iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Notably, the casual use of the phrase "research professor" (i.e., a professor who does research) is broader in meaning than the job title. Often when a student says they want to be a research professor I suspect they actually want to be tenure-line, because they probably want the job security too.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 04/10/2026

Fall semester is the traditional time of year for universities in the US to post faculty openings. If you're reading academic job ads and trying to understand what different kinds of professors do, check out my Periodic Table of Faculty Job Titles at US Universities. shomir.net/faculty_peri...

Shomir Wilson - Periodic Table of Faculty Job Titles

A quick reference for understanding what university faculty do.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Today I remembered this picture I took in 2017 in Gwalior, India, and I added it to a slide deck for a talk I'll give later this week. It'll serve as a metaphor for privacy.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 26/09/2026

I recently led the submission of an NSF proposal to fund a research project, requesting just over $800K. As a single document, the proposal totaled to 93 pages. If you've wondered what's in a proposal like this, I wrote an explainer. shomirwilson.substack.com/p/whats-in-a...

What's in a Proposal to NSF for Research Funding?

Research plans, a budget, and a lot more.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

This might be romanticism for a mundane thing, but it still strikes me as a special moment when I complete the final actions to submit a grant proposal. Beyond relief that it's finished, we've declared the ask, in the form of intellectual effort and dozens of pages. The die is cast.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 15/09/2026

Penn State undergraduates participating in the Schreyer Honors College, please consider joining me for this event. On September 21 I'll lead a discussion over dinner about performing research abroad, based on my experiences in Australia, Scotland, and Singapore. www.shc.psu.edu/events/?trum...

shc.psu.edu

Events - Schreyer Honors College (SHC) at Penn State University

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Reposted by Shomir Wilson

Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

25 years later, I reflect on the periods of isolation on 9/11: I temporarily disconnected from the outside world while I attended a class, sat in a circle with other students, or walked across campus. We’re living in the future, with all it entails. shomirwilson.substack.com/p/reflection...

Reflections on Experiencing 9/11 as a College Student

25 years ago in fall of 2001 I was an undergraduate at Virginia Tech.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

Reflections on Experiencing 9/11 as a College Student

25 years ago in fall of 2001 I was an undergraduate at Virginia Tech.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

A small detail in the experience of teaching: I noticed today that as I stand at the podium I can see out the classroom window to the roundabout in front of the Nittany Lion Inn. That's where I first stepped onto Penn State's campus, in February 2018, for my faculty interview.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

If you're several years out of school and you fondly remember a professor's contributions to your success, do the profession a favor and tell them what you appreciated about their work and what you do now. If they're larger than life in your memory, there's a chance you'll become that for them too.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 01/09/2026

I've had the good fortune to catch up with several of my lab's alumni over the past 12 months. Years-long career story arcs are often interesting to me: goals that evolve, long bets that pay off (or don't), second acts, and the interplay between effort and luck.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

I'm pleased to share a preprint of our accepted EMNLP main conference paper "Affective Context Amplifies Sycophancy in LLM Responses". Sycophancy, an unnatural level of agreement or praise for a person's ideas, is a problem for chatbots, sometimes with disastrous outcomes. arxiv.org/abs/2608.212...

arxiv.org

Affective Context Amplifies Sycophancy in LLM Responses

As conversational companions, large language models (LLMs) often have access to users' emotional states. We study how this affective context modulates LLM sycophancy in subjective, evaluative interact...

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

This paper also marks the release of the PrivaSeerQA Corpus, a collection of 1,293,714 question-answer pairs about organizations' privacy practices, extracted from 345,073 privacy policies. Download it here: git.psu.edu/hlt-lab/Priv...

git.psu.edu

Human Language Technologies Lab / PrivaSeerQA Corpus · GitLab

Penn State Code Repository (GitLab)

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

I'm pleased to share our new DocEng paper "Asking for Privacy: Contrasting Consumer Questions with Questions in Privacy Policies". We contrast themes in FAQ-structured privacy policies with those identified by prior work to study users' privacy interests. dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/...

dl.acm.org

Asking for Privacy: Contrasting Consumer Questions with Questions in Privacy Policies | Proceedings of the 2026 ACM Symposium on Document Engineering

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

26 years after my undergraduate new student orientation, some thoughts as a professor. shomirwilson.substack.com/p/reflection...

Reflections for Incoming College Students

Awkwardness, investing in the future, and the long road to great things.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

I'm experimenting with writing about travel and academia on Substack. It's an intersection of topics that I think about often, and I wanted to write more without the awkwardness of long Bluesky threads. Subscribing is free. I have no plans for monetization. shomirwilson.substack.com?utm_campaign...

Shomir's Substack | Substack

My personal Substack. Click to read Shomir's Substack, by Shomir Wilson, a Substack publication. Launched a month ago.

Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 09/08/2026

A small but growing number of high schoolers follow me on LinkedIn. I’m kind of honored. (How did you even find me?) The piece I've written that would’ve helped me most in high school is Where I’m From. Take a look if you’re contemplating family, geography, and identity. shomir.net/where_from.h...

Shomir Wilson - Where I'm From

Origins, identities, and an inescapable question.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 02/08/2026

Newcomers to ACL Rolling Review: If you like the reviews your manuscript received, remember to follow the procedure to commit to a conference. Otherwise, nothing more happens.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 28/07/2026

I've added a "Thinking Ahead" section to my tenure-track job market guide. Some tenure-line faculty didn't consider this career until partway through grad school, but others entered grad school for it and a few undergraduates (like me) were already thinking about it. shomir.net/tt_job_guide...

Guide for the CS/IS Tenure-Track Job Market

Observations on the academic job market in computer science and information science.

Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

They get easier with practice, but never quite easy. Also, getting the money (in the cases when that happens) makes me reflect on the grantwriting more fondly.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

One thing that's surprised me is the contrast between the distribution of reviewers' overall scores and the distribution of metareviewers' overall scores: on average, metareviewers appear to think more favorably of submissions.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 15/07/2026

Once in awhile I remember that the ACL Rolling Review Dashboard exists, and I browse it. If you've never seen it before, and especially if you're new to NLP research, check it out. The numbers show the enormity of ARR's undertaking. stats.aclrollingreview.org

stats.aclrollingreview.org

ARR Dashboard

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 11/07/2026

I recently traveled to Southern California for ACL in San Diego. Here are four pictures I took outside of the conference: - Joshua Tree National Park at night - Antelope squirrel, Joshua Tree National Park - Derelict sign, near Salton Sea - Crab, Cabrillo National Monument

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

Having a lab lunch at a conference was a milestone I've long waited for, and at ACL earlier this week it happened. Thanks to HLT Lab PhD alumni Mukund Srinath and Pranav Venkit and current PhD student Shahriar Shayesteh for joining me.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 29/06/2026

I added two new sections to my tenure-line academic job market guide: "Are You Ready to Apply?", with suggestions for how to self-assess a portfolio, and "Re-Entering Academia", for people with PhDs who have been away from universities or research for a long time. shomir.net/tt_job_guide...

Guide for the CS/IS Tenure-Track Job Market

Observations on the academic job market in computer science and information science.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 28/06/2026

Travel and Meaning is complete. I added Part 6 (Meaning) and an afterword about the significance of travel to academia and universities. shomir.net/tam_meaning....

Shomir Wilson - Travel and Meaning, Part 6 - Meaning

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Would I want to read a book if someone described it to me like that? Probably not. I'm glad I did, though.

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The resemblance to reality is remarkably cerebral, though: much of the portrayal of academia is in conversations and flashbacks. Instead of a university setting, the novel is about a journey through literal Hell. A friend told me they stopped reading when it became too gruesome. Caveat lector.

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Reflecting on R. F. Kuang's Katabasis six months after reading, it's one of favorite novels about academia. In describing the pursuit of tenure-line faculty jobs, it covers a remarkable amount of ground: the longing, the obstacles, the uncertainty, the failure modes, and the difficult decisions.

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Research conferences are the backdrop for many of these stories: CiCLing 2011 (Tokyo, Japan), ACL 2012 (Jeju, South Korea), LREC 2016 (Portorož, Slovenia), EMNLP 2018 (Brussels, Belgium), EACL 2023 (Dubrovnik, Croatia), ACL 2024 (Bangkok, Thailand), and SIGCSETS 2026 (St. Louis, USA).

Here's Part 5 of Travel and Meaning. Citizen diplomacy, friendship, and conversations without words. shomir.net/tam_people.h...

Shomir Wilson - Travel and Meaning, Part 5 - Pepole

Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 14/06/2026

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I've posted Part 4 (Adventure) of Travel and Meaning. It contains a tornado, a wild boar, a ger camp in the Gobi Desert, an elaborate Pagan ritual, Roman ruins at the edge of the Sahara, and a second wild boar. shomir.net/tam_adventur...

Shomir Wilson - Travel and Meaning, Part 4 - Adventure

Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

I've written something about my travel experiences, for students and other people trying to understand, in a broad sense, what motivates them. The Foreword and Part 1 ("Origins") are up. I'll post the rest as I finish editing and adding photos from my archives. shomir.net/tam_foreword...

Shomir Wilson - Travel and Meaning - Foreword

Sarah Rajtmajer @srajtmajer.bsky.social · 02/06/2026

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Reposted by Shomir Wilson

I’ll be speaking, sharing new findings on the ways emotion shapes LLM sycophancy (work w/ @shomir.bsky.social and @brettfrischmann.bsky.social)

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 23/05/2026

I've added a new section "Generative AI and Writing" to my Guide for Scholarly Writing. LLMs are technological achievements, but we---from students up through the most senior faculty---owe it to ourselves to keep writing. shomir.net/scholarly_wr...

Shomir Wilson - Guide for Scholarly Writing

Good writing means a lot to me. I created this guide to share my writing philosophy with my students and to help students avoid common mistakes that I find in drafts.

Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 18/05/2026

I have a temporary office this summer and North Atherton Street runs directly under it. Look closely and you’ll see it.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

The motivation to deliberately examine how faculty work with student researchers is increasing, as faculty are asked to maintain research output with declining resources, and students face pressures on several fronts.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

One was to a seminar for new PhD students, and the other was to an undergrad research methods class. I originally wrote the paper for faculty, but students appreciated the decomposition of the faculty perspective, which gives them articulate vocabulary to ask for the kinds of assistance they need.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

I recently gave two invited lectures about my paper "Rethinking How We Discuss the Guidance of Student Researchers in Computing", which won a Best Paper Award at this year's SIGCSE. I'd be glad to give more invited talks, for faculty or students. dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/...

dl.acm.org

Rethinking How We Discuss the Guidance of Student Researchers in Computing | Proceedings of the 57th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V.1

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 27/04/2026

I was facing a difficult dilemma in my career, and this picture became a way to express it. I sometimes think about parallel universe versions of me that made different decisions. In an imaginary way, I entertain an obligation to them to prosper on their behalf. I hope they're doing well too.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 27/04/2026

This image shows me in four places at once in the atrium of an apartment building. I made it using my digital camera and Photoshop ten years ago, before generative AI was an option. I took four photographs through an 8mm fisheye lens, providing a field of view of nearly 180 degrees.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 21/04/2026

Four of my post-CHI Barcelona photos: Sagrada Família from Montjuïc, the dragon's back on the roof of Casa Batlló, the harbor in Barceloneta, and cascading ponds on Montjuïc.

Albania was my 50th country.

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Four pictures from my recent pre-CHI visit to Albania.

Performer, Albanian Night, a live show about an Albanian wedding.

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Page views and other analytics mean little to me because I have nothing to sell. However, knowing the impact of this quasi-work---it resembles the faculty duty of service, but it's often deeply personal---motivates me to continue writing.

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Shomir Wilson @shomir.bsky.social · 13/04/2026

I’ve probably said something like this before, but thanks to anyone who has told me that my advice pages or my posts helped them understand academia or overcome obstacles. Several times at CHI this past week, PhD students and junior faculty whom I hadn't met before approached me to say that.

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Don’t worry. There were just over 10K people in person at AAAI this year. They’ll help eat it too.