
Librarians in uproar after borrowing record of teenage Haruki Murakami is leaked - bootload
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/dec/02/librarians-in-uproar-after-borrowing-record-of-haruki-murakami-is-leaked
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hackuser
It's interesting that records, such as library books read, that were common
before the modern Internet are considered private, but if the records are
related to the Internet, such as web pages read (or every place I go, everyone
I talk to, everything I say, etc.), many people say they don't understand why
their privacy is important.

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fraserharris
There is a subtlety involved:

\- people care if _other people_ know what they have read

\- people care much less if a machine knows what they have read

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noobermin
I think this sums up the attitude of most of those confounded young'un
Millennials, myself included.

I like the idea that Youtube remembers the videos I've watched so that it
rec's others, it's a useful feature of the site. The fact that someone else, a
person, could see that information, that is upsetting. It's probably difficult
to have one without the other, however.

~~~
vectorjohn
This has nothing to do with the OP / what library books were read. The
_library_ certainly does know what you read. Likewise, Google and even real
people at Google may know what you watched. But that's not surprising. It's to
be expected.

The real comparison is if Google gave that information, de-anonymized, to
advertisers. Then there would be an issue.

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mc32
So the Kobe daily dismisses the criticism by essentially claiming he's a
public figure and thus fair game but also admit to not obtaining consent from
the other book borrowers.

On the other hand, the information was obtained and "leaked" by someone who
stumbled upon the library cards while disposing old books and ancillary things
from an old library.... It reminds me of the cardfile case in New York[1]
somewhere that brought insight into the lives of adolescents/young adults who
attended some special preparatory kind of institution for kids but whose
history had almost completely been lost...

[1][http://www.slate.com/articles/life/permanent_record/features...](http://www.slate.com/articles/life/permanent_record/features/2011/permanent_record/how_i_found_the_report_cards_and_how_they_changed_my_life.html)

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zck
Has anyone asked Murakami what he thinks? It certainly shouldn't determine
what's moral or not, but it would be very interesting.

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nsns
I find "Librarians in uproar" a wonderful oxymoron.

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eli
It's amusing choice of phrase, but librarians have been very vocal on privacy
and civil rights historically.

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flashman
And yet, I've never heard librarians question whether they should be retaining
borrower records. If I don't trust the government not to abuse those records,
why would I trust some other group of civil servants? Why do librarians still
need to know I borrowed a book more than, say, a few days after I return it?
If they need analytics, why can't they anonymise the borrower ID?

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dalke
> I've never heard librarians question whether they should be retaining
> borrower records.

It is the ALA policy that such records should regularly be purged from the
system. For example, quoting from
[http://www.ala.org/Template.cfm?Section=interpretations&Temp...](http://www.ala.org/Template.cfm?Section=interpretations&Template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=34114)
:

> It is the responsibility of library staff to destroy information in
> confidential or privacy protected records in order to protect from
> unauthorized disclosure. Information that should be regularly purged or
> shredded includes personally identifiable information on library resource
> use, material circulation history, and security / surveillance tapes and
> logs.

You can see some of the effects of this policy at
[http://ask.metafilter.com/228587/What-are-the-negative-
resul...](http://ask.metafilter.com/228587/What-are-the-negative-results-of-
purging-library-records) , regarding how some libraries purge their records
more frequently, as part of the opposition to section 215 of the Patriot Act:

> The library I worked at would delete the record of what a patron borrowed as
> soon as the return is processed. ...

> Libraries have long purged patron records

Or from
[http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2003-07-03/news/030703027...](http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2003-07-03/news/0307030274_1_library-
records-larger-libraries-largest-library-systems) :

> Because of space limits, the Chicago Public Library, one of the largest
> library systems in the country, long has purged unnecessary circulation
> records each day and expunges Internet caches every 30 minutes, said
> spokeswoman Margot Holland. ...

> For years, Skokie's library has purged records on borrowed materials once
> they're returned. Recently, it installed software to delete records of
> Internet use. ...

> Sarah Meisels, Wheaton's library director, noted that Wheaton for years has
> purged circulation records as soon as they are no longer needed, making it
> practically impossible to comply with the Patriot Act.

> In part because the Patriot Act is so rarely invoked, and also because
> libraries historically have gone to lengths to preserve patrons' privacy,
> allowing for the act is almost a moot point, Meisels said.

You say you've "never heard librarians question whether they should be
retaining borrower records." How much have you listened to libraries talk
about their retention policies to know if they have been saying anything?

Bear in mind also that in the US something like 48 of the states have special
privacy laws for library records.

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Paul_S
Once the book is returned isn't it enough to record it in aggregate and remove
the record from the personal file? Maybe they should change the way they keep
records. Or is that a police thing from way back that requires them to keep a
record of all the books you have borrowed. In which case I'm one step ahead as
I spent my highschool in the library and almost never checked anything out.
They will never find out all the terrible fantasy and sci-fi novels I read.

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msbarnett
> Once the book is returned isn't it enough to record it in aggregate and
> remove the record from the personal file? Maybe they should change the way
> they keep records.

These records are ~50 years old, pre the computerization of library borrowing
records.

It's a fair bet record keeping _has changed_ in the intervening decades.

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krapp
The scholarly value of these records is obvious, but I don't see much of a
public interest angle behind publishing them. Is the Kobe Shimbun hoping its
readers will wonder whether or not this famous writer had some controversial
or salacious reading habits? Why not get his permission and at least try to
get an interview putting them into some context?

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intopieces
>The scholarly value of these records is obvious

Is it? Just because someone checked out a book doesn't mean they read the
book. And just because they read a book doesn't mean they liked it, remembered
it, or were influenced by it.

This information has no context. I see no value in them whatsoever.

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krapp
Fair enough, maybe "obvious" is too strong. "Arguable," maybe, or worth
considering.

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alex_doom
I love the comment someone left on that article.

\---

Haiku of the Week:

When I eat deep-fried oysters, I am lonely, But they are delicious.

Only Haruki-san can do this without trying. But not without frying.

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unsignedint
I feel there's some political agenda to this uproar. Librarians and/or
librarian organization in Japan are have reasons for concerns as there are
some movements in munincipalities delegating operation of their public
libraries to commercial enterprises. This is causing bit of concerns for
expecations of privacy for patron's checkout record.

Company called Culture Convenience Club, operator of large book/media chain
Tsutaya, now operates some public libraries in Japan, which basically runs
both a library and a book store in the premise; and patron can optionally
associate their store card with library card, so each checkout from libraries
would count toward their in-store point, I guess in return for the record they
will keep about that checkout. (There have been some questionable book
selection/discard policies some take as conflict of interest, but that's
another story...)

So I feel, at least partially, they are using this as opportunity to increase
public awareness of their position.

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randyrand
Citizens in uproar at librarians for keeping unanonymized decode long records!

p.s. I do not know who actually makes the decision to keep records....is it
law in japan?

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waterlesscloud
Why would this record even exist? What purpose does it serve?

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dec0dedab0de
Library books used to have a little pocket stuck to the back cover, with a
lined card inside. If you wanted to borrow a book, you would take out the
card, put your name on the next line, and give it to the librarian. When you
gave the book back, the card was put back into the pocket.

The system was to keep track of who had borrowed a book, so that they could be
tracked down if it was not returned.

I remember it being really fun in grade school, to realize I had checked out
the same book as an older friend.

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gcb0
I'm from a more metropolitan area i guess. we used library card numbers on
those instead of names

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woodman
> I'm from a more metropolitan area i guess.

I would be surprised if you are from somewhere more metropolitan than Kobe
Japan [0]. It is much more likely that you are just young.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keihanshin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keihanshin)

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DawkinsGawd
Population density is considerably less than that of NYC. Scaling NYC up to
13,000 km² would put the population 90 million

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woodman
The population density is also much less if we scaled the population of my
apartment up to 13,000 km², but that isn't how metropolitan areas are
traditionally measured. The NYC metro area includes three states, lots of
sprawl - so it is much less dense.

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dates
actual list is behind a japanese paywall here ^_^

[http://www.kobe-np.co.jp/news/bunka/201510/0008458279.shtml](http://www.kobe-
np.co.jp/news/bunka/201510/0008458279.shtml)

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yongjik
I'm not sure how I feel on this. On one hand, privacy is important, but on the
other hand, if someone stumbled upon a reading record of teenage Goethe or
Twain, no scholar would say "It's their privacy! We shouldn't look at them!"

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celticninja
Differences being your examples are dead and someone stumbled across them.
This is a car of a live author having his details leaked.

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stevesearer
Does that hold up in the modern sense of internet browsing history? If someone
stumbles across my browsing history, they cannot publish it while I am living,
but can once I am dead?

Sounds like Haruki Murakami should have installed uBlock Origin and that the
library shouldn't have enforced a real names policy :)

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imgabe
Your browser doesn't have a professional code of ethics that prohibits sharing
that information (although maybe it should). Librarians do, and they take it
very seriously. That's why they're upset.

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stevesearer
Totally understand why they're upset. My comment was more directed toward
wondering what being dead has to do with something like a library checkout
history being private or not as the parent suggested. It would seem that
librarians would desire to keep such details private regardless of the
person's status of living or dead.

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Retra
You don't understand why a dead person's privacy is less important than a live
one's? Is that really the problem you're having right here?

