Fans of Toronto Public Library

Bookmobile as political statement

Joe Clark — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 19:21:59 +0000

On Thursdays, the civic building that had its library ripped out, Metro Hall, hosts Bookmobile 2. I visit as a political statement, even in a snow squall.

It’s not like people don’t use this thing.

In fact, I witnessed someone on the bus actually getting a new library card the other week. She was doing it for the E-books, she said, and was surprised and delighted to see the library “even” lent DVDs.

Victory lap

Joe Clark — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 21:05:10 +0000

To celebrate last night’s squeaker victory over the philistines, I thought I’d do a victory lap of local branches, where I would hand back Jason Statham movies and adopt the corniest thumbs-up gesture practicable.

Unwatchably trashy Jason Statham movies, I should say, at the risk of tautology. My friends were quite game to cower behind their monitors and play along.

Oh, and what other trash did I pick up on that same trip?

Now begins the process of truth and reconciliation. It’s gonna have to start with apologies from wrongdoers. See you at the next board meeting.

We beat the fuckers

Joe Clark — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 01:01:03 +0000

Additional library budget cuts reversed at City Council.

Cllr Raymond Cho's motion to reverse the $3.8 million cut to the Toronto Public Library passes. Vote is 22 to 21 #TOCouncil—
Don Peat (@reporterdonpeat) January 18, 2012

I have something to say to Mike Del Grande and Cesar Palacio

Joe Clark — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 14:00:40 +0000

And it’s this: “Go fuck yourselves.” These politicians are trying to censor materials at the Toronto Public Library.

Only Toronto could be run by philistines who think 100 copies of one movie they want to prevent the public from borrowing justifies ridding the system of cinema and periodicals. That is actually what’s been proposed – and it could still happen!

Mike Del Grande, Toronto Star, 2011.11.29:

Councillor Mike Del Grande, responding to the furor over proposed cuts to library hours, told reporters Tuesday that library users can access new releases like Pirates of the Caribbean at any of the [library’s] 98 branches.

“Should the city library become a Blockbuster?” Del Grande said.

Blockbuster closed its Canadian stores in two stages starting last summer. Rogers Video will close 63 stores coast to coast.

Mike Del Grande is a man who grew up poor and wants to impose that same kind of privation on everyone else even in a time of budget surplus. Del Grande was hurt growing up, and, by God, everyone else is gonna feel his pain.
Cesar Palacio, a city councillor who is actually on the TPL Board, dared to propose the library rid itself of “popular” DVDs and all magazines. (He claims to mean “popular” magazines, but since Palacio believes the only purposes of a library are “literacy and library purposes” [sic], he really means all of them.)

So: Two city councillors, one of them a boardmember, want the busiest public library in the world to be stripped of cinema and periodicals. And it could still happen under proposed budget cuts, which, I infer, have been intentionally crafted to be reachable if magazines, DVDs, and all forms of literacy and outreach programming were eliminated.

But anyway, isn’t all this just “common sense”? The Toronto Public Library, which right-wing politicians don’t even use, really is overrun with Hollywood product and other “trash.” Isn’t it?

Nope.

Last year, the library added 570 English-language DVDs

Maybe Mike Del Grande can’t run a computer (“I don’t have a BlackBerry personally. I operate on a $23-a-month phone”), but I can.

I downloaded the complete list of circulating English-language DVDs for adults added to the system last year. It’s 570 titles. (Run the search yourself and the number is 571, but I believe the odd one out is spurious. Generally this list includes titles released in 2011, not necessarily filmed or copyrighted in that year.) Barely any of them are Hollywood movies: There are more fitness titles than Hollywood entertainment product, by my count. Oh, and which version of Jane Eyre would you like to watch? (There are at least three just on one bookmobile.)

Of course I am not suggesting there are too many of any category of movie, including American films. (And the idea of removing magazines from a public library is too stupid to dignify.)

Inspect the list yourself. (Spellchecked, paper-edited, and often fact-checked, the lists’s titles are quite accurate.) Then try to make the case the library is wasting money on movies you personally think nobody should be allowed to watch. And don’t just stop at the letter B: Page through the whole list.

Abbott and Costello Show: Who’s on First?, The
Adjustment Bureau, The
Adventures of Merlin: The Complete Second Season, The
After the Wall: a World United
Afterlife
Ageless with Kathy Smith: Staying Strong
Aki Kaurismäki’s Leningrad Cowboys
Alias: The Complete Second Season
Alias: The Complete Third Season
Alias: The Complete Fourth Season
America, America
An American Family
Antony and Cleopatra
Any Human Heart
Apocalypse: World War II
Arabia
Arbor, The
Art of Getting By, The
Arthur
At the Edge of the World
Athens: Mother of Western Civilization
Atlas: Uncovering Earth
Attack the Block
Bad Teacher
Bananas!
Barney’s Version
Battle for Haiti
Battle: Los Angeles
Bears of the Last Frontier
Beastly
Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of A Tribe Called Quest
Beautiful Boy
Beaver, The
Becoming Chaz
Bedlam: Season 1
Beetle Queen Conquers Tokyo
Beginners
Being Human: Complete First Season
Being Human: Season Three
Beneath Hill 60
Best Food Ever
Best of Travel: South Africa
Best of World Cruises
Bethany’s Skinnygirl Workout
Bette Midler: The Showgirl Must Go On
Better Life, A
Beyoncé Live at Roseland: Elements of 4
Beyond Limits
Bhutto
Big C: The Complete First Season, The
Big Cats Collection
Big Love: The Complete Fifth Season
Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son
Bill Cunningham: New York
Billy Budd
Billy’s Bootcamp: Cardio Sculpt
Birds of the Gods
Black Butler: Season One, Part One
Black Butler: Season One, Part Two
Black Death
Black in Latin America
Black Moon
Blackthorn
Blast! Balloon-Borne Large Aperture Submillimeter Telescope
Blow Out
Bob Harper: Beginner’s Weight Loss Transformation
Bob Harper: Totally Ripped Core
Bobby Fischer Against the World
Bored to Death: The Complete Second Season
Borgias: Season One, The
Brain Games
Breaking Bad: The Complete Third Season
Breaking News Breaking Down
Bridesmaids
Brilliant Moon: Glimpses of Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche
British Royal Weddings of the 20th Century
Britney Spears Live: The Femme Fatale Tour
Buck
Burlesque
Buster Keaton: The Short Films Collection, 1920–1923
BUtterfield 8
Call Me Fitz: The Complete First Season
Calling: Seven Lives, Four Faiths, One Call, The
Cameraman: The Life and Work of Jack Cardiff
Camille
Can We Live Forever? New Technology for a Longer Life
Can We Make It to Mars?
Captain America: The First Avenger
Captains, The
Carbon Nation
Carlos
Carnival of Souls
Case Histories
Casino Jack
Cave of Forgotten Dreams
Cedar Rapids
Celtic Crossroads: World Fusion
Centerville Ghost, The
Change-Up
China’s Terracotta Warriors
Christian Traveler, The
Christopher and His Kind
Cirque du balle
Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer
Client List, The
Colombiana
Colony
Company Men, The
Con Artist
Conan O’Brien Can’t Stop
Conan the Barbarian
Cosmos: A Beginner’s Guide, The
Country Strong
Cowboys & Aliens
Crazy Stupid Love
Cropsey
Custer’s Last Stand
D.Gray-Man: The Complete Second Season
Damages: The Complete Third Season
Dangerous Intimacy: The Untold Story of Mark Twain’s Final Years
Dare to Cook: Chocolate: Holiday Confections with “Chocolate Man” Bill Fredericks
Dark Days
Dave Grohl: The Man with the Midas Touch
David Holman’s Diary
Daydream Nation
Deadliest Earthquakes: Haiti and Chile
Dear Uncle Adolf: The Germans and Their Führer
Death Masks
Debt, The
Delphi: Center of the World
Despair
Devil’s Double, The
Dexter: The Fifth Season
Diana Rigg at the BBC
Dickens in America
Dilemma, The
Discoveries: Vietnam Historic Treasures
Dive!
Doctor Who: Series 6, Part 2
Downton Abbey
Dracula: The Vampire and the Voivode
Drive Angry
Dylan Dog: Dead of Night
Eagle, The
Earth from Above
Ed Hardy: Tattoo the World
Effective Communication Skills
80 Waves
Elsa’s Legacy: The Born Free Story
Elusive Justice: The Search for Nazi War Criminals
Engineering Ground Zero
Entourage: The Complete Seventh Season
Erasing David
Essential Pépin
Everything Must Go
Exhale: Core Fusion Cardio Pure Intensity
Experiencing Hubble: Understanding the Greatest Images of the Universe
Exporting Raymond
Extraordinary Minds: Featured Guest, Jacques d’Ambroise
Extraordinary Minds: Featured Guest, Zainab Salbi
Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition: The Workout
Facing Death
Faith & Doubt at Ground Zero
Fambul Tok
Fast Five
Finding Life Beyond Earth
Fire in Babylon
Firm: Turbocharge Weight Loss
First-Class Ticket: The Complete Doug Jones Travelogue Collection
First Person Singular: I.M. Pei
First Response CARE CPR
Fly Away
Food Fighters: Back and Forth
For Colored Girls
Force of Nature: The David Suzuki Movie
Forgiveness: A Time to Love and a Time to Hate
Forks Over Knives
Four Lions
Freakonomics
Freedom Riders
Friends with Benefits
Fright Night
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood: Part 5, Episodes 53–64
Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood: Part 4, Episodes 40–52
Future, The
Gashole
Genius Within: The Inner Life of Glenn Gould
Get Fit & Fab
Get Low
Gettysburg
Glee: The Concert Movie
Globe Trekker: The Netherlands and Amsterdam 2
Glorious 39
God Bless Ozzy Osbourne
Going Postal
Great Minds of the Eastern Intellectual Tradition
Greatest Movie Ever Sold, The
Greely Expedition, The
Green Hornet, The
Green Lantern
Guard, The
Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench
Hail the Conquering Hero
Haiti: Triumph, Sorrow, and the Struggle of a People
Hall Pass
Hangover, Part II, The
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2
Heavenly Creatures
Heifetz Master Classes
Help, The
Hempsters: Plant the Seed
Here We Are in the Years: Neil Young’s Music Box
Hereafter
Heritage of British Monarchy: A Chronicle of History, Romance and Scandals
High Cost of Living, The
Highwater
Himalayas, The
Hindenburg, The
Hiroshima
Hobo with a Shotgun
Horrible Bosses
Host in the Bleak Midwinter
Hot Coffee: Is Justice Being Served?
Houdini
Hour, The
How Smart Are Animals?
How the Universe Works
How to Get Ahead in Advertising
How to Sell on eBay: Windows 7 Edition, Part 1
How to Sell on eBay: Windows 7 Edition, Part 2
Hubble
Human Experience, The
Human Planet: The Complete Series
Human Services Careers
Hurry Sundown
I Am Number Four
I Gong for Self-Healing
Iceman Murder Mystery
Idiots & Angels
Imagine It!
Immortal Beaver: A Celebration of Aviation History
In the Shadow of No Towers
In Their Sleep
In Treatment: Season Three
Ingredients: The Local Food Movement Takes Root
Inside Hana’s Suitcase
Insidious
Insignificance
Inspector Lewis: Series 4
Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking
Irena Sendler: In the Name of Their Mothers
Israel vs. Israel
Jackass 3
Jane Eyre [Fukunaga]
Jane Eyre [White]
Japan’s Killer Quake
Jerusalem: City Between Religions
Jews and Baseball: An American Love Story
Jig
Jillian Michael’s Extreme Shed & Shred
Joe Madison’s War
Joel Harper’s Self-Defence
John Muir in the New World
Joke: The Lost Bullet
Journey of the Bonesetter’s Daughter
Journey to Mecca: In the Footsteps of ibn Battuta
Jumping the
Just Go with It
Justified: The Complete First Season
Justin Bieber: Never Say Never
K-19: The Widowmaker
K-On! 1
K-On! 2
Kate & Leopold
Kathryn Budgie: Aim True Yoga
Keeper of the Flame
Kegs
Keith Richards: The Human Riff
Kennedys, The
Kids Grow Up: Letting Go Is Hard to Do, The
Kill the Irishman
Kill/Capture
Killer Buns and Thighs
Killer Queens: Five Ruthless British Queens
Killers, The
King Speaks, The
Kiss Me Deadly
Kissinger
Koop: The Art of Wanda Koop
Land Girls
Land Girls: Series 2
Lark Rise to Candleford: The Complete Season Four
Larry Crowne
Last Exorcism, The
Last Mountain, The
Last Night
Last Play at Shea, The
Le Cirque: A Table in Heaven
Legends of Flight
Les Misérables in Concert: The 25th Anniversary, Live
Leslie Sansone’s Walk Your Way Thin: Walk It Off & Tone It Up
Leslie Sansone’s Walk at Home: Burn Body Fat & Sculpt Your Arms
Let Me In
Life in a Day
Life of Leonardo da Vinci, The
Light Speed Nutrition: Diet and Health Management
Light Speed Nutrition: Food Spectrum and Nutrients
Light Speed Nutrition: Foundations of Human Nutrition
Limitless
Lincoln Lawyer, The
Little Fockers
Living in Emergency: Stories of Doctors Without Borders
Looking for Fidel
Loop Diver: The Journey of a Dance
Lost in the Amazon
Love & Other Drugs
Loving Lampposts: Living Autistic
Luther 2
Mad Men: Season Four
Madagascar: The Land Where Evolution Ran Wild
Made in Dagenham
Making Stuff
Managing Menopause Naturally
Margin Call
Married in a Year
Marvin’s Room
Meaning of Life: Perspectives from the World’s Great Intellectual Traditions, The
Mechanic, The
Memento
Memory and the Human Lifespan
MI-5: Volume 8
MI-5: Volume 9
Michael Jackson: The Life of An Icon
Middle Men
Midnight in Paris
Midsomer Murders: Set 18
Midsomer Murders: The Dogleg Murders
Mikado, The
Miracles of Nature: Extreme Habitats
Miracles of Nature: Unique Island Destinations
Miracles of Nature: Unique Travel Destinations
Missionary, The
Moby-Dick
Moguls & Movie Stars: A History of Hollywood
Monogamy
Monsters
Monte Carlo
Mora
Morning Glory
Mr. Nice
Murdoch Mysteries: Season 3
My Run: The Terry Hitchcock Story
My Vietnam, Your Iraq
Naruto Shippuden
Nature of Cities, The
NEDS: Non-Educated Delinquents
Never Apologize: A Personal Visit with Lindsay Anderson
New Sudan, The
News in Review: February 2011
News in Review: March 2011
News in Review: April 2011
News in Review: May 2011
News in Review: September 2011
News in Review: October 2011
News in Review: November 2011
Next Three Days, The
Night Flight
Night of the Generals, The
9500 Liberty
No Strings Attached
No Tomorrow
No Woman, No Cry
NORML Life: The American Marijuana Revolution, A
Nothing Personal
Oliver Sherman
One Day
101 Games and Activities That Teach Leadership and Teamwork: Vol. 1, Trust and Innovation Games
101 Games and Activities That Teach Leadership and Teamwork: Vol. 2, Cooperation and Communication Games
101 Games and Activities That Teach Leadership and Teamwork: Vol. 3, Initiative, Tenacity and Goal-Setting Games
101 Games and Activities That Teach Leadership and Teamwork: Vol. 4, Adaptability, Affinity and Reflection Games
One-Week Job
Oprah: The Past, Present, and Future
Optimizing Brain Fitness
Orgasm Inc.
Our Idiot Brother
Page Eight
Page One: Inside the New York Times
Panorama Finals 2011
Paul
Pearl Jam Twenty
Pee-Wee Herman Show on Broadway, The
People vs. George Lucas, The
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides
Planet Evolution
Plastic Planet
Pompeii: Back from the Dead
Power Surge
Power Workout
Prehistoric: Predators of the Past
Price of Sex
Priest
Priest of Love
Prohibition
Prom
Public Speaking
Questions for Crazy Horse: Hypothetical Conversations with the Strange Warrior of the Ogalla Lakota
Quickfix ℞ with Jill Miller: Kneehab: Improve Knee Health and Prevent Injury
Rabbit Hole
Radiohead: Life on Demand
Rebirth
Red Like the Sky
Red Riding Hood
Red State
Rejoice & Shout
Remembering 9/11: A Day That United the World
Reminiscing in Tempo
Remote-Control War: The Future of Unmanned Combat
Resident, The
Return of the Ghost Ship
Revolution in Cairo
Ricky Gervais Show: The Complete First Season, The
Ripped in 30
Rise of Humans: Great Scientific Debates, The
Rise of the Planet of the Apes
Rite, The
River Why, The
Rodney Yee’s Daily Yoga
Romantic Englishwoman, The
Roommate, The
Royal Wedding of a Lifetime, The
Royal Wedding William & Catherine, The
Rubber
Russell Peters: The Green Card Tour
Salmon: Running the Gauntlet
Samantha Brown’s Asia
Samurai
Sanctum
Sarah’s Key
Saving the Ocean: Shark Reef and the Sacred Island
Science Now: How Does the Brain Work?
Scream 4
Sculpt & Burn Body Blitz
Season of the Witch
Secret Access: The Vatican
Secrets Beneath the Ice
Secrets of Christianity
Secrets of the Dead: Slave Ship Mutiny
Secrets of the Dead: World’s Biggest Bomb
Secrets of the Divine: The Altarpiece of Ciudad Rodrigo
Shaman & Ayahuasca, The
Shameless: The Complete First Season
Shipping News, The
Shock Doctrine, The
Six Feet Under: The Complete First Season
Skin
Skins: Volume 4
Small Act, A
Small Town Murder Songs
Smartest Machine on Earth: Can a Computer Win on Jeopardy?, The
Smiley’s People
Social Network
Something Borrowed
Something Wild
Somewhere
Sons of Anarchy: Season Three
Soul Surfer
Source Code
South Riding
Spartacus: Gods of the Arena
Special A: Complete Collection
Speed of Life
Spill, The
Start Walking at Home: 1 & 2 Mile
Stitch Heaven Salutes Barbara G. Walker
Stonewall Uprising
Storming Juno
Straw Dogs
Streetcar Named Desire, A
Striking Truth
Submarine
Submarine: Hidden Hunter
Such Good Friends
Sucker Punch
Sugar Ray Leonard & Laila Ali: Lightweight & Heavyweight Workouts
Summer Wars
Super
Super 8
Survivors of the Firestorm
Susan Sontag’s Promised Lands
Switch, The
Sympathy for Delicious
Tabloid
Take Me Home Tonight
Takers
Tale of Two Cities: The Circuit City Story
Tempest, The
Teotihuacan, City of the Gods
Textuality
These Amazing Shadows: The Movies That Make America
Third Reich, The
Third Wave, The
30 Minutes Or Less
Thor
Through the Wormhole
Through the Wormhole: Season Two
Top Secret America
Topp Twins: Untouchable Girls, The
Topsy-Turvy
Transcendent Man
Transformers: Dark of the Moon
Travel with Kids: Jamaica
Travel with Kids: Scotland
Tree of Life, The
Tree, The
Triangle Fire
Tron Legacy
True Blood: The Complete Third Season
Tyler Perry’s Madea’s Big Happy Family
UFOs and Aliens
Ultimate Guide: Dolphins, The
Ultimate Wave Tahiti, The
Uncle Bob
United States of Tara: The Third Season
Unknown
Unknown War: War and the Epic Battles of the Russian Front, The
Unloved, The
Untold Secrets of the Civil War, The
Upstairs Downstairs: Series One
Upstairs, Downstairs
Venom: Nature’s Killer
Vidal Sassoon: The Movie
Vietnam in HD
Waiting City, The
Waiting for Hockney
Waiting For “Superman”
Waking the Dead: The Complete Season Five
Wallenberg: A Hero’s Story
War of 1812, The
Warehouse 13: Season Two
Warrior
Wars of the Roses: A Bloody Crown, The
Wartorn 1861–2010
Waste Land
Water for Elephants
Way Back, The
When I Rise
When Rome Ruled
Where Did We Come From?
White Water, Black Gold
Whitechapel: The Ripper Returns
Who Really Discovered America?
Wikisecrets
Wild Target
Wildest Dream: Conquest of Everest, The
Will the Real Terrorist Please Stand Up?
William & Kate: Planning a Royal Wedding
William S. Burroughs: A Man Within
Win Win
Windmill Movie
Wishful Drinking
Witchcraft: Myths and Legends
Wonders of the Universe
Worst in Show
Wrong Side of the Bus
X-Men: First Class
You Again
You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger
Your Highness
Zookeeper

Bonus photo

Here is one face of the bank of shelves on the fourth floor of the Reference Library that hold 4,200 mostly educational DVDs you can borrow.

So yeah, Pirates of the fucking Caribbean proves there’s a problem here, one that can only be solved by scorching the earth.

Aaand we’re back

Joe Clark — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 17:47:35 +0000

TPLFans took a hiatus after my role as the system’s № 1 fan ceased being fun. It was one annoyance after another – an RFID system that the library will debug only if someone else complains, Muslims taking over Thorncliffe. Actually, those were pretty much all my complaints. But they weighed heavily at the time.

It was also a bit of a drag walking into a new branch for the first time and being clocked within seconds by suspicious librarians who thought I was a not-very-secret shopper. I was happy to go back to being an (atypically knowledgeable) library patron.

In fact, it was a touching moment over Xmas when I thanked the long-suffering lady at Beaches for maintaining such a welcoming environment. I actually got a frog in my throat trying to thank them at Jones for always making me feel welcome, as they had spontaneously told me I was half a year before.

But over time I almost grew embarrassed at how much I used the library. I enjoyed killing time during nice long walks downtown (or in East York or north of Eg or some other place) dropping by whatever library branch was en route. (Up to six in some cases.) I began to feel embarrassed about being such a fan of the Toronto Public Library.

But isn’t that what I really was‽ (By definition?)

The year of seething quietly

Let me just sum up the last year or so: With every new assault against the most successful and indeed cherished city service, against the only part of the city bureaucracy that people actually love, I got closer and closer to finally losing my shit altogether.

The straw that broke the camel’s back fluttered earthward last week (2012.01.12), when I was walking along Front St. repeatedly checking the Twitters for details of exactly which outrage the Executive Committee would visit unto the library. (By coincidence, the guy from the library’s PR staff who is most afraid of me walked by without noticing me.)

Right then and there I couldn’t take it anymore. I’d been telling my friends on the Inside that, when the time came, I would stomp into the role of an ACT UP–like obnoxious defender of the library. Sort of standing on a stepladder with a bullhorn, waiting till all the TV cameras are set up (“We rolling sound? OK, take one!”), them delivering a blisteringly quotable broadside.

It could still happen. But let’s talk about what I want.

No budget cuts whatsoever. I’m not going to get my wish. The political hacks, plus Mr. Magoo and the former tobacco lobbyist, who pretend to be the TPL Board already agreed on a 5.9% reduction. That means firing staff and a breakneck-speed rollout of the still-buggy RFID system. It’s already too much of a hit.

What was on the table was an insanely punitive 10% budget cut that only a philistine like the mayor, and his fat-fuck brother Rob, could ever countenance. The ostensible chair of the TPL Board tried a guns-and-butter gambit, claiming that people would prefer more police to better libraries. Not post-G20, we don’t. We now know exactly how overpoliced Toronto is, and, given the choice between a place you can sit and learn or a cop with his namebadge hidden in a pocket shooting a retarded man or pushing you off your own balcony, surprise: People want the library.
Jane “Cipher” Pyper growing a pair. City Librarian Jane Pyper won’t even raise so much as an apologetic whimper to defend her own system. The Toronto Public Library has no public defenders inside or at the Board level. Here’s a spoiler for you: Shortly I will begin lobbying to have Pyper’s contract terminated early for nonperformance. I am telling you I want Jane Pyper fired and will start making applications to the Board to do so.

Would we even notice the difference? Here, Jane, have some spaghetti squash carbonara.
Complete debugging of the RFID system. I want ironclad rules on how to deal correctly with people who innocently set off the alarm on the way in, plus I want every book sent out for a hold so done with theft bit turned off. I want the type and the wording changed on interface screens. I want terminals set up for actual wheelchair access. I want no attitude at all from staff when a patron wants staff to do all the work. And above all, I want no architectural destruction of the sort we saw at Yorkville. Especially don’t butcher the magnificent Beaches Branch.

Our new strapline: Scabrous, unapologetic defence of the Toronto Public Library

Because nobody else has the guts to do that. Let’s leave the genteel discourse to Peggy Atwood and her friends.

Subtle anti-gay censorship at TPL

Joe Clark — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 19:08:36 +0000

The Summer 2011 issue of Gay Times I borrowed from Yorkville branch has TPL Yorkville rubber-stamp markings plunked onto many pages – almost all editorial – showing bare-chested or nearly-nude guys.

Specifically:

12 had stamps
18 didn’t
The cover and 30-odd pages of escort ads didn’t (save for strategic placement of an RFID sticker over a reduced image of a previous Gay Times cover also showing naked guys)
Four pages without sexy photography were also stamped

What exact message are we to take from this?

Incidentally, Yorkville is the ghetto where TPL stuffs most of its gay books, though it must be stated that nearly all branches have some sort of selection (a pretty good one at Parliament) and even Beaches has its own little display.

‘One of @torontolibrary[’s] fav bloggers’

Joe Clark — Sun, 12 Jun 2011 19:24:31 +0000

So who would be an unfav blogger?

Twit from Anne Marie Aikins (and official TPL Twit):

One of @torontolibrary fav bloggers calls Black Creek Library a “comfortable mall-cave” http://bit.ly/jZYY6T ¶ Anne Marie Aikins (2011.06.12)
One of @torontolibrary fav bloggers calls Black Creek Library a “comfortable mall-cave” http://bit.ly/jZYY6T ¶ TorontoPublicLibrary (2011.06.12)

Emblem of my time here

Joe Clark — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 20:42:03 +0000

I was dealing with one of those Chinese librarians that only Chinese can communicate with. Plain declarative sentences uttered twice or thrice, nothing allegorical, nothing idiomatic. And that’s in both directions.

She looks at my card in her hand, then starts pulling it back toward her, then stops herself, as if reminding herself she isn’t in a place where a central committee decides for you. “Would you like a new card?” she asks.

“No, I would not like a new card,” I say with alarm. (Then I have to say it again.) “It’s a prized possession.” It is. But someone thinks it has to be replaced. The Toronto Public Library in a nutshell.

And this, ladies and gentlemen, ends our journey here.

Further evidence TPL managers are really not my kind of people

Joe Clark — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 12:59:06 +0000

Cathy Raine went to the official Riverdale re-opening. I had visited the first day it opened and was not really up to whatever frictions would be involved if I showed up to a branch teeming with managerial staff.

By staying home, I avoided this slap in the face (emphasis added):

I handed a fork to a man who’d missed his chance to grab one and marvelled at the pig’s head resting inside a platter with chunks of pork. A patron standing across from me commented: “That’s a vegetarian’s nightmare!”

It’s actually an outright assault on vegetarians. At least they didn’t install a fucking minaret.

A spirit of caring and sharing and open dialogue with critics

Joe Clark — Thu, 30 Sep 2010 15:30:24 +0000

I wrote to the Toronto Public Library board of directors calling for a moratorium on the gutting and defacement of old branches to install godforsaken RFID self-checkout systems, which do not actually work.

In a display of TPL technical acumen I have come to expect, Director of Branch Libraries Anne Bailey sent along a response – in the form of a scanned-image PDF. I assume this was a deliberate choice given that I am a journalist and an accessibility expert (in fact, I know a great deal about accessible PDF). I assume it was meant to frustrate reading of, quotation from, and distribution of their actual response. Let’s set that aside for a moment.

Bailey trots out various statistics that show most people use self-checkout (they have no choice) and most people like it. The latter says nothing about the endemic failures of the system, nor anything about staff who sit behind a desk and ignore you, or get angry at you when you bring a book near the antenna, or who initially tell you to go use that terminal over there instead of listening to your question, or yell at you from behind the desk when a book you’re carrying sets off their alarm, or chase you up the stairs when that latter thing happens.

Bailey is one of two people this week to insist the old Yorkville desk was not marble. Pictures or it didn’t happen, as the kids say. Neither of these people made a case as to why its replacement had to be MDF and so badly designed that staff can’t actually sit behind it or store a returned book there. Other than that, she pretty much ignores my objections and attested experience. She says nothing about gutting historic library branches, for example, just to convert its entire collection into miniature radio transmitters.

Bailey also promises that improvements to the user interface are coming. Someone else told me that to my face recently, in an actually helpful and informative way. Agincourt branch is the testbed, I was told, a fact TPL has been at pains not to publicize. Language choice on the system is better, there are fewer steps to take, and the crucial deactivation of security bit happens earlier in the process.

I am willing to accept these reports are accurate. But let’s refresh our memories here.

How to turn a fan into a detractor

This Weblog, ostensibly a pop-up blog of intentionally short lifespan, is, by any standard, past its sell-by date. It serves little or no purpose for anyone, including me. Why do I maintain it? Think of our raison d’être: This is a blog for “fans of the Toronto Public Library.” I insist the system has no bigger fan. You could really push it and claim I tie for first place with the much more compliant and soothing Cathy Raine.

I’m at one branch or another four to ten times a week. I read 200 books a year. Right now I’ve got 38 items out. My requests used to take up a significant chunk of interlibrary-loan traffic (now much less so). I feel welcome at my home branch and adore several others, especially Beaches. I schlep across town to Gladstone. I’m all in favour of sinking $30 mil into a Reference reno. The most charming thing I’ve ever seen in over two decades living here is the bookmobile (which I got to enjoy all over again at Word on the Street last week).

I am a fan of the Toronto Public Library.

However.

Apart from that pesky issue of allowing civic real estate to be taken over by Islam, I have one significant objection. It is, of course, the proven failure and costly boondoggle of the RFID system. (Actually, Bailey contends that RFID costs are paid back within two years by keeping libraries open longer.) Well before I was a soi-disant fan of the Toronto Public Library, I objected to the atrocious user interface of this system, and was actually listened to for about an hour five years ago.

Since then, the evidence shows that TPL is happy to entertain any complaints about the system whatsoever as long as they don’t come from me. TPL will act on the same complaints I voiced in 2005 as long as somebody else voices them now. If somebody else says the same thing I do, TPL listens to that other person, not me.

In point of fact, then, at executive levels TPL has deliberately frozen me out. I’ve explained this before: The higher up in the hierarchy I go, the more terrified they seem in my presence. Every week I have perfectly delightful conversations with branch librarians. Yet branch heads seize up; publicists don’t return E-mails for ten days or more; upper mandarins greet me with clenched resignation at branch reopenings. And, of course, the TPL board blows me off. (Twice now, in fact.)

All this is, of course, consistent with the Canadian and indeed Torontonian psychology that mediocrity is to be accepted at all times. We’re all so equal, the thinking goes, that nobody could possibly know more than anybody else, and anyone who is gauche enough to correct mistakes in public is simply being “negative.” Revealing a problem is viewed as the problem. Blowing the whistle just goes to show you don’t fit in with everybody else. They obviously never needed a whistle, so why do you?

But “I don’t like your tone” isn’t a defence. In any rationally-managed enterprise, your critics are a resource. The classic example: If a hacker tries to break into your computers, go out and hire that hacker to keep your systems safe. If you can’t beat ’em, engage ’em. Now, this can be done for nefarious reasons (to “co-opt,” as they say, a persistent critic). But businesspeople who apply design thinking and don’t act as scared as a deer caught in headlights when subjected to criticism view critics as a source of strength.

Toronto is not known for its design thinking or the courage of its executives.

The “Our New System Is So Much Better Even Joe Will Like It” Challenge

I am the biggest critic of RFID and the only such critic whose ass TPL ignores. If anything at all is wrong with an RFID checkout system, I’ll find it or it’ll happen to me. That makes me the toughest beta-tester in the system.

So get me up to the beta-test site. Agincourt branch is somewhere in the hinterlands and is too damned far from my house. But somebody, somewhere, at TPL has a car. That somebody can pick me up from, say, Warden or Kennedy subway stations, give me a lift up to (later, back from) the branch, during which drive we can enjoy perfectly pleasant inside-baseball chitchat. Once there, let me loose on the system for an hour. Let me try to break it.

Don’t tell branch staff what’s happening till we’re halfway through; I need to know how they naturally deal with civilians. When we’re all done, I’ll tell you exactly what doesn’t work and what does. Surely you all agree I will be intellectually honest and will – without reservation – admit when something works or has been improved. But I’ll also tell you what isn’t working. That’s what you’ve dragged me up there for.

This project kills two vegan bird substitutes with one stone. More, actually.

You disprove my thesis that you’re freezing me out. (Détente has to start somewhere.)
You prove to your biggest critic that you really have improved the system.
You prove to that critic you are willing to further debug even a system you insist is already better.
You prove that all you want is an RFID system that really works. You disprove that all you want is for me to get lost and shut up.

Any weekday or weekend is fine. So is one evening a week. You can act like I’m a problem or use me as a solution.