Little Free Library
60 points
4 hours ago
| 11 comments
| littlefreelibrary.org
| HN
not_the_fda
2 minutes ago
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I build these and have one at my house.

Its been interesting.

Had some teenagers try to blow it up with fireworks.

Have to constantly remove proselytizing, mostly christian, pamphlets from it.

Had to buy a stamp https://littlefreelibrary.myshopify.com/products/self-inking... so drug addicts don't clear it out sell the books to buy smack.

Other than hat its been mostly self sustaining.

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jvm___
1 hour ago
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It's fun to be on vacation and go visit one of these. They're usually not in tourist areas and are likely to be in well established neighborhoods that a a different vibe than home. Also fun to read and come home with some random book that anchors you to that trip.
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amatecha
1 hour ago
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yeah! I've done some geocaching (or even just walking around exploring) while on my travels, and have very often encountered these "leave one, take one" type of free libraries along the way. It's really interesting to find different types of books depending on the area - the small town on an island of course has all these books on marine travel, sailing, that sort of stuff, for example. Nice way to get a little extra idea of the area and its culture, sometimes.
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mega_dingus
58 minutes ago
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I've known Rick since 2001 and was around when he & Todd kicked this off. We've both since moved and it's been a pleasure watching this take off (inter)nationally. In parens b/c I can only verify the "national" part, personally. :) I look for them whenever I visit new places
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codebje
14 minutes ago
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I've seen several book boxes in Brisbane, Australia, but neither one that I know the location of has been registered as a little free library.
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atcole
2 hours ago
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Just this morning I added several copies of books 1,2 & 3 of the Wheel Of Time series to a random Little Free Library because I had so much fun reading them and I hoped others would as well.

Hoping this continues.

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rietta
24 minutes ago
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We have one at the local park nearby. A neighbor also has one in her front yard. It's a really neat concept!
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garciasn
16 minutes ago
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There are about a half dozen around my neighborhood. My daughter and I constantly move books in and out of them to keep them fresh on our walks.

Sometimes they’re great; but, oftentimes I find them to be utterly and completely devoid of anything interesting or different. Almost every single one has some sort of religious spam in it.

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bombcar
12 minutes ago
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I find that they're almost always a perfect cross-section of the local thrift store's books - including the absolutely inordinate number of cookbooks.
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jeremy151
3 hours ago
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These are a great way to spread something you appreciate with the world. I once bought a stack of 30 or so well-used Calvin and Hobbes books and would regularly seed a few every now and then.
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jrnichols
58 minutes ago
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We have probably 30 of these within 10 miles and it's great. Perfect excuse to go for a walk, get a book, read it, and then return it to one of the others.
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sien
1 hour ago
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In Australia it's 'Street Library'

https://streetlibrary.org.au/

Do they have other names in different countries?

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amatecha
1 hour ago
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in NA we have to call them "free libraries" because the concept of not having to pay for something is so rare, it has to be clearly indicated upfront! (joking lol, mostly!!)
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RyanOD
2 hours ago
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A great project for any student taking wood shop (our daughter built our LFL last semester).
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chrneu
1 hour ago
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i build lil free libraries and bird houses to get rid of my scrap wood. it's a fun limitation on the project that often makes ya think outside the box, so to speak.
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cwmoore
3 hours ago
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I have been dropping my puzzle books [1] into many of these in my area. It is encouraging to see they are almost always gone when I return.

[1] https://www.kakurokokoro.com/

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jmclnx
3 hours ago
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I think this is very cool and a brilliant idea, there are a few of these in my area where I have borrowed and contributed books too.
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