The Rutherford County Library Board voted to fire Library Director Luanne James for defending the first amendment rights of her young patrons and refusing to move LGBTQ+ children’s books to the adult section of the library📚📜 fox17.com/news/local/r...

Earlier this month, we broke an investigation into a school in Greater Manchester that labelled its librarian a “safeguarding” risk for a book she stocked. We can now reveal that the local authority upheld the complaint that destroyed her career⬇️ www.indexoncensorship.org/2026/03/grea...

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If anyone is friends with any Georgian air traffic controllers, buy them a nice bottle of wine. As guardians of pretty much the only narrow gap still available between Europe and Asia that avoids both Iran, the Gulf, Ukraine and Russia, they are under some substantial pressure.

All these big BBC names suddenly being sacked for their behaviour. I bet it’s been a problem for years and nobody has dealt with it because they are big names. Not fair on anyone. Stamp on it early on.

Two and a half years on from the cyber attack and it's still not possible to consult ebooks at the British Library (which is a right pain when I have an article to finish).

More detail on this fascinating and important case here www.womenshistory.org/education-re...

IFLA Statement on Harm to Lives and Cultural Heritage in the Gulf Region and Eastern Mediterranean #library #archives 📚 www.ifla.org/news/ifla-st...

Just trying this now. I don’t drive or have an ID card, and I don’t store my credit card on my devices. Wish me luck.

"we need to preserve old books", absolutely, and there are people who do that (eg: the UK has specific libraries that hold copies of every single book published in the UK), but WE, as in random people off of the street, do not in fact have to do that to every copy of every book we find.

The historic Bernardine Monastery in Lviv, part of a UNESCO World Heritage site, is on fire after a russian drone attack. 🎥 Xenia Gerke on Facebook

I have been paid royalties! £11.64! Now what shall I buy?

Central London today, in early spring sunshine.

Is this a good sign? My MAGA relative has been posting pro-Trump stuff every day forever, but nothing about the war with Iran. Could it be that she doesn’t support it? Is there a real split in the Trump camp?

There is a new app advertising in my FB feed, claiming to read a menu and tell me which items are gluten free. That would be a no from me. Really dangerous.

🧵And we're off, ladies and gentlemen! It's "they're banning the word EASTER" week. Regular as clockwork... So here comes a history lesson and media lesson all rolled into one thread! PS, I can't believe there's no easter egg emoji? This was the best I could do - 🗿🥚 🤣 I digress! 1/19

Important reflections on the relationship between archives, buildings, heritage designation and state power on the destruction of the Golestan Palace in Tehran. A blog by exiled Iranian archaeologist Leila Papoli-Yazdi blogg.lnu.se/unesco/?p=45...

Tempting though it is, please don’t try to identify the school. That would identify the librarian, and she wants to stay anonymous, for understandable reasons.

My excellent colleague @katiedd.bsky.social has just published this remarkable investigation into rampant book banning in a Greater Manchester secondary school library. 193 books including The Da Vinci Code, Twilight, White Teeth and 1984 Graphic Novel www.indexoncensorship.org/2026/03/scho...

This evening, like many others, I have been preparing food while listening to the news. It is always so unremittingly bad that I always feel as though I am in the first scene of a disaster movie.

Really disturbing.

CILIP & CILIP School Libraries Group continue supporting this school librarian member through this unprecedented and worrying situation

That's more than one book for every 100 Americans published last year. The median American read two books each year. If we up production a little more, say x200, totally manageable with AI, we can have enough for each of us to read two no one else reads www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/...

‘The world’s memory’: why Nigeria is burying its history under a mountain in #Svalbard - www.theguardian.com/global-devel... "first African country to deposit data in the Arctic World Archive, a storage facility designed to preserve records of everything from cultural practices to historical events"

The great debate about giving baked goods to a new neighbour had started up again in another place. Please don’t be offended if we say no. Some of us have to say no to food every day. It’s a massive taboo, but if we do so politely it has to be ok.

Academic publishing is currently experiencing a viral spread of “zombie citations.” I tried following one to see how these references are infecting academic knowledge systems codeactsineducation.wordpress.com/2026/01/30/t...

Please don’t vote for anyone who wants to loosen our gun laws. That is all.

There are other reasons for the UK government not to award or continue Palantir contracts but this statement of intent by its CEO must surely be decisive?

Such a relief. I have generated a transcript from a Youtube video that I really didn’t want to spend an hour watching for the odd nugget. Some of us just prefer to read and find it much more efficient.

This reminds me that someone visiting to view a special collection asked if they could bring a dog with them. It was an assistance dog, so, yes, of course. Ah, it wasn’t their assistance dog. They were just looking after it.

Dismay as ancient heritage sites across Iran damaged in US-Israel bombing

This is cruel to the young people concerned, self-destructive for the UK and will not win over a single Reform voter.

Good.

The new autocorrect on the iPhone is entertaining. I was writing a very dull standard sentence in an email and Gorbachev popped up, uninvited. I think I was just saying something like, “I have already…” Can’t wait to see who appears next.

Really sad that Liza Tarbuck is leaving her Radio 2 show. Cooking on a Saturday evening just won’t be the same. Often laugh out loud funny, with a brilliantly eclectic playlist.

Dear everyone, As per the post from the Bodleian librarian below, AI bots and scrapers are putting just about every website under great pressure, British History Online included. A lot of excellent tech staff are working hard to keep everything working, but outages and siruptions are inevitable.

AI scraping breaks libraries 📚📜

Current status, waiting to collect a prescription from a hospital pharmacy. I live here now.

In memory of Pete, we have launched the Pete Duncan Memorial Fund, which will support PhD students at the School. Donations can be made via peter-duncan-2026.muchloved.com

Tell me about it.

Not everywhere. It’s up to the teachers and head teachers to change it back to be about books, reading and the joy a good story brings. #WBDisaboutreading

Seeing lots of outrage at this, but it’s fine with me. We live in a complex world, and I want our representatives to be able to deal with more than one issue at a time. War is important, but so are public health campaigns. I attend a local exercise class every week, and see how it transforms lives.

A big thank you to Romana from Cultural Emergency Response (CER) for shedding light on some critical, locally-led, work happening in conflict zones. A truly enlightening #CILIPMembersFest26 session. Thanks to all those who attended today too 👏 A recording from the event will be made available soon.

Yes - reading is not just for joy and pleasure, but also for pain and knowledge. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

I find the Observer magazine of no interest now. Apart from Eva Wiseman there is never anything I want to read. A shame.

It is as bad as it sounds, and freedom to read folks have been anticipating this now for years. Make your phone calls. Send your emails.

Jokes on you, Oxford Street had been pedestrianised for years. It just now we're telling the drivers

When I moved to Tooting Broadway a long time ago there was an M&S and a Woolworths opposite the station. Then Primark and Wilko took their place. Now Wilko has gone, M&S is coming back, and before it opens in the Wilko building we have a fleeting reminder of the much missed Woolworths. #ghostsigns

Just back from an exercise class. The trainer has us standing on one leg with our eyes closed. Try it, if you haven’t. The hardest thing we did the whole hour.

I read everything when I was growing up. I had self educated parents who had done exactly the same. Nobody to stop them, so nobody stopped me.