Endangered species ...

... On borrowed time - FT.com. (Hat tip, dave Lull.)

This is not wholly a British phenomenon: in the US, central libraries – not just neighbourhood branches – have been threatened in, for example, Troy, Michigan (saved at the last minute) and Gary, Indiana. Since what goes on in the Midwest rustbelt is of little moment in New York or California, these cases have created very little fuss.

However, the British hoo-ha has gone beyond coffee mornings and Where’s Wally? competitions, and occasionally bordered on the histrionic. “To close a library is a crime,” said Michael Morpurgo. “We have to stand up against the barbarians,” cried Philip Pullman. In north London a group of celebrities unsuccessfully challenged Brent Council in court. Even the magazine Private Eye, the nation’s most reliable debunker of passing orthodoxies, has gone all didactic on us: “Six Myths About Why We Don’t Need Libraries Any More”.