Dear Librarian-  I am so worried I will get the flu from a PBS package. What are the risks? –Cautious in Cleveland

Dear Eve,

It is known that the flu virus will survive on paper surfaces and currency for 8-12 hours at room temperature. So there is a theoretical risk of getting infectious mail (or change at Starbucks!) if someone sneezed or coughed onto your package within several hours of the time it comes to your mailbox. No one knows what the *real* risk is, of course.

In these situations, common sense applies: maintain good handwashing practices as always, and if you are concerned about your mail you can always bring it in, put it into an airtight bin for 12 hours and disinfect your hands (alcohol hand sanitizers kill the flu virus effectively), and then open the bin 12 hours later, at which point you can be sure any flu virus that might have been sneezed onto your mail en route is dead.

Dear Librarian– It seems like you guys are always changing things.  I JUST found out that I can get credits for referring new members!  There’s so much going on that I am not sure how to keep up with it all.  Any suggestions? –Quizzical in Queens

Dear Izzy,

You’re right, we are always tweaking things on the site.  Although a lot of the stuff we do is behind the scenes to keep the site loading fast and everything moving smoothly, we are also constantly upgrading existing features to work better.   When we make significant changes, we will announce them in the Newsletter, but you can also look in the What’s New! section on the site to keep up with changes as they happen.  You can get to What’s New! from the link at the very top right corner of the screen, and also from the Browse Help Docs page in the Help Center.  We try to put updates in What’s New so that new features don’t escape notice; if you check there once a week or so (or if you see something you think might be new),  it can keep you “up to speed”.

Dear Librarian– Can you put the “Convert” button back on the Reminder List? I used that to move stuff from my Reminder List to my Wish List and I don’t know how to do that now! –Boggled in Boston

Dear Tony,

We know that some people used the Convert function on the Reminder and Wish Lists, but on the whole it caused confusion – members didn’t realize that an item couldn’t be on both lists at once, and so they would add a book that was already on their Wish List to their Reminder Lists, and that would take the item off their Wish Lists although they didn’t intend this.   Now an item can be on both lists, and the Reminder List can be a list of ALL the books you want, so you can see it in one place.

It is still easy to Wish List a Reminder List book, by clicking +Wish on the listing on the Reminder List. You can read about the Wish List changes in the What’s New area linked from the “What’s New” at the very top of the site (and on the Browse Help Docs page in the Help Center).

Coming Soon:

• Updated flyers to help Spread the Word
• Book giveaways in the PBS blog