The Long, Dark Teatime of the Soul

I don't know who needs to hear this but not everyone has access to public libraries.

Assuming you even have a library in your town, not everyone can physically get to them! The poorer and more disabled you are, the less likely you are to even own a car, let alone be able to drive it!

And in most US cities, walking from point A to B is either literally physically impossible or illegal, or so literally life-threateningly dangerous that you're better off not risking it!

And assuming you can get to the library -- guess what! There's no guarentee you can actually get a library card! Yes, despite how everyone always sings endless praises, libraries aren't perfect, and there are still very real obstacles between some of the most vulnerable people and being able to borrow from a library!

In many places, you can't get a library card unless you have a driver's liscence / state ID. And in some places, even that alone isn't enough -- you also have to provide proof that you live in the city!

Which means homeless people who've had their IDs literally stolen by the cops, who don't have a mailing address they can use as proof they live in the same city as the library can't get a library card unless they can somehow get to the DMV and miraculously have the money pay for a new ID. Which they can't do without other forms of ID. Which the cops probably also literally stole.

Even if you're not homeless, if someone steals your wallet, and you can't drive, you can't get a library card either now, because you have no ID, and no way to get a new one!

The Internet Archive's lending library is actually free and accessible to everyone who can connect to the internet, with no hoops to jump through. You just have to make an account and you can start reading.

Stop claiming you want people to be able to read books if you don't actually want the most vulnerable people to actually be able to read books. Which have already been paid for and helped the authors.

If you don't even understand the bare minimum basics of how the Internet Archive's lending library works, maybe don't go around proclaiming yourself the expert. And if you literally do not live in the USA, don't go around claiming our libraries are freely accessible to everyone when they're literally not!

The Internet Archive does not hurt authors. It does not hurt publishers. If you understand how it's perfectly fucking fine to buy a book and then lend it to your friends so they can all read it, you understand why the Internet Archive literally accepting fully paid for donations of books which they archive for all of humanity completely for free is also literally fine.

And if you pretend there's actually some evil difference between the two, you just need to admit you've swallowed the capitalist propaganda that publishing companies, who want to turn books into the next streaming service where you never actually own anything even when you buy it, and you're spreading blatant capitalist propaganda that actual authors hate.

It is literally a fact that if people can borrow a book from a library to read it for free, they are more likely to buy it and the rest of the series than they would if they never got the chance to read it without first forking over hard earned money that could be going towards groceries, for a book it might turn out they absolutely hate every second of.

You cannot claim to support libraries and support making books accessible to everyone and then shit on the Internet Archive. Unless you're also going to claim that lending books out to friends or Little Libraries are also immoral.

You forgot one thing though.

Not all libraries are free.

Libraries are public entities that survive on taxes and grants. When federal funding is cut for National Endowment of the Arts or the Library of Congress, all the libraries in the country feel that cut. Local and State taxes hurt libraries when education budgets are cut. Many libraries have to rely on levies to keep paying their employees. As a result, there are many places that libraries have to charge for membership cards, and even some that charge for you to check out a book.

In my library we require a photo ID or/and proof of address (you have to prove you live in the same state here, not the town, luckily) to even get a *computer access card*.

We're free, but there are still barriers to access. Ones that our system is working on getting rid of, but change is not quick or easy when you have a board of trustees that are mostly rich WASPs that have to approve every policy change. The computer systems themselves are a barrier too. Libraries do not have a lot of choice when it comes to tech systems because we're non-profit with very strict rules when it comes to pricing models, so we're not worth putting the effort into attracting our business, therefore we have lots of systems that are outdated, hand-patched to high hell, and that constantly break every time Windows updates.

Libraries (and museums) DO NOT MAKE MONEY. Some of us are lucky enough to have trusts that we can invest and use the interest of to pay for things, most of us are not that lucky.

Also: Keep in mind - not everyone has internet access.

Addendum:

Libraries buy their books once and usually at a higher price. Bigger systems will buy multiple copies, but when the furor of that book dies down, we only have so much room on the shelf for them and generally send some back to the publisher, or sell them used, or donate them elsewhere. If libraries can't afford to buy their books they take donations of new or gently used books to put on the shelf. This is not an unprecedented action.

If you want to read more, read the ALA's library ecosystem reports, or go to your local library's board meetings. They are open to the public, and now with digital technology a lot of them are recorded.

GUYS??

If you don’t know, I have stepped in for @stealyourshiny to finish a story that I fell in love with years ago. I have some big shoes to fill! 

Summary:  From a Kink Meme prompt: Anders manages to separate himself from Justice and loses his memory and the Darkspawn Taint.