Re: [Marxism] New title in the HM Book Series: Witnesses to Permanent Revolution: The Documentary Record

[Paul Lefrak <lefrak@xxxxxxxxx>]

This has been an interesting discussion, but I think there's a false
counterposition being stated:  that of libraries as being essentially seen
as repositories of dead-tree books vs. the unlimited and way in which
e-books can open up much greater storage capabilities and access (including
free access) to a much less... weighty... quantity of printed material.

Comparing *social institutions* like public libraries to a *technology* or a
technological protocol like e-books or bittorrent is worse than comparing
apples and oranges.  Forward thinking libraries and those in the profession
do NOT see e-books as competition to libraries as public institutions.  Many
public libraries have begun to lend e-book readers and electronic books to
users for free.  Library professionals can help users navigate the many
formats and ways to access material and help with finding such material that
may not be apparent to the user.  And more than just books as well.

Certainly public libraries under capitalism are subject to all the
distortions of being a capitalist institution:  budget cuts, ideology,
scarcity of radical viewpoints, a liberal capitalist ethos, support for all
the reactionary restrictions of copyright and the way artists and authors
are compensated under capitalism, capitalist management and anti-labor
policies, cooperation with the state, etc.  One could make the same points
with regard to historically progressive things like public transportation as
well.

The point I originally wanted to make was that as social institutions,
public libraries contain the future germ of socialist society in being much
more than just dusty bookshelves.  They have real potential to serve as
community centers, "peoples' universities", and as institutions that can
provide free access to all forms of lifelong learning.  Despite all the
distortions of being a capitalist institution (and believe me, there were a
lot... I was the union steward for the librarians in my system!), the public
library where I worked offered, completely free of charge (yes, I understand
they did come out of property taxes): public Internet access, computer
training, literacy training, tens of thousands of free public programs,
storytime for children, concerts, performances, art exhibits, language
exchanges, community meeting spaces, reference assistance, special
collections, access to all sorts of databases not found on the internet,
assembling oral histories, tax assistance, small business advice, talking
books for the blind, after-school tutoring, interlibrary loan, etc.... in
addition to the more "traditional" services of lending and providing access
to print books, audiobooks, periodicals, movies, documentaries, and music.

I think it's just wrong to counterpose public libraries to e-book technology
and bittorrent.  The latter have incredible potentials and need to be
integrated into public libraries as social institutions, ones that will
someday still exist and be far better than they are now under capitalism.
Maybe I'm biased, but I would argue that public libraries are probably one
of the best things even under capitalism, at least in the USAmerican 21st
century version of it.

I don't remember who made the point that public libraries may potentially
cooperate with U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security, but the same holds true for
bookstores and medical records as well.  Certainly by subscribing to
something called "marxmail" you'd be taking probably about the same risk as
you would by ordering a radical title from your public library in the U.S.

E-books are fantastic.  But they are a technology based on the individual
(not that that's necessarily a bad thing...) as opposed to a social
institution like public libraries which are community-based.  I think this
aspect has been missing from the discussion which at least for me has been a
good one, even if it has been more than a bit U.S.-focused (which I admit
I'm contributing to here).


Paul Lefrak
Shhhhhh.....


Date: Sat, 28 Mar 2009 14:09:35 +0100
From: David Pic?n ?lvarez <david@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [Marxism] New title in the HM Book Series: Witnesses       to
       Permanent Revolution: The Documentary Record
To: "Activists and scholars in Marxist tradition"
       <marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Message-ID: <93495FCF02A74992B32052D1EF8336D1@Nautilus>
Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed; charset="iso-8859-1";
       reply-type=original
[...]

Elsewhere you say:

> What I objected to was the idea of bittorrent sharing as a replacement
> for libraries or the idea that this type of file sharing is somehow a
> "better" model for socialism than libraries.

I think there are a few reasons why this is essentially true. Mostly,
libraries are and will always be limited by scarcity constraints to do with
space, transportation, number of existing copies of a work, and the very
cost of reproduction of making such copies. They are therefore organized as
institutions to allocate and handle scarcity. BitTorrent on the other hand
is organized to allocate and handle abundance. The costs of reproduction of
works over bittorrent are near-zero, lower the more people who want to have
the work (the inverse of libraries), and essentially constant. Those works
are also, in many ways that matter, freed from the commodity form. So I
don't see why you object so straneously to either statement. BT seems
clearly, if not socialist, certainly post-capitalist.

--David.
________________________________________________
YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
Send list submissions to: Marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Set your options at: 
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40archives.econ.utah.edu