[lukewrites]

I don't think anything compares to going in person.

I'm father of a 4 year old, and we live a couple of blocks from the library. Seeing how his interactions with the shelves has changed over the past couple of years has been really interesting. At first it was enough to look at the covers and spines, then he could pull himself up to the bins of board books, and eventually started grabbing from the shelves himself.

And like you, he loads up with a little bit of everything (it doesn't matter what he chooses, we check it out) and we take it home to read and see what sticks.

It's probably no surprise that one of the most exciting trips he can make is driving to PDX to go to Powell's.

There's probably a UI genius out there with great ideas for it, but I don't see how anything can beat going to a library in person.

[tacLog]

I completely agree. I don't think you can fully replicate this experience remotely.

I am just trying to imagine what you need to do to get as close as possible. Maybe I make this a project happen if I end up with something actionable. Maybe these ideas inspire someone else, maybe they fade away into memories and do very little.

I love the it doesn't matter what you choose you can check it out part. I think it would be really important to have a filter where all the books the kid can see, the kid can have right now. This of course could be disabled by older kids that understand sometimes there is a wait but I think for the younger kids this would be an important detail.

I don't want to replace libraries, I want to make it so every kid that has access to the internet on some device or gaming platform can get 30% of that experience. Or whatever is possible.

[lukewrites]

Yeah between the “take whatever you want” and the sensory experience of seeing and touching and opening books of different sizes, textures, thickness, etc it’s mind blowing to try to replicate.

Just something as simple as having books shelved higher than you head and getting to use a stool to get up to them - that makes finding books so fun!

The more I think about it, the physical is just so important to the experience. I guess it’s for this same reason I hate ebook versions of picture books. The interaction just cannot match what you get to do with a real book.

Not to say this isn’t a worthy goal or interesting problem-every kid should have an awesome library nearby. Just wow, going in person is amazing.