Between 1990 and 2014, visits to public libraries grew by a whopping
181%. For context, the population of the United States increased by 28%
during that period. Why have so many more people been using their
libraries in the last two decades? Here’s what I think…
Librarians Are More Involved in Communities
In the distant past, the library building was the center of a librarian’s professional world. Now, librarians regularly expand the library’s reach by presenting at
community meetings, staffing booths at events, and just generally
applying their skills in creative ways to helping their community.
Responsive, Unique, and High-Quality Program Offerings
Libraries have hosted programs such as book clubs, film screenings, storytimes, and arts & crafts for years. Today’s libraries have raised the bar with their program offerings in the past
few decades to respond to patron needs. Workshops and training on starting a business, basic job skills, and STEM programs for kids, “Community Reads” events and literary festivals are just a few new options available.
Embrace of a User-Centered Approach to Technology
Possibly the biggest reason that library visits have grown so
drastically in the last two decades is that libraries have become the
go-to places for computer classes, help with devices like tablets and
e-readers, and access to free ebooks and audiobooks.
Libraries succeed at technology not by upgrading their computers every
year, but by helping their patrons access the information they need,
whether it is at the library or at home using the skills they learned at
the library.
Okay so as those of you who use PayPal are probably aware, PayPal has this new credit card type thing that they’re DESPERATE for people to use.
So I was buying something with Paypal and suddenly mid check out i noticed something that said I was signing up for their credit card, like not asking me if I want to buy it, one click away as if I was about to finish a transaction for it. I scrolled down and saw a “cancel transaction” button, pressed it, and suddenly I was back to my checkout screen.
PayPal now has a pop up screen that looks almost identical to their normal checkout screen, which will pop up while you’re mid-transaction and try to trick you into signing up for their credit card. Keep an eye out.
While I’m at it, I’m really not happy with the way Tumblr is restoring “the innocence of youth” culture to 1990s-purity-ring levels.
It’s somehow transmuted a few good principles–adults shouldn’t have sex with underage people, underage people shouldn’t take part in porn, very young children shouldn’t be exposed to explicit sexuality–into bullshit like:
– All fiction involving underage sexuality, even non-sensationalized written descriptions of the kind of sexual relationships teenagers often have with each other, is child porn
– Sex education that talks about dealing with STIs and pregnancy and rape is okay, but teaching teenagers about sexual pleasure is gross and anyone who does it is probably a pedophile
– People under 18 all find sexuality frightening or offputting and don’t want to be exposed to it (I’m sure some feel that way, but if you think this is a universal or majority thing, wow, you must’ve gone to a very different high school than I did)
– Having adult content somewhere that minors could stumble across it is as bad as going to the playground and pushing it in kindergarteners’ faces
– Even acknowledging the existence of underage sexuality is suspicious, why would you be talking about this if you weren’t some kind of pedophile
It’s tough to talk about this because it immediately puts you in the company of people who really are being creepy about it, but I think it’s important to push back against these things. Young people have sexualities, they aren’t “innocent” and many of them don’t want to be, and it is possible to acknowledge these facts without exploiting them.
if you make a distinction between 6-year-olds and 16-year-olds with regard to sexuality, there’s a whole posse of antis who will actively go out and crusade in random folks’ inboxes trying to convince the world you’re a pedophile.
because of the ‘believe all accusations and spread them like wildfire’ element of this culture, there’s a whole lot of high-strung scrupulosity victims being manipulated by a handful of bigots, who aim them at women, jews, and queer people pretty much exclusively. you never see a cis straight man being accused this way. you never reblog from a cis straight man and get an anon going “you know he’s a pedophile right???” – if you get a message like that it’s always going to be about someone the right wing hates.
i don’t think it’s at all an irony that the core message of anti culture is the same as 1980′s fundamentalism. i think it’s very deliberate.
Harry Potter star Dan Radcliffe has issued some criticisms against Warner Brothers and the film’s production team for continuing to employ Johnny Depp despite the allegations made against the Grindelwald actor.
“I suppose the thing I was struck by was, we did have a guy who was reprimanded for weed on the [original Potter] film, essentially, so obviously what Johnny has been accused of is much greater than that.”
me @ danrad
I appreciate that he’s just very “you fired a teenager for smoking weed but you’re going to defend a wife beater? Thanks for the job and everything but fuck all of you.”
ugh 