libraries
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Libraries, Now in 3D
3D printers are the latest accessory arriving in modern public libraries. However, just like when libraries introduced technologies such as the Internet, 3D printers raise concerns over what the public should be allowed to do with the equipment. NPR takes…
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A World Without Libraries
Libraries are under threat, and those that want to survive will need to modernize. But what does the world look like if libraries change too much, or cease to exist at all? Over at Huffington Post, Lindsey Drager examines what…
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NYPL as Budget Hostage
A scathing indictment from Jim Dwyer at the New York Times this week accuses city leaders of depriving funding from the library system, and its mayors of holding the NYPL hostage for leverage in budget negotiations. As Dwyer points out,…
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A Live-In Library
Two Denver booksellers have been saving for the last twenty years to launch the Rocky Mountain Land Library. With more than 32,000 volumes, the couple envision a live-in research institution with a focus on western land, history, industry, and writers.…
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Unusual Libraries Result from Modern Needs
Libraries arrive on camels, roll up on three wheels, float into our lives, speed along underground, or sometimes just like to host a party. Libraries of the past have been formal, center of civilization institutions of state control. The move toward…
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Shelters for Families, and Books
Twenty homeless shelters serving NYC families will be getting their own libraries as part of a new initiative from the Departments of Education and Homeless Services. The project, supported by Scholastic and a number of literacy organizations, aims to address…
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Derrida Goes to Princeton
New Jersey is about to get Poststructural, thanks to Princeton’s recent acquisition of Jacques Derrida’s library. The collection contains nearly 14,000 books, many of which bear marginalia from the celebrated critic and philosopher. The collection will be available to scholars…
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Redefining the Commons
A library is rarely ever just a library, often evolving alongside the community it serves. The Lacuna Project is taking this idea literally by building a library made entirely of books for this year’s Bay Area Book Festival. Festival-goers will…
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Finding Buried Treasure (in the Library)
Librarians at the University of Buffalo have discovered priceless Greek and Roman coins—but they weren’t digging in the ground to find the artifacts. The coins were already in the library’s own collection. NPR reports that the coins, donated by Thomas…
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A Library of Wine
Napa Valley is one of the most bountiful producers of wine so perhaps its unsurprising that it’s also home to a comprehensive collection of writing about wine. Founded in 1962, the non-profit Napa Valley Wine Library has 3,500 volumes including…
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Keep Warburg Weird
The future of the Warburg Institute, one of London’s most influential and strangest libraries, is examined at length in this week’s New Yorker. Adam Gopnik covers the history of the center, from its founding in pre-Nazi Germany through the height…
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James Patterson, Philanthropist
Bestselling author James Patterson is giving school libraries $1.25 million in grants of $1,000 to $10,000 for books, reading programs, and technology, reports the Washington Post. Patterson has previously pledged $1 million to 175 independent bookstores. His generosity is all…