#weefreecommunitylibrary — Public Fediverse posts

@mlanger Yeah, it's funny you mention the Lopez transfer station - I was thinking of similar when I wrote the trash/treasure comment. It's both true that people throw away actual treasures all the time and some people think their trash is treasure.

At some point, I decided if a book looked like trash to me and had been sitting in the #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary for a while with no one taking it, I'll pull it and put it in the Goodwill pile (which will be viewed by more people once donated). Even things I think are good, if they sit there for a while, get the same treatment. It helps avoid crap building up, at least. :)

Mostly talking out loud here, but semi-community spaces, or tended community space, can be tricky. There's typically one of three problems:

1. People take, but don't contribute. Okay in small amounts but not good if it's the entire community. I watched another little library get stocked by one person and cleared out (twice), without anyone else contributing. It just sits empty now.

2. People think their trash is other people's treasure. Sometimes it is, and often it's just ... trash. I've seen this in little libraries that end up full of old versions of random textbooks and other ancient and tattered books. They're full and no one borrows anything.

3. The curators of the community space overreact to instances of 1 & 2 and add so many controls that the spaces cease to feel communal: https://defector.com/trinket-box-purveyors-are-melting-down. (Free with login.)

Anyhow, there's no perfect formula, but it's a thing I think about a lot as I interact with (and curate) the #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary.

Put a handful of N95 masks out in the #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary, which I have mixed feelings about. On one hand, trying to encourage neighborhood sharing and it’s smoky af right now. On the other, I’ve seen what happens on multiple occasions when people think a location is for “any stuff I have that *might* be useful to someone, anyone”. I’d rather the library remains mostly focused on books and games.

But today is smoky and I would really rather my neighbors mask up if they can for their own health. So masks it is until this goes away.

So excited!! Two of the jailbroken kindles left the #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary! Finally, after over a month out there. One came back pretty quickly (public domain murder mysteries), but the other is still going. The third one - the YA loaded one, hasn’t moved. Maybe the tech is too old or counts against valued “screen time” to use, not sure.

Not sure if I’m going to keep the Kindle Touch as a backup for myself, but I finally got the Touch jailbroken today with KUAL on it. KUAL was a challenge, and I might post details of how to do it later, it involved finding a mirror site for ancient firmware updates.

But I’m loving these screen savers! The plan is to put two of the old Kindles (once I cover the logos, #BurningMan style) out in the #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary. The Paperwhite is definitely going out as it has a small crack.

My readme asks people to buy the books if they love them to support the writers (they could of course steal copies if they really wanted) and to charge the devices before returning (using an ancient microUSB cord). It’s the modern version of “be kind, rewind”.

Ahhhh, came back from the weekend trip with @Wham and several of the #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary books are gone, yay!! And even better - a few new ones have shown up! Much excite!

It was definitely right to put the sign on the #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary, as the school bus crowd this morning trickled over to take a look. Exactly as I’d hoped for placement! Except I was hoping it would be fully operational. I did see one kid trying to make out what was behind the sign, so maybe it built anticipation. :-)

This feels safer for now given how wiggly it is. My fear right now is it will wiggle enough to make people anxious opening it, so they won’t open it at all in the future. #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary

It LOOKS good. I just suspect that if people try to use it they’ll get a little scared off and stop from the wiggle. #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary

Bleargh, construction is really annoying. I had an EZSpike for the #WeeFreeCommunityLibrary, and tried to get it in with @Wham this weekend. We actually bent the spike trying to get it into the ground here (full of rocks).

We shifted to a bracket in a concrete block, which seemed like it was working, except now the library wiggles alarmingly. (This, except it's got a small metal post between the bracket and block: https://www.homedepot.com/p/11-in-x-11-1-2-in-x-11-1-2-in-Concrete-Pier-Block-with-Metal-Bracket-8053112/202820094)

This all feels it harder than it "ought" to be.