We notified him on Oct. 11, 2004, that he was banned from all Baltimore County Public Libraries until such time as the matter of the missing books was resolved.

This is the kind of platform we've been looking for a long time. Libraries digitize their stuff and put it up, but none of the libraries have comprehensive collections of everything. Now we can say: 'We have this particular edition of Mark Twain, but it's not as good as that one over there,' and we add it to the collection.

This is the kind of platform we've been looking for a long time, ... Libraries digitize their stuff and put it up, but none of the libraries have comprehensive collections of everything. Now we can say: 'We have this particular edition of Mark Twain, but it's not as good as that one over there,' and we add it to the collection.

All three of the libraries are entering into a time, or have already been in a time, when they face reduced funding.

The three rules of the Librarians of Time and Space are: 1) Silence; 2) Books must be returned no later than the last date shown; and 3) Do not interfere with the nature of causality.

Libraries really are wonderful. They're better than bookshops, even. I mean bookshops make a profit on selling you books, but libraries just sit there lending you books quietly out of the goodness of their hearts.