Rob Truman

Dublin-based nonprofit lays off 80 central Ohio workers, cites AI and federal cuts DUBLIN, Ohio (WCMH) — A Dublin-based organization that manages the Dewey Decimal System and partners with libraries worldwide has laid off dozens of central Ohio employees, citing the rise of…

80 employees at OCLC were laid off due to "AI" and "federal budget cuts."

www.nbc4i.com/news/local-n...

The show "Foundation" season 3 episode 3 is trying to help out special collections librarians. There is a whole exchange about not needing gloves.
@book-historia.bsky.social I feel like you should add this to your pop culture references.

In the blog post announcing the featured notebooks, there's a wonderful quote from Nick Thompson, CEO of The Atlantic, that made me think of Atkinson and Hypercard all over again: "The books of the future won't just be static," he said. "Some will talk to you, some will evolve with you, and some will exist in forms we can't imagine now." Featured Notebooks are a glimpse of that possible future.

Magic Cards and Knowledge Bottles -Steven Johnson https://adjacentpossible.substack.com/p/magic-cards-and-knowledge-bottles (how the featured notebooks in NotebookLM came to be) #AI #NotebookLM

If you change your mind come join the chill librarians of RIPS and GD for a relaxing reception tonight at Lewis & Clark Law School’s law library. Can even go for a walk in the state park in our backyard. 🦌

a stuffed bunny in a white ECFx: Intelligent Automation shirt and a stuffed leopard, both on top of a leopard print bandana

#AALL25 Swag Thread! Starting with stuffies: an ECFx bunny and a Leopard Solutions leopard that I trust will not eat my face. Bandana also courtesy of Leopard Solutions.

Inside ICE’s Supercharged Facial Recognition App of 200 Million Images 404 Media has seen user manuals for Mobile Fortify, ICE’s new facial recognition app which allows officers to instantly look up DHS, State Department, and state law enforcement databases by just point...

This is truly wild: @josephcox.bsky.social got the user manual for ICE's new facial recognition app, which appears to be one of the most powerful face rec systems ever because it is connected to tons of different government databases and surveillance systems

www.404media.co/inside-ices-...

Six Supreme Court justices misread my children's book, the author says Justice Sotomayor called out the conservative supermajority for botching the message of "Uncle Bobby's Wedding." So did its author, in an interview with All Rise News.

"Six Supreme Court justices misread my children's book, the author says"

Justice Sotomayor called out the conservative supermajority for botching the message of "Uncle Bobby's Wedding." So did its author, in an interview with All Rise News. www.allrisenews.com/p/sarah-bren...

ICE is also the fault of a complicit press.

How, where and who did ICE recruit? Why isn't every newspaper in the country devoting themselves to finding out who is in this brand new secret police force that now terrorizes America?

It's the definition of newsworthy. The answer is: they're afraid.

One researcher's brave stand in the urgent defense of academic freedom • Louisiana Illuminator Academic institutions exist to challenge the status quo, not protect it. Tulane has the opportunity to reaffirm that mission. It must not squander it.

COMMENTARY: Lt. Gen. Russell Honoré on the "gag order" that led a Tulane Environmental Law Clinic researcher to resign: "When universities permit political or financial interests to muzzle scholars, they betray their core mission: the free pursuit of knowledge." lailluminator.com/2025/06/18/a...

250+ million acres of public lands eligible for sale in SENR budget reconciliation package The bill mandates disposal of over 2 million acres of BLM and National Forest lands; public lands eligible for sale in the bill encompass over 250 million acres, including local recreation areas, wild...

"The bill directs what is likely the largest single sale of national public lands in modern history to help cut taxes for the richest people in the country....all without hearings, debate or public input." wilderness.org/articles/med...

Join me on Tuesday, June 17, 2025 at 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM (Central) as I discuss Criminalizing Climate Displacement. To register & for more information: https://www.law.uh.edu/eenrcenter/events/2025-0617.asp

Join me on Tuesday, June 17, 2025 at 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM (Central) as I discuss Criminalizing Climate Displacement.

To register & for more information: www.law.uh.edu/eenrcenter/e...

In happier AI news, Gmail just tried to turn my email about an "RA application" into an email about a "RA RA application." That sounds like way more fun.

The Best Superman Comic for the Curious Reader We asked 21 creators to name the Best Superman Comic for the curious reader stepping out of James Gunn's new movie. Some answers may surprise.

We asked 21 comic creators, everyone from @gailsimone.bsky.social to @jason-aaron.bsky.social to @juniba.bsky.social, what Superman Comic they'd give to a curious reader stepping out of @jamesgunn.bsky.social's Superman. Their answers may surprise. www.comicbookcouplescounseling.com/post/the-bes...

“The platforms were no longer social, in any meaningful sense of the word, but rather centralized and exercising constant (algorithmic) editorial discretion.”

Thought this piece was quite astute 👇

Instead of the healing and normalization of the Jewish condition, the force of Israel has deepened our wounds. In a paradoxical way, by externalizing our pain and inflicting it on another people, we are becoming more distant from the sources and resources of our own possible healing. By seeing power as the only way forward, by feeling that with power comes dignity and respect, by projecting power as the only line of defence against a further violation, another holocaust, that very power unraveled the tradition, culture and religion that had itself been violated. What the Nazis had not succeeded in accomplishing - the undermining at a fundamental level of the very essence of what it means to be Jewish - we as Jews have embarked upon. I witnessed this in the hospitals and in the streets where Palestinians, struggling to assert their own dignity, were being systematically beaten, expelled and murdered by those who had suffered this indignity less than fifty years earlier.

Lately, I often think back to this passage from Marc Ellis’ book Out of the Ashes. I feel haunted by it every time I hear about the state of Israel.

Can’t imagine why it would drive folks away :-\

"Kelly Garcia… suggested that librarians in Hillsborough County were illiterate and told Ayres they lacked a 'single shred of decency.' She described the librarians as 'child abusers' and asked if Ayres had considered firing all of them."

I started my career as a legal services lawyer. The work they do is essential. Speak up about this one.

“…the state’s only accessible library service for people who are blind or have other disabilities.”

Against Technofeudal Education Pillars For Protecting Our "Core Infrastructure" From OpenAI

what if I pitched a collection development article titled “print is a rent strike” theamericanvandal.substack.com/p/against-te...

I'll have more to say about this later but... Goodness. This article's description of the decisionmaking process on (cleaned up) and including an abbr. for Palestine does not make anyone look good.
papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....
#LegalWriting
#Citation
#Bluebook22
cc: @scotusplaces.bsky.social

A crowd of people holding Pride flags gathers outside a mural-covered building on a sunny day; some police officers and safety vests are visible among the attendees.

250 Edgewater (Chicago) residents and allies protected kids and parents participating in drag story hour this morning at @chicagopubliclibrary’s Edgewater Library.

Federal Judges Are Begging Us to Pay Attention A Data-Driven Analysis of nearly 300 Federal Cases Reveals Judges Quoting Kafka and Warning of Democracy in Peril

NEW: I analyzed nearly 300 federal cases involving the Trump administration. Federal judges—across the political spectrum—are using language I’ve never seen before. One called government actions “unconscionable.” Another quoted Kafka. They’re begging us to pay attention.

Commentary: I'm fighting Parkinson’s one punch at a time Times columnist Bill Plaschke writes about his experience taking a boxing class to help fight Parkinson's disease symptoms.

Really brave and moving column from my old pal Bill Plaschke. My mom has been dealing with Parkinson's for years. It's truly awful and heartbreaking.

“…a national experiment on millions of students”

"To our surprise, giving o3 the class notes resulted in a lower score…. Why would it do worse?

"Previous studies… have shown that large language models' reasoning abilities degrade substantially with more information passed to them... In a sense, o3 may have gotten distracted by so much text."

“An era of such inscrutable excess”

so here's the thing about new technologies. my experience is that it takes decades before the tech even begins to get to the point where you can use it without any grounding in the analog that proceeded it.

What does India May want to accomplish in the Iowa House? May said she first got involved in Iowa politics earlier this year when she attended a town hall held by the state legislators in her area, including Thomson. In part, May said she went to oppose a bill that would deny state funding to libraries that are members of the American Library Association and Iowa Library Association, and another that would remove an exemption in Iowa's obscenity law that shields libraries and educational institutions. Neither bill ultimately passed. "I’m a nurse and a librarian, and I went to my first town hall this year to advocate for libraries and realized that there were a lot more pieces of legislation that were harmful on the Iowa level that I didn’t even hear about until it was too late," she said.

The woman who shouted "people will die" at Joni Ernst, India May, is a nurse and a librarian who first got involved in politics by going to a town hall about bills aiming to defund libraries.

Now she's running for state house.

eu.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/p...

Working with my students gives me a lot of hope. They’re always more responsible and more thoughtful than the average media piece makes them out to be. That’s not to say we aren’t all having a hard time navigating things, just I really think they aren’t lazy slackers trying to skate by on AI.