Bookmobile Day 1: Free? What does “free” mean?
James Jacobs, Sarah Washburn from Techsoup and I (Shinjoung Yeo) are currently on a tour around CA driving the Internet Archive's bookmobile for 2 weeks and visiting 10 rural libraries in Northern California. Please stop back here or at Sarah's blog for pictures and updates of our adventures.
Our first stop today was the Placer County Library in Auburn, CA. After having breakfast at Awful annie's in Auburn's old town (it's not awful at all so you should check it out!) we drove to the library. Delightfully all the staff were excited and waiting for us to see the Bookmobile. Everyone was extremeley curious about the technology that we're carrrying to download, print, bind, cut and make books (especially satellite on the top of the bookmobile which is not quite working but is well-used for a prop :-) ) and how we're able to make books on a fly.
As any well-trained bookmobilista knows, the first thing you need is power, so we pulled up to the front of the library and finally found a plug by pulling our power cord through the bookdrop. You never know how book drop box can be used when the bookmobile's in town!
Despite being a little remote from Auburn's downtown area, the library was very lively and heavily-used by community members. As soon as we set up the table around 10am, there was a steady stream of people stopping by and asking us questions. Surprising (or *not* so surprising in living in capitialist society!) one of the most common questions that we were asked was what we were selling. We told them that we were not selling anything but promoting free public domain books which are freely available to everyone at archive.org. One person, obviously still a little confused about our intentions, asked again if we were selling machines ( referring to our heavy duty cutter, bookbinding machines we use to demonstrate how to make a book). We told the person no (kindly), but he persisted and asked if we were selling software. It was not just one person asking questions like this, but more than 50% who dropped by asked similar questions. Maybe we should have put a tip jar out; that may have alleviated their cognitive dissonence :-)
We noticed that some people couldn't grasp the concept of FREE. Just free with no "but" and no ginsu steak knives. It makes you wonder. I think we are all well-trained in our market-oriented society to think that there are producers and consumers and there seems to be no room for FREE between them.
While we were promoting FREE public domain books it might be our chance to educate our community about what should be "FREE" - free books, free library, free health care, free eductation, free government documents(!) ....
Here are some photos from our first day and you will see some government documents as well.
Tomorrow we will be setting up the bookmobile in the town of Quincy, California [pop.4,300, 90% White].
Please check back for progress reports and photos. We'll be on the road until September 15, 2007. We'd love to hear your comments on our trip.
Continue readingLost webpages?
CBS reported that the Alabama Department of Homeland Security has a website that listed groups they consider possible terrorists. However, after the agency received complaints from people, some Web pages were removed from the list. The original list of the groups that the agency considered possible terrorists were:
- Environmentalists
- Anti-Genetics (those opposed to genetically-altered crops)
- Animal Rights
- Anti-Abortion
- Anti-Nuclear
- Anti-War
- Pro-Gay Right
Response to “The Machine is Us/ing Us.â€
CorytheRaven posted a response to Prof. Wesch's “The Machine is Us/ing Us†about which we posted a few days ago. The full transcript is available on Digital Ethnography blog
Media philosopher Marshall McLuhan observed that “The Medium is the Messageâ€. That is, the form of media is what changes consciousness irrespective of the content of that media.Continue reading
ALA President Leslie Burger testified before the U.S. Senate
ALA President Leslie Burger testified before the U.S. Senate concerning recent closure of several libraries in the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). She urged the Environment and Public Works Committee halt all library closures.
Despite the fact that Congress hasn’t passed a FY 2007 budget, EPA has already begun closing libraries and restricting public access to many of the libraries that are still open. Thus far, we have seen the closure of three regional libraries – in Chicago, Dallas, and Kansas City – OPPTS and headquarters libraries in Washington, DC. Also, we have just learned that in the Region 4 library in Atlanta, the inter-library loan technician is the only staff member left, a fact EPA previously had not disclosed. The regional library in New York City was scheduled to be closed to the public with reduced hours for EPA staff on January 2, but, in light of Congressional and public pressure, EPA only recently decided to halt further closures of its libraries for the time being.Continue reading
President Bush’s library debate expands
We posted a story a few days ago about the controversy surrounding George W. Bush's presidential library. Here is a follow-up story in Inside Higher ED. While faculty members at Southern Methodist University (SMU) are mobilizing to challenge the university's plans to build President Bush's library, scholars have begun a campaign against Bush's executive order 13233 that extends the power that former presidents and their families have over their presidential papers, asking SMU to turn down the library as long as the executive order stays in place.
"I think this is very significant," said Benjamin Hufbauer, an associate professor of art history at the University of Louisville and author of Presidential Temples: How Memorials and Libraries Shape Public Memory (University Press of Kansas). "They are raising the profile of an issue that gets to the heart of the profession." With the executive order in place, Hufbauer said, it isn't fair for SMU to argue that a great scholarly resource will be placed on its campus. "People say that the archive is the most valuable part of it. That's where you can hopefully get to historical truth," Hufbauer. "But if you don't have all the papers, instead you have just a museum of political propaganda."Continue reading
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