If libraries were thought up today, they would be shut down by book industry lobbyists
this is… pointedly untrue… like literally ALA was last weekend and publishers fucking LOVE libraries and lobby FOR them to remain open and well-funded… how do you think libraries acquire their thousands of books? libraries buy more books than any single consumer ever could or would and publishers recognize that and rely on it?? this post is ridiculous.
Well, right, because libraries already exist. If there weren’t already a system in place that the industry had grown up around, and today someone thought, “People should be able to access knowledge for free”… Hm! Kind of like the Internet.
So no, book industry lobbyists are not out to shut libraries down, but if libraries didn’t already exist, in today’s climate of protecting the monied classes above all else, you bet your ass there’d be subscription tiers, just like the Internet’s gonna have now. Ain’t nothin’ going to exist in this world if the ruling classes can’t make money off it.
I did mean to tag-essay something like that before I reblogged the post initially, but I was feeling lazy and figured it was self-evident that this isn’t a post about shutting the hundred-plus-year-old concept of public libraries in the US down, but rather, if libraries were thought up today, as the post says.
(via aimmyarrowshigh)