On that Forbes Library Article

The librarian and librarian fan portion of the web erupted in outrage this weekend, after economics professor Panos Mourdoukoutas wrote in Forbes that Amazon should replace local libraries.

Many people tweeted about the flaws in the piece. Here’s one round-up of those critiques.

I agree with all the criticisms. Mourdoukoutas has an insufficient respect for the value of community-funded resources, and an overly fawning view of the corporate behemoth that is Amazon. The idea that Amazon — which tracks user reading behavior in order to sell more stuff — would suddenly honor patron privacy is absurd. A good public library offers a balanced collection across many topics, and it is absolutely fine if some materials rarely check out. The “Amazon library” would quickly narrow down to just a handful of popular titles, leaving the community at large bereft of any variety and almost all culture.

So this is a terrible idea. Yes. Absolutely. Without any doubt.

But what intrigues me is how often these “let’s end libraries” broadsides appear. Professor Mourdoukoutas’s piece is just the latest in what is now a long legacy. For example, a 2004 report predicted that public libraries would be “redundant” by 2020. And the United Kingdom has been de-investing in public libraries for years.

The professor’s weekend salvo, then, was not new. It was simply the latest in a long-running series of pieces skeptical of libraries. The authors are generally well-off professionals who can easily afford to buy books for themselves, who may well have never set foot in a public library.

When the “let’s end libraries” salvos come out, the reaction is predictable. Librarians and their boosters are outraged, appalled, offended, and amazed. They tweet, retweet, and then retweet some more. That feels good and righteous. Then the controversy subsides, and everyone moves on to the next outrage. Six months later another well-heeled professional pops up and writes a version of “let’s end libraries,” and the cycle begins anew.

To the extent that the “let’s end libraries” movement could gain political traction, rather than merely serve as clickbait, library advocates should become more proactive about the value of librarianship and not primarily reactive. Every Library is in the forefront here, by building the political case for libraries at the local level. Check them out.

The trouble is that many people do think of library as “book warehouse” — and indeed, this warehouse function is something that Amazon does better than anyone else. But librarians are also archivists, curators, and community builders. Librarians need to tell their story, early and often, and not just when someone dashes off a spectacularly bad take.