The gentlemen over at Freakonomics pose a fascinating question. Imagine if libraries did not exist. Somehow, we had missed out on the whole Alexandria thing, and the only way to get books was to buy them. Then imagine a wealthy philanthropist tried to start libraries across the country (like Andrew Carnegie did back in the day). There is no way the book publishing industry would allow books to be given out for free. It simply couldn't happen. Thank God we got our libraries when we did.

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