Their difficulties are an example of a problem that pervades the media. When readers clicked on the headline, to go to the inside page, they were taken to another, slightly more complete, headline. Next to it was a caricature of what, presumably, was Bill Gates, his tentacle-like cables wrapped around a computer, with an illustration of the world on the monitor. But another click that took readers to the column in question revealed that it is more complex than that. The column does criticize Gates, to a limited degree, and it raises questions about a contribution he is making to libraries.
Public libraries are perhaps America's most under-appreciated institutions.
They save lives, they open worlds, they combat ignorance and prejudice, and they do it for less than the producers of 'Waterworld' spent on Perrier. Since I just closed on a new home, this is a matter of more than academic concern. So far, however, he hasn't. Alterman ends his column with another reference to how Gates might respond to his criticisms. And that's certainly a nice segue from a description of how Gates could put him in the poorhouse to a proscription for how Gates should be helping to lift other people out of the poorhouse.