booksale.org/

Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#106

Post by AtlasBarfed »

fhdkweig wrote: post #26
WillAdams wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is what deep basement storage is for. A last copy policy will ensure that when one wants to compare a first edition of _The Fellowship of the Ring_ against a second, one can get the full weight of Aragorn's snark: >What did you fear that I should say? That I have here a rascal of a rebel dwarf that I would gladly exchange for a serviceable orc?'

Schools in poor towns don't have multiple levels or basements or even extra storage rooms. What you see is all you get. If there is enough space to have a room full of books, it would be better used as a publicly accessible set of stacks. The only real reason to have a librarian-only room is for books that are rare and valuable.

Society is completely overloaded with a vast surplus of commercial property. Something can be done

Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#107

Post by asdff »

bastawhiz wrote: post #10

My first thought is how accessible these books are. If a book hasn't been checked out in years, and there's another library in the interlibrary loan network that has a copy, there's no practical reason to keep another copy. If you can request a book and have it arrive in a few days, that's not an issue in any real sense, especially for books that nobody is checking out in the first place. I used to work in a library,…

It seems like they just don't really plan inventory in a logical way but in a sort of rigid first in first out way. For example I just checked out a recent addition of a classical book, one of those original classical translations that were reprinted in the 2010s with some new forward I will skip over as the only thing different than the 1990 edition, or the 1960 edition for that matter.

The library had probably 30 copies of this edition, most all sitting on shelves, while maybe 1 or 2 each of all other older editions. I'm guessing solely because this edition is "new" therefore they ordered a case of these books from the publisher when they came out whether there was demand for it or not, and the quantities of the older editions are much more likely to be matched to true demand of this book.

And eventually, they will have to destroy what probably 29 copies of this book in some years time.

Seems kind of stupid right? Why order such an excess of books?

Then I also wonder if they could sunset these quantities better. Rather than destroy the excess copy after I return it, maybe just let me keep it?

Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#108

Post by bastawhiz »

anigbrowl wrote: post #31
bastawhiz wrote: post #10

My first thought is how accessible these books are. If a book hasn't been checked out in years, and there's another library in the interlibrary loan network that has a copy, there's no practical reason to keep another copy. If you can request a book and have it arrive in a few days, that's not an issue in any real sense, especially for books that nobody is checking out in the first place. I used to work in a library,…

Our basement was stuffed to the gills with romance novels that nobody was reading anymore, mysteries published decades ago, and kids books that probably related to kids from a previous generation more. This is hardly comparable to difficult philosophy books as mentioned in the article, though. To my mind, the poin of libraries is to house and make accessible difficult or challenging books that might not necessarily b…

My local library wasn't meant for academics, but the problem is exactly the same. In fact, I'd expect a library with those kinds of books to be more amenable to trimming the collection: you often don't have a romance novel in mind, you browse for one that piques your interest. I'd be surprised if anyone was actively browsing shelves for philosophy books that seemed fun. That's the sort of stuff you go to the card catalog for.

> I do not understand why you would buy 20 copies of one book when you could have it and 19 other books.

Easy answer. Libraries know what their clients will check out. Often, because books are requested. If fifty people wait-listed the last big Dan Brown book, the library buys enough so that those people aren't waiting months to get their turn.

And yes, it's frustrating for librarians. Nobody likes buying lots of books that are not especially good. But that's literally the whole point of the library. Providing access to books that people actually want to read.

Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#109

Post by mjmsmith »

ciscoriordan wrote: post #24
gammalost wrote: post #18

At the risk of sounding a bit pretentious: I think the relationship a lot of people have with books can best be described as commodity fetisishm. People see some value in the physical books themselves. They are sacred, discarding them becomes a crime against knowledge. Sure I get it, the nazis burned books; but these libraries are in no way comparable to that

I stayed at an Airbnb that had fake books on the shelves! I looked them up and they aren't even especially cheap. But they probably get stolen a lot less.

I'd like to believe that real books would get swapped more often than stolen.

Re: A dumpster arrived behind my university's library

#110

Post by asdff »

ForOldHack wrote: post #46
bastawhiz wrote: post #10

My first thought is how accessible these books are. If a book hasn't been checked out in years, and there's another library in the interlibrary loan network that has a copy, there's no practical reason to keep another copy. If you can request a book and have it arrive in a few days, that's not an issue in any real sense, especially for books that nobody is checking out in the first place. I used to work in a library,…

I was walking down the street, and I saw a art/documentary style picture of a book seller, wearing a Fez, it seemed interesting, so I took a picture of it, and later fawned on it... until I realized that his books were on display, so I rotated the picture, and scanned the titles. There were three Greek tarot decks, which were interesting, and a book, that was about an old technology. I went to the library to see wher…

You could have renewed that book though right? I haven't actually ever done an interlibrary loan but for "in network" books seems I can continue renewing them indefinitely until the end of time.
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