On Tue, Jun 25, 2002 at 04:56:10PM -0500, Harmon Seaver wrote: | would be aware of it, and people would be talking. I don't know of any way it | would be possible to make the software keep track of just one person, it would | have to keep the records for everyone. Of course, someone could keep track | manually, but I'd be willing to bet that if this were happening at all, the ALS | would know about it and would be filing suit against the DOJ. No, they wouldn't. The USA PATRIOT act forbids a library from talking about it. Thats why point 12 of the recent House Judiciary committee letter to Ashcroft asks about libraries. http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/Terrorism_militias/20020613_letter_t... | | On Tue, Jun 25, 2002 at 02:23:08PM -0700, Joseph Ashwood wrote: | > ----- Original Message ----- | > From: "Eric Cordian" <emc@artifact.psychedelic.net> | > | > > It was my understanding that libraries destroy records of patrons' | > > activity as soon as the books are returned. Nonetheless, this is an | > > interesting Federal fishing expedition, with warrants issued by secret | > > courts, and criminal penalties for librarians who talk too much. | > | > I can tell you that at least in some areas that is simply not the case. I | > have personal experience with the San Jose City library and know this for a | > fact to be incorrect. They store information since the last upgrade of the | > central database, currently the better part of a decade, but coming up on a | > cycle point. Although it is very difficult to get the information, and large | > portions of even that have been lost through various issues. | > | > That is just a single area, but it seems reasonable that most | > cities/counties/schools would follow the same general principle. Of course | > with the lax way the information is kept it takes nearly a week to recover | > the list of books you've checked out in the last month that have been | > returned (unless there are penalties), so there is some saving grace to the | > system. | > Joe | | -- | Harmon Seaver | CyberShamanix | http://www.cybershamanix.com | -- "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -Hume