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Comment by zwayhowder | Hacker News Reader

Some good questions there, for reflection or the dreaded "do you have questions for us" bit in the interview.

With regards the library. Yes, but I paid for every book in it. And most are never touched. It's frankly a little depressing.

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Maybe if the books in your library aren't touched, that's a sign that the chosen books aren't the most valuable

Haha, I think that's what the parent was hinting at with the "depressing" title.

But I disagree with the diagnosis! As Patrick Collison says,

> I guess I fall somewhere in the middle in the Umberto Eco theory of the library[0].

[0] https://www.google.com/books/edition/How_to_Travel_with_a_Sa...

(Quote from https://patrickcollison.com/bookshelf)

On the other hand, my bookshelves are almost entirely full of books I haven't read. I get rid of most books after reading them to make room for more. In that sense asking whether I'd read every book on the shelf would be like seeing a refrigerator full of food and asking if I'd already eaten everything in it.

I have a ton of books I might want to refer to though and there are things I do want to re-read now and then. (And a lot of new stuff is digital.)

I've pretty much hit steady state though. No more bookcases/piles of books. I don't have a lot of incentive to go beyond that for now, though I'll probably donate at least a few more bags to my library's book sale at some point over the coming months.

I found it a bit depressing that I was the first person to borrow most of the books that I got out of a university library.

(OP) Never considered the "do you have questions for us"... thats an interesting thought.

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