Library patrons - ya gotta love em. If you want there to be a library at all, that is. Reading some library blogs from the US here and, more confrontingly, here reminded of some of the crazies Ive met in public libraries over the years. The alien abduction survivor, the ordinary looking porn viewer, the "feel like a fight, lets go to the library" crowd, the conspiracy theorists, the mentally ill and the common or garden idiots....
Havent seen one for ages. I guess they come around about 1 in every 200 punters which could be every day in a public library but might take me a year in the government library. Hope so!
Yesterday at school, I listened to a year 9 student interrogate a staff member about loan conditions. "Yes I know its a 2 week loan but what about renewals, fines, borrowing blocks etc?" She asked in a nice way but you could tell that she was going to push the boundaries (you rarely get sugar coating from this generation). Good on her, I reckon, if youre going to be REAL library user, you need to know the fine print.
I spend a lot of time at DOT requesting ILLs from other libraries. Some books but mostly journal articles. These requests come and go by email and I havent met any of the requestors in person yet. At this stage, every request is as important and urgent as every other request, which probably isnt very efficient. But I suppose I'll learn as a go.
Dont get me started on the temptation to access information in ways that I shouldnt - if librarians weren't so law abiding, the journal aggregating business would be in the same position as the recorded music industry.
1 comment:
Gosh, and I thought some of my library patrons were bad, am glad I don't have ALABOOBS.
And in regards to illegal things, I had a lecturer let me know that it was my duty to copy a segment of a copyrighted DVD for them as "for educational purposes" means they can use whatever they like. I think they missed a few things in the copyright legislation.
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