Bookslut: A dispatch from the 2012 Public Library Association conference.

March 28, 2012 - 2:17pm — Anonymous Patron (not verified)

Bookslut
Book Report
A dispatch from the 2012 Public Library Association conference.
By Jessa Crispin

Libraries are in crisis. Right? I mean, that is all we hear. All around the nation, budgets are being slashed, hours shortened, librarians laid off. And on top of that we have e-books... doing something. God dammit, e-books. You are always ruining everything.

What is the future of the library, in a world of the financial crisis, where all inessential services are being slashed in city budgets — inessential services ranging from health care for the poor to libraries to a large chunk of Camden, New Jersey’s police force — in ineffective austerity measures? My infallible editor sent me to the 2012 Public Library Association conference in Philadelphia to find out.

[continues here: http://www.thesmartset.com/article/article03271201.aspx ]