[murbot]

Seriously. I bought a year membership for $5 the other day because my kids got 'em there. I haven't really been in a library since I was FORCED to in school.

Do you guys know they HAVE MUSIC CDs THERE?

I checked out a 4 CD Allman Brothers collection, a 4 disc Jimi Hendrix set, and several really cool double CD sets. Lots of singles too, semi-old stuff that usually costs a ton in the stores.

It's too bad though, they say you're not supposed to copy them. I'll have to really work at listening to all of this music in the next 3 weeks.

My god, imagine if you could just import all of this music into iTunes. That would be insane.

Libraries are gnarley.

[Wrao]

Yea, I've seen some really rare hard to find out of print albums at my local library. It's quite awesome. My mom and sister are both library addicts, they check out dozens of books and movies at a time.

[Koodari]

With DVD firmly entrenched, I guess I should take a look at what the local libraries have to offer. In VHS times they didn't have anything worth seeing.

Anyway.. I'm very disappointed in the book selection of libraries. They only have fiction, nothing informative I want to read. Different university libraries have some of those books, but they are scattered all over the town, usually every book in a different library. Amazon saves...

[murbot]

I also managed to score some super easy brownie points with my wife while I was there.

She just read The Notebook by Nicolas Sparks, watched the movie, so now she's on this Sparks hunt. She tried getting a couple of his books the other day but they were all out. She was bummed.

So I'm in there balancing an armload of CDs, just heading to the counter, and I spot a hardcover book of his sitting on a tray just about to be shelved. I grabbed it and threw in in the pile.

Of course I didn't mention how easy it was to find, just that "the lady said this was the only one in".

[thuh Freak]

pfft. liberries are still lame.

[Luca]

Screw you.

Actually they are lame. I work in one.

[Maciej]

Libraries rock, only the big ones tho. Its really easy to get lost in the numerous shelves @ school, and I can actually get work done.

And to imagine, they're free!

[staph]

I don't need to be convinced — both my parents and several of my better friends are librarians.

The National Library of Australia (where my father worked) is a depositing library, so they even have an extensive collection of unexpected things: porn magazines, comic books, Video Hits magazines, etc. I suppose something has to pad out the 7 million volumes.

[Windswept]

Ahhhhh.....libraries.

I'm surrounded by libraries, including the one in my own house that has a few thousand volumes - up here in a loft built especially for all my books. Unfortunately, as soon as I unpacked my books from boxes and put them on the 16-foot long, custom-built shelves, the shelves were full.

I've bought a zillion more books since then. It's a sickness, it really is...

ANYway... there's a really good jr. college library a mile away, an absolutely incredible main city library half a mile away (probably the best public library in the entire state), and a major university-branch library two miles away. I chose this location on purpose, so that when I really get going with my own writing, I'll never be at a loss for research materials.

My city library has twice as many DVD's as VHS stuff; tons of unabridged books on tape; lots of visual media on world travel, etc. Tons of music CD's. They even used to check out framed art prints to hang on the wall, but I don't think they do that anymore.

Plus, their interlibrary loan service is fantastic. I got on a military kick a few years ago, and was reading various war book series. One book was unavailable, right in the middle of the series; so the library had it sent up from an army base in the southern part of the state.

My library schedules informative lectures on every possible topic; book discussion groups of all kinds; weekly coffeehouse nights with music groups playing, and open-mike access; music performances of all kinds, from chamber music to African drum groups. They have sculpture, painting, and other kinds of art displays, as well as the computers I use when I'm having online problems at home.

Libraries are wonderful. Probably the best possible use of taxpayer dollars.

[Luca]

Oh man. Porn + library is a bad thing. There are way too many crazies who hang out here and look at porn on the computers when they think no one's looking.

[drewprops]

Really good libraries have a nifty musty smell, especially down in the deep stacks where they have periodicals about topics that nobody remembers. I never made out in a library, but have heard some stories~!

[Brad]

Actually, that "musty" smell that comes from old books is produced from a type of mold that grows in the paper and in the spine. It's the same type of mold that is used to produce a certain hallucinogenic drug that was very popular in the 70s.

[Maciej]

My school library has a lot of places where people simply don't visit.

[Windswept]

Originally Posted by drewprops Really good libraries have a nifty musty smell, especially down in the deep stacks where they have periodicals about topics that nobody remembers. I never made out in a library, but have heard some stories~!

When I was a freshman in college, one night I was looking for a volume on the fifth floor of the stacks. The whole floor seemed deserted. Suddenly, a guy of Middle Eastern origin came down my aisle and, out of the blue, started telling me that I was "beautiful like the sun and the moon and the stars." When he put his hand on my chest, I turned around and made a dash for the elevator. Kind of a creepy experience. I only went into the stacks in the daytime after that.

[murbot]

When I was there this was this Iranian dude asking about books. A girl was looking them up on the computer at the front. Something about Iranian heritage.

Then I heard her saying "CIA case files". I shit you not.

I would have given him a hurricane elbow and called the cops, but this is Canada. No terrorists.

[Kickaha]

No, you just send them down here...

[Windswept]

Originally Posted by Koodari With DVD firmly entrenched, I guess I should take a look at what the local libraries have to offer. In VHS times they didn't have anything worth seeing. Anyway.. I'm very disappointed in the book selection of libraries. They only have fiction, nothing informative I want to read. Different university libraries have some of those books, but they are scattered all over the town, usually every book in a different library. Amazon saves...

I would say American libraries are 65-70% non-fiction. I'm guessing, but I'd say the fiction that gets checked out the most is in paperback form. The hardbacks are just SO heavy.

Our libraries are very well-used by the public. Like I said, a wonderfully beneficial expenditure of taxpayer monies.

It's a shame your libraries don't seem well-stocked. I bet they have an interlibrary loan program there, so you can find a title you want, put in a request, and they'll locate a copy anywhere in your region and send it to your local library for you to check out. Anyway, it's definitely worth a try. Amazon is great, but plenty of things are better to check out of the library for free, rather than buy.

[Kickaha]

The Raleigh, NC city library system is actually pretty sweet. The Cameron Village branch is undergoing a massive renovation right now, and one of the folks there is in the middle of purchasing and *gasp* organizing the graphics novels as honest to god literature. As in, out of the children's section, into the database by author, artist(s), inker, etc, and treated like Real Books. I love it. I can't wait to see what he ends up doing with the section.

[Wrao]

I mentioned this story in another thread but It bears repeating here.

an old man in his 60s or 70s, over the course of at least 25 years, stole over ten thousand books from our local library. He just stored them in his house his wife didn't pay much mind to it, it was like a hobby for him, since he didn't read them all(though if he did, daym) anyway, that was fun.

[autodata]

Let me preface this by noting that I am a librarian, one whose main focus is web apps and networks

Originally Posted by Koodari Anyway.. I'm very disappointed in the book selection of libraries. They only have fiction, nothing informative I want to read. Different university libraries have some of those books, but they are scattered all over the town, usually every book in a different library. Amazon saves...

Doesn't matter. Interlibrary loan is the shit. You can basically get anything you can think of. If your library has a robust ILL dept, they'll even email authors and get unpublished (or hard to get) stuff directly. I get all of my DVDs through interlibrary loan. It's slower than netflix, but I just order them online whenever I think of one I want to see.

No video games, though. I've been thinking about having the next library revolution I start be about getting video games. I've started planting the seed on some listservs and I think I might try to bring it up at a conference. We're still a couple years off, but there have been a couple public libraries that have hosted LAN events (counterstrike, etc). Video games are the single major area of culture that libraries haven't touched, but the older folks are starting to recognize that the librarians in my 35 and under generation want them. On the selfish end, I'm so accustomed to interlibrary loan I think it's crap that I have to go to blockbuster to try out games before I buy them, or in the case of xbox games like Halo, beat them in a day.

You know, our library has a cafe now. A bunch are starting to. Free wireless, access to 90% more info than is on the public web, DVDs, CDs, etc

[autodata]

Originally Posted by Kickaha and one of the folks there is in the middle of purchasing and *gasp* organizing the graphics novels as honest to god literature.

It's been like pulling teeth trying to get these people to realize the significance of graphic novels, even with great graphic journalism like Joe Sacco's books. We still don't get them as part of the normal collection. Some of these older librarians are so out of touch...

[Windswept]

Originally Posted by autodata You know, our library has a cafe now.

Oh, I'm SO jealous.

A bunch are starting to. Free wireless, access to 90% more info than is on the public web, DVDs, CDs, etc

Truly wonderful places.

But I think Koodari lives in Finland or Sweden, or someplace.

So maybe it's not the same there.

[autodata]

Originally Posted by Carol So maybe it's not the same there.

I've heard their interlibrary loan system isn't as developed. We still interact with european and asian libraries a lot, though, but with more academic materials. I don't really know any details about european libraries, though. Then again, the dutch seems to have it going on with tech in general and library tech in particular, and scandinavia seems to be popping up a lot

[autodata]

BTW, murbot, I've been really jealous of canadian libraries recently. Every time I find out about some cool new library web technology, it's almost always being done by a canadian librarian/programmer.

[billybobsky]

Dude. Librarians. Know. Everything. They. Will. Track. You. Down. If. You. Refuse. To. Pick. Up. Your. Library. Card. Pick. It. Up. And. Die. Wait. And. Die. Either. Way. You. Are. Screwed. The. Only. Thing. That. Will. Save. You. Is. The. Fact. That. They. Cannot. Read. Sentances. Containing. Only. One. Word.

[Windswept]

Originally Posted by autodata BTW, murbot, I've been really jealous of canadian libraries recently. Every time I find out about some cool new library web technology, it's almost always being done by a canadian librarian/programmer.

Canada rules!

(See, it's cold outside there for so long, that Canadian programmers have 'extra' time to come up with cool new stuff.)

(As a side note: the cutest guys in the world live in Canada. I've said it before; I'll say it again. Nothing to do with libraries, I know; but the point is worth making on a regular basis. Why? It just *is*, that's why! Yeah, yeah, so I'm off-topic. So sue me.)

[BlueRabbit]

Originally Posted by autodata No video games, though. I've been thinking about having the next library revolution I start be about getting video games. I've started planting the seed on some listservs and I think I might try to bring it up at a conference. We're still a couple years off, but there have been a couple public libraries that have hosted LAN events (counterstrike, etc). Video games are the single major area of culture that libraries haven't touched, but the older folks are starting to recognize that the librarians in my 35 and under generation want them. On the selfish end, I'm so accustomed to interlibrary loan I think it's crap that I have to go to blockbuster to try out games before I buy them, or in the case of xbox games like Halo, beat them in a day.

IIRC, my library used to carry some video games. I think that's where I got SimTower back in the day... The problem is, what do you do with people who copy game CD's and just use them? That would just make game piracy that much more widespread. On the other hand, the people who would do that are like the people who copy music CD's from the library - I guess there's not much you can do about that.

[sunrain]

I actually remember being able to check out software programs from libraries (including games). They came on 5.25" floppies in ziplock bags usually with a sheet explaining the program.

Wow, just dated myself there.

[Koodari]

Originally Posted by Carol But I think Koodari lives in Finland or Sweden, or someplace. So maybe it's not the same there.

You would be correct. The location is Finland.

We do have an inter-library loan system and as far as I know it works well. It's just that the books I want are nowhere to be found in regular libraries. A few of them are in university libraries, which to the best of my knowledge do not have an interlibrary loan even though they have a common search system, so it's a pain in the ass having to go to a far part of the city to a library that only has one book of interest. And that still leaves the vast majority of the books unavailable.

The libraries would very possibly have these books had they been translated into Finnish, but alas, they are usually in English only. Nothing specialized enough that they should be limited to a speciality library - mostly it's "science for laymen" and how-to books - biology, psychology, decision making, game theory, computer business, physical training and others.

[autodata]

A lot of libraries are connected through a large system called OCLC. It's like a large database that has records of essentially everything cataloged anywhere (in theory). In the US it's very widespread, so basically you can get anything that any kind of library would carry. I surprised someone this morning by getting her a book published just last month.

speaking of libraries: [1]and [2]