You need to be careful with that line of reasoning. Things change, it wasn't clear necessarily when Rosanne was on that Sitcoms were dying. Nor that the replacement wouldn't need jokes. The take away is things change and if multiple things change at the same time in a negative way it hurts.
What struck me was sitting in a library surfing the web. I'd much rather sit in the library and read books. If his description of the days being so long an boring and lonely for the homeless, does it make sense to start a program to read to them for a couple of hours a day. It won't be boring and it could be educational.
And it was particularly hard to foresee that the replacement wouldn't need writers, which had been a basic requirement of broadcast serial entertainment since before television.
>>I'd much rather sit in the library and read books.
Unlikely.
Have you ever been seriously ill, and nothing that doctors seem to do is working? Have you been in a super shitty situation with massive amounts on uncertainty surrounding it?
The problem is people are so eager, and their energies are so much more spent in worry and anxiousness that stuff like 'book reading project' will be least of their priorities. All the time its like- Will this cure help? Can I get a job here? Can I move to somewhere cheaper?
From his perspective the priorities would have been, finding information or some lead or a job posting that can get him his next meal, a place to live, a long term solution to his problems.
A book reading project? People can't focus on reading a news paper correctly when are tensed and anxious. Such things are for the time of peace.
Can you do that if you're homeless? (I don't know for sure - my local library doesn't say either way except for the statement "living in or owning property in [my area]").
Depends on the library, and perhaps on when you ask. The Cambridge Public Library web site now says they require a "current local address", so the homeless may be out of luck. But they used to require only that you be able to sign your name. (This was advertised with posters featuring a very dejected looking cat.)
It must depend on a lot on the library, which must depend a lot on the city. I have read of cities in New Jersey winding up in litigation over trying to push out the homeless essentially camping there. I believe that a co-worker used to complain of the homeless crowding the main DC library.
What struck me was sitting in a library surfing the web. I'd much rather sit in the library and read books. If his description of the days being so long an boring and lonely for the homeless, does it make sense to start a program to read to them for a couple of hours a day. It won't be boring and it could be educational.