1Ken.Jones
As an American resident of China, I was shocked (SHOCKED!!!) that I was unable to access the San Rafael (California) Public Library page celebrating Banned Books Week. Not, surprisingly, blocked by the Great Firewall of China, but by SRPL's Cloudflare settings which block my Chinese IP address. As it turns out, more and more literary and public access websites are becoming more provincial, preventing access based on geography. The very audience which is most in need of these services and which most needs to avail of internet-based resources is also the very audience which is being malignly prevented from doing so. Ahhh, the irony of it all!
2aspirit
This is complicated.
Banned Books Week focuses on what happens inside the USA. Residents of other countries aren't the intended audience.
A public library's primary audience is residents in its service area, which is usually a metro or county, certainly not the entire world. Access to library materials might be granted to people outside the service area, but restricting access to some of the materials is not new. Someone in the next county over might not be allowed to read everything offered to the public in the service area.
If you are a qualified member of the library, I can see why being restricted would be shocking.
However, servers across the USA are frequently targeted by Chinese (and Russian) attackers. This does not seem to be well understood. I'm going to share something I'm not really supposed to here. I used to work in a municipal IT department that was under almost constant attack; supporting the defenses was a primary focus for several members of the staff, but all of the city's employees were responsible for keeping not only the medium-sized city and associated areas secure through regular routines that would at times go as far as unplugging our desktop computers at the end of the day. According to rumor (as in, not an official statement to the public), the attacks on those computer networks increased 400% when the 45th POTUS took office. Breaches became frequent, and the general public have largely been unaware that this affects government functions, personal privacy, as well as public safety through the reliability of public utilities used at home and in businesses.
Defense of government servers especially can be costly. At the same time, library funding is at risk because of pro-censorship politicians and groups. I understand why a public library would tighten security to protect its resources.
But also, I understand the frustration of hitting a wall online. Even here within the continental USA, this happens to me for a variety of reasons, including geographical restrictions. (Example: Japanese publishers fed up with American pirates had blocks up for a while.) I despise the wall every time.
Many people want to think of the internet as an entirely open, global space. That's a common dream. I think it's a good dream. However, that has not ever been reality.
Banned Books Week focuses on what happens inside the USA. Residents of other countries aren't the intended audience.
A public library's primary audience is residents in its service area, which is usually a metro or county, certainly not the entire world. Access to library materials might be granted to people outside the service area, but restricting access to some of the materials is not new. Someone in the next county over might not be allowed to read everything offered to the public in the service area.
If you are a qualified member of the library, I can see why being restricted would be shocking.
However, servers across the USA are frequently targeted by Chinese (and Russian) attackers. This does not seem to be well understood. I'm going to share something I'm not really supposed to here. I used to work in a municipal IT department that was under almost constant attack; supporting the defenses was a primary focus for several members of the staff, but all of the city's employees were responsible for keeping not only the medium-sized city and associated areas secure through regular routines that would at times go as far as unplugging our desktop computers at the end of the day. According to rumor (as in, not an official statement to the public), the attacks on those computer networks increased 400% when the 45th POTUS took office. Breaches became frequent, and the general public have largely been unaware that this affects government functions, personal privacy, as well as public safety through the reliability of public utilities used at home and in businesses.
Defense of government servers especially can be costly. At the same time, library funding is at risk because of pro-censorship politicians and groups. I understand why a public library would tighten security to protect its resources.
But also, I understand the frustration of hitting a wall online. Even here within the continental USA, this happens to me for a variety of reasons, including geographical restrictions. (Example: Japanese publishers fed up with American pirates had blocks up for a while.) I despise the wall every time.
Many people want to think of the internet as an entirely open, global space. That's a common dream. I think it's a good dream. However, that has not ever been reality.
3Ken.Jones
>2 aspirit: So I'm collateral damage. It's still ironic.
Thanks aspirit, for the thoughtful post. You've enlightened me greatly.
Thanks aspirit, for the thoughtful post. You've enlightened me greatly.
4aspirit
>3 Ken.Jones: You're welcome. And, it is ironic!
For now, if there's something specific you were looking for on the San Rafael website, maybe someone else here can get it for you.
For now, if there's something specific you were looking for on the San Rafael website, maybe someone else here can get it for you.
