On Thu, 30 Sep 2010, Jonathan Rochkind wrote:
>> Why not ask the scholars? I bet you not a one will advocate for the
>> removal of large amounts of research material to make room for more
>> study spaces.
>
> As long as they'll pay for more space too, that's all good. But you'll
> still run out of space eventually, and either need to build more
> building or deaccession. It would be nice if we could have all the space
> we want for free.
But there is a simple solution that could be applied to all these
problems: lobby for laws requiring cancellation of copyright exclusions on
titles that have not generated significant income [define that] for their
authors for 20 years or more. Then those titles could be digitized and
the physical books be put in storage (or, god forbid [?], sold on the
Internet).
Think about it: the opposite approach, that has been developing for a
while, seems to be to find as many ways to squeeze corporate income out of
old books as possible, despite limiting access to intellectual content
(and crowding shelves) in the process. Isn't it all a question of
societal priorities -- profit or knowledge -- or have we already gone too
far beyond that?
"All the space we want for free"-- hmmmm. Would that be something like
government [i.e. people]-sponsored free Internet access for all? Or might
some governments [i.e. elitist] come along that would prefer to limit
freedom of information, or be conned into it by budget-cutters?
:) ??
Cheers!
John G. Marr
Cataloger
CDS, UL
Univ. of New Mexico
Albuquerque, NM 87131
jmarr_at_unm.edu
jmarr_at_flash.net
**There are only 2 kinds of thinking: "out of the box" and "outside
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Received on Fri Oct 01 2010 - 12:58:36 EDT