Reposted by Finch CollinsMar Hicks @histoftech.bsky.social · 10/09/2026The way AI is going to “kill everyone” is just by manufacturing consent for ever worse outcomes & conditions, like many governments do. It is a governing technology after all. And like bureaucracy it launders responsibility so the people & institutions who deploy it aren’t accountable for the harms 13680230
Reposted by Finch CollinsThe Verge @theverge.com · 02/09/2026As a new Harry Potter trailer makes the rounds, it bears repeating that there’s no way to watch this show without supporting J.K. Rowling’s bigotry and the structural violence she’s inflicting on the trans community.theverge.comThere is no ethical consumption of HBO’s Harry Potter seriesYou can’t without supporting Rowling’s transphobic bigotry. 366201029862
Reposted by Finch CollinsDavid Brauer @dbrauer.net · 28/08/2026Sucks that the Univ of Minnesota libraries are closed to the public. If the past several years have taught us anything, it’s that knowledge is necessary to fighting stupid bad fascists. So here’s a helpful doc on how to assist good U people who want knowledge freed: docs.google.com/document/d/1...docs.google.comUMN Libraries Public AccessTHE CONTEXT After slowly closing parts of campus off to the public over a handful of years, in January of 2026 amidst Operation Metro Surge, the University of Minnesota’s upper administration decided... 1110344
Reposted by Finch CollinsTressie McMillan Cottom @tressiemcphd.bsky.social · 27/08/2026I have seven invitations from student groups to talk about A.I. They know what I think about A.I. That's why they asked me. They aren't feeling it, y'all. 202489471
Reposted by Finch CollinsRyan Cordell @ryancordell.org · 27/08/2026Ok I can share—today MSLIS student Nadja Robot donated a teletype machine to @skeuomorphpress.org’s Undead Media Lab But this is not just any teletype—it’s the one Michael S. Hart used to digitize the Declaration of Independence & Alice in Wonderland—the 1st texts in what became Project Gutenberg 1033792
Reposted by Finch Collinskelly jensen @heykellyjensen.bsky.social · 24/08/2026This. Libraries are places where HUMANS with EDUCATION and EXPERTISE help you navigate information and connect you with resources. Data centers are warehouses. Libraries are not warehouses. They can be repositories, but they don't just store. They're alive. Support the fuck out of the PEOPLE. 014359
Reposted by Finch CollinsCaroline Lucas @carolinelucas.bsky.social · 27/08/2026Unbelievably disappointing u-turn from the PM - where is the serious culture change at Westminster we were promised? Our democracy should not be for saletheguardian.comBurnham drops support for political funding cap aimed at curbing mega-donorsPM said he would set bar at £500k, but trade unions say funding reforms could undermine their ability to donate to Labour 107990310
Reposted by Finch CollinsRobert Paulett @robertpaulett.bsky.social · 15/08/2026This is the chart I made for my undergrads that’s worked pretty well for me. 46510
Reposted by Finch CollinsAdam Koszary @adamkoszary.bsky.social · 26/08/2026people underestimate the power of the curators. they can just pick up, like, a baked bean and put it in the collection. bean will be there for forever. bean will have a label. 35012
Reposted by Finch CollinsDr Vanessa @hpsvanessa.bsky.social · 26/08/2026Someone outside academia once suggested I "get my PA to organise a workshop so we could discuss [topic]" and I laughed and laughed and laughed. Mate, I barely have my own desk, let alone a PA. 1013911
Reposted by Finch CollinsLilly Irani @gleemie.bsky.social · 26/08/2026Mechanical Turk may be shutting down, but AI will always depend on data workers whose knowledge trains and tunes models. AI runs on extracted cultural skills and knowledge, and culture is always changing. Less the end of an era, but the end of an early prototype. 215461
Reposted by Finch CollinsRebekah Higgitt @rhiggitt.bsky.social · 25/08/2026We (the fabulous Science & Technology department @ntlmuseumsscot.bsky.social) are looking for a FT fixed-term Assistant Curator. Details here: careers.nms.ac.uk/job/936922 Deadline: 6 Septembercareers.nms.ac.ukAssistant Curator, Technology 12227
Reposted by Finch CollinsSonja Drimmer @sonjadrimmer.bsky.social · 15/08/2026How on earth is the framing for this about dopamine and not the expansion of mining for behavioral data to those who cannot afford to buy the things they want? restofworld.org/2026/south-k...restofworld.orgThe online shopping trend where you buy nothingOn South Korea’s “dopamine sites,” the pleasure comes from aspirational shopping rituals like browsing, curating, and tracking — not from a delivery. 113440
Reposted by Finch CollinsJonathan @jsench.bsky.social · 22/08/2026PBSA is searching for an Editorial Assistant! Review of applications begins September 1 and goes through the 15th. Information & instructions to apply are at the link below. Position manages logistics of journal processes. $5000 annual honorarium, 1 year w possibility of renewal.docs.google.comEditorial Assistant job descriptionPBSA Editorial Assistant description and qualifications The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America (PBSA) seeks an Editorial Assistant. PBSA is a peer-reviewed quarterly journal published o... 01012
Reposted by Finch CollinsTamara Atkin @tamarajatkin.bsky.social · 23/08/2026I was first contacted by Callum at the Island Archives in 2024, and it feels like barely a month goes by without a new discovery! Shout out not only to him and @drdavidrundle.bsky.social but also J.R Mattison, with whom I’ve been writing about the Griselda fragment. Excellent collaborators all! 35214
Reposted by Finch Collinsclaire m. l. bourne @roaringgirle.bsky.social · 22/08/2026now in press! 📖 the contributions to this collection are brilliant and a little bit weird (compliment!) & i can’t wait for it to be out in the world. forthcoming 2027… ✨ 3418
Reposted by Finch CollinsTalia "ATTACK DOGS is out now!" Bhatt ⚢ @taliabhatt.itch.io · 22/08/2026I better not see anyone waving this around as though a worthless statement counterbalances funding a right wing hate campaign and constant legal attacks on trans people's ability to exist in public. 571484310
Reposted by Finch CollinsDavid M. Perry @lollardfish.bsky.social · 20/08/2026what's funny about this is that monks were perfectly delighted with the printing press, the myth that the late medieval church resisted printing is false, you can actually embellish printed books and people did, illuminators and scribes are not the same people, and simon should read more. 673117569
Reposted by Finch CollinsSean Aitchison @sean8urson.bsky.social · 19/08/2026oh shit its for real for real fucking DO NOT update your windows, I had to do a clean reinstallpcworld.comWindows 11's August update is crashing games and causing PC problemsFollowing the installation of the August security patch for Windows 11, some users have reported serious problems with their systems. This is a known issue, and here’s how to resolve the error. 15838052678
Reposted by Finch CollinsAlejandra Caraballo @esqueer.net · 20/08/2026I've never seen such an effort to censor a document as I have the Amnesty International report on gender critical groups because of JK Rowling. They removed the report from the Wayback Machine and now I got a DMCA strike on my Google Drive for having it. It was deleted and removed from my account. 230114235344
Reposted by Finch CollinsKate Crowe @kcrowe.bsky.social · 21/08/2026I have had to clarify that when I'm labeled an AI skeptic it's mostly that I am a capitalism and potential for state violence skeptic. My field of librarisnship used punch cards and semiautomatic data processing to create expansive access to the world's libraries. The same technology... 1222
Reposted by Finch Collinssarah clark (they) @sarahclark.bsky.social · 16/08/2026i hope being in the hole in omelas looks good on my resume 15219
Reposted by Finch CollinsSteven J. Gibbons @stevenjgibbons.bsky.social · 19/08/2026In the continuing onslaught of in-your-face AI, it is now almost impossible to open a scientific paper without an AI-summary coming up. Your first instinct may be “Ah that is useful”, but is it really close to the truth or what the author intended? (contd. - full "rant" on lnkd.in/p/euwbwNgY) 39338
Reposted by Finch CollinsSHARP News @sharpnews.bsky.social · 18/08/2026REMINDER TO SUBMIT! #BookHistory #Publishing #Authorship #Reading #Bibliography 075
Reposted by Finch CollinsElizabeth (Liz) Lehfeldt (she/her/hers) @lizlehfeldt.bsky.social · 17/08/2026Super-niche question: I'm looking for descriptions/insight into how #earlymodern people would have crafted sheets of paper into provisional "notebooks" for the purposes, say, or record keeping/accounting. Not formal, bound books, but spaces for jotting things down, etc. 102113
Reposted by Finch CollinsKate Ozment @grubstreetwomen.bsky.social · 14/08/2026Hold the phone -- the London Book Trades database is BACK and I missed it! It was a limited but useful index of tradespeople that was a victim of the "oh no hackers" Bodleian takedown in 2024. AND because it's back I found another woman publisher!! lbt.bibsoc.org.uk/index.php?ti...lbt.bibsoc.org.ukHistory of the Project - London Book Trades 15116
Reposted by Finch CollinsBeth DeBold @elizaaudacis.bsky.social · 14/08/2026Also a lot of what researchers might view as a small/annoying favour are either routine, easier than you’d think, or are actually interesting! So ask librarians and archivists for small/annoying favours! (Just be prepared to hear “it may take us a couple days” or “no” if it really isn’t possible) 27219
Reposted by Finch Collinsthene @thene.bsky.social · 13/08/2026out it goes: my long post about Rachel Hope Cleves's claim that Tillie Walden plagiarised her book. It's long because Cleves's claim is much, much more bizarre than it looked on first reading. I'm not going to bury the lede here. Cleves's claim does not hold up. buttondown.com/thene/archiv... 671495624
Reposted by Finch CollinsElise Watson @ewatson.bsky.social · 13/08/2026#earlymodern #bookhistory Workshop Call for Papers: Women’s Professional Networks in the Early Modern Book Trade, University of Edinburgh 6-7 May 2027 Please feel free to share with anyone who might be interested! 05864
Reposted by Finch CollinsDr Laura Sangha @lsangha.bsky.social · 13/08/2026Things people don't realise fall into the category of 'being a historian': creating editions and datasets from primary evidence that people stumble, use, and then say 'history doesn't need historians!' And now let me tell you about librarians and archivists 1396
Reposted by Finch CollinsThe History on Film Podcast @historyonfilm.bsky.social · 13/08/2026One of the driving principles of the Black Digital Humanities is that real human work has to be done to combat racialized structures built into technological systems and “well-structured datasets”. AI definitionally cannot do that. It obscures AND entrenches systematic/systemic biases. 0147
Reposted by Finch CollinsLiesbeth Corens @onslies.bsky.social · 13/08/2026ARGH. There are many causes of the UKHE crisis, and the governmental underfunding is undoubtedly the most harmful one. But let’s not let that big one draw sole attention, so we forget the harm done by the pure disrespect of managers for staff & their disdain for meaningful conversation with them. 35620
Reposted by Finch CollinsOlivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · 08/08/2026exactly 💯 on LLMs: they simulate the output we call language, not the cognitive capacity we call language! 492511700
Reposted by Finch CollinsCaroline Ball @heroicendeavour.eurosky.social · 07/08/2026If you're receiving a lot of complaints, perhaps it's because things aren't working the way they should? So, I don't know, maybe that should be what services and governments focus on, rather than what tools people are now using to make their voices heard? Vox populi and all that, you know... 121
Reposted by Finch CollinsWeird Alex @jackalpants.bsky.social · 06/08/2026It's time again! Cis allies: if you can, please consider being chaff for us. Toilet hobbycops think like 10% of people are trans, and to overturn our segregation we need respectable cis people causing trouble on our behalf. Please wear a trans flag pin. Get in good trouble, as John Lewis put it. 12539257
Finch Collins @finchinthestacks.bsky.social · 05/08/2026now this is a good framing of one tension at the heart of my work with library data! 171
Reposted by Finch CollinsElise Watson @ewatson.bsky.social · 05/08/2026We are so proud of the brilliant work of friends and contributors in this issue: thank you to all who brainstormed, peer reviewed, proofread, and helped us think through these #QueerBibliography subjects!euppublishing.comEdinburgh University Press Journals - Table of Contents - lih: Vol 42, No 2 1126
Reposted by Finch CollinsMalcolm Noble @malcolmjnoble.bsky.social · 04/08/2026The first journal number from #QueerBibliography 2025 is available online, guest edited with the utterly brilliant @ewatson.bsky.social. Thanks to @jilld17.bsky.social and Nadine Kozak for making space so quickly, to anonymous reviewers, our authors, and for Fran Affleck's meticulous copy editing. 11910
Reposted by Finch CollinsDr Evelyn Koch @evelynkoch.bsky.social · 24/07/2026My timeline might be pleased to know that there's now a statue of Sylvia Townsend Warner on Dorchester's high street. 25215
Finch Collins @finchinthestacks.bsky.social · 31/07/2026Friday afternoon catalogue data wrangling -- personally, I'm fond of "bookse;;er." 1160
Reposted by Finch CollinsDot Porter @leoba.bsky.social · 31/07/2026Do you use digitized medieval manuscripts in any capacity? Do you have opinions about the metadata that describes them? We want to hear from you! Please take a moment to fill out our very short survey. Please repost and share with anyone you know who might be interested! forms.gle/sBPXAnoRhwe1...forms.gleDigitized Medieval Manuscripts: Metadata PreferencesA brief survey about what metadata formats people prefer to go along with their digitized medieval manuscripts. The results of this survey will be used to consider what metadata we make available thro... 37879
Reposted by Finch CollinsCaroline Ball @heroicendeavour.eurosky.social · 29/07/2026Reading articles on the amounts HE has spent in APCs over the last 5-10 years, and slowly watching my blood pressure rise. Millions upon millions, on something WE CAN ABSOLUTELY DO OURSELVES FOR A FRACTION OF THE COST - what universities couldn't do with that kind of money now... 😠 And breathe... 45422
Reposted by Finch CollinsDorothy Berry @dorothyjberry.bsky.social · 22/07/2026This is a great student-authored short piece about, in my read, how the allure of innovation/problem solving/bragging rights has led a lot of smart people to ignore the work of archivists and historians when developing historical, archive driven tools. 18223
Reposted by Finch CollinsOlúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social · 21/07/2026every time you write overly defensively you should remember that you are pursuing a strategy of writing careful sentences specifically for people who demonstrably either won't or can't read them 484814961
Reposted by Finch CollinsClaire Boardman @claireboardman.bsky.social · 21/07/2026👀 CfP: "Submissions are open for our two-day conference ‘What does a good digital society look like?’ on 10 & 11 June 2027, at Sheffield Hallam University, UK. Submit your abstract or proposal by 29 October 2026." Full Details: digitalgood.net/conference-2... @digitalgoodnet.bsky.social #DHdigitalgood.netConference: What does a good digital society look like? - ESRC Digital Good NetworkDigital technologies should be good for people, societies and the planet, but there is ample evidence that they are often not. Social scientists, humanities scholars […] 0118
Reposted by Finch CollinsFaculty of English, University of Oxford @engfac.bsky.social · 23/07/2026We’re delighted to announce that Professor Leah Price has been appointed to the Professorship of Bibliography and Modern Book History.english.web.ox.ac.ukProfessor Leah Price appointed as Professor of Bibliography and Modern Book History 111623
Reposted by Finch CollinsSHARP News @sharpnews.bsky.social · 22/07/2026📢 ATTN BOOK HISTORY PEOPLE 📚 Have you or a friend published an edited collection on a #BookHistory topic in 2026? A monograph? An exhibition catalogue? Yes?! Submit the citation information to have the work included in the SHARP 2026 Annual Bibliography. docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...docs.google.comSHARP 2026 Annual BibliographyThis form is for collecting citation information for 2026 edited collections, monographs, and exhibitions catalogs. They should be: Published in 2026 Any language Any topic in book history We encoura... 01611
Reposted by Finch CollinsKatie Birkwood @girlinthe.bsky.social · 21/07/2026In things I wish I hadn't seen, but now I have and you will too... New research published in the Journal of the Institute of Conservation recommends PPE for handling all red rot because of the risk of heavy metal contamination (lead, arsenic, cadmium). #GLAMS 📚 www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....tandfonline.com 153725