MichaelZimmer.org

The West Bend library controversy continues to escalate….with calls for book burning and growing national exposure (and, unfortunately, ridicule). Here’s the (abridged) history and escalation: [Updated on 6/19/09 to include ABC News coverage, and 7/22/09 to include CNN] 02/15/2009: Ginny Maziarka, who blogs at WISSUP, files a formal complaint with the West Bend Community Memorial [...]

The West Bend Community Memorial Library board held a public meeting this evening to consider the request from the “West Bend Citizens for Safe Libraries” that the library remove books they consider to be “obscene” or “child pornography” from a section of the library designated “Young Adults.” (Background can be found here and here, and [...]

I’ve written frequently about how the shift from accessing information in offline spaces to online spaces has particular privacy implications. For example, strikingly different privacy norms and expectations emerge when comparing information-seeking activities in libraries vs. bookstores vs. Google Book Search. Today, Fred Stutzman revealed a particularly troublesome example of how relying on the “My [...]

Hannah Yale, and art student here at UW-Milwaukee, has created an amazing gurellia art project, in collaboration with the UWM Library, called “The Original Google Project.” Here’s the description from its Facebook page: This project was designed as a collaboration with the UWM Library as an awareness effort for the use of library resources over [...]

The controversy over the status of various GLBTQ-themed books (and now, apparently, any “sexually explicit” books) in the young adult section at the West Bend Library has taken a turn for the worse. The city’s common council voted against reappointing four members of the library board over disapproval of their actions (or non-actions) regarding the [...]

In recent weeks, two citizens of West Bend, Wisconsin have petitioned the West Bend Community Memorial Library to remove gay-themed books from a section designated “Young Adults,” arguing the books should be reclassified and placed in a restricted area requiring parental approval prior to being released to a minor. They further demand that the books [...]

I’m attending the Library 2.0 Symposium organized by the Information Society Project at Yale Law School. We’re only an hour into the agenda, and it has already been an incredibly provocative and enlightening event. You can follow the Twitter stream at #Lib20, and the ISP is liveblogging here. The remarks I gave on the Ethics [...]

Banned Books Week 2008 is being celebrated September 27 – October 4, and is the 27th annual celebration of the freedom to choose what we read, as well as to select from a full array of possibilities. According to the American Library Association, more than 400 books were challenged in 2007. The 10 most challenged [...]

As Banned Books Week near (September 27-October 4), Nancy Kranich, past president of the American Library Association, reminds us of the many attempts to restrict our right to read, including an example from Wasilla, Alaska: This year’s banned book focal point actually goes back to 1996 in Wasilla, Alaska, when the director of the local [...]

This week I received a formal reply to my July 2 letter to the Shorewood, Wisconsin Public Library regarding its requiring I provide my social security number to obtain a library card, that confirms the anecdotal evidence that the library might have changed its policy and/or procedures in this regard: Michael Zimmer, PhD Assistant Professor [...]