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Comment by mberning | Hacker News Reader

This is completely and utterly asinine. Not only does this inappropriate use cause a hostile environment for people that legitimately want to use the library, but it lowers the number of available workstations for legitimate use. Just imagine your grandmother or little sister going down to the library to do some research and being uncomfortable in this environment. Think they are going to go back? No, of course they won't. But they will continue to pay tax to fund it. I don't understand how anybody could be 'OK' with this gross misuse of public funds.

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When I worked for a public library system (for, not at; I was a library employee), a fair amount of my time was spent watching the public internet stations. Mostly, helping people use the internet, keeping track of who was out of time, etc., but occasionally that meant kicking out people we caught looking at porn.

It's not like it's encouranged. Be realistic. It's usually grounds for banning, and I doubt my library system was unique there.

Some people spent time on facebook, myspace, flash games, etc., but some people spend lots of time on Hacker News, too. Not sure what your point is, there. It's not like kids were allowed to sit playing flash games all day when people wanted computers for schoolwork (or whatever).

Who said it was encouraged? Every library is different. I'm sure if you go to one out in the burbs it is a lot different than in in the inner city, like I was visiting.

Your tone is making people misconstrue your point.

Perhaps we should pay someone to decide what people are allowed to look at on those computers. Actually, that doesn't seem fair. Perhaps we should pay a committee to decide, and they can hand their decision to an IT department to implement. Well, I suppose adding another responsibility to the library's IT staff will mean we'll have to pay to add a position to the department so they're staffed well enough. There. Problem solved. Funds are no longer being misused. Right?

Because this is the internet, the above probably seems really snarky. It's meant to be a calm, civil anecdote to illustrate my point, but I apologize if it does seem hostile. In any case, I think preventing people from using their library computer time as they see fit 1) will result in upset users due to many false positives, 2) results in more ... "big-brother-ism", if you will, 3) will cost as much money as it saves.

I see your point. From a different perspective, if the library weren't so complacent on enforcing the rules there would be a need for less workstations, less IT staff, less infrastructure, less management. I guess I look at people surfing porn and youtube on public computers and see that as a 'waste' of money as compared to how it was intended to be used.

If they're anything like every library I've ever worked for or visited in my entire life, they're probably too underfunded and understaffed to perfectly block people from using the public computers to do anything the local policy considers inappropriate. I highly doubt it's a matter of complacency.

In fact, most librarians I know (admittedly not too many) are even more "information should be free" than your average GNU hippie.

These are the places with a sign up in the windows that said "The FBI has not yet raided us," after all.

That matches my experience. Those positions are not contradictory, though. It's about preventing a hostile environment for people who want to use the library, and keeping anybody from monopolizing public resources.

It's true. There's a difference between acknowledging that and getting righteous about 'my tax dollars going to some poor people looking at porn,' that's all I'm saying.

Since when does watching where your money goes make you righteous? Has nothing to do whether I think they are right or wrong for looking at porn. I don't give a shit if people look at porn, or do drugs, or work as a prostitute. What drives me nuts is that this unsanctioned use drives more and more cost every year. If all the people viewing porn at the library were kicked out how many workstations would be rendered unnecessary? Probably a significant number. Those funds that would have been spent on those workstation could be put to use somewhere else, such as local police, fire, sanitation, etc. A rather better use of money in my book. Sorry if that comes off as being 'righteous'.

> Sorry if that comes off as being 'righteous'.

The problem is that you're presenting it as a class issue. Read it again:

> Glancing over the screens I could see a variety of pornographic images, facebook and myspace pages, and youtube. The library is a great resource, but I was completely pissed off that my tax dollars go to support that.

This is a bit different than an argument that they could cut down on 'probably a significant number' of computers if there was lower usage. The whole point of having a resource is to use it, so I'd argue that we should be trying to promote utilization anyway...

'surfing youtube' vs 'how it's intended to be used' is missing the forest for the trees: libraries are about disseminating information.

> Thus, modern libraries are increasingly being redefined as places to get unrestricted access to information in many formats and from many sources. They are extending services beyond the physical walls of a building, by providing material accessible by electronic means, and by providing the assistance of librarians in navigating and analyzing tremendous amounts of information with a variety of digital tools.

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library

I'd pay a small tax increase of .1 cents to abolish internet pornography in libraries. Call me a party pooper, but there's a time and place, and the place for pornography is definitely not public spaces.

I don't care if there's a nude painting on display, but I do care if there's some hard core humping on a computer monito in a public place where my child can see it... I mean he was just born, give him at least a few years innocence!

You make it sound so easy. Leaving aside the complicated legal question for determining what is and isn't considered pornography* , how would you go about actually doing it? Is internet filtering perfectly reliable? Would hiring several extra library employees specifically to watch the internet stations suffice? Library staff are already trying to prevent people from viewing pornography on the public computers, working within the resources available. Sheesh.

* At the library system I worked at, it was a matter of staff judgement.

I'm perfectly happy with staff judgement. If they need it then I vote we pay them for their extra time or another resource to help (well I'm Canadian so my vote only counts up here).

Didn't mean to say it was easy, jus worthwhile.

I reread my comment after it had been downvoted and realized I was probably not clear at all. I don't care about the downvoting, but I wanted to clear it up so no one reading it felt persecuted or unappreciated.

When I said .1 cents I actually meant a small amount but not a trivial amount per paycheck multiplied by the tax paying population. So around 7 million per year. Not sure if that's significant enough, but it was just a figure off the top of my head meant to demonstrate that by paying a small amount individually we could help the issue.

Anyways, I've over-explained it now... but I felt like a douche when I checked my threads this morning.

I understood where you're coming from. Unfortunately, tax increases for any library services can be a hard sell.

Mainly, I just wanted to point out that it's a quintessential "Small Matter of Programming" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Small_matter_of_programming) issue in library policy, and people who have never worked for a library can easily underestimate the difficulty. My response was a bit over-bristly, though, sorry.

Would this be the wrong time to bring up the HN guidelines? (http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

Calling someone else's argument asinine seems to be exactly what the guidelines specifically ask not to do. eg:

"When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. E.g. "That is an idiotic thing to say; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3.""

I see and empathize with your point, but you're getting into some tricky first amendment issues if you attempt to police what people are doing (short of playing videos at high volume).

Strangely enough, I often study at a public law library (where I am right now) and I occasionally see the staff kick someone out for misuse of the computers here, even though it's run by the county. Perhaps it's because there are only 6 of them and they're meant for accessing legal databases like Lexis/Nexis, not checking your facebook status. (I'm using my laptop, they probably wouldn't approve of me using HN on a library machine either!)

In my experience as a library employee, there had to be a strong case that somebody was disrupting other patrons' abilities to use the library / creating a hostile environment before they could get kicked out. Coming in falling-down-drunk, stealing stuff, or looking at porn on the internet stations was pretty clear cut, but sometimes the line was fuzzy.

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