morgenthegrey

Half-assed ideas

• American Western University in Rothstown, Ohio
• Dementia typewriter (The smallest mistake is an indication of sloppiness) - mistakes cause Alzheimer's rather than the other way around? (See http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-3406 for inspiration maybe)

"Humans are not alone on this planet. We filled this world with our bodies and things but also our thoughts, and when there was no more room for us in our heads we spilled over into other things."

• Little Bunny Foo Foo -J
• Grendel's claw

Keeping Libraries Relevant in the 21st Century

TODO: Keep working, rewrite with clinical tone.

Item #: SCP-XXXX

Object Class: Euclid probably

Special Containment Procedures: Track down the source of the letters. Foundation webcrawlers have been updated to identify press releases and social media posts announcing new services at public libraries. Agents review hits and remove/censor items about services unrelated to libraries.

Description: SCP-XXXX is a phenomenon that targets libraries with budgets known to be insufficient. Library(ies) receive a letter saying they've received a grant they haven't applied for. Contact info includes a nonexistent address and email/phone for support.

Grants are for varying degrees of relevance to library services (expanded ebook collection, cake pan collection, Rube Goldberg-type AMH, oil change bay, etc.). Within the next week or so, the new item or service appears while nobody's paying attention, along with a phone number/email address for support.

Library staff find all this perfectly natural and do their best to support it. The thing is state-of-the-art at first. Depending on actual relevance to libraries, the new thing continues to work pretty well or not so well. Items/parts are unique and can be obtained only through the anomalous vendor. The library can get grantor-paid support by contacting the vendor (whose name & contact info don't match any known company). First "hit" of support is free and paid for by the grant-giving org. Subsequent support is crazy expensive and is not paid by the organization because it has moved on to other projects.

Staff try to support it themselves (but suck at it because they're librarians, not mechanics or whatever). They then pay for the super-expensive support, taking money from other funds until it runs out, then finally ignore the item and let it fall into disuse/disrepair.

Staff & public sentiment range from "Oh well, we tried and it didn't work" to complete loss of faith in that library.