#seattle-public-library — Public Fediverse posts

Hell naw isn’t Intel Optane like really unstable? Found this on BEALIB06 computer at SPL.

#spl #seattlepubliclibrary #intel #technology #inteloptane

Exploring the Library’s Photography Books – Shelf Talk

• Authors & Books, News & Stories, Arts & Culture, About

Exploring the Library’s Photography Books

February 2, 2026

I love reading photography books. Flipping through their pages brings a much-needed sense of creativity and inspiration, while also providing a window into history, community, connection, and the world around us. Here are some that I have enjoyed recently:

Pilgrimage

Annie Leibovitz travels to locations that hold meaning for her, including Emily Dickinson’s house in Amherst, Louisa May Alcott’s Orchard House, the homes of Virginia Woolf and Charles Darwin, Thoreau’s cabin on Walden Pond, and more.

National Geographic: The Photo Ark

A collection featuring Joel Sartore’s lifelong project to make striking portraits of the world’s animals, especially those who are endangered, reminding us of the beauty of so many species. 

Eye Dreaming

Photographer Anthony Barboza refers to the act of looking at the world as “eye dreaming,” in which he remains open to glimpsing people and places that feel familiar. In capturing them on film, he finds connection and art in the everyday. 

France is a Feast 

This collection features Paul Child’s photos of Julia Child and their life together in France, along with personal stories told by Paul’s great-nephew Alex Prud’homme. 

Continue/Read Original Article Here: Exploring the Library’s Photography Books – Shelf Talk

How Seattle, King County libraries get books into your hands

• Books
• Life
• Local News
• Northwest

How Seattle, King County libraries get books into your hands

Nov. 2, 2025 at 6:00 am, Updated Nov. 2, 2025 at 6:01 am

Tony Lauricella, automated materials handling system lead, dumps a tote of books into a singulator to be sorted at Seattle Public Library’s Maintenance and Operations Center in Georgetown on Sept. 11. (Karen Ducey / The Seattle Times)

1 of 11 | Tony Lauricella, automated materials handling system lead, dumps a tote of books into a singulator to be sorted at Seattle Public Library’s Maintenance and Operations Center in Georgetown on Sept. 11. (Karen Ducey / The Seattle Times)

By Sara Jean Green, Seattle Times staff reporter

Under a pitch-black sky, Jason Hayes and Chris Little loaded stacks of blue storage totes into box trucks parked outside a Georgetown warehouse that, up until a few years ago, housed luxury sports cars.

On this particular Tuesday, Hayes would drive to Rainier Beach, Columbia City, Beacon Hill and Leschi while Little made stops downtown and at seven sites in the northeast part of the city.

Hayes manages the Seattle Public Library’s materials distribution and fleet services, coordinating drivers who fan out every day to deliver totes filled with books to 26 library branches. Little, a library driver for 28 years, said the “bread-and-butter” of his job is the mobile library, the unofficial 27th branch that holds pop-ups at Seattle Housing Authority buildings and housing complexes for seniors and people with disabilities.

“It’s getting the library to people who can’t get out,” he said. “‘It’s like Christmas once a month’ — that’s what people literally say.”

Hayes and Little are two of the 18 library employees who work out of the Maintenance and Operations Center, a nearly 20,000-square-foot industrial warehouse on Corson Avenue South. Known as the MOC, it serves as the Seattle Public Library’s hidden hub, where an average of 10,000 books a day begin their journeys across the city, with 60% of them destined to fill online holds and the remainder returning to their home branches.

In an industrial park 25 miles to the east, off Interstate 90 in the tiny, unincorporated community of Preston, the King County Library System’s distribution center handles three times the daily volume of books processed through Seattle’s central sorter and serves 50 branches across a vast geography, from Skykomish to Algona.

A borrowing agreement between the Seattle and King County library systems — first signed in 1943 — meansresidents can borrow from both.

For library patrons, it can seem as if books magically appear on hold shelves in their neighborhood branches. But the infrastructure, technology and logistics involved in moving books — along with CDs, DVDs and mobile Wi-Fi hot spots — reflects the value placed on public libraries and is indicative of the Seattle area’s literary culture. The two libraries’ digital collections of audiobooks and e-books are attracting even more readers who prefer listening and scrolling to turning pages.

An abundance of books — and e-books

The Seattle Public Library and the King County Library System are beloved institutions with a combined collection of 6.8 million copies of physical and digital books. E-books and audiobooks are gaining in popularity but have yet to surpass demand for bound and printed copies. Source: https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/GWj9m/

Seattle Public Library, King County Library System (Fiona Martin / The Seattle Times)

The two library systems are part of a larger ecosystem, said Stesha Brandon, Seattle Public Library’s literature and humanities program manager. Our region boasts numerous local authors and “a committed community of readers” who shop at local bookstores, attend readings, take part in programming, use libraries and support library levies, she said.

“It really is the kind of place where we kind of breathe literature,” Brandon said. “Stories are part of our DNA. Maybe some cities feel it more through music or sports or other things, but I think here in Seattle, we definitely feel it through books.”

Continue/Read Original Article: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/how-seattle-king-county-libraries-get-books-into-your-hands/

#2025 #America #Books #Education #History #Libraries #Library #LibraryOfCongress #Opinion #Reading #Science #SeattlePublicLibrary #Technology #TheSeattleTimes #UnitedStates

@MNSpy

You can also participate in the #BooksUnbanned project from the #SeattlePublicLibrary: https://www.spl.org/programs-and-services/teens/books-unbanned

#Seattle #PublicLibrary goes low-tech after #cyberattack

Clare McGrane
June 07, 2024

"Creative solutions

While the attack crippled key systems, the library's 27 branches are still open, hosting events and checking out physical materials.

"For 10 days after the attack, checkouts were done manually with a #PencilAndPaper. Librarians wrote down patrons' library card numbers and cataloged each item borrowed on stacks of forms. One joked that they were back in 1990.

"Now staff have cobbled together a temporary solution that relies on Microsoft Excel, moving forward in time to 1995.

"'I just scan your card into the spreadsheet,' said Spenser Hoyt, demonstrating the check-out process. Hoyt is the borrower services operations manager at the library's central branch.

"'We are able to use our fancy RFID tag technology, so all I have to do is set [the book] on the pad... and it is 'checked out' to you," Hoyt said.

"Hoyt puts air quotes around the phrase "checked out" because the item isn't technically logged in the library's cataloging system. For now, the spreadsheet acts as a record of checkouts that will be uploaded into that system when it's back online.

"One wrinkle in this work-around: There's no way to check materials back into the library's collection. (SPL is asking patrons to hold on any books or other materials until they can process them again. The system doesn't charge late fees.)"

Read more:
https://www.kuow.org/stories/seattle-public-library-goes-low-tech-after-cyberattack-knocks-out-most-digital-services

#Libraries #cyberattack #SeattlePublicLibrary #LowTech

Plasma Bolts • Seattle, Washington, USA
Minolta DiMAGE 7hi • 2004

#Photography #DigitalCamera #ColorPhotography
#Minolta #MinoltaDiMAGE7HI #PointAndShoot #BridgeCamera

#Seattle #SeattlePublicLibrary #Light #PostModern #PewPew #Reflections #ReflectionPhotography

Tobi Ogundiran at the Seattle Public Library: Please join members of Norwescon at Tobi Ogundiran’s presentation of his new book Jackal, Jackal: Tales of the Dark and Fanta… (#NisiShawl #SeattlePublicLibrary #ThirdPlaceBooks #TobiOgundiran)

Full post: https://www.norwescon.org/2023/07/20/tobi-ogundiran-at-the-seattle-public-library/

Books Unbanned | The Seattle Public Library

This brilliant program makes #ebooks and #audiobooks available to teens and young adults anywhere in the country. It was started by #brooklynpubliclibrary and #seattlepubliclibrary is the second one to join in helping kids and young people everywhere access books being banned by the religious right.

I hate that it has to exist. I love that it does.

If you know or are a young person living somewhere where books are getting banned because adults are afraid of change, follow the link and get your free card to private access to all the books.

https://www.spl.org/programs-and-services/teens/books-unbanned
#library #libraries #bookstodon #books #freedomofthought #freedom
#seattle

Took advantage of the Seattle Public Library's free COVID-19 vaccine clinic. It was raining a bit, but it turned out to be a pleasant ride.

cc @Librarianbikes

#SEABikes #Seattle #SeattlePublicLibrary

Been to the downtown #SeattlePublicLibrary lately? Come visit the glorious place where I work - we're open evenings again! https://bit.ly/3Hbv9MC
#Seattle #libraries

Seattle friends: do you have a library card and a few minutes of spare time? If so, please suggest that they stock my book, Personal Finance for People in Tech (ISBN 979-8361628438) in print, ebook, and audiobook. Make your suggestion here: https://www.spl.org/books-and-media/suggest-a-title
#BookPromotion #Libraries #SeattlePublicLibrary #ThingsToDoWhileSnowedIn

#SeattlePublicLibrary has just digitized The Helix, Seattle's first underground newspaper published from March 1967 to June 1970.

https://bit.ly/3UFcrAF

#Seattle #PNW #Counterculture #underground #journalism #1960s #Alternative #libraries #archives #digitization #LocalHistory