"This is a seminar about making. It’s run out of the Graduate School of Design, Harvard University, Spring, 2012. We will focus on creating products, services & experiences, broadly defined, for the Harvard Library community. With generous funding provided by Prof. Robert Darnton and the Harvard Library Lab, projects will be deployed in «Test Kitchens» — partner libraries, such as the Loeb and Widener Libraries, that allocate portions of their public space to these experiments."

"Undoubtedly libraries are a good thing. The access and training that we provide for technology isn't offered by any other public service (largely because public services are rapidly becoming a dirty word in this gilded age of decadence and austerity), and without our services it wouldn't be the end of the world, but it would be a significant dimming.

If you can take yourself out of your first world techie social media smart-shoes for a second then imagine this… [lengthy case study]

So that little melodrama right there is every minute of every day at the public library…The digital divide isn't just access, but also ability, and quality of information, , and the common dignity of having equity of participation in our increasingly digital culture."

"The pun in the title is intended, of course, for here is a collection of 30-odd poems, stories, and articles on revolting librarians--those who revolt against the system and those who are revolting because they are the system."

Georgia Mulligan, College & research libraries

"I was recently asked to do a conversation/talk with Janette Sadik-Kahn, our commissioner of transportation, at the  AIA New York Center for Architecture Center (American Institute of Architects).  Since I imagined there might be some architects or designers in the audience, I took some time to share some of my notes and photographs from my summer Latin American bikes and cities tour. I also took this opportunity to finally organize some of the notes I had taken and post them. So here it is, many months late."

"This little correspondence cracked like lightning in my head. I mean, it’s no big deal; it’s a small thing, it’s a letter, they were both in Michigan, it makes perfect sense. And yet, and yet: Clifton Wharton, president of Michigan State University, and Marguerite Hart, librarian of Troy—a tangible thread connected them. And as soon as you realize that, you can’t help but imagine the other threads, the other connections, that all together make a net, woven before you were born, before you were even dreamed of—a net to catch you, support you, lift you up. Libraries and universities, books and free spaces—all for us, all of us, the children of Troy everywhere.<br />
<br />
What fortune. Born at the right time."<br />
<br />
[…]<br />
<br />
"And it’s not the librarian laughing and crying at the same time here; it’s me. Every time I’ve read these letters, it’s me."

"I don't know whether it's going to come in the form of a more successful movie franchise about librarians than that TV thing Noah Wyle does, or a basic-cable drama about a crime-fighting librarian (kinda like the one in the comic Rex Libris), or that reality show I was speculating about, but mark my words, once you've got Old Spicy on your side and you can sell a couple of YouTube parodies in a couple of months, you're standing on the edge of your pop-culture moment. Librarians: prepare."

"The LII Mission Statement: The mission of Librarians' Internet Index is to provide a well-organized point of access for reliable, trustworthy, librarian-selected websites, serving California, the nation, and the world."

"Have you ever wondered the past life or secret dreams of your local librarian as they helped you find research paper resources and swiped the bar code on your books? As it turns out, a lot of world leaders, famous authors and legendary philosophers and scholars had careers as librarians. Read below to find out who."

"Those of you with a historical imagination will recognize Thomas Jefferson's prayer for schooling - that it would teach useful knowledge. Some places do: the best schooling in the US today is coming out of museums, libraries, and private institutes...Consider the difference between librarians and schoolteachers. Librarians are custodians of real books and real readers; schoolteachers are custodians of schoolbooks and indentured readers. Somewhere in the difference is the Rosetta Stone that reveals how education is one thing, schooling another."

"if the library is doing its job, there are lots of books in our collection that people won't agree with; there are certainly many that I object to. Library collections don't imply endorsement; they imply access to the many different ideas of our culture, which is precisely our purpose in public life. ... Although I suspect you may not agree with my decision, I hope it's clear that I've given it a great deal of thought, and believe it is in accordance with both our guiding principles, and those, incidentally, of the founders of our nation."

"The Library Arcade features games designed to help students develop research skills through entertaining and easy-to-repeat activities. At this stage, we are testing each game to work through any technical glitches and prepare the games for a final versi

"Did Borges ever imagine a library in which we could know which volumes users were thinking about consulting? [William Gibson]"

"Every Thursday morning we send out our free newsletter, New This Week, which features dozens of high-quality websites carefully selected, described, and organized by our team of librarians. Topics include current events and issues, holidays and seasons,

"Welcome to the original Learning 2.0 Program. This site was created to support PLCMC's Learning 2.0 Program; a discovery learning program designed to encourage staff to explore new technologies and reward them for doing 23 Things."

"In an online world of small pieces loosely joined, librarians are among the most well qualified and highly motivated joiners of those pieces. Library patrons, meanwhile, are in transition. Once mainly consumers of information, they are now, on the two-wa

"When politics gets mean and dumb, you can cheer yourself up by walking into a public library."