Woo-hoo, I'm officially published!

[sylvar]

Anonymous Library Cards Allow You to Wonder, 'Who Was That Masked Patron?' by Ben Ostrowsky

And I'm June 2nd's Library Link of the Day. Cheers, John!

Comments

[meandering.livejournal.com]

Woo! Very spiff article. I'm wondering if the benefits of an anonymous library card system are worth the effort to implement it. I would imagine that you think that they are, but do you think most other librarians/library administrators would?

[sylvar.livejournal.com]

That depends. What's the monetary value of the mayor's borrowing record? How much would it cost the library in reduced cooperation from the city if a library employee leaked the fact that the mayor checked out books on how to avoid paying income taxes?

[meandering.livejournal.com]

I can see the personal issues that would sway one library or the other for a anonymous system. What I'm wondering is if there is enough demand to actually have these systems implemented. I'd love to see this sort of system around, but I'm afraid that too much of the "we don't have anything to hide" reasoning would kill a proposal for this.

[ximinez]

Woot!

But can you buy an anonymous library card with your credit card? ;)

[sylvar.livejournal.com]

You'd be a fool, but some libraries do accept credit cards. (Most of the time, cities/counties don't want to lose revenue to merchant account fees.)

[ximinez]

Being a fool was kind of the point. However, there would be a utility to it, too, in the out-of-residency-area scenario.

[papertygre.livejournal.com]

Very interesting article. Congrats!

[madam-sosostris.livejournal.com]

I'm curious what those mothers who check out 10-15 children's books at a time for their kiddies would have to say about that. $180 to front for storytime? Egad.

[sylvar.livejournal.com]

Oh, they'd use their identity-based traditional library card for that.