Ein2

I visited the library at the University of Sussex yesterday for the first time in ages. I was unpleasantly surprised to discover that the library is now locked up tighter than a drum. In order to enter the library at all, you need to have a valid library card which is scanned by a card reader attached to the turnstyles. This just seems so… odd. I can understand preventing unauthorized people from removing items from the building, but why prevent anyone from entering and using the contents in a polite way? I’ve been to university libraries in several European countries, across three Canadian provinces, and in a few American states, and I’ve never seen a locked down library before. The war on terrorism has spread to libraries: our knowledge might be contaminated. Lock those libraries!

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