Brian

January Magazine has a round-up of several books for babies.

"We already know that kids who grow up surrounded by reading material are more likely to develop a taste for books as entertainment than ones that aren’t. All that needs to be decided, then, are what books to surround them with."

Author Don DeLillo and the Steppenwolf Theater put on a staged reading of excerpts from his novel Cosmopolis. Story in the Chicago Tribune (free registration may be required).

Sheldon Pacotti makes the case in Salon that a completely open society, rather than a government crackdown, may be the best chance for surviving terrorism by means of nanobots, engineered biological viruses, or other self-replicating technology.

"What happens, in a police bureaucracy, if someone releases a nanotech plague into the environment? If the police can suppress information on the structure of the nanobots, then only a handful of government bureaus and hand-picked researchers may be allowed to work on a cure. Millions could die waiting for the bureaucracy to solve the problem. On the other hand, if the molecular structure of the pest is published worldwide, anyone with the expertise could help design defensive technology."

In today’s Chicago Tribune, columnist Dawn Turner Trice, who says she has always loved libraries, plugs the library referenda that will be on the ballot tomorrow.

"Many library systems are doing well and aren’t asking for tax increases. Some are doing such bang-up business that they need money for expansion. My focus is on the ones just vying to stay alive."

The Strib reports on the latest development in the Minneapolis saga. I suggest that the staff members are really suing over library management issues, but who’d want to read a story with a headline like that?

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U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia banned all broadcast media from a speech he gave this week.

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He was speaking at a ceremony where he received the Citadel of Free Speech award.

AP story here.

(It’s Friday on the other side of the globe …)

Lileks has added his take on Big Little Books (or is it Little Big Books?) to his Institute of Official Cheer. "They\’re comics! They\’re books! They\’re a joyless synthesis of both!"

This Chicago Tribune article (free registration may be required) says that EBSCO is close to reaching a deal to buy RoweCom (formerly Faxon). The publishers that RoweCom didn\’t pay with the money libraries paid to RoweCom are apparently in separate discussions with EBSCO regarding this deal. Swets Blackwell pulled out of its talks to buy RoweCom, citing liability issues.

Of interest to all you United States v. ALA junkies out there, the government filed its brief on the merits with the Supreme Court a couple weeks ago. The Office of the Solicitor General finally got around to putting it on the Web, along with a few appendices.

I\’ve only glanced at the brief, but it looks like the government is relying a lot on the old "filtering is like book selection" argument.

[Update By Blake, @ 4pm] Jim Faith passed along a bunch more Amicus briefs online:


Brief written by Ken Bass (who defended the Loudoun County Library in 1998) on behalf of public libraries.


Brief written by Kristina Bullock, Bruce Taylor, and Jan LaRue and on behalf of pro-family groups.

Brief written by the ACLJ on behalf of members of Congress.


Brief written by the Liberty Legal Institute, on behalf of mayors and cities

A Chicago Tribune article (free registration may be required) about the mainstream appropriation of Goth styles quotes librarian John Wirtz quite a bit. Wirtz is also a member of a band called Anarchy Ass & the An-R-Kids.