You will be missed...

Writer Arthur C. Clarke Dies at 90

By RAVI NESSMAN – 15 minutes ago

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (AP) — Arthur C. Clarke, a visionary science fiction writer who won worldwide acclaim with more than 100 books on space, science and the future, died Wednesday in his adopted home of Sri Lanka, an aide said. He was 90.

I suppose many people already know about this, but it was news to me.

This suit is not settled but the group against the library site change won a victory in having two letters both saying the County was in violation of their civil rights. It's up to the federal Institue of Museum and Library Services now to send it determine if it should be sent to the Justice Department.

I just heard that the people or person who filed the civil rights law suit about the library won their case. I'm supposed to be getting more info this evening, but this is a reliable source.

From TomDispatch.com, I was taken by the featured article written by librarian, Chris Ward, The Public Library As Asylum For The Homeless. Although from Salt Lake City, Ward writes about two important issues here in Knoxville and Knox County.

Homelessness is described from Ward's position on the frontline at the downtown library. His voice also convinces us of the importance of the public space provided when a community commits to an urban library.

Ward recently retired as the assistant director at the Salt Lake City Public Library. He's a little preachy* but he's earned the right for his career commitment. He says, "I like to think of our library as the civic ballroom of our community where citizens can practice that awkward dance of mutuality that is the very signature of a democratic culture." The value of the library as a public gathering place is an overarching principle that makes it possible for him to persevere because some day’s encounters yield only frustrating despair.

Inseparable from discussion of downtown libraries are urban transients, the homeless, the outcast. We all know what this problem is – it’s the stinky ick factor or the awkwardness of being within earshot of a schizophrenic...