The Library
Though I don't seem to have as much time as I'd
like to read, I love books, and probably knock down two or three a week. I'm
poor, and cheap, so I get them at the library. The Sacramento library system
(using exactly the same software as Hong Kong Polytechnic University, so it may
well be pretty standard stuff) lets you search for books online and reserve them
-- even fetching them from neighboring libraries, if needed. So once a week I
go in and pick up a stack of books that's waiting for
me.
If they were to invent libraries
today, they would no doubt be found massively illegal because of massive
copyright infringements. People are trying to learn for free! I worry that as
the legal environment changes and the technology gets more sophisticated, public
libraries will fade away.
Filed Mon - January 31, 2005, 10:36 AM in
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