Libraries Gear Up to Put AI in a Terrarium
August 7, 2026
Are you tired of Big Tech and AI invading your life? You aren’t the only one and librarians are also sick of it. What some of them are doing to combat the rise of AI and Big Tech is hosting events that are AI free events as told to TechCrunch in the story: “Librarians Are Hosting Viral ‘Avoiding AI’ Workshops For People Who Are Fed Up With Big Tech.”
One librarian named Charlie Bailey in Philadelphia started hosting these events, because he felt that AI tools were foisted onto people without their permission. He runs the events like this:
“Bailey starts the hour-long workshop with an overview of how AI chatbots and other consumer AI tools work, explaining why people might want to use these products, and why they might opt to abstain. Then he walks through all of the most popular tech platforms and devices, showing step-by-step instructions on the projector to guide people through turning off specific features.”
Bailey wants people to remember that they can think and do stuff with AI:
“ ‘As a librarian, I think it’s important to see this as advancing digital literacy and helping people reclaim their autonomy over whether they want to use AI tools,’ Bailey said. ‘It’s important, especially when it can be so difficult not to use them, and when the design seems to force adoption.’”
For many of the participants who attend the AI workshops, they don’t reject the technology. They want more control and freedom over how it is being integrated into their lives. Another librarian Hannah Cyrus said:
“ ‘I think the forced adoption of AI on people’s devices might be the straw that’s breaking the camel’s back in some ways,’ she said. ‘The awareness has been growing for a long time that these products and these companies that make them have an outsized influence over us, and that we’re not really using these products in the way that we would like to.’”
Remember that humans control the technology not the other way around. Digital literacy and information literacy are more important these days as machines take away the thinking. I want more libraries to put AI in a terrarium and put the focus on reading and thinking for oneself.
Whitney Grace, August 7, 2026
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