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Anonymous Library Cards An Option?
Ben Ostrowsky writes "On the heels of the possibility of requiring fingerprinting to use library resources, librarians don't like hoarding personally identifiable information; many are keenly aware of privacy concerns. Now it appears that anonymous library cards may be a possibility on the horizon. Tell your librarian you want to be anonymous!" From the article: " You've seen anonymous cash cards already; you may even have received them before. They're better known as gift cards. Using the same principle, libraries can issue a borrower card that uses cash, rather than personal ID information, as collateral. Here's an example: If a privacy-minded user deposits $20 to get an anonymous library card, she can check out The Terror State without identifying herself. Her account balance is temporarily reduced by $15, and when the library checks the CD back in (in good condition), her balance is restored to its original value."
I'd rather not be anonymous at thge library. I'd rather have my reading list looked through than participate in a system meant to bypass the current political climate. By participating in an anonymous system, I would feel like I was legitimising the laws and practices that I feel are attacks at my personal liberty. By participating in a anonymous library card program, the situation that I find abhorrent might continue longer than it would under the current system
Thats great if you want to turn the library into a bookstore. Dropping $15 (or whatever) for a book is no big deal for some people and they will feel no obligation to return the book.
I'm sure our underfunded libraries and overworked librarians will find this system easy to implement.
These fingerprint scans for PC use are a stupid idea implemented by some town in Ill. I've never heard of. I'm sure that program won't fly...
I would LOVE this thing if it were implemented. I could go to public libraries when travelling! I could borrow a book I really need for my schoolwork when I forgot my regular library card, etc.
This is a great idea, not only for privacy, but for convenience. You get to use the ressource without the hassle, and it doesn't cost you a fortune, you loan them money, they loan you a book, you exchange it back when you are done. Everyone's happy!
Let's stop creating solutions for problems that don't exist. We have enough real problems in the US that need solutions...
Why don't you go work on solving them instead of posting on slashdot then?
Don't know where to start? Go volunteer to help out your local "overworked librarian", I'm sure they'll appreciate it.
You can't take the sky from me...
Remember the old, completely paper-driven library cards of 30+ years ago? The borrower's name was written on the card, and every borrower before them was on a permanent list. No anonymity there at all. More recently, you were issued a bar-coded card that tracked what you borrowed against your name. No anonymity there, either (because, if you don't return the book, they need to know who's running around with a $50 copy of a coffee-table Leonardo DaVinci collection, or whatever).
Now, you walk into a library, as you've been able to do for centuries, pull a book off the shelf, sit down, and read it. Put it back. There's no tracking involved, never has been (except perhaps at the Library Of Congress and some other huge collections where you have to put in a request for the book to be brought out - and there's been no anonymity there, either). But if you want to walk away with the book, they want to know who's got it. Why is that a bad thing? If you want to temporarily take posession of something that the taxpayers paid for (or which was donated to the community by a private party), it's certainly reasonable for the community to have in place a way to get hold of that person when they don't return the item, or to charge them a fee if they hang onto it for longer than is reasonable.
Now, you walk into a library and want to use the internet. Fine. But suppose your entire purpose of using that service is to phish, defraud, or otherwise be bad? If some merchant somewhere tracks a fraud attempt, or a bank tracks the use of a stolen credit card back to an IP address mapped to a machine in a facility provided by taxpayers, isn't it reasonable to be able to figure out who was driving at the time they were committing a crime? The fingerprinting issue was about computer use. Biometrics are about making sure you are who you say you are, so that lifting an acquaintence's card doesn't allow you to commit crimes in her name using public facilities.
That said, I don't think I'd want a bored IT intern at a library able to troll through proxy logs and see, by name, who was looking at what on the web. Biometrics should just be a hash, and that sort of log data should be just like financial transaction data, with need-to-know one-way storage. Yes, that can be cracked. But so can everything if you can't trust anyone, ever. If a municipality, county, or school wants to continue to offer free computer/net use, but wants to mitigate the obviously real risk of people running scams from their network, they should certainly have the option of doing something about it. It's all about transparency, though: letting the users know what's being collected when they sign on, and generally how it's being protected and under what circumstances (subpeona, etc) it can be retrieved.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
I would describe the the first few years of my (way too young) marriage as "first world poverty", we were easily in the bottom 20% bracket. I lost access to the library because I could not afford to pay the fine for a misplaced book. My answer was "op-shops" and second hand books, I never went without smokes because I rolled my own and to this day (25yrs later) I am still addicted. The biggest problem with being poor is that you get oh-so-fucking-sick of scrimping and chasing work. When you occasionally get a wad of cash you stock the cuboards, pay the red bills, get new clothes for the kids and blow the rest on a dirty weekend because you just want a break from it, even for a day.
I agree 100% with your sentiments (except poor does not imply uneducated), if you really want privacy you will find the $50 (~2 slabs in Australian money). If you are that dirt poor that you can't afford it then simply read the book in the library, trust me, you will have the spare time and it will cut down your smoking (librarians frown on that type of thing in thier library).
Librarians are a powerfull force in upholding everyones right to read Chairman Mao, the Koran, the Bible, the Unabomer's manifesto, Osama BL's diatribes or anything we fucking feel like. The interest from a single account would amount to the best part of nothing to anyone living in a country that has local libraries in the first place. If the system became popular, (no offence but I'm sure you would get takers in the US), the total interest could be a tidy sum and used to enhance what I consider is a service at the core of any "free" civilization.
To all the naysayers that are throwing up red herrings such as poverty what is the alternative besides the current status-quo (ie: no option of annonomous accounts for anyone)?
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
I don't think this will ever fly, either. There is a lot of time/money invested in cataloging library materials... they can't afford books walking out the door with no accountability. Which I can GUARANTEE would happen in spades.
A deposit to cover the cost of the book isn't enough. Even a hefty processing fee wouldn't cover it. It's not just money, either... the library has chosen the item for a reason, and wishes it to be available to the public. When an item is lost&paid, it isn't available until it can be re-ordered/re-added, which takes time... enough of this takes place already (via both legitimate claims AND white lies) without helping it along with a "hey, it's like a bookstore!" option.
See, I work for a library (sysadmin) and I can tell you straight up that librarians don't actually give a crap about fines, fees, and replacement charges.
They just want their stuff back, so other people can use it. It's what we're here for, right? Fines are nothing more than a necessary incentive to bring stuff back when you are supposed to. So other people can use it. Without them, people wouldn't. Sometimes they don't anyway. Many libraries hold "amnesty weeks" on a regular basis to encourage people just to give us back the stuff, and we'll forget about the whole thing. Replacement charges are there to accomodate legitimate cases of patrons losing material, allowing them to make it right.
Amazingly enough, There are those that just take stuff and pay the charges anyway.
It's tough enough already to keep stuff from being stolen. Add an anonymous aspect to the "I can just pay for this item instead of return it" attitude... my goodness! How on earth would we keep half of the stuff from walking out the door for good?
Besides, this is a solution to a non-problem. Librarians are ingrained with the traditions of "freedom to read", and protecting patrons right to privacy in that regard. You think you hate the Patriot Act? Most librarians spit venom at any mention of it. (Not out on the floor with the public of course.)
I've sat in seminars with over a thousand of my peers (at vendor sponsored conferences, no less) where honoring those traditions and preserving patron privacy in the face of Patriot Act was the topic of the day. Presentations were given by libraries and organizations that fought it from the get-go. Not sure why I tell you this, other than perhaps hoping it inspires some kind of confidence.
If you are truly concerned about privacy, and how your library handles it, ask the librarians. They'll probably be happy to help you. They may even refer you to the director, invite you to a library board meeting, or put you in contact with a sysadmin that might be happy to chat. (Yeah, we're busy. But some stuff is important, and public perception of privacy is a biggie on that list.)
Have you discovered your library has no privacy policy, or a lousy policy? Ask about getting it changed. Talk to the Director. No luck? Go straight to the library board and hit them up with it. Still no luck? Ask the ALA what you can do about it. Put a bug in the local media's ear. If there is a "Library Friends" group of some kind, join it. Heck, get yourself on the library board. Don't just sit & bitch. Kick some ass!
Now, check this bit from the article:
Unfortunately, if an over-zealous special agent on a fishing expedition wants to know who checked out Anti-Flag's album The Terror State yesterday, the librarian will probably have little choice. Under the USA PATRIOT Act, he or she would have to surrender the personal identity information that was originally collected to protect the library's materials.
Yeah, well... there's a reason must of us purge logs that would disclose personal circulation history (and similar info) on a daily basis. Doesn't neccessarily have anything to do with the Patriot Act o