Advertising on Library Webpages

[Donald Barclay]

Bruce,

Public Radio and Public Television accept advertising (call it what you
will, it's advertising), and they have policies that allow them to reject
ads. There is a case right now where the KKK was trying to uderwrite a St. 
Louis public radio station and the station refused the underwriting.
Nobody who accepts advertising does so without some kind of policy on what
is and is not acceptable. Sometimes these policies are challenged. It's
part of the game

In fact, libraries participate in a kind of advertising when they name
themselves, or parts of themselves, after big contributors. What's the
difference between my library being named the M.D. Anderson Library and
having a banner on our webpage advertising a company that made Anderson
rich? When libraries seek naming gifts, they have the right to reject
unacceptable names. I don't think you could get any library in this
country to call itself the "Adolph Hitler Library" for any amount of
money. 

Finally, I'm not seriously contemplating advertising on library webpages.
I was just curious. As I said in my original message, "file this under
'Hairs--Wild."


Donald A. Barclay
Coordinator of Electronic Services    always the beautiful answer
University of Houston Libraries       who asks a more beautiful question
dbarclay at uh.edu                               --e.e. cummings
www.uh.edu/~dbarclay

On Sat, 25 Oct 1997, bruce pomerantz wrote:

> > File this under "Hairs, wild--"
> > 
> Does anyone know of any library webpages that
> > sell advertising space the way commercial webpages do?
> > 
> > There are probably legal, ethical, logistical, and other arguments against
> > libraries supplementing their income via web advertising, but income is
> > income.
> > 
> Donald A. Barclay
> > Coordinator of Electronic Services   
> > University of Houston Libraries    
> 
>    
> I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you *REALLY* did not
> think this through. Let's consider selling banners for various causes. 
> For instance, let's let the pro-life folks advertise for their cause and
> then go to the pro-choice folks and extort money from them so that they
> can have an equal banner. Don't have the money?  Gee, tooooo bad.  
> 
> And since we are public organizations, we could not reject anybody's
> advertising, unlike private organizations such as newspapers, radios,
> and television which do have the right to reject advertising.  So, every
> hate group and paranoid group could gain legitmacy by advertising on a
> library's webpage.  
> 
> Now, I am not advocating omiting their materials from the library.  It's
> our duty, through our collection development policies, to include their
> materials when appropriate.  But allowing them to promote themselves
> through advertising is unethical, money be damned!  
> 
> Bruce Pomerantz
> On Sabbatical in Cincinnati
> > Coordinator of Electronic Services    always the beautiful answer
>