Leftists really have to prioritize public libraries in budget fights.

Chicago Public Library's budget cuts would mean losing HALF of the materials budget. It would mean losing 90 staff members. Cop budget's fine, though.

So who’s cancelling their travel plans to Core Forum?

"If discovery tools return hallucinated results, the credibility of the library itself could be undermined. Students may come to see the library’s systems as just another unreliable search engine." BINGO

Aside from my "was this really written in 2025, not two years ago" snarky response, I couldn't help thinking throughout this entire blog post that a huge part of why so many libraries are STUCK on dealing with AI is because we literally don't have the staff time or funding to deal with it.

SPD out here on Northgate shutting down the taco stand between 8th and Roosevelt due to "multiple licensing and health code violations" that they wouldn't provide anymore info about.

Wondering why no one likes your posts anymore, even among your friends? It's because @jay.bsky.team and team have decided to hide a huge amount of content from all of our feeds by default. Here's how to turn it off. First go to the hamburger menu in the upper left corner

@libbyapp.com I love you so much. Please reconsider using generative AI in your app. Just like @thestorygraph.com, we don’t need generative AI to make book suggestions that you can already make based on our interests.

Librarians told 404 Media they're being inundated with new pitches for AI library tech and catalogs are being flooded with AI slop books. But more broadly, AI maximalism across society is supercharging the ideological war on libraries, schools, government workers, and academics.

Someone tell me how to explain to my clients they should listen to what courts say when the highest court in the land says they don't deserve to eat. Because all I've got is "if you don't you'll go to jail." And that's just government by force.

From “Jingo” by Terry Pratchett

Anyone who thinks this will work has never been into an indie book/music store staffed by sarcastic, judgmental staff that’s still doing gang buster business. I know this because I used to be one of those sarcastic, judgmental booksellers.

The Supreme Court’s ruling on Trump’s passport sex markers policy conveys as much casual transphobia as a two-page judicial opinion ever could without actually including slurs. Absolutely vile stuff. ballsandstrikes.substack.com/p/the-suprem...

some “cease” fire

Time to dust this old cherry off that someone shared with me years ago and support @sbworkersunited.org in their potential upcoming strike!

ron wyden looking straight at the camera and saying “taxation is the compromise”

A thing about AI in higher ed right now is that half of us are scrambling to deal with the implosion of our information environment that broke reading/writing/source verification, while the other half is trying to achieve a massive institutional buy-in of the very thing that's causing the implosion

Workers: I enjoy doing this task Employers: that task is being done by AI now Mainstream journalism: nobody wants to work anymore

Pretty big turnaround in the latest (small) batch of about 36,000 Seattle ballots, which went 51.6 percent for Katie Wilson and 48.1 percent for incumbent Bruce Harrell. Overall, the new numbers are 52.6 Harrell, 46.9 Wilson. Yesterday, those numbers were 53.8 Harrell, 45.7 Wilson.

Seattles be like “I love Zohran” and then vote to re-elect Bruce fucking Harrell.

Treating anti-Blackness as beside the point, as not disqualifying, as something to be overlooked, I’d argue, is partially how we got here.

“The students are already using AI so we need to use AI too” okay 10 years ago you thought youths were eating Tide Pods and I didn’t see anybody chowing down on those in the break room at work.

Seattles be like “I love Zohran” and then vote to re-elect Bruce fucking Harrell.

BREAKING: After months of stonewalling by Starbucks, unionized baristas just voted 92% to authorize a ULP strike unless Starbucks finalizes fair contracts & stops union busting. If forced, our baristas will strike in dozens of cities on November 13 – the company's busiest sales day of the year.

Student 1: the weather forecast today makes no sense. Student 2: yeah that’s because they fired all the scientists

“While there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.” —Eugene V. Debs

🚨 STRIKE ALERT: Journalists at Science News are on strike and holding a 12-hour picket outside of the office! After 560 days of bargaining, the Science News Media Guild (@sn-media-guild.bsky.social) is demanding and fair contract NOW!

Colorado Republicans had targeted school board races as their best opportunity in 2026 but teachers union and Democrat-backed candidates lead in Denver, Jefferson County, Cherry Creek, and even conservative Douglas County, per 9NEWS' Jennifer Meckles. #copolitics

I’m going to sleep so well knowing how incensed with rage trump and Cuomo are right now.

Now comes the even harder work. But for tonight, let's celebrate.

As a New Yorker I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. Why the fuck is Staten Island even part of NYC?

I’d like to do a local, student-focused, “if you work for this employer, you can join this union“, sort of like this post I did for library workers sites.google.com/view/fairlib...

Library workers, what do you like to see most in managers?

I feel like I post about this fairly frequently, but I think it’s a good thing to remind people that you don’t have to look a certain way to be a serious person or to do a serious, public-facing job

Congratulations Abigail Spanberger. I can't wait to work alongside my union siblings to force her to go back on her campaign promise of not repealing right to work.

Never been tempted to tag JD Vance in a post before.

I've mentioned this before but it bears repeating. Don't leave FSA funds on the table at the end of the year. LOTS of places like homeless shelters etc... would love donations of FSA eligible items. For the past 2 years, I've used left over funds to shop here: fsastore.com - then donate the items.

People’s behavior in airport bathrooms proves that we learned nothing from Covid.

“Your baseball team didn’t do well, did they?” -my Gen Z employee seeing me walk in this morning

It’s weird taking an extended break from social media because when you come back it’s like stepping into a noisy bar on a busy Saturday night. You’re inundated with a thousand conversations and arguments and energy around you and it’s jarring after the quiet darkness of outside.

The ICE detention center near Buffalo has banned book deliveries, New York Focus has learned. One advocate says almost all the material at the facility is in English. nysfocus.com/2025/10/08/b...

I wish there was some kind of book on social and cultural expectations for short-form social media. I was never on Twitter and because of that I feel like I sometimes don’t understand expectations on Bluesky. I got blocked by someone I respect today and I think it’s a faux pas to talk about that?

Me, every minute of every hour of every day:

So far there have been zero trans women reported as having visited epsteins pedo island. But lots of people who want you to think trans women are threats to children seemed to have gone there at some point. Curious...

It is our duty to fight for our freedom. It is our duty to win. We must love each other and support each other. We have nothing to lose but our chains.

The US put Assata Shakur at the top of their terrorism list as recently as 2013, which really should have told everyone how much people who fight for the US’s founding documents promising equality and justice to be upheld for Black and brown people are considered Enemies of America.

Elon Musk and Peter Thiel mentioned in Epstein documents released by Democrats

RIP Assata Shakur

RIP Assata Shakur

Cinnamon should have felt comfortable addressing issues to its boss directly. Doesn’t it know that a union only hurts its relationship with management? /s 🙃