Tuesday News: Simon & Schuster, saving books, productivity, and awkward engagement photos
Milo Yiannopolous Book Deal with S&S Generates Backlash – Oh, Simon & Schuster. The only thing sadder than giving Yiannopolous a $250K book deal is trying to justify it as advocacy of “free speech.” Sure, MY is free to say a lot of the crap he says, but publishing is about money, and we all know this is a money move for the publisher that has f*** all to do with free speech. Because the whole idea behind the concept in the US is that it is supposed to strengthen democracy by protecting minority viewpoints and assuring that we have a robust “marketplace of ideas.” If Yiannopolous actually cared about any of these things, I could respect S&S’s argument. And if you are not familiar with Yiannopolous (and missed the whole Twitter-banning episode), I highly recommend this essay as one of the best character summaries I have seen. Of course, the free speech defense goes both ways, and the Chicago Review of Books will not review any 2017 S&S titles in protest. Some bookstores are balking, as well:
While the book has risen up the charts at Amazon, at least one independent bookseller said her store will not be stocking the book. “The books my staff and I choose to place on our shelves is a reflection of our community,” said Kate Rattenborg, owner of Dragonfly Books in Decorah, Iowa. “Our community is not a community of hate, and I will not provide shelf space for a book where the author has risen to notoriety based on his discriminatory harassment, online bullying, and striking fear in others.”
After being reached for comment, S&S stated: . . . “While we are cognizant that many may disagree vehemently with the books we publish, we note that the opinions therein belong to our authors, and do not reflect either a corporate viewpoint or the views of our employees, and request that readers withhold judgment until they have had a chance to read the actual contents of the book.” – Publishers Weekly
To save books, librarians create fake ‘reader’ to check out titles – Claiming that the library will save money by keeping titles in circulation that will eventually become popular again (thus saving them from being pulled and later repurchased), two Florida library employees created a fake patron who checked out more than 2,000 books in less than a year. An investigation uncovered the unlawful scheme, which also uncovered some of the problems inherent in a library system that aims to provide a community service and yet makes its component libraries compete for funding.
The goal behind the creation of “Chuck Finley” was to make sure certain books stayed on the shelves — books that aren’t used for a long period can be discarded and removed from the library system.
George Dore, the library’s branch supervisor who was put on administrative leave for his part in the episode, said he wanted to avoid having to later repurchase books purged from the shelf. He said the same thing is being done at other libraries, too.
If true, that could be a problem.
That’s because nine city-run libraries that are part of the Lake County library system and receive a percentage of their funding based on circulation levels. The system is a cooperative with centralized cataloging and check-out privileges for residents at any library, among other benefits. – Orlando Sentinel
3 books to read for a more productive 2017 – What drew my eye to this one was the mention of Charles Duhigg, who wrote one of my favorite books, The Power of Habit. He has written a new book on productivity (Smarter, Faster, Better), which I’m sure is no hard-hitting scientific study, but is likely an entertaining and informative read (or listen). I don’t know anything about the other two books (Cal Newport’s Deep Work and Gabriele Oettingen’s Rethinking Positive Thinking), but you can check out summaries in the above-linked article. – TreeHugger
From an upside down kiss to a VERY steamy toilet embrace, are these the most cringeworthy engagement photos EVER? – Brought to you by Awkward Family Photos, these are engagement photos are definitely memorable. – Daily Mail
Oh, hee! “Chuck Finley”!! Someone at the library was a Burn Notice fan.
I’m really puzzled by the firing of the librarian. Every librarian I know has checked out books to save them from mindless automatic weeding — I’ve done it myself (I saved the POLDARK series through five consecutive fiction purges, to be vindicated [VINDICATED!] once the television series came out and *everybody* wanted the books.)
As for creating fake library cards — we all do that, too, to use for training and various other internal purposes. Dewey Duck and Mickey Mouse have cards at my library, as do various other improbably named “patrons”.
I guess the crime was doing all this “under the table”, instead of openly. I don’t see why the librarians couldn’t have checked out the books on their own cards. Does the library require “proof of reading” for the checkout to be “counted”?
But surely this “crime” doesn’t deserve more than a reprimand. The really guilty party is a stupid funding allocation system, that relies more on brute numbers than a more sophisticated analysis of the services the libraries provide to their community.
“request that readers withhold judgment until they have had a chance to read the actual contents of the book.”
So, “please, please, please drive up our sales, so you can give informed hatred of this turd.”
No thanks. I’m not willing to punish other authors for S&S decision, but I have no qualms about holding an opinion on this book without ever reading it. It’s crap and I hope it tanks hard.
@hapax: It strikes me as a well-intentioned move, but one that is illegal especially given that money is involved. Checking out a book to save it from being weeded on your own card is one thing. But a purposeful scheme involving 2,000+ checkouts?
The allocation causing competition between libraries is awful, but frankly these librarians were conspiring to commit fraud and steal those funds from the other eight libraries. They were aiding one part of their community but potentially damaging others. I don’t agree with the system, but they tried to game it in a rather selfish way.
As a library patron, I have done the same. I have checked out music cd’s and books that I think are important for the library to keep. I know that they rely on check-out numbers to determine what books should remain on the shelves. If I think that a book or topic is important, then I will check it out every once in awhile.
We can all do the same. Is there an author that you love? Even if you have all their titles, check out one of their books. Is there a subject that is near and dear to your heart? Antarctic History? Samoan Folk Art? Tibetan Prayer Wheels? Obscure languages? Check the books out!!
And consider this, the librarians may have created the fictitious patron because the library may not “count” the books they check out as “circulating”. They may only count books checked out by the public as circulating.
Also, some libraries ask that you don’t shelve any books that you use in the library. When they collect the books to reshelve them, they scan them to count them as “used” so they can keep track of reference books.
Find out how your library tracks book or media usage and use that information to keep books in the library. Yes, many libraries have limited shelf space but do they really need 6 copies of a 10 year old best seller instead of a book on canning and preserving foods?
I don’t know if you’re aware of the Stop Funding Hate campaign, but please be aware when you link your readers to the Daily Mail you’re driving up its ad revenue and providing financial support to a misogynistic, homophobic, transphobic, racist organisation (one that the wikipedia article doesn’t pick up on is the time they outed a trans teacher, leading to her suicide).