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Taking books from the Distributed Library -
Hundreds of members of the Mediamatic community came the first day to meet and pick up their favorite titles.
Mediamatic gave away all its books. We distributed our library in protest to skimpy Dutch art funding policy making practices. The way it's going, we won't be able to take care of our library ourselves anymore. So we've asked our audience to take over the responsibility.
All members of the mediamatic.net community (new and old) could pick up their favorite books for free. You just had to publish the ownership on your profile alongside a picture and a small description. And promise that you will always honor a lending request from an other community member. Et voilá, a distributed library.
Browse the collection
Read the rules here
and watch a filmed impression (dutch language) of the first day by Parool TV's Jelle de Gee:
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Melancholy in the Library (before distribution) -
The days before the bookfest everything seems to be in order...
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Mediamatic Library after 1 day of distribution -
We've given away 70% of our books in 1 day to the members of the Mediamatic social network.
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Dwaze dagen / Invasion of the book worms at the Mediamatic Distrubuted Library Fest. -
At 16:00 hours on the saturday a crowd rushed into our office to get the first picks. Book lovers are civilised folk though. There was no fighting.
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Wow! there's that vintage copy of Parkett Magazine is was missing! Where? In the Mediamatic Distributed Library of course!
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Long queues at the check out. -
We had four skilled librarians working very hard but the turn out was just too overwhelming.
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But why stand in line if you can read? -
Many visitors spent hours reading before they made their final choice from the Mediamatic Distributed Library.
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Some video of day 1:
First come, first served. We have a library with thousands of books, magazines and multimedia. And there will be a bookbar and some music.
Location
Mediamatic office, Post CS building, Oosterdokskade 5, fifth floor
(the very last time in the Post CS, next month we will open at a new location....)
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Not enough chairs? no problem. We can read on the floor. -
Director Jans Possel is very happy with the crowd that came to collect our old media.
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I youst found a vintage VOLVO CD-rom at the Mediamatic distributed library fest! -
Texting home about the best finds on the saturday afternoon.
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Argentinian artist Aimée Zito Lema (of Gastarbeider fame) selected a few years of the dutch art magazine Metropolis M at the distributed library fest. Now that's "inburgering" the Mediamatic way!
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Browsing books on the Mediamatic site may be better for your neck. -
Tjerk seems very relaxed though, while he is browsing our physical library for the last time...
Contributions
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uɐɯʞuǝɯ
Anne
margarita
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Emina
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ideacritik
karla
Kristin
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Paul
Jans
Willem
Annabel
Liquidate the art depots
This is indeed a great project. It was, as I understood, meant in protest of the cultural funding stalemate in 2008. Now, four years later, there are plans for cultural cuts again.
The art depots of museums are chockfull. Why not liquidate them also and do the same with paintings and sculptures as Mediamatic did with books?
Borges must have anticipated this.
Oh this is brilliant. By contrast, a traditional library suddenly seems so cold and lonely and anti-social. SHHHH! the librarian yells.
But Mediamatic patrons gain not only a book, but also a real contact with someone in their own city – and maybe share a coffee, get hints about the book, groove with someone else's enthusiasm.
If Borges (the bibliomancer who wrote ‘The Library of Babel’) did not think of this first, I'm sure he absolutely loves it (up in his beatific Library of bliss).
was there an inspiration for this move or first instance of such thing?
It seems so logical way to deal with analogue/physical library in the context of communal development and shared resources.