The Microsoft Library in Redmond has long been a quiet anachronism in the middle of the high-tech campus, a place where authors gave talks and employees checked out old-fashioned paper books, including titles recommended by CEO Satya Nadella and other execs.
That chapter of the company’s history is now closing.
The Verge broke the news Thursday that Microsoft’s traditional library is going away as part of what Microsoft described internally as a shift to a “modern, AI-powered learning experience.”
Responding to an inquiry from GeekWire, the company confirmed that its libraries in Redmond, Hyderabad, Beijing, and Dublin closed as of this week and “are being repurposed into collaborative spaces for group learning and experimentation,” where employees can explore emerging technologies.
“We’re evolving Microsoft Library locations and services to better support how employees learn, stay current, and build new skills,” a Microsoft spokesperson said via email. The changes are already underway and will roll out fully in the coming weeks, according to the company.
In an internal FAQ obtained by The Verge, Microsoft described the new approach as a “Skilling Hub” and acknowledged that the decision “affects a space many people valued.”
The shift also includes cuts to employee subscriptions for newspapers and industry reports. Publications affected include The Information and Strategic News Service, which had provided global reports to Microsoft employees for more than two decades.
Microsoft said it continues to offer access to more than 20 digital resources and subscriptions, “prioritizing those most valuable to employees.”
Strategic News Service didn’t mince words about Microsoft’s AI-focused rationale.
“Technology’s future is shaped by flows of power, money, innovation, and people — none of which are predictable based on LLMs’ probabilistic regurgitation of old information,” Berit Anderson, the company’s chief operating officer, told The Verge.
The library has moved around over the decades, from the original Building 4 to Building 92 most recently. The news of the closure drew a nostalgic response on X from Steven Sinofsky, the former Windows president, who called the library “a crown jewel of the early days.”
“They bought every PC book and two copies of every software,” Sinofsky wrote. “If you found one you needed that they didn’t have, they acquired it.”
Read the full article here
