Give newborns automatic library cards, authors urge; BBC, December 15, 2025

Kerena Cobbina, BBC; Give newborns automatic library cards, authors urge

"A group of leading authors are calling for every newborn baby to be signed up for a library card automatically at birth. 

Writers including Sir Philip Pullman, Richard Osman and Kate Mosse have backed the proposal by think tank the Cultural Policy Unit (CPU), which says a universal, lifelong membership issued at birth would boost literacy.

"A lot of people still feel that [libraries are] not for them," Mosse told BBC Radio 4's Today programme, but said automatically giving out cards could show that "every single young child that's born is welcome".

The CPU proposal would see membership linked directly to birth registration, so library cards would be waiting for newborns at their local library."

Puerto Rico governor signs bill that critics say will restrict access to public information; AP, December 14, 2025

ÁNICA COTO, AP; Puerto Rico governor signs bill that critics say will restrict access to public information

"Obtaining public information in Puerto Rico has long been difficult, often forcing local media organizations that could afford it to go to court despite the government approving a law in 2019 to allow access to public information held by state agencies."

US librarians tackle ‘manufactured crisis’ of book bans to protect LGBTQ+ rights; The Guardian, December 15, 2025

Claire Wang, The Guardian ; US librarians tackle ‘manufactured crisis’ of book bans to protect LGBTQ+ rights

"As the culture wars descended on America’s public libraries, librarians like Young have moved to the frontlines of a battle to protect free speech and LGTBQ+ rights. In at least half a dozen states, they have joined forces with civil rights groups to oppose book bans, often facing personal and professional repercussions. Some of their legal challenges and victories, organizers and experts say, can provide a roadmap for grassroots resistance against coordinated censorship campaigns."

Supreme Court Won’t Hear Texas Library Case: List of Banned Books; Newsweek, December 8, 2025

Dan Gooding and Gabe Whisnant , Newsweek; Supreme Court Won’t Hear Texas Library Case: List of Banned Books

"The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a challenge to a Texas county’s removal of 17 books from its public libraries, leaving in place a lower court ruling that allowed the purge. 

The books targeted by officials span topics including sexuality, gender identity, racism and even juvenile humor.

Residents who sued argued the removals violated their First Amendment right to receive information, but the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected that claim. 

The Supreme Court’s decision means the ruling now applies across Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi."

Trump administration says sign language services ‘intrude’ on Trump’s ability to control his image; AP, December 12, 2025

MEG KINNARD , AP; Trump administration says sign language services ‘intrude’ on Trump’s ability to control his image

"The Trump administration is arguing that requiring real-time American Sign Language interpretation of events like White House press briefings “would severely intrude on the President’s prerogative to control the image he presents to the public,” part of a lawsuit seeking to require the White House to provide the services.

Department of Justice attorneys haven’t elaborated on how doing so might hamper the portrayal President Donald Trump seeks to present to the public. But overturning policies encompassing diversity, equity and inclusion have become a hallmark of his second administration, starting with his very first week back in the White House.

The National Association for the Deaf sued the Trump administration in May, arguing that the cessation of American Sign Language interpretation — which the Biden administration had used regularly — represented “denying hundreds of thousands of deaf Americans meaningful access to the White House’s real-time communications on various issues of national and international import.” The group also sued during Trump’s first administration, seeking ASL interpretation for briefings related to the COVID-19 pandemic."

'It's insulting they think we can't handle it': The Australian teens banned from social media; BBC, December 10, 2025

Katy Watson , BBC; 'It's insulting they think we can't handle it': The Australian teens banned from social media

"With nearly all her friends living at least 100km away, social media is a lifeline. But not anymore, now that Australia's social media ban for children has taken effect.

"Taking away our socials is just taking away how we talk to each other," Breanna says. 

While she can still text her friends, it's not the same as a quick "snap" or a "like" on a photo that allows her to play a part in their lives even when she is far away."

'This is the end': Australian teens mourn loss of social media as ban begins; Reuters, December 10, 2025

Christine Chen, Reuters ; 'This is the end': Australian teens mourn loss of social media as ban begins

"Australian teenagers have taken to social media for the last time to farewell their followers and mourn the loss of the platforms that shaped much of their lives before a world-first ban took effect on Wednesday.

In the hours leading up to the ban's midnight start (1300 GMT on Tuesday), a flurry of goodbye messages came from teenagers - as well as adults - on platforms including TikTok, Instagram and Reddit.

Australia has ordered 10 major platforms including TikTok, Alphabet's YouTube and Meta's nstagram and Facebook to block around one million users under the age of 16 or face massive fines.

Some 200,000 accounts have already been deactivated on TikTok alone, the government said, with "hundreds of thousands" to be blocked in the coming days.

Young Australians, who have grown up using social media, faced the prospect of losing access to their favourite apps with a mix of sadness, humour and disbelief."

Library Agency Reinstates Grants Canceled by Trump Administration; The New York Times, December 5, 2025

Jennifer Schuessler , The New York Times; Library Agency Reinstates Grants Canceled by Trump Administration

[Kip Currier: Restoration of Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) grants for libraries, archives, and museums -- cut earlier this year by Trump 2.0 -- is good news for people throughout the country whose lives are enriched by these vital institutions and community anchors.

What does it say about an administration that eliminates support for libraries, archives, and museums that provide free access to thousands of books and summer reading programs, historical records and exhibits, and life-enhancing programs like job seeking and AI literacy, but which will pump millions and millions of dollars into the building of a White House ballroom that no one voted for and only the very wealthiest will ever have access to?]

[Excerpt]

"The federal agency that supports the nation’s libraries has restored thousands of grants canceled by the Trump administration, following a federal judge’s ruling that the executive order mandating the cuts was unlawful.

The executive order, issued in March, said the Institute for Museum and Library Services, along with six other small agencies, must “be reduced to the maximum extent consistent with the applicable law.” Soon after, the agency put most of its staff of 70 on administrative leave, fired its board members and began informing grant recipients that their federal funding had been eliminated.

In April, the attorneys general of 21 states filed a lawsuit arguing that the cuts, which included roughly $160 million in funding for state library agencies, violated federal law.

John J. McConnell Jr., the chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island, ruled in their favor on Nov. 21, calling the administration’s moves “arbitrary and capricious.” Canceling funding appropriated by Congress, he said, violated the doctrine of separation of powers.

This week, the agency announced the restoration of “all federal grants” in a terse post on its website. The post made no reference to the court ruling."

A full-body MRI can reveal hidden killers. Do we want to know?; The Washington Post, December 5, 2025

Dana Milbank, The Washington Post ; A full-body MRI can reveal hidden killers. Do we want to know?

"The new technology that powers these full-body MRIs — something called diffusion-weighted imaging (don’t ask me to explain) combined with the pattern recognition of artificial intelligence — has the potential to save our lives by revealing budding cancers, silent aneurysms and other hidden would-be killers before they become deadly.

But the scans cost $2,500 a pop and insurance won’t pay. Worse, for every cancer these MRIs find, they produce a slightly greater number of false positives that require a biopsy, with the potential for infection and bleeding and emotional distress. Even when the scans don’t produce a false positive, they almost always come up with some vague and disconcerting abnormality.

Like many emerging technologies, this one can improve our lives, make us miserable, or both. Nobody yet knows which it will be, because we’re the first humans to have the option of examining our innards with such clarity. Will we feel better after viewing our insides? Or will we become anxious about things we hadn’t even thought to worry about?"

New York Times Sues Pentagon Over First Amendment Rights; The New York Times, December 4, 2025

Erik Wemple, The New York Times ; New York Times Sues Pentagon Over First Amendment Rights

"The New York Times accused the Pentagon in a lawsuit on Thursday of infringing on the constitutional rights of journalists by imposing a set of new restrictions on reporting about the military.

In the suit, filed in the U.S. District Court in Washington, The Times argued that the Defense Department’s new policy violated the First Amendment and “seeks to restrict journalists’ ability to do what journalists have always done — ask questions of government employees and gather information to report stories that take the public beyond official pronouncements.”

The rules, which went into effect in October, are a stark departure from the previous ones, in both length and scope. They require reporters to sign a 21-page form that sets restrictions on journalistic activities, including requests for story tips and inquiries to Pentagon sources. Reporters who don’t comply could lose their press passes, and the Pentagon has accorded itself “unbridled discretion” to enforce the policy as it sees fit, according to the lawsuit."

Es Devlin’s Towering Beachfront Library Illuminates Miami Art Week; artnet, December 2, 2025

Sarah Cascone, artnet ; Es Devlin’s Towering Beachfront Library Illuminates Miami Art Week

"Es Devlin’s The Library of Us has emerged as one of Miami Art Week’s most dramatic spectacles. The 20-foot-tall rotating bookshelf housing 2,500 books invites visitors to read and reflect in a quiet counterpoint to the frenzy of Art Basel. By day, it towers over the sands of Miami Beach, a triangular wedge of a bookshelf set within a circular pool of water, slowly rotating in the Florida sun. By night, it glows like a beacon, offering a mesmerizing tribute to the power of the written word.

Designed to serve as sculpture, library, and public gathering space, the work invites visitors to step onto a circular platform that rotates them into shifting proximity with strangers. As the interior circle spins, viewers will face different people on the outside, creating a social experience. Set just feet from the Atlantic, the piece doubles as a meditation on fragility—of culture, of knowledge, and the environment.

“What would the resonance of 4,000 books with differing points of view revolving together without disagreement be in this place in Miami. What would happen if encircling that library were water, rising waters?,” Devlin told guests at the opening for the ambitious work.

The artist’s nearly 20-foot-tall bookshelf represents a remarkable vision. Sure, everyone loves to bring a beach read down to the shore, but there’s something poignantly fragile about seeing an entire library within a stone’s throw of the ocean waves, pages and spines open to the salty breeze. But this apparent vulnerability seems fitting for this city on a tiny strip of land, the colorful hotels and vibrant restaurants increasingly at risk of flooding due to climate change and intensifying storms...

The 2,500 titles included are those she considers formative to her philosophy, life, and practice.

Where libraries are traditionally places of reverent silence, Devlin has created an audio track to accompany her monumental sculpture. She reads various quotes from the many titles included in the display—some of which have been banned by Florida schools, according to the artist. She’ll donate all the books to Miami public schools and libraries after the installation ends."

‘Your Country Will Ultimately Get This Right’: Rachel Maddow on How the U.S. Will Move On From the Trump Era; Time, December 1, 2025

Philip Elliott, Time ; ‘Your Country Will Ultimately Get This Right’: Rachel Maddow on How the U.S. Will Move On From the Trump Era

"TIME spoke by phone last week with Maddow from her home in Western Massachusetts about her latest project, the MSNBC reboot, and how history can inform—but not save—the Resistance...

Doing the right thing doesn't always pay off in the short run, but your country will ultimately get this right. The good guys will be rewarded and the bad guys will be punished or forgotten. Having faith in those kinds of moral outcomes is really a nice guiding light to have in dark times like these...

How has your thinking about your specific role in the media environment changed since Trump 1.0? Has it changed? 

I was waving a lot of warning flags in Trump 1.0 about what could be going on and how we should see the risk of the kind of government Trump was trying to impose. 

Now, we're there. There's no use in warning anymore. We've got masked, totally unaccountable secret police grabbing women out of daycares and building prison camps everywhere. In less than a year, the President has stuffed multiple billions of dollars into his own pockets, into those of his family. He has literally torn down the White House. We're no longer at the point where we need to be warned about what's coming. We're now at a point where what we need is understanding what's going on, knowing what our options are in terms of how to preserve our democracy, to make sure that we're not going to be the generation that lost the republic."

Jason Schwartzman Finds Peace at the Library; The New York Times, November 29, 2025

Elisabeth Vincentelli , The New York Times; Jason Schwartzman Finds Peace at the Library

"Library Card

My mom [Talia Shire] studied with Stella Adler, who told her that as an actor you need a library card and a bus pass. I feel calm in libraries. I think it’s because everyone else is so calm, and everyone’s working or researching or something. It’s almost like a movie set, and I have to pretend I’m working, too. Everyone should have a library card. It’s like a bicycle but for your brain."

‘The Library of Congress’ Review: Corridors of Knowledge; The Wall Street Journal, November 25, 2025

 Michael Auslin , The Wall Street Journal; ‘The Library of Congress’ Review: Corridors of Knowledge

"When the president unexpectedly fired the librarian of Congress, a prominent legislator denounced the “open despotism which now rules at Washington.” The year was 1829, and as Andrew Jackson installed a political ally as librarian, it was Henry Clay who accused the president of being a threat to democracy. 

This is but one vignette from Jane Aikin’s comprehensive history “The Library of Congress” (Georgetown, 356 pages, $32.95), which shows how bare-knuckled domestic politics have often shadowed the crown jewel of America’s intellectual institutions. In April, the library turned 225 years old, secure in its position as one of the world’s largest libraries. It now houses approximately 178 million items, from ancient clay tablets to Stradivarius violins, from the Gutenberg Bible to ever-expanding digital records."

Colleen Walsh, Harvard Law Today; Holding the past accountable by making it visible

Harvard Law School Library’s Paul Deschner discusses the decades-long effort to make the full archive of Nuremberg Trials records available online

"“The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored.” So said United States Supreme Court Justice and U.S. Chief of Counsel to the International Military Tribunal, Robert H. Jackson, during his opening statement for the prosecution at the first of 13 Nuremberg Trials, which began 80 years ago, on Nov. 20, 1945.

For decades, the Harvard Law School Library has been working to make the nearly complete set of Nuremberg Trials records publicly available online. It launched the first version of Harvard’s Nuremberg Trials Project website in 2003, but until recently only roughly 20 percent of the Law School’s trove of Nuremberg materials had been accessible to online visitors. Today, the full collection of 140,000 documents comprising more than 700,000 pages is live and searchable by anyone around the globe.

Harvard Law School Library’s Paul Deschner, who has helped guide the project almost since its inception, spoke with Harvard Law Today about the scope of the archive and what it took to bring the entire collection online."

Inside the old church where one trillion webpages are being saved; CNN, November 16, 2025

Hadas Gold , CNN; Inside the old church where one trillion webpages are being saved

"The Wayback Machine, a tool used by millions every day, has proven critical for academics and journalists searching for historical information on what corporations, people and governments have published online in the past, long after their websites have been updated or changed.

For many, the Wayback Machine is like a living history of the internet, and it just logged its trillionth page last month.

Archiving the web is more important and more challenging than ever before. The White House in January ordered vast amounts of government webpages to be taken down. Meanwhile, artificial intelligence is blurring the line between what’s real and what’s artificially generated — in some ways replacing the need to visit websites entirely. And more of the internet is now hidden behind paywalls or tucked in conversations with AI chatbots.

It’s the Internet Archive’s job to figure out how to preserve it all."

Netherlands WWII cemetery removes displays honoring Black soldiers; Military Times, November 14, 2025

Claire Barrett, Military Times; Netherlands WWII cemetery removes displays honoring Black soldiers

[Kip Currier: Reading this story, I was struck by how important it is to raise our awareness of people and events whose stories and contributions often are either unknown or not as well-recognized by more people as they should be. 

That anyone would learn about the service and contributions of Black American soldiers in the Netherlands during WWII and be troubled that their stories are included in the Netherlands American Cemetery and Memorial in Margraten is an outrage. 

How dare the Heritage Foundation -- and even more, the Trump 2.0 administration that has codified these kinds of historical purges -- strive to erase this history and these Black American military members and their service from this Dutch museum.

Thank you to all those who are sounding the alarm about another example of this kind of historical censorship.]

[Excerpt]

 "The Netherlands American Cemetery and Memorial in Margraten, the only American military cemetery in the Netherlands, has quietly removed panels displaying the contributions of Black American soldiers during WWII, sparking outrage from Dutch and American citizens.

One of the two displays featured an overall history of Black American military personnel fighting a double V campaign — victory at home and abroad — while the other told the story of George H. Pruitt, a Black soldier in the 43rd Signal Construction Battalion who drowned a month after the war’s end while attempting to save a comrade’s life in a German river.

The two panels were added to the visitor center in September 2024 after the American Battle Monuments Commission, a U.S. government agency that oversees the cemetery, received criticism from families and historians for not including the contributions of Black service members and their experiences fighting in the Netherlands.

At the time of publishing, ABMC did not respond to requests for comment from Military Times. The commission, however, told Dutch news outlets that one panel is“off display, though not out of rotation,” although a second panel was “retired.” 

The panels were reportedly rotated out in early March, one month after President Donald Trump’s executive order terminated diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, initiatives across the federal government.

The same month the panels were removed, The Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank, contacted the ABMC for its supposed failure to comply with Trump’s anti-DEI initiatives...

Among such men was 1st Sgt. Jefferson Wiggins of the 960th Quartermaster Service Company, one of more than 900,000 Black men and women who served in the U.S. military during WWII.

Wiggins and the men of the 960th QSC were tasked with the grim job of burying American dead in Margraten.

What was once a fruit orchard would become the final resting place for some 8,300 U.S. soldiers, including 172 Black servicemen. In 2009, Wiggins recounted to historian Mieke Kirkels how the work was done under horrific conditions, often with only rudimentary tools like pickaxes and shovels to dig the graves. 

“There was a permanent arrival of bodies, the whole day long. Sundays included, seven days a week,” Wiggins recalled. “I find it difficult, even now, to read in the paper that soldiers ‘gave their lives.’ … All those boys in Margraten, their lives were taken away.”"

Dark forces are preventing us fighting the climate crisis – by taking knowledge hostage; The Guardian, November 14, 2025

George Monbiot, The Guardian ; Dark forces are preventing us fighting the climate crisis – by taking knowledge hostage

"An epistemic crisis is a crisis in the production and delivery of knowledge. It’s about what we know and how we know it, what we agree to be true and what we identify as false. We face, alongside a global threat to our life-support systems, a global threat to our knowledge-support systems."

Ready to Go: Joining the fight to defend libraries, workers, and the right to read; American Libraries, November 3, 2025

Dan Montgomery , American Libraries; Ready to Go: Joining the fight to defend libraries, workers, and the right to read

"When the interview committee asked why I was interested in the executive director position at the American Library Association (ALA), I replied, doing my best impression of famed mountaineer George Mallory: “Because it’s the ALA!” I was responding, of course, to my belief in libraries and in the right to read, both of which have been under serious attack. And library workers and advocates who defend reading, books, and unfettered access to knowledge are critical to protecting American democracy. So, to be part of the organization most squarely in the forefront of that cause seemed to me an unmissable opportunity, and a great honor."

Federal Cuts, Immigration Raids and a Slowing Economy Hit Rural Libraries; The New York Times, November 12, 2025

Anna Griffin

Photographs by Jordan Gale

, The New York Times; Federal Cuts, Immigration Raids and a Slowing Economy Hit Rural Libraries

"“A library is in a lot of ways a kind of civic symbol, a demonstration of a community’s commitment to itself. So what does it mean if that goes away?”"