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Ohmington t1_ismxze3 wrote

It costs money to provide those services for free. The more traffic you have in your website, the more it costs to run it. If the whole world flooded a small library with library card requests, etc. while being funded by a small community, there is probably a good chance that library won't last. I don't know the extent of it or if I am even correct, but nothing is free. Libraries are expensive to run.

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SmittyFjordmanjensen t1_isnl5m8 wrote

I've worked in various libraries and my wife is a librarian. While it's true, these services cost money, librarians just want you to read more, period. if it means utilizing their resources but not contributing to the tax base that pays their bills, there's nothing abnormal about that. Area visitors and homeless people patronize libraries too.

Electronic resources are finite, only a certain number of "copies" distributable at any given time. Either the library would find a way to grow or they'd advise you where else to go.

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jefrye t1_isn499h wrote

>If the whole world flooded a small library with library card requests, etc. while being funded by a small community, there is probably a good chance that library won't last.

What would actually happen in that scenario, assuming that the people running the library are the tiniest bit competent, is that the library would stop making library cards available to non-residents.

No library is going to start offering a service, see it quickly draining their resources, and just watch as their budget is run into the ground.

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