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Simon Davies

@simonfd.bsky.social
1.9K followers 718 following 1.4K posts

Publishing Manager, @themhra.bsky.social Co-editor of the MHRA Style Guide Posting about scholarly publishing • History and future of the book • Book design, typography, typesetting 📚 Also work on the history of witchcraft & magic 🌒 • Views here my own

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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 15h
This is the first MHRA-organized event since I've been working here; we used to run events quite a lot many years ago, but not for a while. This one was my idea: volume 100 of a periodical publication is a once-in-a-lifetime thing to happen, it had to be marked. I hope people will come!
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 16h
Please come along to this if you're in/near London! There'll be three interesting talks plus a drinks reception after (well, two interesting talks and one talk by me)
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 17h
Great piece. I hope libraries will listen and take a stand. (Via @acadpubnews.bsky.social) www.insidehighered.com/opinion/view...
insidehighered.com
AI Slop Coming to University Library Near You (opinion)
Librarians must hold the gates against machine-generated titles.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Listening to a high-up guy from a semi-major US university press talk about the importance of learned societies, and recalling the extremely rude and un-collegiate email I received from a staff member there when I suggested a collaborative initiative with the society I work for. Hmmmmm
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Prof. Liz Oakley-Brown @earlymodlancs.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
As the new academic year gets underway, here's a reminder of Colin Burrow's important essay for @lrb.co.uk (10/9/26) www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4... and a link to the accompanying podcast (18/9/2026) www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and...
lrb.co.uk
Colin Burrow · Good Weird or Bad Weird: Uses of Criticism
Literary criticism is a supremely occasional skill, where you have to be bold enough to operate where there aren’t any...
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 27/09/2026
That really would be a limited edition
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Jenni Adams @jenniad.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
Increasingly thinking that rather than open access (e)books, all I want are cheap paperback editions that either I or my institutions’ library can buy and actually read 📚
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Modern Humanities Research Association @themhra.bsky.social · 21/09/2026
Our colleagues in the @englishassociation.bsky.social are hosting an event in London on 17 October, Why Subject Associations Matter -- celebrating their 120th birthday! Do come along if you're in the area. Details here: englishassociation.ac.uk/confronting-...
A painting of a group of hands in a rainbow of different colours
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Spending today working on my talk on the history of the Annual Bibliography for our London event in October (join us!). It's going to be so hard compressing everything into the time available. Also I haven't given a public lecture for about 10 years... www.mhra.org.uk/news/2026/08...
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
The persecution of Brighton University staff by the management there has been probably the longest and most bitter battle of the current HE crisis. Immeasurable harm done to staff wellbeing. But their situation is a warning to all others: this will come for you in the end too.
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Modern Humanities Research Association @themhra.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
We've just published a new volume in our 'Jewelled Tortoise' series! 'Vernon Lee’s Cosmopolitan Prose. A Translated Selection', translated and edited by Colton Valentine. All info 👉 www.mhra.org.uk/publications...
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
Final proof checks this week to the Annual Bibliography of English Language & Literature for 2025. Still published in print after 100+ years! Not many subscribers these days (most access the online version), but it's nice that there are still a dedicated few. The print volume has its own value.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
When @themhra.bsky.social was founded in 1918, it was reported in The Times, and the Minister of Education sent a letter of support and good wishes. How times have changed eh! For newspapers, politicians, and the MHRA itself...
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
‘44% of respondents said they were concerned that disclosing their use of AI would negatively affect how others viewed their work’ …of course it will. Maybe take the hint? These people are supposed to be academics… www.researchinformation.info/news/oxford-...
researchinformation.info
Oxford updates AI disclosure guidelines for academic authors - Research Information
Research found widespread uncertainty among academic authors over when artificial intelligence use should be disclosed
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Well this is annoying (in Collini, Literature & Learning (OUP)). Never mind that a lit scholar writing an actual history of English Studies shouldn’t be getting these journals confused, the abbreviation error could have been spotted by anyone literate 🤦‍♂️
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Just love that art nouveau cover design 👌
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
If you're submitting work to a journal published by a commercial publisher (why would you do that? but whatever), always make sure if you have a query/problem to contact journal staff rather than the publisher (unless it's a tech problem). Especially if the publisher uses 'AI' assistants to 'help'.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Got my first AI book club scam email today! For an edition I published with ACMRS in 2013. Feels like they’re scraping the barrel with me tbh. But you do feel a pang of excitement on first seeing the email. It’s a cruel scam. (And famously academic authors have so much money 🙄)
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Ben Williamson @benpatrickwill.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
Seen several pieces about how genAI for "editing only" can completely change a text's meaning and erase the writer's voice and ideas. But it reads well! So if the results look good you might press submit without realizing it's messed up your manuscript nicholashagar.medium.com/i-could-not-...
nicholashagar.medium.com
I Could Not Get AI to Edit One Page
The tools for AI-assisted editing don’t exist yet. That’s pushing everyone toward full delegation.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
Just started reading Stefan Collini’s latest; enjoying it, but oh lord does someone need to take away the button on his keyboard that inserts scare quotes (His copy-editor should have seen to this)
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
I've said it before and I'll say it again: scholarly editing is an advanced skill; it's not for everyone. Knowing the literature of a field does not itself equip you to be an editor. If you don't have highly developed textual accuracy skills then it's not for you.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
People will complain about the deadening effect 'AI' has on writing, then a few sentences later say that it has potential to help non-English speakers publish their work in English. It can't be both. Yes, it will put their work into English, but it will be bland, plagiarised slop English.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
Filling out a survey on AI in relation to society activity (opportunities: none; harms: many) is gratifying but has also made me angry: I really wish I didn’t have to think about this shite, ever
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
I'll be giving a talk in October (16th) about the history of the MHRA's Annual Bibliography of English Lang & Lit, including a run down of which authors have been studied the most over the past hundred years (mostly obvious, but some surprises!). Please do come along if you're in the London area.
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Modern Humanities Research Association @themhra.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
📣Event! Celebrating volume 100 of the Annual Bibliography of English Language & Literature and the MHRA’s Work in English Studies 📆 16 October in London. All welcome. Join us in celebrating over a century of scholarship. Please share! Full details here: www.mhra.org.uk/news/2026/08...
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
The author with the most amount of academic studies on their work in the Annual Bibliography for 2025 (after Bill S obvs) is Tolkien. His critics were always bafflingly wrong and stupid; they’ve been proved wrong by time, as it was always clear they would be. app.the-tls.com/219084/conte...
app.the-tls.com
Bored of the Rings
Tolkien and his critics
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
If a robot needs a crash pad at the end of the course in order to be able to run a race, it has not successfully run that race. This seems to me like an analogy for a lot of 'AI' shite. Baffled that anyone would think this is cool (it's absolutely not)
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
That’s enough slop news for today thank you
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Hausmann, a professor of the practice of international political economy [said] “The FT uses human editors […] If this were done by AI, how would the outcome be different? How would it be worse?” Who’s going to tell him? www.chronicle.com/article/prof...
chronicle.com
Professors Were Singled Out for Writing With AI Help. Now They’re Defending Themselves.
A Harvard and a UC Berkeley faculty member admitted to writing opinion essays with help from AI. Experts say their decision sends a message as students are disciplined for AI use.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 24/08/2026
Scientists: ‘science teaches critical thought just as well as the humanities’ Also scientists: www.nature.com/articles/d41...
nature.com
Staggering 90% of biomedical papers now show signs of AI help
The figure, which is much higher than previous estimates of Large Language Model use, is for papers published in December and archived in PubMed
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
Nice creative use of ornament in this pamphlet on the plague from 1631 #typography
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
Doing some research with the first minute-book of @themhra.bsky.social, begun in 1918 — fascinating organizational history!
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 20/08/2026
Another day, another aggressive letter from a UK HE institution about their 'rights retention' policy, threatening imaginary legal repercussions that they have no right or ability to enforce. These are wild attacks on academic freedom, but I haven't seen any commentary on this yet.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
I’ve been working on a bunch of 17th & 18th C texts recently that are plagiarised from earlier works, and it’s made me paranoid that any text I edit might be taken from somewhere else without me realising it 😰
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 14/08/2026
Are some people genuinely unable to distinguish between a hyphen and a dash? Or is it that they just can't be bothered to work out how to write a dash in word processing software? It's such a bafflingly universal error, even among professional (academic!) writers.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
Looks like some publishers are very slowly beginning to realise they need to take a firmer line on ‘AI’ use. I hope the MHRA proves to be ahead of a trend here: our AI policy does not permit any use of generative AI in material submitted for publication. The focus on ‘disclosure’ is a red herring.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
If we wanted better machine written history? We never wanted any kind of machine written history. Why would anyone, anywhere, ever want that?
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
A selection of pretty title pages from French type specimen books, 1754–1818 #typography
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
I work for a non-profit society journal publisher; I also do some work for a society journal published by one of the major commercial, profit-extracting publishers. A major, prestigious, long-running journal in literary studies on each side. The commercially published one gets more submissions.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 12/08/2026
The eclipse can’t be a forewarning of doom because the doom is already here
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 11/08/2026
Visited an art exhibition in Suffolk on Friday in which one of the three featured artists was exhibiting a bunch of 'AI' slop: immediately obvious that it was slop, and it wasn't even well done (if such rubbish ever can be). Apparently based on the work of Sebald, which is frankly an insult
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 08/08/2026
Nice explainer of optical size in typefaces by @elliotjaystocks.bsky.social #typography adobe.design/ideas/the-ol...
adobe.design
The old typography is new again
Born of analog typesetting constraints, optical sizing is once again relevant in digital design
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 06/08/2026
‘The free use, or even the moderate use, of italic for emphasis in a text is now regarded as an exhibition of bad taste on the part of the writer and a needless affront to the intelligence of the reader.’ — De Vinne, 1901
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
How lovely to have multiple Agamemnon gifs to choose from in the year 2026
static.klipy.com
Brian Cox as Agamemnon Laughs in Troy
ALT: Brian Cox as Agamemnon Laughs in Troy
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
Any chance anyone out there is an expert on Seneca in the original Latin? 🥲 Need a line from his Agamemnon translated (in a way 17thC readers would have done); all the online translators give goofy results and early modern translations are no help (neither is Loeb)
static.klipy.com
Turning And Facing You Agamemnon
ALT: Turning And Facing You Agamemnon
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 05/08/2026
Saw The Odyssey last night, not bad! I liked the structure and the way the story was told; there were some nice emotional moments, plus totally awesome monster effects. Let down by absolutely atrocious dialogue. Writers/script editors need a career change. Not sure how I feel about Darth Agamemnon.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
Honestly don’t know why I check Bluesky, it’s always so depressing here.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 02/08/2026
Librarians laughing about the AI companies buying books just to destroy them. Really shouldn’t be surprising at this point but somehow it still is. ‘Haha people are so stupid for caring about books as objects when they can easily be replaced’
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
More anti-slop weapons: a web font that sends different text to the 'AI' scrapers compared to what is read by humans, i.e. what the text actually says. Not sure it's all that useful but it sure is fun to fight back. www.creativebloq.com/design/fonts...
creativebloq.com
This free font "poisons" AI
Hate AI? Then you might want to try ShieldFont.
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Simon Davies @simonfd.bsky.social · 31/07/2026
This sounds like an April fool but it’s true! Excellent feature. Need this on all platforms pls. petapixel.com/2026/07/31/s...
petapixel.com
'Seems Like AI Slop' Button Added to LinkedIn
We need this everywhere.
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