[markbnine]

Our local library is more like a free internet shop with half the terminals taken up by transients and the other half by kids from the nearby jr. high, playing shoot-em ups. It's impossible to get a terminal. They also have a huge DVD collection that rivals the old blockbusters. Not sure who's checking out books anymore.

[sedachv]

You missed this part of the interview:

People have moral panics about bedbugs in their library or perverts in the library or — you’ll catch a cold from the library, like, whatever the thing is. And there’s a shred of truth to that, but realistically people are afraid of their own public, I think, in a lot of ways. And so being kind of matter-of-fact about the fact that, “Well, these really are who your neighbors are. Like, you can choose just to ignore that that’s how the world works, but you know, these are all your neighbors, and you see them all at the public library. You’re welcome.

[Mz]

Your library has terrible policies. Good libraries have policies in place for allotting computer time fairly in order to adequately serve all members.

Your library may also be underfunded. This is an issue for a lot of libraries.

[sanderjd]

My library is like that as well, except that there is a good "reserve a computer" system that means you just have to wait a bit to get one, and lots of people (including me!) are still regularly checking out books.

[gumboshoes]

User complains that there are also other users. Film at 11.

[booksnobbery]

What makes anyone's needs or social status less valid than any other library patron?

[rwallace]

I don't think it's valid to prioritize access on the basis of social status, but I do think it's valid to prioritize need before entertainment. If you're playing a game and someone comes along who needs to fill out a job application form and there are no free terminals, you have a moral obligation to give up your seat.

[sillysaurus3]

I'd disagree with this. Entertainment is one of the basic human needs. Many games also require a certain amount of time to complete, and some games have severe penalties associated with leaving because it ruins the experience for all the other players.

One way to deal with this situation is to disallow entertainment on certain computers. That way there are always computers available. Still, in the era of everybody having an internet-capable mobile phone, the original premise seems suspect. In fact, the people using library computers to play games seem more likely to be the ones who need it most. Many kids don't have a home PC capable of running the games, whereas pretty much everybody has the internet.

[cowpatcallr]

That is ridiculous.

You think that someone who wants to play WoW in a library is of the same importance as someone finishing a highschool assignment in the library because their parents can't afford a computer at home?

Get real.

How about going back to library of alexander and letting the commoners play dice games in it.

> Entertainment is one of the basic human needs.

Ok, if you believe that, then fine. But where is it writ-large that entertainment == playing video games on a free, public library computer? There's lots of entertaining books in the library too. Grab one and sit quietly on a chair if free entertainment is so important to you.

[pavel_lishin]

> But where is it writ-large that entertainment == playing video games on a free, public library computer? There's lots of entertaining books in the library too. Grab one and sit quietly on a chair if free entertainment is so important to you.

Who are you to dictate which fun is Proper and Allowed?

[sillysaurus3]

No, not WoW. You can leave WoW whenever you want and come back later. It also consumes huge amounts of time, so it's not at all the same.

Dota / LoL / CSgo matches last an hour and have severe penalties for leaving, and they are very popular at internet cafes so I wouldn't be surprised if that was what's being played.

Let's be honest: that highschooler will almost certainly spend as much or more time on Facebook than on their assignment. The poorer the person, the more likely this becomes.

Meanwhile you get to use that extremely-uncommon corner case to penalize everybody else just because you dislike video games.

Those people reserved their computer time like everybody else. You don't get a say in how they use it as long as they're following the rules. It's doubly important to protect a shared public resource: we live in an era where anyone can attack X as immoral, especially when X is harmless.

[Nullabillity]

> No, not WoW. You can leave WoW whenever you want and come back later. It also consumes huge amounts of time, so it's not at all the same.

> Dota / LoL / CSgo matches last an hour and have severe penalties for leaving, and they are very popular at internet cafes so I wouldn't be surprised if that was what's being played.

Perhaps not the most fair comparison, as soon as you get into even casual raiding/mythic+ dungeons.

[qbrass]

If kids are in dire need of entertainment, they can read a book or something. There's no obligation to provide people with any form of entertainment they desire.

[Mz]

Playing games and other "frivolous" activities are a primary source of learning computer literacy for children. If you say poor kids can't play games on a public computer, you are putting them at a serious disadvantage compared to their wealthier peers, who are much more likely to have access to computers at home and generally have more computer time and latitude. You are putting an additional burden of restriction on an already disadvantaged group.

Years ago, I sent my mother-in-law our old computer when we upgraded, and I made sure to include kid-friendly software on it so my very poor nieces and nephews would have reason to get on their grandmother's computer when they were at her house. I saw this as a very important element in trying to make sure they didn't wind up on the wrong side of the digital divide. At the time, computers were not nearly as central to modern life as they are currently.

[nickpsecurity]

I see where you're going with this. The benefits you're getting at is worthwhile if the software brings those benefits. Most of what kids are doing on games isn't like the other things they'll be doing. The games are just designed to suck up their time if anything making them better at doing that. Lots of their fun apps, esp social media, are the same. Here's a nice article by an educator on how kids don't know how to use computers despite all the time they spend on them:

http://www.coding2learn.org/blog/2013/07/29/kids-cant-use-co...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13506283

You'd have to curate the experience to do something that forces them to learn necessary skills. I've seen those skills dressed up as games or something on occasion. Most fun apps don't do that, though.