Sarah Ames

A banner advert for the University of Warwick, which says "Beyond ignores curiousity". This is a spelling error.

The University of Warwick has paid a lot of money, I'm guessing, for their internet banner ads on the Guardian and elsewhere.

But they can't spell "curiosity". This isn't a US-UK variant. They just, genuinely, have a massive spelling error in their banner ads.

A sign reading ‘It’s our birthday! 100 today’ in front of the National Library of Scotland building in Edinburgh.

🎪 The mayhem begins!

Celebrate with us! Doors open at 10am at George IV Bridge (Edinburgh) and Kelvin Hall (Glasgow). Be among the first 500 at each site to get your special edition centenary comic, created by Beano!

#NLS100 #Beano

Screenshot of the app showing a page from a book + different views of existing and new ocr.

Many VLM-based OCR models have been released recently. Are they useful for libraries and archives?

I made a quick Space to compare VLM OCR with "traditional" OCR using 11k Scottish exam papers from @natlibscot.bsky.social

huggingface.co/spaces/davanstrien/ocr-time-capsule

The AI powered Library Search That Refused to Search From Clarivate's Summon to Primo Research Assistant, content‑moderation layers meant mostly for chatbots are "quietly" blocking controversial topics from being searched

[Blogged] The AI powered Library Search That Refused to Search - From Clarivate's Summon to Primo Research Assistant, content‑moderation layers meant mostly for chatbots are "quietly" blocking controversial topics from being searched
aarontay.substack.com/p/the-ai-pow...

Slide with title Digital Humanities for a World Unmade, blue background with stylized images of a Dutch windmill, Leaning Tower of Pisa, Hagia Sofia, Big Ben, and the Singaporean lion.

Here's a write-up of my keynote from #DH2025, since academic publishing is slow and this was written for right now. roopikarisam.com/talks-cat/dh...

Unsure if that's an opposition to AI or an opposition to the opposition of AI. But the culture of backlash it has created is a real danger that could undo 20 years of utopian thinking, argumentation, and implementation.

About this Collection | Selected Datasets | Digital Collections | Library of Congress Datasets are increasingly a key digital resource used in a wide range of fields. The Library of Congress selects, preserves, and provides enduring access to datasets with the goal of cultivating a bro...

The Library of Congress is looking for feedback on their amazing/unique "Selected Datasets" collection. You can see the collection here and the survey link is at the top of the page. www.loc.gov/collections/... Anyone interested in working with datasets check out the collection and take the survey.

The 2025 AI Index Report | Stanford HAI

Stanford HAI AI Index: 'training compute doubles every five months, datasets every eight, and power use annually' but AI models 'often fail to reliably solve logic tasks even when provably correct solutions exist, limiting their effectiveness in high-stakes settings where precision is critical'

Wragge Labs A compilation of things I've built over the last 30 years to help people see and use the online collections of libraries, archives, and museums.

For 30 years I've been experimenting with ways to see & use the online collections of libraries, archives & museums. I've made useful things, playful things, & weird things. Here's a big list of them for you to explore! https://wraggelabs.com #GLAM #histodons #digitalHumanities

Is it human to make a huge profit from knowledge? asks Hilde Van Wijngaarden from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in this afternoon's session on Knowledge as a Catalyst. #LKFS2025

Knowledge Futures I want to start in a singular place of culture, the British Museum. From the Great Court one can now peer into that symbol of human knowledge, the round reading room.  We all somehow have it i…

here's my presentation to the super #LKFS2025; super important conversations. Many thanks to @masudk.com and colleagues for showing the way to knowledge futures. and here's Allan Ginsberg on the library dancefloor!

anatomiesofpower.wordpress.com/2025/06/27/k...

Library Catalogues as Data book cover

Happy to see this published today, and it's been a real privilege to work on with Paul Gooding, @melissaterras.bsky.social and the @facetpublishing.bsky.social team. Thanks to all the wonderful contributors! Here's the link: www.facetpublishing.co.uk/page/detail/...

Library Catalogues As Data book

Hurrah! My next book is instantiated, and in-the-world! Library Catalogues As Data: Research, Practice, Usage. Edited with Paul Gooding and @semames.bsky.social. Proud of this one! Official publication date soon… www.facetpublishing.co.uk/page/detail/...

Today we launched a small service on JSTOR to help expert researchers get bulk access to bibliographic data and full text content. A fun part: you can go download 12M+ metadata records bulk in one file, right now: www.jstor.org/ta-support

AI Scraping Bots Are Breaking Open Libraries, Archives, and Museums "This is a moment where that community feels collectively under threat and isn't sure what the process is for solving the problem.”

'“I don't think that people appreciate how few people are working to keep these collections online, even at huge institutions,” Weinberg told me. “It's usually an incredibly small team, one person, half a person, half a person, plus, like their web person who is sympathetic to what's going on.'

Fancy Edinburgh Uni as a visiting fellow? Global Majority Fellowships in NLP 2025-2026, for early careers researchers. For this 1st year, we welcome applications on “Responsible NLP and Digital Cultural Heritage”, working with me! 2-3 months in duration, Visa fees, stipend &travel. Please share!

Today we released Institutional Books 1.0, a 242B token dataset from Harvard Library's collections, refined for accuracy and usability. 🧵

What a life! I’m glad you wrote this.

Brilliant definition outline of the ALA defn of sustainability from @rebekkahsa.bsky.social

Sustainability comes from meeting the triple bottom lines:
• environmentally sound
• socially equitable
• economically feasible

And a good reminder that every job is a climate job.

#LCSeminar2025

Is this MBE-related by any chance? Enjoy enjoy!

YouTube video by The Video Game History Foundation The unseen history of Myst | VGHF Library Highlights

The creators of Myst series (@cyan.com) saved hundreds of video tapes from the making of their iconic adventure game franchose.

We helped preserve them. Here's what we found.

So if I am getting this right:
Thursday the librarian of Congress was fired.
Friday the copyright office rushed out a draft report suggesting genAI training on copyrighted works shouldn’t be legal.
Saturday the head of the copyright office is fired.

Got suggestions of priority #LoC datasets or collections to be saved? Please let the excellent @datarescueproject.org folks know!

SGSAH Collaborative Doctoral Award Studentship PhD Title: “Mainlining AI into the Veins”? Library collections as data in the age of Extractive AI Capitalism Funding body: AHRC  Deadline for applications: 5pm, Friday 30th May…

Very pleased to say Paul Gooding, @semames.bsky.social and I are looking for a PhD student, funded by AHRC @sgsah.bsky.social. Topic: '“Mainlining AI into the Veins”? Library collections as data in the age of Extractive AI Capitalism'. Closing 5pm, Friday 30th May 2025. Please share!

A framework for AI-ready data Define AI readiness and its underlying principles through our new research.

Data is the foundation of AI. Poor quality data drives up costs and can lead to hidden problems for AI, while biased data negatively affects the performance of AI models. Our latest research seeks to define AI readiness and its underlying principles. Find out more.

SGSAH Collaborative Doctoral Award Studentship PhD Title: “Mainlining AI into the Veins”? Library collections as data in the age of Extractive AI Capitalism Funding body: AHRC  Deadline for applications: 5pm, Friday 30th May…

Seeking PhD student to work on '“Mainlining AI into the Veins”? Library collections as data in the age of Extractive AI Capitalism'. AHRC-funded @sgsah.bsky.social &
supervised by Paul Gooding, @melissaterras.bsky.social , @semames.bsky.social and me. Please share! melissaterras.org/2025/05/06/s...

title slide

Here's the video of my BRAID seminar on 'Decomputing' - countering AI's scaling of structural violence and environmental nihilism via degrowth, de-automatisation and pushing for convivial tech through people's councils vimeo.com/1079775335

Also with @silcrow.bsky.social. Really looking forward to this!

Southampton Digital Humanities (@dh@pixelfed.social) 🏆 We are delighted to announce the Launch of our new MSc Digital Humanities at the University of Southampton! Applications now open for September 2025! 💻 On this course, you'll develop the skills to...

🔊 Applications are open for our new MSc in Digital Humanities (Data Science). Tell your students!
pixelfed.social/p/dh/8227564...