Libraries

Life Wish: The Pleasantly Terminal Films of a Thai Director

Sex in the Library: Kids Have Fun, Librarians Gripe, and the Internet Explodes

We're late to the party, admittedly. But it has come to our attention that the sex columnist for U.C. Berekley's Daily Californian wrote an autobiographical column about coitus in the library -- and the Internet has reacted. Per the column, the writer inveighs in favor of sex in the library. A comme ... More >>

By Hook or by Book

With Mirkarimi Mess Over, Mayor Can Go Back to Not Caring About Ethics Commission

The Examiner recently ran an article that tells you much of what you need to know about the Ethics Commission's place in this city -- but not everything. One year after suggesting the mayor remove Library Commission President Jewelle Gomez, Ethics put together a letter to ask how the hell that' ... More >>

Movement to Digitize Libraries Gains San Francisco Ally

Some might think that libraries would hate the idea of being digitalized -- the scanning of books, papers and other texts and creating a virtual counterpart. But turns out, that's not actually the case.Organizations, including the San Francisco-based Electronic Frontier Foundation and the American L ... More >>

Muni Town Hall: New Chief Meets, Confounds His Public

Penelope Houston's "On Market Street": A Song for S.F.'s "Invisible" Street People

As its title suggests, Penelope Houston's seven-years-in-the-making new album, On Market Street, deals directly with social issues that confront San Franciscans every day. Given her job as a librarian at the San Francisco Public Library's main branch, Houston -- a former singer for S.F punk band the ... More >>

Prelinger Archives Show How San Francisco Has Always Struggled with Change

Ethics Commission Must Beg Mayor to Enforce Sunshine Ordinance

When it comes to getting the Sunshine Ordinance enforced, you might as well be walking on the sun...​Last night, after 18 prior rejections, the Ethics Commission finally deigned to hold a hearing of a case referred its way by the Sunshine Ordinance Task Force. For those scoring at home, the task f ... More >>

Fresh Eats: How to Read a $625 Cookbook, for Free

S.F. Public Library to Acquire the Six-Volume Modernist Cuisine

​ I was out for dinner with a couple of friends this week, talking about the reading Nathan Myhrvold gave this week at Omnivore Books, which we had all missed. The cost of attendance: purchasing a copy of Myhrvold's six-volume, 2,400-page Modernist Cuisine -- one of the most talked-about, controve ... More >>

Hunt for Fun, Hunt for Pun

Speed Dating at the Library -- No, Really

Wonder, wonder, wonder no more: Kathleen McGowan wrote The Book of Love​In San Francisco, libraries serve many more purposes than they do in other towns -- in which they're mainly used by 14-year-olds to loudly check their Facebook accounts until the librarian boots them out. Here they serve as de ... More >>

What Book Does Library Have Most Copies Of? No One Knows.

Really, Zeitoun? Really?​After it turned out that we might be waiting 11 years for a book on hold, we grew interested in the number of copies the San Francisco Public Library keeps of certain much-loved tomes. What, we queried the library, is the book it has the most copies of? Well, it turns out ... More >>

Branch Libraries Host Free Gingerbread Parties

davecobb/FlickrThings can get gory.​It's not till you're older, with a 420-fueled freakout over that late-night session with Chucky under your belt, that things like gingerbread men can seem sinister. When you're a kid gingerbread men are charming ― something you can verify by watching the l ... More >>

San Francisco Eats: Main Library Takes a Close Look at City's Dining History

The exhibit exhumes 160 years of S.F. dining history.​With multiple blogs covering new restaurant openings, trends, and gossip with the fervor of Woodward and Bernstein scooping Watergate, local foodies are more than well informed as to what's going in San Francisco's present-day dining scene. ... More >>

Videogame Competition at S.F. Libarary Comes as Surprise to Librarian

​Of all the libraries in the city, you might think it odd that little old Bernal Heights would be the one tapped to host a national competition. So does the librarian there. On the American Library Association website, Bernal is listed as San Francisco's participating branch in Saturday's "Nationa ... More >>

Baylinks: Mayhem, Grossness, & Archival Fun

Sit. Stay. Explore some archives.​ This is just one of the awesome dog-themed posts the library's History Center and Book Arts & Special Collections blog (yes, there is one, and yes, it's awesome) has posted recently. [What's On the 6th Floor?] Mayhem at the Beauty Bar. Not the usual kind. [Mi ... More >>

Nancy Mary Sage, 1906 Quake Survivor, Dies at 105

Nancy Mary Sage was six months old when The Big One hit in 1906 and destroyed her family​Whenever a survivor of the Great Quake of '06 dies, more of them always seem to turn up after the obituary runs in the San Francisco Chronicle. Nancy Mary Sage died yesterday in Littleton, Colo. at age 105; he ... More >>

What Do You Get For Being Mayor of S.F. Library on Foursquare?

The once and future mayor...​Maybe you know someone -- maybe you are someone -- who must compulsively whip out a phone whenever entering a cafe, restaurant, or bar in order to ensure he or she will remain mayor of said establishment on foursquare. It's a fitting metaphor for San Francisco, where m ... More >>

Retired Execs, Aspiring Online Romeos Show Up For Remedial Library Computer Class

Yes, students have been confused by the "return" button; they expected some parts to move. And, yes, other students had no idea that one could erase text by simply hitting "backspace." But, no, no one has ever attempted to apply Wite-Out to the computer screen. Librarian Johanna Goldschmid is a ve ... More >>

Historic Preservation Commission stalls library renovations

Revamped Harvey Milk Library Looks Like Hugh Hefner's Crash Pad

Joe EskenaziYep, it's the only working fireplace in the San Francisco library system. Sadly, hot toddies are not permitted.​Make of this what you will: The Harvey Milk Memorial Library in Upper Market, which will reopen on Saturday after a 20-month retrofitting and renovation, looks as good as it ... More >>

Move Your Feet

Show Up at Dynamo Tomorrow Morning, and You Might Score a Free Book

Jesus H. Shatner/FlickrOne of these babies should be as essential to reading as an Itty Bitty Book Light.​Wouldn't we all read more if it somehow involved doughnuts? Tomorrow morning, books collide with sinkers in front of Dynamo Donut Coffee (2760 24th St. at York), scene of a book giveaway ... More >>

SF Weekly Bugs Library To House Giants-Related Exhibit. Good News! It Was Already On Its Way.

Jon Leonoudakis prior to 'The Earthquake Game' in 1989​Earlier this month, SF Weekly noticed a sports-centric exhibit commemorating the Giants-Dodgers rivalry being shown in enemy territory at the Burbank Public Library. We vowed to hit up the San Francisco Public and wheedle them into hosting thi ... More >>

The Velvet Aboveground

Some People Just Won't Shut Up

Howard Wiley Gains Inspiration from an Unlikely Locale: Angola Prison

Don't Have the Money for Tahoe? Take a Vacation In, uh, San Francisco

Bamako's Beauts

Literary Sampling

What Tom Stoppard did in this 1974 play would be too expensive to try today

Hear This

The Meat Purveyors drag bluegrass through the gutter; the Owls one-up the Beatles

Best Walking Tours

City Guides

Secret Rivera

Four decades after it was rescued from a storage shed, Diego Rivera's magnificent City College mural remains a hidden treasure

Fun with Pipe

How Robin Stein, a journalistic neophyte, put excitement in her life -- and a dangerous Texas pipe manufacturer on the front page of the New York Times

Collect Calling

Since selling his world-famous film archive to the Library of Congress, Rick Prelinger's been busy saving 40,000 magazines, newspapers, and government documents from history's dustbin. He wants you to take a look.

All quiet on the Webcaster front

Congress and the music industry fight over Internet radio

Best Walking Tour

City Guides

One Book, One State

If San Franciscans tried to choose a single book to read, we'd kill each other. Fortunately, it's been chosen for us.

Best Private Library

The Mechanics' Institute Library

Postscript

Mint Conditions

Spy vs Spite

The Clinton administration has praised the Anti-Defamation League for helping shield kids from Internet hate. But should a group that spied on thousands of Californians be allowed to police the Web?

The Man Who Came to Dinner

Night+Day

Letters

Unspun

Letters

Letters