Guest Edited by AJ Boston (Associate Professor and Scholarly Communication Librarian, Murray State University) Begins on Page 14
If Rumors Were Horses
Whew! We’re under a heat dome here in the southeast U.S.
The heat index was 109F yesterday! Stay cool and hydrated out there, folks. I’ve been combing through the latest news, press releases, whispered updates, and enthusiastic LinkedIn posts, and it’s safe to say there’s never a dull moment in the world of libraries and scholarly publishing. So saddle up, pour some sweet tea (or something stronger), and let’s take a look at what’s been happening lately.
Mergers & Acquisitions
Big news straight out of the gate: Knowledge Unlatched finds a new home with Annual Reviews! It was recently announced that AR signed an agreement with Wiley that enables Knowledge Unlatched (KU) — most recently owned and operated by Wiley — to move to a new home within the Annual Reviews organization. The move supports one of the most recognized initiatives in open access publishing and marks KU’s return to nonprofit stewardship. “Knowledge Unlatched has played a formative role in showing that open access for books and monographs is possible at scale,” said Richard Gallagher, President and Editor-in-Chief of Annual Reviews. “We’re excited to build on this legacy. KU will remain at the forefront of open access book publishing, help more journal publishers adopt
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Against the Grain (ISSN: 1043-2094), Copyright 2025 by the name Against the Grain is published five times a year in February, April, June, September, and November by Annual Reviews. Mailing Address: Annual Reviews, PO Box 10139, Palo Alto, CA 94303-0139. Subscribe online at https://www.charleston-hub.com/ membership-options/
Editor Emerita:
Katina Strauch (College of Charleston, Retired)
Editor:
Leah Hinds (Charleston Hub)
Manager:
Caroline Goldsmith (Charleston Hub)
Research Editor:
Judy Luther (Informed Strategies)
International Editor:
Rossana Morriello (Politecnico di Torino)
Contributing Editors:
Glenda Alvin (Tennessee State University)
Rick Anderson (Brigham Young University)
Sever Bordeianu (U. of New Mexico)
Todd Carpenter (NISO)
Ashley Krenelka Chase (Stetson Univ. College of Law)
Eleanor Cook (East Carolina University)
Kyle K. Courtney (Harvard University)
Cris Ferguson (Murray State)
Michelle Flinchbaugh (U. of MD Baltimore County)
Dr. Sven Fund (Fullstopp)
Tom Gilson (College of Charleston, Retired)
Michael Gruenberg (Gruenberg Consulting, LLC)
Bob Holley (Wayne State University, Retired)
Matthew Ismail (Charleston Briefings)
Donna Jacobs (MUSC, Retired)
Ramune Kubilius (Northwestern University)
Myer Kutz (Myer Kutz Associates, Inc.)
Tom Leonhardt (Retired)
Stacey Marien (American University)
Jack Montgomery (Retired)
Lesley Rice Montgomery (Tulane University)
Alayne Mundt (American University)
Bob Nardini (Retired)
Jim O’Donnell (Arizona State University)
Ann Okerson (Center for Research Libraries)
David Parker (Lived Places Publishing)
Genevieve Robinson (IGI Global)
Steve Rosato (OverDrive Academic)
Jared Seay (College of Charleston)
Corey Seeman (University of Michigan)
Bruce Strauch (The Citadel, Emeritus) Lindsay Wertman (IGI Global)
Graphics:
Bowles & Carver, Old English Cuts & Illustrations. Grafton, More Silhouettes. Ehmcke, Graphic Trade Symbols By German Designers. Grafton, Ready-to-Use Old-Fashioned Illustrations. The Chap Book Style.
Publisher:
Annual Reviews, PO Box 10139 Palo Alto, CA 94303-0139
Production & Ad Sales: Toni Nix, Just Right Group, LLC., P.O. Box 412, Cottageville, SC 29435, phone: 843-835-8604
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Send correspondence, press releases, etc., to: Leah Hinds, Editor, Against the Grain <leah@charlestonlibraryconference.com>
The annual Charleston Library Conference is the can’ t-miss event where librarians, publishers, vendors, and innovators come together to explore the latest trends, share insights, and shape the future of our field. Register now to take advantage of the Extra Early Bird rate and secure your place!
Charleston In Between is back! Join us on July 8-9, 2025, for the first-ever hybrid edition of our dynamic mid-year event , designed to bridge the conversations between Charleston Conferences. This year, we’re offering a small , in-person gathering in Berlin, Germany, alongside robust virtual participation options to connect our global community of academic librarians, scholarly publishers, and information professionals.
Save the Date!
The Charleston Conference at the Frankfurt Book Fair Friday, October 17, 2025, 9:30 am - 12:00 pm
Micro-conference on Hall 4.0 Academic Stage
From Your (evaluating options) Editor Emerita:
Hi everyone, there are so many choices out there these days! New products, platforms, evolving business models, shifting policies, emerging technologies, you name it. Academic librarians and publishers alike are constantly faced with the challenge of evaluating a multitude of options. Decision fatigue is real, y’all!
This issue of Against the Grain offers a timely and wideranging exploration of legal challenges reshaping scholarly communications. Guest-edited by AJ Boston, Associate Professor and Scholarly Communication Librarian at Murray State University, this issue brings together legal scholars, librarians, and industry professionals to unpack the lawsuits, policies, and market dynamics currently confronting the publishing ecosystem.
Featured articles include a conversation between AJ Boston, Megan Bean, and Tara Trentalange, a wide-ranging dialogue between a scholarly communication librarian and two legally trained colleagues exploring key lawsuits. “Uddin v. Elsevier: Peculiar By Design?,” by Megan Bean, is a deep dive into the controversial class action lawsuit that frames unpaid peer review as market manipulation. Bean critiques the framing of the case
Letters to the Editor
and the glaring absence of universities in the plaintiff class. In “Federal Oversight Targets Scholarly Publishing,” by Ryan James Jessup, Ryan examines expanding liability for fraudulent research, the collapse of Hindawi, and government scrutiny of editorial negligence. “Academic Libraries, Legal Infrastructure, and Information Politics” explores how libraries can reclaim their role as institutional stewards amid legal uncertainty and policy shifts. “Expanded Access in a World of Corporate Capture: Hachette v. Internet Archive” analyzes the far-reaching implications of the decision for controlled digital lending and library access models. And “Discovering the Rest of the Story: The Power of Document Disclosure” argues for greater transparency and the importance of FOIA-like tools in uncovering the forces shaping scholarly infrastructure.
We also have a fascinating special report from the alwayslovely Frances Pinter on her recent trips to Ukraine. “Inside Ukraine’s Defense of Scholarly and Literary Identity” is a timely look at the role of libraries and publishing in wartime cultural preservation. Thanks for sharing this story, Frances!
Lots to read here, so let’s get cracking! Love, Yr.Ed.
Send letters to <editors@against-the-grain.com>, or you can also send a letter to the editor from the Charleston Hub at http://www. charleston-hub.com/contact-us/.
Dear Katina:
I love the Charleston conference and am so pleased the virtual option continues to be an option.
Would you please advise if online access to Against the Grain is included in the virtual Charleston conference registration? I am unable to access and did not receive a pw reset notification. I do not recall if I had a personal subscription, or if the University of New Brunswick subscribed for me, or if my subscription was included because I attended the virtual conference for many years. Sadly, I missed last year’s, but attended this year (virtually).
Thank you, Linda Roulston (Electronic Licensing Librarian, University of New Brunswick, Harriet Irving Library) <linda.roulston@unb.ca>
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Dear Linda,
Thank you for your email. It’s wonderful to hear from you and to know how much you enjoyed the Charleston Conference!
Yes, a complimentary one-year Against the Grain subscription is included for in-person and virtual Charleston Conference attendance. All attendees were sent a welcome email in early February with instructions for how to access the publication starting with the February 2025 issue, v. 37 #1. We’ll be happy to re-send that email shortly. Please let us know if you have any questions!
Best regards, Leah Hinds (Executive Director, Charleston Hub) <leah@charlestonlibraryconference.com>
Dear Caroline:
Thanks for your email and for considering me to be featured in your Librarian Luminaries column. Please share the interview questions with me and I will provide the responses and some media in the coming weeks. I appreciate the opportunity to share my story with the world.
Best regards, Nancy Kwangwa (Deputy Librarian, Women’s University in Africa) <nancykwangwa@gmail.com>
Thank you so much, Nancy! We’ll post this on the Charleston Hub as our June Librarian Luminary. We’ll also include this in our publication Against the Grain and will send you a draft of that for review before we officially publish. Thanks again!
For information on bulk orders or discounts, please contact:
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DOING THE CHARLESTON
My Personal History of Scholarly Communication
Katina Strauch with Darrell W. Gunter
In 1980, Katina Strauch started the Charleston Conference: Issues in Book and Serial Acquisition to bring together librarians, publishers, and vendors to discuss issues shared by the three groups The meeting has continued annually and boasts over 3,000 attendees in person and virtually This memoir is Katina’s diary and story of the Charleston Conference and its development concurrently with her career as a professional librarian. Over the last 45 years, there have been massive changes in scholarly communication, changes that Katina has been at the heart of Where and what will the library and publishing professions develop next? The sky’s the limit to reimagining! Let’s go
Rumors continued from page 1
Subscribe to Open, and take an active role in coordinating and amplifying Diamond Open Access efforts worldwide.” Read the full press release here. I remember when Frances Pinter first started talking about the idea for Knowledge Unlatched at the Charleston Conference way back when! Gosh!
Global academic publisher Emerald Publishing Limited has acquired now publishers. Founded in 2004, now publishers is a leading source of academic content, publishing research monographs, journals and Foundations and Trends (FnT) with strengths in the areas of Business, Economics, Computer Science and Engineering. The sale comprises over 50 books, 14 peerreviewed journals and 28 Foundations and Trends serials.
Following a recent announcement that SLA would begin a dissolution process, the Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) and the Special Libraries Association (SLA) have announced that they have entered into formal negotiations to pursue a merger of the two organizations This initiative reflects a shared commitment to strengthening the future of the information professions and delivering expanded value to members of both communities. The boards of directors of ASIS&T and SLA have unanimously agreed to begin discussions aimed at creating a combined association that would serve a diverse, global membership of information professionals across academic, corporate, government, and nonprofit sectors. Thanks to Ramune Kubilius for keeping us apprised of the situation!
AI Updates
Wiley and Perplexity recently announced a new partnership that will integrate Wiley’s authoritative content into Perplexity’s generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) search capabilities for educators and students. With the agreement, Wiley becomes Perplexity’s first education partner, creating new pathways for educational institutions to interact with trusted scholarly resources through AI search. Reactions have been mixed from the library community! What do you think?
Just announced June 24th: Choice and Clarivate launched a free, eight-week newsletter micro-course titled “Generative AI Literacy Essentials for Academic Librarians.” It aligns with ACRL’s AI framework and includes case studies, interviews, and curated resources. You can still register — it runs through mid-October 2025. Learn more on the ALA News site or sign up with Choice360
Marshall Breeding’s 2025 Library Systems Report has been released! An excerpt from the “Looking ahead” section: “AI, especially generative AI, increasingly pervades education, publishing, health care, and social media. Expect the library technology industry’s development and integration of this technology to come at full speed. Libraries will have to carefully parse which technologies can amplify their work and which may do harm. They are already working closely with vendors to ensure that products and services with AI features deliver appropriate results. Having the ability to automatically generate descriptive metadata at a speed and scale not previously imagined is an attractive prospect, but these tools must be accurate.”
Read the full report at https://librarylearningspace. com/2025-library-systems-report-is-released/
And here’s an interesting article on AI Refusal in Libraries: https://acrlog.org/2025/06/11/ai-refusal-in-libraries-a-starterguide/ “AI refusal can refer to a spectrum of approaches to AI, whether that’s refusing to use AI tools entirely, refusing the use of AI as much as possible, refusing to prioritize the use of AI, refusing to accept either boosterism or doomer narratives, refusing to accept the idea that AI is inevitable, or some other refusal. It can also refer to more cheeky ways of refusing AI, such as using scare quotes around ‘artificial intelligence’ to indicate disbelief that these tools are actually displaying intelligence (hat tip to librarian Dave Ghamandi!).” Are you Team AI or Team Refuse? Inquiring minds want to know!
For those of us who need a primer, Aaron Tay has written an extremely useful guide to AI in academic search tools. This article was featured in Katina Magazine (still getting used to having a publication named after me!) as part of a deep dive into 3 AI academic search tools. Thanks, Aaron! Very helpful!
Conference and Meetings
Our beloved former Librarian of Congress, Carla Hayden, is back on the keynote circuit! She’ll be speaking at ALA Annual alongside award-winning author Kwame Alexander. Expect big crowds and a few teary eyes. Hayden and Alexander will discuss the current state of libraries and the challenges library professionals are facing not only in America but across the world, from book bans to library funding. Attendees can look forward to an informative discussion on the importance of libraries as cornerstones of democracy.
And speaking of teary eyes, those in attendance at the SSP 2025 annual meeting were moved and inspired by Heather Staines’ presidential address “Discouraged, but Not Disuaded.” Brava, Heather! Hear, hear!!! The Scholarly Kitchen has had a great series of posts about various reactions and takeaways from the meeting. Keynote speaker David Schiffman, Marine conservation biologist and science communicator, shared stories and lessons learned from a career studying sharks and educating the public about how to protect them as a framework for communicating the value of research in a challenging environment. Leah Hinds and Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe presented another installment of the Charleston Trendspotting Initiative! This year’s session focused on finding solid ground with our enduring values and preparing to persevere through the tough times ahead. Talk about apropos! And the Charleston Hub was there as an exhibitor for the first time. Caroline Goldsmith and Mike Jones from Annual Reviews were there meeting and greeting folks in the exhibit hall with great traffic and attendance numbers!
Christy Anderson, the social media manager for the Charleston Hub (and not to mention, also the Executive Director, the Network of the National Library of Medicine Region 2!) attended the Medical Library Association (MLA) 2025 annual meeting. This was her first time attending MLA and she wrote a summary report for the Hub blog! Ramune Kubilius, longtime conference director and also on the organizing committee for MLA, is rumored to be sending in a write-up of her own
<https://www.charleston-hub.com/media/atg/>
experience attending the event. More to come! In the meantime, read Christy’s report here.
By the time this issue is published, the 2025 Charleston Conference call for papers proposal form will be closed. We’re looking forward to all of the wonderful submissions that will no doubt come pouring in from around the world! The preliminary agenda will be available in early September. Registration is open and the extra early bird deadline is July 12!
An update from the amazing, how-does-she-do-it-all Toni Nix! 120 Charleston vendor showcase booths have sold so far, with very limited space remaining. Read about the vendor
showcase on the Charleston Hub. Over 100 sold in the first 48 hours! If you’re on the fence, you should move quickly to secure your spot
New Jobs and Recognitions
Roger Schonfeld has been appointed as Managing Director of JSTOR Digital Stewardship Services at ITHAKA. In this role, he will lead the newly launched service, combining AI-driven asset processing (JSTOR Seeklight), long-term archiving via Portico, and improved access through the JSTOR platform. “My entire career has focused on the ways in which libraries and cultural organizations steward our collective knowledge and heritage with the goal of helping them to do so thoughtfully, affordably, and with meaningful impact,” said Schonfeld. “It has been a tremendously gratifying experience to bring together this work with the exceptionally talented JSTOR team working with our community to develop this new service. I believe so strongly in the potential of JSTOR Digital Stewardship to help the library, archives, and museum professionals caring for collections to do their work more effectively and to take on some of the most persistent, difficult challenges they face. I’m glad to be in it with them.”
Leo Lo has been appointed the University of Virginia’s next University librarian and dean of libraries, effective September. Leo is currently the dean of the College of University Libraries and Learning Sciences at the University of New Mexico, and is also the current president of ACRL!
continued on page 12
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Bet You Missed It — Press Clippings — In the News
Carefully Selected by Your Crack Staff of News Sleuths
Column Editor: Bruce Strauch (The Citadel, Emeritus) <bruce.strauch@gmail.com>
Dig Out the Paint Brushes
Robert Rauschenger was the pioneer of objet trouvée (Strauch’s note: which is to say he dug rubbish out of bins and stuck it on canvas thereby making a freakin’ fortune ). Leaving NYC in 1970, he made a home on exquisite Captiva Island off Ft. Myers, Fl.
Over time, he purchased surrounding properties as a buffer and to host other artists. Annually, he welcomed 100 lucky souls before it was all flattened by Hurricane Ian in 2022. Rauschenberg had died in 2008, but his foundation continued the custom.
Now it’s been rebuilt and is open to applications.
For those unfamiliar, Captiva is a major shell collecting and bird watching locale. What’s in the attic that could be glued onto canvas?
See: Norman Vanamee, “The Un-Tortured Artist,” Town & Country, March, 2025, p.54.
Manuscript Chewing Dog
If a dog ate your homework, you’re in illustrious company. In 1935, John Steinbeck had published Tortilla Flat, bringing him a minor influx of money that permitted the first comfort in his marriage. He set to work on the next story and was two months into it when his setter pup chewed it to confetti. He had no copy or other draft.
He wrote his literary agent: “I was pretty mad, but the poor little fellow may have been acting critically. I didn’t want to ruin a good dog for a manuscript I’m not sure is good at all.”
He set back to work on a tale of two migrant workers that became the ever-famous Of Mice and Men.
See: “John Steinbeck’s dog ate the first draft of ‘Of Mice and Men,’” History Facts, Hello@feedingcuriosity.com, Feb. 13, 2025.
Crime Exactitude
Is it blood “spatter” or “splatter?” Do cops really do those big white boards with threads connecting the suspects?
Help is here. Cops and Writers was fired up in 2019 by Patrick O’Donnell and pals after seeing too many author flubs. And there’s no fee to join.
The forum has 7,600 members with around 40% being active police professionals.
Let’s face it. Writers seldom have a background in gritty violence. I mean, how much blood gushes out when a knife is plunged in a chest?
Otto Penzler, owner of Mysterious Bookshop in NYC, knows the letters will pour in when errors are made. Otto fixes the digital version of the book so at least that’s straight.
DNA tests take months, not hours, to return. Cops don’t go rogue to get the killer.
See: Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg, “These Cops Save Writers From Scorn,” The Wall Street Journal, April 12-13, 2025, p.A1.
Obits of Note
Tim Robbins (1932-2025) was raised in Richmond, dropped out of Washington & Lee, and moved to Seattle where he became an art critic. A Doors’ concert and dropping acid for the first time put him on his path as a novelist. Another Roadside Attraction (1971) with a mummified corpse of Jesus displayed at a hotdog stand spead by word-of-mouth and became a hit.
Still Life with Woodpecker (1980) and Skinny Legs and All were “masterpieces of vibe over plot.” He wanted a life of enchantment, and writing was his path there.
Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (1972) was a bestseller which became a movie with Uma Thurman and Keanu Reeves.
See: “The novelist who conjured trippy dreamscapes,” The Week, Feb. 21, 2025, p.35.
David Edward Byrd (1941-2025) was dumped into foster care, then reclaimed by his mother once she had traded up to a Howard Johnson’s executive. They lived in a Miami Beach mansion where Byrd was deeply miserable. He served as a child bartender at wild family parties where guests jumped from balconies into the pool.
His passion for art was not supported by his stepfather so he was on his own. Despite starvation and heavy drug use, he earned a master’s in stone lithography from Carnegie Mellon. In 1967, he landed on a hippy farm commune where a friend got him a poster gig for promoter Bill Graham’s Fillmore East.
Byrd produced a poster of four people looking through a psychedelic tunnel of hot pink, purple and orange bands that had the effect of a strobe light. This led to ten years of book jackets, album covers, and posters that helped “invent the visual identity of an era.”
He depicted the Jefferson Airplane as Egyptian figurative art and the Who’s “Tommy” as a Busby Berkeley musical. His 1968 Jimi Hendrix “Experience” poster is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Louvre.
In the ’70s came posters for musicals like Stephen Sondheim’s “Follies,” and “Godspell,” reviving the musical poster as an art form.
See: Jon Mooallem , “His Posters Captured the Psychedelic Age,” The Wall Street Journal, March 8-9, 2025, p.C6.
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Help Support Katina through Sponsorships and Advertising
At the 2024 Charleston Conference, the Charleston Hub unveiled Katina, a new digital publication that addresses the value of librarians to society and elevates their role as trusted stewards of knowledge.
Named after Katina Strauch, the visionary founder of the Charleston Conference, it is written by and for the international community of librarians, and will also be of special interest to publishers and vendors.
Your support during the inaugural year (2025) will help bring this engaging content to all, openly available without restriction
Let’s Read Antiheroes
(1) Miguel de Cervantes, The Ingenious Gentleman
Don Quixote de la Mancha, (1605) (Author lists him as a “delusional antihero.” A vainglorious fool, but loveable because a book lover, although books “are his undoing.”); (2) Dorothy B. Hughes, In a Lonely Place (1947) (“Sociopathic antihero.” The mind of a serial killer that inspired Highsmith and all who followed); (3) Muriel Spark, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1961) (Eccentric narcissist who charms her girl students. Delusional.); (4) Richard Stark, The Hunter (1962) (Pseud. of Donald Westlake who wrote so many books he needed multiple names. This is one of 24 of a series about a master thief.); (5) Anthony Burgess, Inside Mr. Enderby (1963) (Dyspeptic poet who is launched on a series of improbable comic adventures.)
See: Jonathan Ames , “Five Best,” The Wall Street Journal , Feb. 22-23, 2025, p.C8. Ames is author of novel “Karma Doll.”
Failing Museum of Failure
Samuel West created the Museum of Failure, and it proved to be quite popular. After all, who wouldn’t want to see product flops like Crystal Pepsi and a golf club you could use as a urinal when you got caught in need out on the 8th fairway?
And there’s coffee-flavored Coca-Cola, Microsoft’s Zune music players and Colgate’s venture into frozen dinners. An adult section features a spray-on condom that took too long to dry.
For the Trump haters out there, you can gaze upon Trump steaks, Trump University, and the Trump board game. West took on two different sets of partners and, as will happen, it resulted in acrimony and a bankruptcy.
But as he’s fond of saying, “Failure is a bruise, not a tattoo.”
See: Zusha Elinson, “He Built a Museum of Failure, Now He’s Rooting for It to Flop,”The Wall Street Journal, Mar. 12, 2025, p.A1.
Iconic Redhead
Christina Hendricks grew up the daughter of a forest ranger moving from one hick town to the next in Oregon and Idaho. Always the new kid, she developed an attitude and was a Goth in middle school. Community theater was her salvation, and her mother encouraged this.
Christina was blond, but loved Ann-Margaret and Lucille Ball. So her mom said — go for it! She dyed her hair red!
She entered a Seventeen magazine modeling contest, modeled in NY, LA, London, Japan and Italy. She had TV commercials and music videos.
At age 30, she auditioned for “Mad Men” wanting the part of Midge, Don’s beatnik girlfriend, her persona growing up. But her age was more like office manager Joan, and this was the part she landed.
And thus we know her today.
And, historical note, both Lucille Ball and Ann-Margaret were manufactured redheads.
See: Marc Myers, “”Mad Men’ Star’s Punk-Goth Phase,” The Wall Street Journal, April 11, 2025, p.M15.
Another Obit of Note
L.J. Smith (1958-2025) was raised in Southern California and started to write her first novel in high school. Lisa Jane liked the way J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis used their initials, and did the same. The Night of the Solstice took several years to complete and only sold 5,000 copies.
But it was noticed by Alloy Entertainment and allowed her to launch the sexy vampire craze with three Vampire Diaries novels. She sold the rights for mere thousands to her regret when the CW Network produced a TV show. Of course the suits wanted her to recycle the episode plotlines as stand-alone novels.
An angry L.J. resorted to Amazon’s Kindle Worlds and began writing her own vision. An autoimmune disorder didn’t slow her down. Before it took her life, she had polished off Night World, a YA series.
See: “The author who started the teen vampire craze,” The Week, April 11, 2025, p.35.
Rumors continued from page 9
Nancy Kirkpatrick has been named Dean of Libraries at Smith College, effecting this August. Nancy joins from her most recent role as dean of university libraries at Florida International University.
Robert H. McDonald has been appointed as Senior Vice Provost and Director of the University of Texas Libraries starting this August! Robert will succeed Lorraine J. Haricombe, who has served in that role since 2015.
Masud Khokhar will become Chief Digital and Information Officer (CDIO) at the University of Leeds initially for a two year period starting in July.
My congrats to everyone!
Have you been paying attention to the Library Luminaries series on the Charleston Hub blog? Caroline Goldsmith has put together a fantastic group of interviews that feature a different librarian each month who has had a recent notable achievement,
implemented a new idea or approach in their library, who is a trail blazer, or who is an overall exemplary model of service, scholarship and innovation. Recently, featured luminaries include Nancy Kwangwa, Deputy Librarian, Women’s University in Africa, Clare Graham, Director of the Malvern-Hot Springs County Library, Theresa Quiner, Director for the Kuskokwim Consortium Library, and Isaac Gilman, Executive Director of Orbis Cascade Alliance and Dean of University Libraries at Pacific University. If you would like to nominate a librarian or library staff to be featured in this column, please reach out to Caroline at caroline@charlestonlibraryconference.com!
That’s it for this installment of the Rumors rodeo. Take care and see you next time!
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In Conversation with Megan and Tara
By AJ Boston
(Associate Professor and Scholarly Communication Librarian, Murray State University) <aboston@murraystate.edu>
with Megan Bean (Copyright & Information Policy Specialist, Assistant Professor of Practice, Mississippi State University Libraries) <megan.bean@msstate.edu>
and Tara Trentalange (Associate Attorney and Records Manager, Trentalange & Kelley, PA) <TLT@tktampa.com>
Last September, I was invited to guest edit a special issue of Against the Grain focused on current legal issues in the publishing industry. At that time, I had just commented on a class action antitrust lawsuit brought against commercial publishers for an Ask the Community roundup in The Scholarly Kitchen. The opinions I expressed there were based on my understanding of scholarly communication and publishing, but without much formal legal training to help back those views.
To help round out my thinking on the many ongoing legal issues in publishing and related industries, I reached out to two people who are a bit newer to librarianship, but have formal legal training, to share in a wide-ranging discussion on some of these topics. In this conversation, you will get to know these two upcoming librarians as we discuss cases such as Uddin v. Elsevier and Thomson Reuters v. Ross Intelligence
I am immensely grateful to Megan Bean and Tara Trentalange for dedicating time to share their perspectives here. An additional note of thanks to Megan, whose comments on Uddin v. Elsevier were substantial enough to warrant a stand alone piece which you will read in this issue.
Meet the Librarians
AJ Boston (AJ): Thank you for agreeing to be part of this conversation. Before we jump into the deep end, let’s introduce ourselves to each other and the Against the Grain readers. I’ll start. My name is AJ and I’m an associate professor and I’ve been a scholarly communication librarian at Murray State University since 2016. I graduated from library school in 2013 and previously held positions as a public library circulation manager and interim business reference & instruction librarian.
Megan Bean (MB): Hello, and thanks for this opportunity for new arrivals to converse. I’m a Professor of Practice at Mississippi State University (MSU) Libraries, where I’m a Copyright & Information Policy Specialist. I started in August 2023 and I’m the first to fill this position at MSU.
My legal perspective is grounded in my academic studies and work experiences. I have an interdisciplinary undergraduate degree in Law & Society (University of California Santa Barbara), which drives me to investigate how legal incentives work in the real world. No matter my audience, a big dollop of pragmatism shapes my copyright perspective.
My passion for the balancing act of copyright law dates back to my time at Duke Law (JD 2000), where I was influenced by the thoughtful public domain advocacy of Professor David Lange. Alas, the public domain wasn’t hiring when I exited law school, so I followed the legal market to Los Angeles, joining a Big Law Firm litigation practice with a roster of motion picture studio clients. I’ve also long been a photographer, first as a hobbyist and later as a university photographer, shooting work-for-hire. My varied journey allows me to see copyright law from multiple vantage points.
Tara Trentalange (TT): Echoing Megan, thank you for the opportunity to discuss this topic. I’m currently an associate attorney at a personal injury firm that focuses on medical malpractice on behalf of plaintiffs. We are a relatively small law firm, so I also serve as a records and information manager much of the time. I started this position after graduating from the University of Illinois Chicago Law School in 2023.
Before attending law school, I earned my master’s library and information science from the University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign in 2019. While I have no formal employment experience in libraries, I’ve worked in records management in a variety of settings from university archives to the Bureau of Land Management.
Relationship to Law, Libraries, and ScholComm
AJ: Thanks for that! Next, I’m curious to learn about your relationship with law, libraries, and your relationship with “scholarly communication.”
TT: I first discovered my interest in libraries while earning my bachelor’s degree in history at Auburn University. The history curriculum provided me many opportunities to spend time researching in the library and in the archives. I took courses on archival theory and public history, and the combination of these courses and experiences led me to the conclusion that I wanted to attend graduate school for library and information science.
While applying to library programs, I interned with the Bureau of Land Management where I created and began implementing a records management program for their archaeology department. This experience strengthened not only my interest in libraries and information science in general but also my dedication to working in this field. I toyed with the idea of becoming a law librarian, which was something I had only minimal exposure to at the time, so I applied to several places that had both a library science program and a law school. Unfortunately, I was not accepted to the law schools I applied to, but I did manage to get into the iSchool at the University of Illinois in UrbanaChampaign. I worked as a graduate research assistant in the University Archives for some time until the project I was working on was completed.
I graduated with my master’s degree shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic began in 2020 which made it difficult to gain employment in my chosen field. As such, I applied to law schools in Chicago, where I was living at the time, and was accepted to the University of Illinois at Chicago. This is where I would likely pinpoint the beginning of my relationship with the law. My law school experience looked much different than a traditional one, as for two of my three years I attended classes remotely.
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About Katina
Katina is a digital publication that uniquely addresses the value of librarians to society and elevates their role as trusted stewards of knowledge. Named after Katina Strauch, the visionary founder of the Charleston Conference, it is written by and for the international communities of librarians, vendors, and publishers.
Katina’s mission is to improve library and information science and inspire a sense of fulfillment among its worldwide professionals. It delivers content that is easy to understand, engaging, informative and accurate. It covers key topics, emerging trends, transformative technologies, and library resources, and offers guidance on career and organizational development. By celebrating librarian contributions to open science, scholarship, and the enrichment of society, Katina aims to provide a springboard for community discussion and engagement through three content sections.
Katina Features and Editors:
Editor-in-Chief: Curtis Brundy Associate University Librarian for Scholarly Communications and Collections, Iowa State University cbrundy@umass.edu
Resource Reviews: Builds on the groundwork set by The Charleston Advisor to provide critical reviews of products and resources for the information industry.
Senior Editor: Jill Emery Collection Development and Management Librarian, Portland State University Katina-Reviews@annualreviews.org
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Senior Editor: Kate McCready Program Director for Open Publishing, Big Ten Academic Alliance Katina-Open@annualreviews.org
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Senior Editor: Search in progress, announcement coming soon. Katina-Talent@annualreviews.org
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Elizabeth Weiss, Developmental Editor, eweiss@annualreviews.org
I first interacted with scholarly communications during undergrad, long before I would know that was what it was called. The scholarly communications process facilitated much of the research I engaged in during this time. Several courses had us engage in informal peer review, and we held a mock scholarly conference where we presented our research projects. In library school, I learned more about it as a subfield of information science and that the concepts I had been interacting with were within the realm of “scholarly communications.” In law school, I continued interacting with this field through the lens of copyright and intellectual property and the more specific subcategory of law reviews. I have been particularly interested in open access and institutional repositories since library school, but now I have the added legal perspective. It’s been really interesting, and also somewhat distressing, to see the interplay between rights of access and rights of authors and publishers. Open access is really important for many reasons but, personally, since I now work for a small firm, it’s really important for us to be able to do research while also keeping our costs down.
MB: It’s hard to believe that although I’d been in the MSU community for around two decades before I took this job, I’d never heard of “scholarly communication.” It’s a reminder to us all that the term has little traction outside of academic libraries. I’ve been on a steep learning curve since my arrival to Schol Comm, catching up on the quirks of copyright law in academia and becoming acquainted with this rather complicated scholarly publishing ecosystem. While it would take a lifetime to understand the details, I have a grasp of the fundamentals of the Schol Comm Dilemma from the angle of copyright law and can see the unsustainability and precariousness of the digital academic publishing world.
My legal background may make me braver (or more foolhardy) about diving headfirst into a complex and high stakes arena like Schol Comm. My advantage as a newcomer here is that I don’t yet have my own ego invested in any particular solutions. Moreover, I’m based at a library with longstanding budget constraints where we must be especially creative in our problem-solving. While wealthier academic libraries have been able to use their resources to be activist “good guys” in the open access arena, my own library has had to prioritize meeting our campus’s essential needs. I’m grateful for the institutions that have been able to support more ambitious open access initiatives for the benefit of the world. I’m working to provide what I can to our campus community: education and information.
As the only person in a position focused on the subject of copyright law on my campus — or perhaps in the whole state of Mississippi — I have the potential to have a fair bit of influence. With that in mind, I’m treading carefully as I monitor Schol Comm and the volatility of today’s copyright terrain.
Cases of Note
AJ: As I mentioned to both of you separately, this issue of Against the Grain is focused on lawsuits/legal action in the scholarly publishing and information industries. There are plenty of examples to pick from. Which of these have caught your attention?
Case of Note: Uddin v. Elsevier
MB: I’ve been fascinated by the antitrust class action lawsuit Lucina Uddin v. Elsevier, B.V., et al., No. 1:24-cv-06409 (E.D.N.Y. Sept. 12, 2024). The case’s implications could be huge for Schol Comm, yet I’ve seen little discussion of the fundamental issues that raised red flags for me. Whatever the outcome of the case,
the concerns brought up by Uddin could spur many a lively conversation.
AJ : Megan, there has been plenty of conversation about Uddin v. Elsevier from folks who are knowledgeable in scholarly communication but are perhaps less versed in actual law (telling on myself here). It sounds like you have a bit of the reverse here: formal legal training and experience and self-proclaimed “newcomer” status in scholarly communication. Can you share a bit more about the fundamental legal issues that us scholcommers may be overlooking?
MB: Thanks AJ. This seems like a fine time to mention that, in addition to my being a Schol Comm newbie, I claim no expertise in antitrust or class action law, so take my broad sweeping observations with a healthy grain of salt.
What fascinates me about Uddin is not parsing through the legal nitty gritty but marveling about the forces that brought us to this particular class action case at this moment. And also bracing ourselves for its potential impact.
I can see how antitrust law applied here would — by design — make scholarly publishing more beholden to market forces. That impetus becomes even more remarkable when coupled with the observation that universities and funding agencies have no say in the matter. Could this be the perfect storm?
AJ: Megan, your original response had so much depth, we spun it into its own standalone piece. I appreciate the unique insights you raise there! We talked a bit about this back in the winter, but would you care to share a bit about your legal experience that pertains to Uddin?
MB : What an opportunity to share my meandering observations! And sure, I’m also happy to relay a story from my past as a litigator. What follows falls more in the category of cocktail party banter but, way back, when I was a Big Firm junior associate, I was part of a team involved in one of the most important book industry lawsuits of the time, and it was on antitrust grounds: American Booksellers Ass’n v. Barnes & Noble, Inc., 135 F. Supp. 2d 1031 (N.D. Cal. 2001). The American Book Association & 23 independent bookstores had sued Barnes & Noble and Borders, alleging that the large booksellers were unfairly using their market dominance to receive discounts & preferential treatment from publishers.
The case ended with a decisive summary judgment victory on behalf of the defendants, and the remaining bits of the case settled soon after. I recall rather nice bottles of champagne being handed out to all the victorious attorneys, with gratitude from Len Riggio (B&N’s leader and largest shareholder until the sale of the company in 2019).
My experience in this one court battle punctuates a point: if you’re going to bet on a winning side, remember that owing to their deep resources, the odds are nearly always in the favor of the mega firms and the clients who can afford them.
Interestingly, parallel to the factors leading to Uddin, the ABA v. B&N case arose during a moment of particular stress in the publishing & bookselling marketplace. Independent booksellers had been under tremendous market pressure from the dominant big box booksellers. Curiously, even at the time, the biggest threat to all wasn’t a named defendant: Amazon was circling all the parties to this case, challenging the very future of brick and mortar bookstores. Ten years later, Borders would file for bankruptcy. Who would have guessed then that Barnes & Noble and so many key independent booksellers would prove nimble enough to withstand these last decades of market turbulence? What a reminder of the ability of various players
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Katina is a digital publication that addresses the value of librarians to society and elevates their role as trusted stewards of knowledge. Named after Katina Strauch, the visionary founder of the Charleston Conference, it is written by and for the international communities of librarians, vendors, and publishers and covers content across three core sections:
Resource Reviews, which provides critical reviews of products and resources for the information industry.
Open Knowledge, which addresses the evolving roles of libraries and librarians and their contributions toward an open knowledge ecosystem
The Future of Work , which offers practical insight into library careers and organizational development
www.katinamagazine.org
Ar ticle Proposals
our
Katina welcomes proposals from authors interested in contributing to any of our three sections We encourage prospective authors to familiarize themselves with the content of the publication before submitting a proposal . Our readership is broad and varied in their level of experience in the industry, from early career to advanced management level and beyond. Our goal is to provide easy-to-understand, engaging, informative, and accurate content that will be of general interest to the entire library and scholarly communications community.
to adapt to change: it’s a fool’s errand to prognosticate during a time of great disruption.
During the ABA v. B&N litigation, I was tasked with getting to know the independent bookseller plaintiffs and I found my loyalty to our client sorely tested by the journey. In the years since, I’ve done penance by making a point of supporting independent booksellers whenever I can. I’m delighted that (a) so many independent booksellers have proved resilient to changing times and (b) that I now find myself in a position where my moral compass more easily aligns with the tasks of my job. While the values supported by academic libraries feel like they’re under fire all the time, at least they’re causes I feel extra motivated to fight for.
Cases of Note: Thomson Reuters v.Ross Intelligence
TT: There are a couple of cases I’ve been keeping an eye on, and both of them broadly implicate fair use among other things. The first is Hachette v. Internet Archive, which has been discussed at length for the past couple of years. The second, which I have seen little public discussion regarding, is Thomson Reuters v. Ross Intelligence. This case is especially interesting to me because it also involves the training of Artificial Intelligence (AI) large language models on copyrighted materials. In early February, a federal district court in Delaware ruled that the AI usage of Reuters’s copyrighted materials — specifically, Westlaw headnotes — was not fair use.
AJ: Tara, do you have a general philosophy about fair use, copyright, and large language models? Can you briefly summarize (for a novice such as myself) the court ruling in the case of Thomson Reuters v. Ross Intelligence, and whether it seemed like the right call, in your opinion?
TT: Similar to Megan, I don’t claim to be an expert in the specific subject matter of this case. I took some classes on copyright, trademarks, and patent law in law school. I dabbled a bit in copyright in library school as well. So my opinion on these topics is influenced by both of these schools of thought as well as keeping up with a few current cases.
I generally support a broad application of the doctrine of fair use because it promotes and facilitates research, the spread of knowledge, and freedom of expression. Strict enforcement of copyright without fair use would, for example, hinder the ability of educators to use copyrighted materials for learning purposes or prevent libraries from being able to digitize their copyrighted materials because they would need to obtain permission from the copyright holder. This would place an enormous administrative and financial burden on anyone attempting to access and teach about anything copyrighted. It would also thwart the purpose of copyright protections by stifling the flow of knowledge.
As for copyright, I understand the purpose for which it was originally created, but I think what we’re seeing currently runs counter to that stated purpose. I tend to agree with the view that copyright has evolved in the context of capitalism to no longer benefit the creators themselves but the corporations that control the copyright. And since these corporations have the resources, they’ve amassed huge amounts of copyrighted material. We’ve seen this with academic publishers like Megan discussed, but it’s also an issue in the music industry and in entertainment.
It’s complex because, while I don’t support strict enforcement of copyright protections and am generally in favor of fair use, I’m also wary of large language models like the one at issue in Ross Intelligence and the scraping of copyrighted material in order to train these models. In that case, Ross Intelligence was building a
legal research tool to compete with Thomson Reuters’s Westlaw. In order to train this model to produce reliable results to natural language queries, Ross sought to license Westlaw’s Key Number System and headnotes. Thomson Reuters declined. Ross then sought to train their model on memos generated by a third party company, LegalEase Solutions. However, LegalEase was drafting these memos using Westlaw’s data, including the Key Number System and headnotes. This led Thomson Reuters to sue Ross Intelligence for copyright infringement.
In federal court, Thomson Reuters argued that the use of its Key Number System and the case headnotes in training Ross Intelligence’s legal research tool infringed on their copyrights. Ross Intelligence argued that its use of this material was permitted under the fair use doctrine and that the headnotes were not sufficiently original enough to qualify for copyright protections. Both parties moved for summary judgment on the issues.
The most recent development in this case was the court granting partial summary judgment in favor of Thomson Reuters on the issues of infringement and the failure of Ross Intelligence’s defenses, including the affirmative defense of fair use. In a twenty-four page memorandum opinion, the court held that Ross infringed at least 2,243 headnotes and that their various defenses did not hold water.
In order to prove infringement of copyright, the plaintiff must show that it owned valid copyright in the first place. The plaintiff must also show that the alleged infringer (Ross) copied protectable elements of the copyrighted work. The second factor of this analysis has two parts: that Ross actually copied the protected work and that Ross’s copy was substantially similar to the copyrighted work. Actual copying means that the alleged infringer did, in fact, use the copyrighted work in creating his or her own. This can be proven directly with evidence that the defendant copied the work, or indirectly by showing the defendant had access to the work and produced something substantially similar.
Copyright registrations made before or within five years after the first publication of a work are prima facie evidence of the validity of copyright. This can be rebutted by showing that the works are not original because the Constitution limits copyright protections to original works. But the threshold for “originality” is remarkably low and requires only a minimal degree of creativity. The court explained in detail that both the headnotes and the Key Number System meet this creativity threshold. The headnotes are original on an individual basis, because they “introduce creativity by distilling, synthesizing, or explaining” part of a judicial opinion. The headnotes are also original as a compilation because the compiler makes choices of selection and arrangement. Thus, the court held that Thomson Reuters has valid copyright in the works at issue.
The court also found that Ross Intelligence had actually copied at least 2,243 headnotes and that there was a substantial similarity between the headnotes and the Bulk Memos produced by LegalEase. The defense of innocent infringement was rejected because it is inapplicable where the infringed work bears a copyright notice, as Westlaw’s headnotes do. Copyright misuse was also rejected as a defense because Ross failed to make a showing that Thomson Reuters had misused its copyrights to stifle competition. Ross had previously attempted to bring an antitrust counterclaim against Reuters on a similar theory of stifling competition, but the court rejected this argument as well. The remaining defenses of merger and scènes à faire were also rejected as inapplicable to the facts of the case.
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As for the fair use defense, the court considered four factors: the use’s purpose and character, the copyrighted work’s nature, how much of the work was used and how substantial it was in relation to the whole of the work, and how the use affected the potential market or the value of the copyrighted work. Ultimately, the court ruled in favor of Thomson Reuters and rejected Ross’s fair use argument.
The court declined to grant summary judgment on the issue of the Key Number System, finding that there were still factual disputes. Summary judgment is proper where there is no issue as to any material fact and the party moving for summary judgment is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law. So the issue involving the Key Number System would need to be brought in front of a jury.
As for my opinion on whether this was the right call, my answer would have to be that it depends. The judge who authored this opinion, Judge Bibas, is very convincing. But as with many issues in law, I can see the argument for both sides here.
AJ: Tara, with the court having rejected Ross’ fair use argument, what downstream effects (or lessons) do you think that libraries, vendors, publishers should now be considering?
TT: Taking into account that the set of facts in the above case is really quite different from the lending model of libraries and other established cases of fair use, the court’s rejection of that argument here could lead to stricter enforcement of copyright protections to the detriment of fair use. For libraries, fair use is extremely important for lending materials to their patrons.
On the other hand, or perhaps on a spectrum of fair use and copyright, publishers (who are often the holders of copyrights) financially benefit from enforcement of copyright protections. This case could represent an opening for publishers to seek enforcement of those protections by limiting fair use by libraries and other institutions. As for vendors, I see them as sort of in the middle of the spectrum but closer to a stricter enforcement of copyright because they are licensed to distribute copyrighted materials.
More than anything, I think the overall lesson here is that this issue is not going away, and it’s not something that’s cut and dry. I think we’re going to see more lawsuits by copyright holders challenging fair use in the immediate future, and they’re going to have monumental effects on libraries.
Based on this case and in combination with Megan’s assessments and her litigation experience mentioned above, another lesson to be learned is that antitrust law doesn’t seem to favor the little guy. It’s worth mentioning that Ross Intelligence was a startup company with very little resources, and Thomson Reuters is a behemoth of a company with a market cap of $82.21 Billion. In Ross, one of the very first arguments they made was that Thomson Reuters’s Westlaw violated antitrust law. It was dismissed almost immediately. Ross Intelligence shut down in 2021, citing this very lawsuit and the financial burden of litigating it as the reason.
Topics in this Issue
AJ: In the issue of Against the Grain, we expect to see pieces covering a variety of topics. Are there any burning questions you hope to see answered in any of these?
TT: I’d like to know more about what the future of the Internet Archive is going to look like in the aftermath of Hachette , because I’m a staunch supporter of the Internet Archive. Additionally, I’m a resident of Florida, which has the highest or one of the highest amounts of books that have been banned by the Florida Department of Education, so I’d definitely like to know more about any legal challenges to book bans. It’s baffling to even say that education officials have banned books.
MB: This will be an interesting issue, indeed. I’m most interested in the intersection of data cartels and scholarly communication and am eager to read all I can on the subject. Schol Comm has been wrestling with the copyright ownership and control issues for years, but data cartel issues now loom as the most existential threat. It seems that everyone’s aggressive pursuit of Open Access at all costs has aligned with other market forces to create even bigger problems. It pains me to see the data mongers and AI proponents working together to kill the beating heart of copyright law at the expense of creators. I can see how all the data recorded from scholars’ interacting with journal articles could lead to some dystopian observation and control situations for academics and universities in general. Data has value, and anyone who can pay for it can use it for their own ends. These are terrifying times and we all should be paying close attention.
AJ: These are great questions to be thinking about and I hope some of the pieces in the rest of this issue will help illuminate. Thank you both for taking part in this conversation!
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Uddin v. Elsevier: Peculiar By Design?
By Megan Bean (Copyright & Information Policy Specialist, Assistant Professor of Practice, Mississippi State University Libraries) <megan.bean@msstate.edu>
This commentary addresses the Uddin v. Elsevier lawsuit, focusing on its “Unpaid Peer Review Rule” prong and how the incentives of class action have shaped the case. Moreover, the plaintiffs have framed the issue as a dispute solely between scholars and publishers. But this excludes the universities and government funders that have hitherto financed the bulk of academic publishing and may bear the indirect costs of this litigation. Only time will tell the impact of this massive class action, which could shift the dynamics of scholarly publishing during a time of turbulence.
State of the Case
Since the initial flurry of discussion about Uddin v. Elsevier soon after its filing in the fall, most onlookers have quieted into a wait-and-see mode. This makes sense: a class action lawsuit of this scale tends to move at a glacial pace, and there’s nothing new to report. Those of us watching from afar will get to witness the filings picking up pace during the summer, with the Defendants’ motions to dismiss due by May 5th. Barring any extensions, we can expect the back and forth of the opposition and replies to wrap up by August 6th. The motion to dismiss process is timed for the case to have an opportunity to disappear in part or in its entirety at this early stage, before all involved have invested significant time and resources in what could be a lengthy and costly discovery and litigation process.
This lull is a good moment to point out the incentives at play and the voices that are pointedly missing from the litigation. In this commentary, I’m going to focus my attention on the prong of the complaint that I find most interesting and far-reaching: the “Unpaid Peer Review Rule,” along with the particularities of Uddin v. Elsevier
Class Action Fundamentals
First, let’s pause to note the class action nature of this case. Our legal system uses the lure of giant potential payoffs to incentivize plaintiff class action attorneys to be on the lookout for their next big lawsuit. I wish I knew the backstory of how this case came into being, but I feel confident that it wasn’t initiated by the first named plaintiff, Lucina Uddin. It’s unlikely that Uddin knocked on doors until she found an attorney who sympathized with her qualms and was willing to take on her case. She was more likely head-hunted as having the right specs to represent the class of publishing scholars: Uddin has published over 175 academic articles and “provided peer review services for over 150 journals, including journals owned by each of the six Publisher Defendants: Elsevier, Wolters Kluwer, Wiley, Sage, Taylor & Francis, and Springer.”
Per the Lieff Cabraser website, this plaintiff firm has a track record of bringing class action cases against universities. While hanging around academia, I’m sure there were plenty of opportunities to hear disgruntled faculty bemoaning the injustices and monopolist tensions of the scholarly publishing ecosystem. The class action lawyers’ task was to line up the optimum deep pocket defendants, find a viable legal theory for their case, and seek out a handful of scholar plaintiffs to represent the huge class.
By the November 15th Amended Class Action Complaint, the class representatives were rounded out with three
more “Scholar Plaintiffs.”
Presumably, the added academics were also vetted for their likeability and ability to fill strategic gaps in the claims, adjusted to tell the optimum story. It’s also customary to offer representative plaintiffs a larger piece of the ultimate class action award pie: additional compensation to recognize their time and service to the case.
Herding Academic Cats
It’s especially amazing to see how with one case filing, Uddin has been able to shepherd all publishing scholars into a single class, with the plaintiff attorneys acting as their legal voice and puppet master. For under the U.S. class action laws, the plaintiff class is an automatic “opt-in” format. Any class member could later ask to opt out, but there are logistical obstacles and little incentive to do so. Few scholar authors could afford to bring a lawsuit on their own. Opting out would amount to a selfharming symbolic protest; after exiting the class, the former member would have no voice in the outcome and miss the chance to receive their sliver of any eventual proceeds.
Once the judge certifies the class, the plaintiff attorneys get to advocate on behalf of all publishing academics, whatever their individual thoughts about the scholarly publishing world. What power!
The “Scheme” as Described is not the “Schol Comm Dilemma”
I’m here to join in the chorus of others who have observed that the complaint’s articulation of the “Publisher Defendants’ Scheme” comes across as… weird.
The plaintiff attorneys have borrowed snippets of familiar language used to describe the Schol Comm Dilemma, but they’ve harnessed it to different ends. They’ve voiced the shocking heart of the problem: how taxpayer money has been hemorrhaging towards mega-publishers that “have sustained profit margins that far exceed the most successful corporations in the economy.” It feels as if the plaintiff attorneys smelled blood, found deep pockets, and pulled language from decades of others’ railing about academic publishing. But in order to shape a cognizable case with these plaintiffs and these defendants, they haven’t told the story as I understand it. The complaint does not directly address the fundamental Schol Comm Dilemma horror of how modern academia feels as if it is now at the beck and call of giant corporate interests.
[Sidebar: The tale would be familiar to any readers here, but here’s my newcomer’s vast simplification on how we got to this point. First, journal consolidation led to the amassing of many copyrighted article minimonopolies, hidden behind ever-pricier paywalls. And then heavyweight distribution networks loomed as the next threat, harnessing publishing and readership data to make their business models indispensable to the academic P&T process. All this has driven up overall costs, funneling
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more and more taxpayer money into the hands of megacorporations. The pre-digital publishing world may have been relatively inefficient, but at least those journal business models seemed aligned with the public interest values of academia, with the copyright safety valves of first sale and fair use protected by libraries’ owning physical journal copies. And importantly, back in that halcyon pre-digital world, there was a thriving academic publishing ecosystem, with many more small publishers able to take part in the competitive marketplace.]
The origins of the Schol Comm Dilemma lie in the peculiarity of how academic norms differ from one’s usual expectations for copyright law: in other comparable workplaces, the copyright in articles published by full-time faculty employees would have been treated as work-for-hire: intellectual property owned and managed by the employer universities. If universities had been the ones managing their faculty employees’ copyrights and scholarly publishing contracts all along, I imagine today’s scholarly publishing marketplace would better reflect the priorities of academia.
Instead, university Schol Comm advocates and government funders have attempted to use their limited influence to counter the broken publishing marketplace, finding ways to slow the monopoly forces and retain some scraps of academia’s public interest values. Given the individual publishing contracts that underlie it all, it’s been a real challenge to herd those faculty cats: educating faculty about their author rights, getting faculty and institutional buy-in for rights retention and Open Access Policies, and attaching open access requirements to research output from publicly funded grants. These efforts have tried to shelter academia from the harms of capitalism run awry, but it often feels as if they’ve only built speedbumps against everstrengthening market forces.
Note that antitrust class action lawsuits are supposed to remove market hindrances. By design, Uddin is here to increase the efficiency of capitalism by removing those speedbumps.
Universities are Shut Out of this Lawsuit
There are many oddities with this case but, for me, the primary strangeness comes from the convenient removal of universities from the equation. The complaint proposes that academic publishing is an exclusive relationship between scholars and publishers, and that a lawsuit with just these parties can resolve the antitrust problems plaguing the industry. This excludes those who have traditionally paid for the lion’s share of the rising publishing costs: government funders and universities (backed by taxpayer dollars). Are universities destined to be the real losers here?
If publishers lose or settle this lawsuit, surely they’ll pass those charges along to their university customer base. And in addition to indirectly footing the bill for this expensive litigation, will universities find themselves also now paying the pass-on costs for paid peer review? It feels like no matter what, the funders lose.
I can see at least two additional reasons why universities were left out of the case: (1) Lieff Cabraser is accustomed to suing universities and seeing them as the “bad guys”; it’s difficult to switch sides to lobby on behalf of those you have long viewed as your opponents. (2) If individual academics are hard to herd, just try herding universities, each with their own general counsel and the means to hire skilled outside law firms. In any litigation with such high stakes, universities would want to exert control. I can’t imagine these large and powerful entities allowing themselves to be automatically “opted in” to a plaintiff class, with a random
entrepreneurial firm serving as their united voice and binding them to the outcome.
So it’s not an obvious conspiracy to leave out universities (and their take on how to protect academia and the public interest). But nonetheless, universities and government funders now have no obvious say in the outcome, which could include an injunction dictating the future business model of scholarly publishing.
Curious Timing
It’s worth reminding us all that for the plaintiffs, the perfect class action case is not one where the parties fight to the bitter end, reaching the jury trial called for in the complaint. Ideally, the plaintiff attorneys want to motivate the defendants to settle long before expensive litigation eats up too much of their potential future winnings.
What if to reach that earlier settlement, the plaintiffs can promise the publisher defendants something they might actually want? They have devised a negotiation table where publishers can speak directly to a few representative professors, while shutting out the clamor and obstructions of universities and government funding agencies. Could this case offer commercial academic publishers the “global peace” of an unfettered capitalistic model?
Filed just a few months before the tumult of 2025, Uddin seems to have eerily provident timing. At this existential crossroads, political and financial pressures appear to be aligning to shrink the role of academic institutions. Publishers are looking at the likelihood of smaller streams of funding from federal grants and library budgets. To keep their business models viable in the face of a turbulent forecast, there might be increased mutual incentives for both faculty and commercial publishers to minimize the policy input of increasingly powerless university middlemen. (Those universities may also be busy just trying to survive.)
Could this case be timed to offer a neutral “the litigation made us” pathway towards paid peer review? And if this revised funding model impacts the whole industry, what might be the outcome?
Academics could be cast even more as independent contractors, with potential value beyond their university employment. By reviewing X times, they could publish Y times. If publishers have enough capital on hand, they could tweak the ratio as needed to keep journal content flowing. Assuming Open Access is the dominant publishing model, the largest publishers would continue to shift their business towards the selling of data from their network platforms. Continuing academic P&T demands and research would presumably continue to drive the market for the data-driven networks. Depending on the going price for reviewing, some academics might be able to turn reviewing into a serious moonlighting gig, augmenting their salaries or even becoming free agents, paying the rent in between academic jobs.
This whole case could be following the 2025 playbook. Just let government step aside so that capitalism can work without obstruction. But will it be in the mutual interests of the named parties in this case to settle on this model? And what about the broader competitiveness of the marketplace: how might all this impact the smaller academic publishers?
As we all know, Uddin is a super complicated case, with many elements at play. but the factors addressed here — and the missing voice of universities in the case — seem to call out for additional attention. And now we sit on the sidelines to watch how it plays out.
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Federal Oversight Targets Scholarly Publishing: Antitrust, Censorship, and the Expanding Case for Research Fraud Liability
By Ryan James Jessup JD/MPA (Owner, Social Web Branding Publishing Consultants) <RyanJamesJessup@gmail.com>
Guest Editor’s Note: Ryan James Jessup JD/MPA, owner of www.SocialWebBranding.com, explores how federal scrutiny of scholarly publishing is intensifying amid antitrust cases, censorship investigations, and concerns over fraud in federally funded research. He examines the collapse of Hindawi, mass retractions, and foreign influence risks that have exposed failures in publisher-run peer review systems. As legal pressure builds to hold publishers liable for compromised studies, Jessup argues that retractions increasingly signal editorial negligence. He concludes that while independent peer review certification is gaining traction as a market response, accountability in publicly funded research remains an open question. — AJB
The scholarly publishing industry, long criticized for monopolistic practices, faces intensifying legal scrutiny. As major publishers shift blame onto researchers for failures in peer review and research integrity, lawmakers and federal agencies are escalating antitrust litigation, censorship inquiries, and expanding financial and criminal liability for fraudulent federally funded research.
Legal scholars and regulators are now questioning whether publishers should bear financial responsibility for fraudulent research funded by taxpayers. Emerging legal precedents suggest publishers may soon face accountability for disseminating compromised studies.
Antitrust Action: Federal Scrutiny and the Hindawi Collapse
In Uddin v. Elsevier et al. (2024), six major academic publishers — Elsevier, John Wiley & Sons, Sage Publications, Springer Nature, Taylor & Francis, and Wolters Kluwer — are accused of colluding to suppress competition by fixing peer review prices at zero and restricting manuscript submissions. The lawsuit underscores concerns among the DOJ Antitrust Division and FTC, who previously scrutinized publisher mergers.
A critical illustration emerged following Wiley’s 2021 acquisition of Hindawi. Within two years, Hindawi was inundated with paper mills, manipulated peer reviews, and fraud, leading to thousands of retractions. The scale highlighted how unchecked consolidation can erode editorial oversight and facilitate widespread fraud.
The Emerging Case for Publisher Liability in Research Fraud
“Whether due to nonfeasance, editorial negligence, or outright fraud, most retractions indicate that a study did not meet even the most basic standards of academic scrutiny through peer review. Publishers claim that the value journals bring to the scholarly community is held in the integrity of peer review. But
every single retraction — 100% of them — represents a failure of that very same peer review system,” commented Mr. Christopher Marcum, Senior Statistician and Senior Scientist at the White House Office of Management and Budget, Office of the Chief Statistician of the United States. Marcum continued, “According to Retraction Watch, in just 2024, a single publisher issued nearly 3,000 retractions. That’s just a single publisher in a single year and likely a significant undercount because of the largely passive and lengthy processes it takes to identify, investigate, and eventually act on issues once identified in a published article. It took the Lancet 12 years to retract the 1998 Wakefield paper, which continues to harm the public to this day. The publishers were never held to account for the preventable disease and death that article caused while claiming continued value of its (failed) peer review system.”
Under the False Claims Act (FCA), entities misusing federal funds face legal accountability. In United States ex rel. Thomas v. Duke University, Duke paid $112.5 million for falsified federally funded research. This principle could extend liability to publishers profiting from disseminating compromised federally funded studies.
Emerging legal scholarship, supported by precedents such as United States ex rel. Joshua Harman v. Trinity Industries, Inc. (2017), suggests publishers profiting from fraudulent federally funded research without rigorous peer review safeguards could face FCA liability.
Retractions serve as litmus tests of publishers’ accountability. The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) faced highprofile retractions, notably the 2001 Bezwoda breast cancer study, still erroneously cited without retraction acknowledgment. Publishers failing proactive retraction management risk undermining the integrity of scientific knowledge.
NY State Senators Demand Investigation into Censorship
In October 2024, New York senators John Liu, Toby Stavisky, and Iwen Chu called for an investigation into Springer Nature’s $2.7 million SUNY contract, accusing the publisher of censoring research to comply with Chinese government policies. Springer Nature allegedly blocked studies in China and pressured Taiwanese researchers to align with China’s political stance, raising concerns about academic freedom and foreign influence.
Federal agencies now closely scrutinize undisclosed foreign influence in research. Publishers found suppressing federally funded research or altering content under foreign censorship demands could face severe legal penalties and restrictions on government contracts.
These allegations are part of broader concerns about foreign influence in academic research. Federal agencies have been increasingly vigilant about undisclosed foreign involvement in research activities. Publishers and institutions found suppressing federally funded research or altering content under
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foreign censorship demands could face legal penalties and restrictions on government contracts. The Department of Justice has emphasized the importance of transparency and compliance with laws like the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA).
Third-Party Peer Review Certification as a Safeguard
Facing increased liability and fraud exposure, publishers are turning to independent peer review certification programs like COPE, STM Integrity Hub, Crossref, Reviewer Credits, and PeerReviewMe.org. These programs offer standardized professional alternatives, reducing fraud risks and liability exposure.
If regulatory scrutiny intensifies further, third-party certification could become essential to publishers’ continued authority to publish federally funded research.
Ultimately, as scholarly publishing navigates unprecedented scrutiny, the central question emerges: Should publishers continue benefiting financially from publicly funded research without bearing equal accountability for systemic failures in peer review, censorship, and research integrity?
References
Uddin v. Elsevier et al., No. 2:24-cv-07652 (C.D. Cal. 2024).
United States ex rel. Thomas v. Duke University, No. 1:17-cv276 (M.D.N.C. 2019).
United States ex rel. Harman v. Trinity Industries, Inc., 872 F.3d 645 (5th Cir. 2017).
“New York Senate Inquiry into Springer Nature’s SUNY Contract,” New York Post.
“Federal Scrutiny of Research Fraud under the False Claims Act,” U.S. Department of Justice Press Release.
“Hindawi Fraud and Retraction Concerns,” Nature News
Christopher Marcum, LinkedIn Profile, https://www.linkedin. com/in/christopher-steven-marcum-15b88249/
“Springer Nature Retracted 2,923 Papers Last Year,” Retraction Watch, February 17, 2025, https://retractionwatch. com/2025/02/17/springer-nature-journal-retractions-2024/
“Corporate Lessons from Recent Foreign Influence Prosecutions,” Reuters, January 13, 2025, https://www.reuters. com/legal/legalindustry/corporate-lessons-recent-foreigninfluence-prosecutions-2025-01-13/.
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Academic Libraries, Legal Infrastructure, and Information Politics
By Allison Jennings-Roche (Associate Director of Digital Initiatives & Collections, RLB Library, The University of Baltimore) <ajenningsroche@ubalt.edu>
and Paul T. Jaeger
(Professor and Distinguished Scholar-Teacher, The University of Maryland) <pjaeger@umd.edu>
The United States, over the past hundred years, has built a remarkably robust knowledge sharing infrastructure, full of institutions and personnel that work and often collaborate in increasingly innovative ways to meet the needs of our communities and researchers. Public, academic, school, and special libraries not only collect resources, but they build tools and systems (consortia) to share those resources between each institution. The invisible yet essential backbone of this knowledge sharing infrastructure is the legal infrastructure, everything from the Constitution to copyright laws, which both protect intellectual property and academic freedom, but also allow for fair use and collaboration.
Issues of law directly impacting library activities — particularly freedom of expression and fair use — have been extensively addressed in policy making and through courts. While policies regarding specific kinds of fiscal allocations and even some levels of collection development vary from institution to institution and sometimes even state to state, librarians were able to operate under the assumption that the protections afforded by the law, as understood by the pillars of our field, would remain inviolable. For example, courts have consistently upheld the rights of librarians who work in public institutions to express their opinions on issues related to the library so long their opinions do not negatively impact the operations of the library, but the laws that now exist in many states creating criminal liabilities for librarians seem to indicate otherwise in practice.
Recent developments in the political landscape in the United States have completely destabilized the foundations of the practice of librarianship, both in terms of financial support for the institutions of the field and in terms of presumed protections of library professionals. It is now a felony in many states for librarians to provide access to certain types of books to their communities, libraries have been completely defunded and replaced with Sheriff’s offices in some communities, many state legislatures have seriously considered shuttering their state libraries, and librarians across the country are navigating censorship movements, disinformation flows, and attempts to erasure entire cultures from collections (Jaeger, Jennings-Roche, et al. 2023).
This current aggressively anti-library political climate has roots in many eras, and the politicization of information has been building for nearly a century. The collections of libraries of all types were threatened and frequently censored during the anti-communist Red Scare of the 1950s. The tactics of McCarthyism were then transferred to the civil rights movement. By the 1980s, the election of Ronald Reagan ushered in the era of neoliberal economic policy — in which we still reside — that significantly devalues anything that is not a capitalist venture, including the institutions of the public good and the community good (Buschman, 2020). The Clinton administration
in the 1990s expanded this philosophy to include rebranding the government itself as a business. George W. Bush’s administration brought curtailments of information access in many libraries through the requirements for computer and network filters from the Children’s Internet Protection Act and the removal and classification of much material under the USA PATRIOT Act (Jaeger, 2007; Klosek, 2025).
Tying these threads together, the first Trump administration repeatedly expressed intentions to end all federal funding for libraries, other cultural heritage institutions, and information access and literacy programs. These intentions are abruptly being brought to crushing reality in the second Trump administration, with federal funding through the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) and other sources has disappeared.
As of the writing of this article, public libraries and school libraries remain most publicly in the crosshairs of the far-right as they seek to exert control over American society through control of materials in library collections and school curriculums. These kinds of libraries thus far have received the brunt of the censorship, criminalization, book bans, and defunding efforts.
However, academic libraries are not immune and should not operate as if their larger institutional affiliation will save them or their users. While the states that have passed criminalization laws have focused them on public and school libraries, the laws in many of these states are written so that they could potentially be applied to more institutions, like publicly-funded museums and libraries at publicly-funded higher education institutions. Along with the range of other challenges brought by disinformation and cultural erasure movements, academic freedom, as an ideal and as a practice, is directly under threat from the federal and state involvement in curtailing student and faculty speech under the current administration. Just as the threats to imprison librarians are an extreme extension of censorship, so are threats to deport international students and faculty members for voicing opinions that the administration does not like.
Information politics has already significantly infiltrated our institutions. Academic library workers and the publishers and vendors we rely on (and who profit from our success) would do well to take seriously our responsibilities to our researchers and to the protection of knowledge itself. The recent extreme accelerations of information politics make it profoundly unwise to act as though this will all blow over or to believe that operating under the previous status quo will serve as an effective shield.
Data, Privacy, and Social Justice
Libraries, especially academic libraries, have handed more and more of our systems, processes, and collections
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over to third party companies and vendors, taking for granted that those organizations would share our values and priorities, such as protecting the privacy of patrons. Recent technological developments have made searching faster, collection development less labor intensive, and even research more targeted and specific. However, the success of these tools and technologies relies on the release of massive amounts of data about our researchers, our institutions, and our students to the companies. Unfortunately, such companies could also decide to — or be forced to — hand over this data to the government.
The underlying assumptions of institutional neutrality and academic freedom, not to mention consistent federal funding, that have built the culture of academia today are being challenged in real time by an administration that is openly nationalist and anti-intellectual in its aims to reshape the work of American scholars and students (Stanley, 2024).
The looming threats for academic libraries are being previewed in public and school libraries right now. Book bans are being used as a tool to specifically remove the perspectives and experiences of traditionally marginalized populations from collections, including Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC), lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, intersex, asexual and beyond (LGBTQIA+), Jewish, and disabled (Knox 2015, Jaeger, Jennings-Roche et al. 2024). Library workers in many states face potential prison sentences of ten years for failing to adhere to the book bans. In some locations, databases have been removed from public access and police check the shelves of the library for banned books. If legislatures are willing to impose these kinds of draconian measures on public and school libraries, there is no reason to think that the same state legislatures would hesitate to extend the measures to public institutions of higher education.
In higher education, the federal government has been actively promoting goals of cultural erasure through the collection of information from universities about international students and employees, removing federal funding if institutions do not end programs deemed related to diversity, inclusion, and equity (DEI), cancelling grant funds for projects deemed DEI, and even deporting some international students whose views were too publicly in contrast to the policies of the administration.
In all of these circumstances, the data of the library could be used to further administration goals at any institution of higher education. As a result, understanding the data collection practices of the tools being used in libraries is of utmost importance. It can no longer be something that we can trust others to have secured.
When vendors offer new databases/subscriptions/journals based on the research interests of our users, we must immediately question what data is being collected in order to make that determination. We are already seeing how the second Trump administration is pulling funding based on programs or courses; the ability to quickly access data about the top search terms at any one academic institution would be a treasure trove for those seeking to target institutions where “unacceptable” topics are being researched.
Libraries must know from companies that they work with:
• What data is being collected?
• Where is it being stored?
• How long is it being retained?
• What security protocols are in place?
• What are the politics of the organization should any governmental agency seek access to this information?
All of these questions must be taken incredibly seriously when considering resources.
Often in marketing demonstrations and sales calls this information is not shared and representatives are not fully knowledgeable on the details of their tools. The use of algorithmic and machine learning recommendations offered by many of the AI “upgrades” for these resources fundamentally requires training data about the research being done by students, employees, and faculty members — including the library professionals, of course — at each institution.
At the time of writing this article, attacks by the federal government on academic institutions are only becoming more extreme. Limits on collections, like at the Naval Academy, are horrifying, but they are only the beginning of what will likely be much wider attacks on research, knowledge creation, and academic freedom (Alonso, 2025). Third party resources have troves of data that could potentially be wielded to target those using tools based on their research topics.
The overall shift to digital collections has allowed for seamless and real-time access to many materials for researchers and library users. However, when information is politicized, licensing and subscription based models are even more precarious than physical collections. Additionally, physical copies of materials are readily shared between institutions; not all eBooks are interoperable or allow for intra-institutional lending (Halperin, 2025).
Sales trends have also reflected broader shifts in culture; and vendors and publishers kept pace by offering resources reflecting the social justice consciousness that arose in the Black Lives Matter (BLM), #MeToo, and related movements. However, having subscriptions to such products now would seem to make a library more likely to be targeted by the administration, either through direct action like cutting federal funding to the institution or through collection of the usage information of those databases from the vendors offering the databases. Ironically, as vendors will likely seek to avoid being seen negatively by the government for offering social justice products, they may cease to offer not only social justice specific products but a much wider array of products for fear that they might be labelled “social justice,” resulting in further cultural erasure.
Social justice is not an “add-on” and should not be siloed away from other resources about various populations and epistemologies that can be easily monitored or removed, but data products reducing justice to marketable buzzwords have done exactly that. In the movement to capitalize on trends, isolating these collections in such as way not only reinforces that this information is outside the norm and therefore needs to be opted in to, but it also allows for outside political forces to target libraries based on these subscriptions and could subtly reinforce self-censorship by precarious library workers. The only ethical and reasonable solution, though perhaps not the most lucrative one, would be for libraries to include these collections as a part of their larger packages, not siloed and labeled in a way that facilitates cultural erasure and literal erasure.
Because of their inherently electronic nature, eBook lending and interlibrary loan (ILL) could seemingly be readily harvested should the government so desire. In the pre-Internet age, government programs to monitor the reading habits of specific individuals or entire communities — like the FBI”s Library Awareness Program (LAP) from the 1950s through the 1980s — relied entirely on agents physically visiting libraries and interviewing library workers (Jaeger, 2025). The difficulty of such efforts offered a fairly strong protection that is now gone.
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Both the data about library users and the collections related to social justice are open to literal erasure. As academic library resources have been attempting to cater to trends instead of integrating this vital information into existing data sets and resources, foundational information and the users of that information have been made far, far more vulnerable.
Managing Risk and Protecting Academic Freedom
Academic librarians and publishers would do well to consider the larger political forces at play when making decisions about the resources that they want to provide for their communities and what data is collected and shared through those resources. Recently, increased threats to information access — and even the freedom of librarians — amplify the pressures on the field that derive from existing social biases that are inherently dismissive of professions perceived as feminized.
Librarianship as a field, especially many professional library organizations, also are contributing to the current multitude of challenges facing academic libraries by trying to adhere to the impracticable concept of neutrality. It is not possible for an item, a collection, a person, an institution, or a profession to be neutral, and no library has the physical or financial resources to actually encompass every perspective on every important issue.
Neutrality has also become a truly self-destructive stance politically. The concept of neutrality poorly served the profession for nearly a century by telling librarians not to defend their institutions or speak up about issues of importance to the library and the community it serves (Jaeger & Jennings-Roche, 2025). However, censorship and disinformation movements that have captured much of the country have also seized upon neutrality as a weapon to use against libraries. Neutrality not only hampers the ability of librarians to effectively speak up against these movements, it also gives purveyors of book bans and disinformation the impression that their opinions about information are as equally valid as those of library professionals (Jaeger & Jennings-Roche, 2025).
Preserving academic freedom — and perhaps even keeping the library open — in the current political context demands clear demonstrations of the contributions of the library and understandable articulations of the values that the library will defend. As the changes since the second Trump administration began amply demonstrate, we cannot rely on legal infrastructure to protect our institutions, let alone our more vulnerable users, during this authoritarian and anti-intellectual turn in American history. Collectively, librarians and publishers alike must reckon with our new reality and attempt to find practical ways to reduce harm in the face of genuine threats to the safety of the people we serve.
References
Alonso, J. (2025, April 3). 400 Books Removed From Naval Academy Library. Inside Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered. com/news/quick-takes/2025/04/03/400-books-removed-navalacademy-library
Buschman, J. (2020). Education, the Public Sphere, and Neoliberalism: Libraries’ Contexts. The Library Quarterly, 90(2), 154–161. https://doi.org/10.1086/707671
Buschman, J. (2023). Libraries, Democracy, and Citizenship: Twenty Years after 9/11. The Library Quarterly, 93(2), 181–201. https://doi.org/10.1086/723850
Buschman, J. (2024). Equal Respect: The Civic Engagement Libraries (Already) Perform for Democracy. The Library Quarterly, 94(1), 101–116. https://doi.org/10.1086/727817
Halperin, J. R. (2025, February 25). Library Futures | Call for Interoperable Ebook Standards in the Academic Book Market. https://libraryfutures.net/post/call-for-interoperable-ebookstandards
Jaeger, Paul T. (2007). Information Policy, Information Access, and Democratic Participation: The National and International Implications of the Bush Administration’s Information Politics. Government Information Quarterly, 24, 840-859.
Jaeger, Paul T. (2025). The Immortality of Hatred and Revenge: The Interconnections of Censorship, Disinformation, and Cultural Erasure in the Book Bans Targeting Marginalized Populations. The Library Quarterly, 95(1), 4-41.
Jaeger, Paul T., and Allison Jennings-Roche. (2025). Clarifying Intellectual Freedom, Neutrality, and Professional Expertise to Better Defend Libraries from Books Bans, Disinformation, and Defunding. Political Librarian, 8(1), 89-96. https://doi. org/10.7936/pollib.9032
Jaeger, Paul T., Allison Jennings-Roche, Natalie Greene Taylor, Ursula Gorham, Olivia J. Hodge, and Karen Kettnich. (2023). The Urge to Censor: Raw Power, Social Control, and the Criminalization of Librarianship Political Librarian 6(1), 1-20. https://doi.org/10.7936/pollib.8711
Jennings-Roche, Allison. (2025). Gender, Politics, and The Public Library: How Polarization and Feminization Conspired to Destabilize One of “The Most Trusted Professions.” Political Librarian 8(1), 147-159. https://doi.org/10.7936/pollib.9017
Klosek, K. (2025). Recognizing and Resisting Censorship in Online Safety Bills: A Framework for Libraries. The Political Librarian, 8(1), 24-30. https://doi.org/10.7936/pollib.9008
Knox, E. (2015). Book banning in 21st-century America . Rowman & Littlefield.
Stanley, J. (2024). Erasing history: how fascists rewrite the past to control the future (First One Signal Publishers / Atria Books hardcover edition). One Signal Publishers / Atria.
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Expanded Access in a World of Corporate Capture: Hachette vs. Internet Archive
By Jennie Rose Halperin (Executive Director Library Futures, NYU Engelberg Center on Innovation Law & Policy) <jennie@libraryfutures.net>
After four years of litigation, Hachette v Internet Archive case closed not with a bang, but with a whimper. In 2024, four years after the Internet Archive announced its “National Emergency Library,” the Second Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the publishers on all four factors of fair use, claiming that the Internet Archive’s specific way of providing access to scanned print copies of in copyright books was infringing. The court ordered them to take down all the materials that had an eBook surrogate, amounting to approximately 500,000 books in their now 3.4 million volume collection.
This is not to say that the court’s opinion was correct, and the further restrictions on fair use and the right of first sale for libraries will prove problematic over time. The opinion is profoundly damaging and could have larger implications that stretch far beyond the facts of the case. But, as Author’s Alliance wrote shortly after the decision, … the Court focused its analysis on the facts of the case, which was really about IA lending digitized copies of books that were already available in eBook form and licensable from the publishers. The legal analysis in several places turned on this fact, which we think leaves room to make fair use arguments regarding programs to digitize and make available other books, such as print books for which there is no licensed eBook available, out-of-print books, or orphan works. CDL will remain an important framework, especially considering the lack of an existing digital firstsale doctrine.
As they write, it is important to remember the facts of the case when considering the future of whole book digitization and lending, which does not roll off the tongue quite so easily as “Controlled Digital Lending.” CDL began as a niche academic concept proposed in a paper by Georgetown Law Library Director Michelle Wu in 2011. In the paper, “Building a Collaborative Collection: A Necessary Evolution,” Wu writes, “This article proposes that academic law libraries pool resources through a consortium to create a centralized collection of legal materials, including copyrighted materials, and to digitize them for easy, cost-effective access by all of its members” (Wu, 2011 1-2). Wu is circumspect and lawyerly, proposing that “The [digitization] policy should exclude items frequently accessed by users (e.g., textbooks, reporters) and focus on scholarly materials less in demand (e.g., monographs in “law and” fields, laws in the American colonies, foreign law) but still useful for research” (2011 535). At the heart of the paper is the concept that a digitized copy of a book is a format shift, and if digitized in copyright books are lent out on an “owned to loaned” basis, where the physical copy is sequestered as the digitized copy is loaned, that copyright would still be respected. This concept was expanded upon by Dave Hansen and Kyle K. Courtney in their 2018 whitepaper on the topic, and a statement was signed by a few dozen libraries and many individuals. In the paper, they coin the term “Controlled Digital Lending” and define it as such CDL enables a library to circulate a digitized title in place of a physical one in a controlled manner. Under
this approach, a library may only loan simultaneously the number of copies that it has legitimately acquired, usually through purchase or donation… Essentially, CDL must maintain an “owned to loaned” ratio. Circulation in any format is controlled so that only one user can use any given copy at a time, for a limited time (Courtney and Hansen 2018, 2).
When the Internet Archive began their “Open Libraries” program in 2018, they took this concept and supercharged it. Buying up entire libraries and digitizing the print books, or digitizing entire library collections through their “partner” program, many of the print surrogates are warehoused in a massive offsite storage facility in Richmond, CA. Still others remained at partner libraries and were sequestered based on an algorithm that prompted librarians to remove materials as they were lent digitally. By March 2020, there were 1.4 million books available for lend (Freeland 2020). According to the catalog available online, that number is now 3.4 million. At the time, Chris Freeland, Director of the project, told Library Journal, “We really want to tell this story of library reformatting and our long-term storage of both the physical object as well as its digital surrogate…because we want to offer libraries a way of dealing with space issues and crowded collections… We see ourselves fitting into a unique niche for the library community (we are accepting donations to make the scholarship available to the world, not resell it), and we want the community to know more about what we’re doing” (Enis 2019).
In 2020, the Internet Archive was sued for mass copyright infringement for an expansion of the project called the “National Emergency Library,” which ended lending limits on their materials during the pandemic closure of physical libraries. At the time, opinions on the National Emergency Library were mixed. Jill Lepore called it a “gift to all readers” and NPR called it “compelling,” even as publishers and some authors decried it as piracy (Lepore 2020) (Dwyer) 2020. Among libraries and library workers, opinion was split. While many individual librarians and libraries came out vocally in support, many others stayed silent, and some individual librarians voiced their displeasure at having digital lending brought into the mainstream and challenged. They believed this could potentially create negative case law in an underexplored legal arena and divert resources away from already challenged libraries.
From an outsider’s perspective, the legal and cultural fight surrounding Controlled Digital Lending has felt perplexing from the very beginning; the Archive was compliant with takedown requests and publishers could have chosen to simply ask the Internet Archive to end its “National Emergency Library” or to take down individual titles that they felt were infringing instead of immediately suing. The legal fiction they created, that scanned copies of paper books represented a legitimate threat to authors, simply didn’t seem to hold water. Scanned CDL books are not the same as licensed eBooks, and the initial filing made that clear; rather than focusing on their books’ competition with the licensed eBook market, they went into detail about how the
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Internet Archive’s poorly rendered scans would depreciate the market for legitimate eBooks due to their poor quality. In later filings, the prosecution transitioned their argument, convincing the court that the CDL scanned books directly compete with the “thriving” licensed eBook market. But, as anyone who has worked with eBooks knows, the licensed eBook market is a rentier system characterized by corporate capture, private equity, surveillance, and monopoly (Ebooks for Us).
A surprising amount of the final decision hinged not on the program itself, but on how the Archive marketed the program. In their view, a library serves only its patrons in a geographic area, not the whole world. Further, the court writes, “IA markets its lending services to libraries as a free alternative to Publishers’ print books and eBook licenses,” particularly pointing out the phrase “You Don’t Have to Buy it Again!” in their materials (Hachette 48). The marketing of libraries as “free” has been taken up by other library writers as potentially problematic. In a 2013 article for American Libraries Magazine, D.J. Hoek writes, “But libraries, as we know, do not exist for free. They cost their communities — whether composed of taxpayers, tuition-payers, donors, or a combination — a substantial amount of money” (Hoek 2013). Even so, many libraries do market themselves as free alternatives to publishers’ books, and the Open Libraries program costs the nonprofit Internet Archive an enormous amount of money. In a 2023 blog post, Brewster Kahle writes, “For those of us tending libraries of digitized and born-digital books, we know that they need constant maintenance — reprocessing, reformatting, re-invigorating or they will not be readable or read (Kahle 2022). To be clear, the Archive does buy the books they lend, and in then lending them to the public, they operate like a library. CDL, as many have pointed out, provides the author money in the initial purchase of the book, much like a physical copy. What is unique about the Archive’s program is that they purchase entire libraries and vastly expand the access rights from a physical library constrained by location to a digital library of millions of people. While not changing the terms of copyright, this does change the fundamental purpose of the collection. From a fair use perspective, evaluating this expansion in terms of commerciality feels like the wrong metric; a better evaluation would be in the purpose and character of the use, or whether this access was expanded for nonprofit and educational use. Part of the reason why the court’s writing is dissatisfying could be because this expansion of access does not have a clear analogue in law. The collection and loan of physical objects are limited to the people who can physically touch them. But the court’s evaluation could have thoughtfully considered the promise of access from a nonprofit, educational purview. Expanded access is one of the great innovations of the digital age and should be celebrated, not gatekept. While the expansion of access through whole book digitization changes the lending paradigm, communities of book lovers could consider this an opportunity to reach new audiences, work with libraries and small presses, and experiment with new forms of delivery in order to support both access and the public good as well as the continued viability of publishing.
Another issue with the court’s decision is the role of monopoly middleware in the digital market, which is completely overlooked. The only applicable digital reading statistics the court can cite are from Overdrive. Overdrive, owned by private equity firm KKR, likely controls up to 96% of all public library eBook loans (Halperin 2024). Even then, the data is limited, “Checkouts of eBooks on OverDrive by library patrons increased dramatically between 2010 and 2020,” they write. “This surge
in lending translates to greater profits for Publishers, some of whom find library eBook licenses occupying an increasing percentage of their overall eBook revenues” (Hachette 9). But profits are not the goal of libraries lending books to patrons, and the court’s insistence that this underregulated market is ”thriving” is naïve at best, dangerous at worst. The court further takes issue with the “Better World Books” link at the top of books, another innovation in discoverability that does not square with a narrow definition of library lending. For hundreds of years, libraries helped maintain a virtuous cycle of book sales and lends — while the BWB link introduces some level of commerciality into the Open Libraries program, ultimately the court positions the program as competing with licensed eBook sales, which is false by any numeric metric. The decision refers four times to “common-sense inference” for this justification. In this “common-sense inference,” any lending of in-copyright, in-print materials should be prohibited because they might compete with the market, despite established laws of first sale. As Jason Schultz and Aaron Perzanowski write in their excellent book The End of Ownership, this distinction means that digital content is subject to a “mutant form of contract law” that is a “private regulatory scheme with restrictions” (Schutz and Perzanowski 2018 66, 58). Like with many other forms of technology, public institutions are the canary in the coalmine — when libraries can never actually buy the materials, how can they build a digital collection?
Ultimately, the Hachette Case proves the axiom that “no good deed is left unpunished” and perhaps that “capitalism always wins.” The idiosyncrasies of the Archive’s digital lending program were built with the best of intentions to improve discoverability of out-of-print works through sharing and their Better World Books sales program, to benefit collection reach through innovative digital programs, and to provide access to collections at a time when most libraries were closed. Instead of litigation, this case could have opened a conversation between publishers and libraries about access to collections, library marketing, and how to meet the needs of the reading public. Publishers could have asked themselves why librarians are so displeased with the licenses on offer and innovated with their customers to build a better system. But publishers and aggregating middleware care about their bottom line, while libraries care about expanding access. This tension and values misalignment consistently come into play in digital library spaces, and the Archive became the scapegoat for publishers to intimidate libraries looking to assert their rights. If this sounds like a conspiracy, look no further than “Protect the Creative Economy,” an astroturfed “Coalition” fighting librarian-led eBook bills around the country and endorsed by the American Booksellers Association, Association of American Publishers, Copyright Alliance, and others (Protect the Creative Economy).
Finally, like many other regulatory decisions made by U.S. Courts in the past thirty years, the Hachette decision passes the risk assessment for digitization of in copyright books onto the individual or individual institution rather than setting appropriate regulations that might clarify the law in the favor of the public interest. Murky regulatory environments almost always benefit capital, which leads to poor outcomes for the public. The emphasis on commerciality in the court’s decision means that each individual institution must do their own risk assessment rather than relying on a clear set of standards for digital ownership, particularly in the case of dual editions or rare and out of print copyrighted work. The CDL whitepaper specifically addresses the “Twentieth Century Problem,” or
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the lack of access to twentieth century works due to copyright restrictions coupled with a lack of commerciality. This was one of the major problems that CDL was supposed to solve, and it still can. The murkiness of the law even after the case is a double-edged sword: It does not close the door on CDL or other forms of digitization, but it does change the risk profile and means that continued advocacy for clearer guidelines on digital ownership is necessary.
As library workers and supporters, we must ask ourselves if our alignment with the publishers and middleware that make our digital collections into a “Proquest,” “Overdrive,” “Elsevier,” or “EBSCO” library are truly in line with our values. Together, we must consider how we can collaborate with independent publishers in favor of ownership and clearer discoverability and marketing that benefit the public, not just corporations. We must work together to expand access to and control of collections to resist censorship and digital peonage that keeps us tied to publishers as they change the terms of our licensing agreements. Don’t let corporations erase our past or steal our right to lend — together, we can fight it.
Bibliography
“Controlled Digital Lending and Open Libraries: Helping Libraries and Readers in Times of Crisis | Internet Archive Blogs.” 2020. March 9, 2020. https://blog.archive.org/2020/03/09/ controlled-digital-lending-and-open-libraries-helpinglibraries-and-readers-in-times-of-crisis/
Dwyer, Colin. 2020. “‘National Emergency Library’ Lends A Hand — And Lots Of Books! — During Pandemic.” NPR, March 26, 2020, sec. The Coronavirus Crisis. https://www.npr.org/ sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/03/26/821925073/ national-emergency-library-lends-a-hand-and-lots-of-booksduring-pandemic
“E-Books for Us.” n.d. Ebooks for Us. Accessed April 23, 2025. https://ebooksforus.com/
Halperin, Jennie R. 2024. “We’re still fighting for fair use.” Library Futures Blog. April 23, 2025. https://www.libraryfutures. net/post/were-still-fighting-for-fair-use
Hansen, David R., and Kyle K. Courtney. 2018. “A White Paper on Controlled Digital Lending of Library Books.” LawArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31228/osf.io/7fdyr
Hoek, D. J. 2013. “There Are No Free Libraries.” American Libraries Magazine . March 13, 2013. https:// americanlibrariesmagazine.org/2013/03/13/there-are-no-freelibraries/
Kahle, Brewster. “Digital Books Wear out Faster than Physical Books | Internet Archive Blogs.” 2022. November 15, 2022. https://blog.archive.org/2022/11/15/digital-books-wear-outfaster-than-physical-books/
Lepore, Jill. 2020. “The National Emergency Library Is a Gift to Readers Everywhere.” The New Yorker, March 26, 2020. https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/the-nationalemergency-library-is-a-gift-to-readers-everywhere
“Library Futures | Stepping Down as Co-Chair of the National Information Standards Controlled Digital Lending Working Group.” n.d. Accessed April 20, 2025. https://libraryfutures. net/post/niso-cdl-statement
Perzanowski, Aaron, and Jason Schultz. 2016. The End of Ownership: Personal Property in the Digital Economy. The MIT Press. https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/10524.001.0001
Wu, Michelle M. 2011. “Building a Collaborative Digital Collection: A Necessary Evolution in Libraries.” Georgetown Public Law and Legal Theory Research Paper No. 11-47. https:// scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/facpub/699
Enis, Matt. n.d. “Internet Archive Expands Partnerships for Open Libraries Project.” Library Journal. Accessed April 21, 2025. https://www.libraryjournal.com/story/internet-archiveexpands-partnerships-for-open-library-project “Hachette Book Group, Inc. v. Internet Archive, No. 23-1260 (2d Cir. 2024).” 2025. Justia Law. April 23, 2025. https://law. justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/ca2/23-1260/231260-2024-09-04.html
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Discovering the Rest of the Story — The Power of Document Disclosure
By Kevin S. Hawkins (Program Director, Johns Hopkins University) <kevin.s.hawkins@ultraslavonic.info>
By now you’ve probably read books or watched films about the horrors of the opioid crisis in the U.S. — a still unfolding tragedy of misuse of prescription and street drugs that has led to over half a million deaths and many more struggling with addiction. And you may be aware of lawsuits against opioid manufacturers (most famously, Purdue Pharma), distributors, pharmacies, and others that have played a role in the opioid crisis. This litigation has, in some cases, led to compensation for victims of the opioid crisis or funding for opioid treatment programs. But when public-interest litigation is resolved, the public can gain more than just financial compensation.
Publicly accessible versions of documents filed in court as part of a lawsuit are usually redacted to keep proprietary information confidential. But there are even more documents generated as part of litigation which rarely become public but which can be equally if not more valuable than the court record. Before the parties even go to trial, there is a common-law procedure called discovery during which each party can obtain potential evidence from the other party. Each side requests records from other that might strengthen their case, and they choose the strongest documents to bring to trial as evidence. Unfortunately, most of what is exchanged never sees the light of day and is simply destroyed at the conclusion of litigation.
Many lawsuits are settled before reaching a verdict in court. These settlements often include confidentiality clauses by which damaging information is to be kept secret. However, there have been a few cases where documents shared through discovery are publicly disclosed as part of a court-approved settlement. This was pioneered in the case of litigation against the tobacco industry and has continued more recently with litigation against opioid manufacturers and consultants that have worked with them and most recently with litigation against chemical manufacturers. Attorneys for plaintiffs made the case that the alleged public harm caused by the corporate defendants justified these internal documents becoming public in order to avoid similar harms in the future. Many of these previously internal corporate documents are made available through the Industry Documents Library (https://www.industrydocuments.ucsf.edu/), hosted by the University of California, San Francisco, including the fast-growing Opioid Industry Documents Library (https:// www.industrydocuments.ucsf.edu/opioids/ ), which is being collaboratively developed in partnership with Johns Hopkins University. Others are found on the Toxic Docs (https://www. toxicdocs.org/) website.
Even for litigation that goes to trial, these documents include many untold stories that are never presented in the courtroom or in other documents filed with the court. For example, while thousands of lawsuits were filed by state and local governments, Native American tribes, and individuals against Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals, the company’s court-approved bankruptcy agreement included a provision to make 1.4 million
documents publicly available in the Opioid Industry Documents Archive, which allowed researchers to study Mallinckrodt’s plan for capturing the opioid market, called “Operation Change Agent,” that included targeting specific prescribers and strategies for opposing prescriber resistance (Klein et al., 2024). Other research has revealed contracts between the opioid industry and medical communication organizations to help the companies influence medical science and opinion (Bernisson and Sismondo, 2024). It’s critical that these previously internal documents be made available for researchers and the public to enable this kind of research to understand the role that these companies played in creating these public-health crises.
What does all of this have to do with lawsuits in the publishing industry and library community? No matter what your view on who is right in these suits, we could learn a lot by having access to the documents which are exchanged by the parties through discovery. To take as an example Hachette v. Internet Archive — in which four major publishers alleged copyright infringement by the Internet Archive through its National Emergency Library — the community of librarians and publishers could be having a more informed discussion of market effects from controlled digital lending if the documents exchanged through discovery in this case had been made publicly available. I encourage those involved in current and future litigation relating to publishers and libraries to include in any proposed settlement a provision for document disclosure, with resources dedicated in the settlement to support public access to the documents through a trusted repository, to bring greater transparency to the circumstances around the litigation.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank A.J. Boston, Ana Enriquez, and Kate Tasker for their valuable feedback on drafts of this article.
References
Maud Bernisson and Sergio Sismondo. 2024. Promoting Opioids, A Story About How to Influence Medical Science and Opinions. Front. Med., Sec. Regulatory Science 11. https://doi. org/10.3389/fmed.2024.1327939
Daniel Eisenkraft Klein, Ross MacKenzie, Ben Hawkins, and Adam D. Koon. 2024. Inside “Operation Change Agent”: Mallinckrodt’s Plan for Capturing the Opioid Market. J Health Polit Policy Law 49 (4): 599–630. https://doi. org/10.1215/03616878-11186127
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ATG Special Report — Inside Ukraine’s Defense of Scholarly and Literary Identity
By Dr. Frances Pinter (Director, Academic Relations, Central European University Press and Amsterdam University Press; Founder, SUPRR, Supporting Ukrainian Publishing Resilience and Recovery) <frances@pinter.org.uk>
Ukraine is battling for its very survival on all fronts. So, it was heartening to see the response to a small victory in the otherwise obscure world of persistent identifiers (PIDs).
Recently, SUPRR (Supporting Ukrainian Publishing Resilience and Recovery), an initiative I launched in 2023, got involved with the Russian ‘theft’ of Ukrainian ISSNs. In short, publications in territories occupied by Russia are using the ISSNs of Ukrainian journals originally founded by the now-displaced Ukrainian institutions of higher education. Russians are also obtaining entirely new ISSNs while falsely claiming to be the legal successors of Ukrainian publications. We brokered discussions with the ISSN International Agency who then found a technical fix that allows readers to identify whether they are reading the original version or the Russian hijacked version of the journal. More about this curious battlefield here.
This tech fix was all made possible by the forensic work of legal scholars from the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv and academics at the displaced institutions who are now scattered all around Ukraine. The provenance of what people are reading becomes even more vital here to maintain publishing integrity.
The deadline for this article was the 1st of May 2025, just before my third trip to Ukraine in the past eighteen months. If you are reading this in June, I will have returned again from Book Arsenal where this year’s theme is “Everything is Translation.” In the publishing world, translations are always a challenge. How can we finance them, promote them and get people to read them? Yet, there is an unshakable belief that it does the soul good to understand others through translation. I believe passionately that we are all enriched by translations, especially of stories that tell about lives we can hardly envisage.
Last year, I went primarily to speak on a panel at this literary event that attracted over 35,000 people — including President Zelensky. All these people, like me, had their sleep disturbed by air raid alerts, something that happens almost every night. Russia sends one plane to the border. It hovers, then goes back to base. Millions are alerted — just in case. And recently, more bombs have been showered on Ukraine than ever. Many, if not most, people now ignore the sirens and choose not to go to the bomb shelters. But they are still woken up. The whole country is exhausted by what seems like warfare by deliberate sleep deprivation. Yet, the latest polls show that 80% are willing to keep on fighting.
You can’t get to Ukraine by commercial flights. Airspace is closed, a security risk. So, most people enter by train, bus, or car from somewhere along the border with Poland. I’d flown to Warsaw, and after a few delightful days attending the Warsaw Book Fair, set off on a three-hour train ride to Chelm, and then two hours later climbed aboard a tired-looking train for the 12-hour ride to Kyiv. No one told me the train wouldn’t have food or drink. Luckily, I had a bottle of water, an apple and an emergency Mars bar.
I arrived in the early morning and was collected by a man sent from my hotel. That was my first night in Ukraine, on a train. After freshening up, I went down for breakfast in my virtually empty Radisson Hotel. I was then collected by a beautiful young student who’d been tasked to look after me over the next few days. I’d protested against this excessive care, but she was charming and, after getting over her shyness, provided me with much insight into the life of an eighteen-yearold university student in a war zone.
On my second day, I continued with more meetings and the odd air raid during the day — leading to interesting shelters. By this time in 2024, many basements had been converted into surprisingly smart-looking shelters. The creativity with artwork and design in the basement of one university library made it easy to forget why one was there. Coffee and tea were plentiful. Clean toilets and even shower facilities were to be found.
I went to bed on my second night prepared for air raid alerts. I’d downloaded the app that goes off on your phone and even tells you what kind of an alert it is so you can judge its seriousness. Whether to go to the shelter or not is the question. At about 2 am it went off — first on my watch, then on my phone. A few seconds later, the hotel alarm tore through the room. The instructions were to go to the lowest level of the underground car park. Taking the elevator could be risky as electricity might be cut at any time. As I set off, I remembered that rooms at the higher levels of the hotel were cheaper than the lower ones, contrary to usual pricing policies. Now I understood why. The lower ones were closer to the basement, closer to safety.
The highlight of the following day was meeting the Rector of Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, the largest university in Ukraine with 30,000 students. He is a philosopher. We talked about Karl Popper and Open Society interspersed with details of what it was like running a university without electricity. Before I left, he showed me his military vest.
I also went to the Ukrainian Book Institute (UBI), a state body that promotes reading and Ukrainian books. They’d arranged for me to meet a group of Ukrainian publishers. UBI is located in the wonderful Lavrska complex — an estate full of historical churches. There is now a petition to rename Lavrska Street after Ivan Mazepa. I’m not sure why, but no doubt I will hear about it when in Kyiv.
Although by now tired from the air raid alerts in the night, the next day was exhilarating. Book Arsenal was humming, full of people buying books, looking at art installations, and attending presentations at both indoor and outdoor stages. The sun was shining — and you could have been at any of the numerous such events around the world — except it was not.
A few days earlier, the Russians had bombed Faktor Druk, one of Europe’s largest printing factories, located in Kharkiv. It
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was a callous and desperate attack on Ukrainian culture. Some 50,000 books were destroyed, many of which had been destined for the book fair. At Book Arsenal, set against a plain white wall, was a long white table on which about a dozen burned books from the wreckage were placed. It was certainly a design triumph where “less is more.” One could not help but feel a chill when looking at the display. I was reminded of the quote by the 19th century writer Heinrich Heine who said in 1823, “Wherever they burn books, they will also, in the end, burn human beings.” Of course, in this war it is happening simultaneously — on both sides — Ukrainians dispose of Russian books meant to spread propaganda. Thankfully, the Buffett Foundation has paid for the rebuilding of the printing factory.
At Book Arsenal, I met many people who spoke fondly of the translation programme I’d started while working for George Soros’s foundation in the ’90s. We enabled the translation of over 1,000 classics of the social sciences and humanities of the West into Ukrainian. Many said these books had transformed their lives, and I understand they continue to be used in education today. I ran a similar programme in all the other post-communist countries. Although some of the printed books of the translations into Russian have been burned because of the connection with Soros, the translations themselves cannot be destroyed. I must believe these books will live on to see another day.
Another cruel blow for Ukrainians was the recent and very sudden withdrawal of USAID funds. When a country like Ukraine is at war, there are limited funds to pay for textbooks. USAID had been paying for primary schoolbooks. Now this has stopped. An appeal is out to private foundations to help fill the gap until the state can take on the cost.
This year, SUPRR will have a stand at Book Arsenal. We’ll display the genuine journals that Russia is attempting to appropriate alongside books from Ukrainian university presses and run an OER prototype on Ukrainian migration. I’ll be speaking about the ISSN saga, widely considered as a Ukrainian win, along with stolen artifacts from museums where the physical objects are tragically still not located. In the case of knowledge in digital form, we must celebrate that we have ways and means of protecting them from attack and ensuring they are available for now and posterity. I’m sure we can all think of other countries where this threat is real.
The Ukrainians I met in Kyiv will be there after the war ends. I hope the resilience I saw in them will see them through. I can hardly wait to go back. I’ve tasted the essence of Ukraine: its people, their love of freedom and of being true to yourself, and to be all and everything that makes us human. Their war is truly our war. Their deep held belief in freedom is something our community shares and is fighting to uphold on all fronts.
Column Editor: Corey Seeman (Director, Kresge Library Services, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan) <cseeman@umich.edu> Visit him at https://www.squirreldude.com/
Column Editor’s Note: Last month, I was able to attend a global meeting in Vienna, Austria of academic business library directors. My colleagues came from Europe, North America, Asia, Latin America and South Africa. It was a wonderful conference where we shared what was happening in our worlds and what was happening in theirs. The business library directors hold these meetings every four or five years. Vienna was supposed to be the destination in 2020 … but honestly, I have no idea what happened that year. It seems like a lifetime ago.
The meeting was hosted by Vienna University of Economics and Business (WU Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien) with a relatively new and absolutely stunning campus and a beautiful library. Actually, one of the best things to do when going to a conference is the ability to visit another campus and enjoy their campus pets. While the Vienna University of Economics and Business did not have campus squirrels, it was next to The Prater, a great public park in Vienna. With a five AM sunrise, getting up and out for an hour in the morning before the day started was just what I needed. It helped me clear my head, enjoy the surroundings and get some squirrel pictures. Any walk can be a safari if you have the right attitude!
One of the things that is really enjoyable about going to different schools for conferences is that you get to see what type of setup they have in their shop. And while some libraries can be stunning and some can be modest, both can share collection items. Seeing a familiar book on the shelf is always a welcome sign — especially to a librarian.
These books on our shelves and in our databases enable us to support the educational mission of our students, our faculty and our communities. And since not every student body is the same, not every collection should be as such. So every review that we publish here, we try to share what is special, or not, about the work. It will be up to you if it deserves a spot on the virtual or real space on your shelves.
Special thanks to our reviewers who take the time to explore these works to see if they are appropriate for libraries. Special thanks to my reviewers for this issue: Margaret Dawson (Texas A&M-Central Texas), Victoria Eastes (Texas A&M-Central Texas), and Michelle Polchow (University of California, Davis). As always, I want to thank them for bringing this column together.
column, please also write me directly. You can also find out more about the Reader’s Roundup here — https://www. squirreldude.com/atg-readers-roundup.
Happy reading and be nutty! — Corey
Chancellor, Renate. Breaking Glass Ceilings: Clara Stanton Jones and the Detroit Public Library. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2024. 978-1-5381-5701-5 (print), 130 pages. $90.00.
Reviewed by Michelle Polchow (Unit Head, Electronic Resources Management, University of California, Davis) <mpolchow@ucdavis.edu>
Looking for a good book to promote dialogue and build community by encouraging diverse members of a campus or book club to read together? Breaking Glass Ceilings: Clara Stanton Jones and the Detroit Public Library has all the elements to inspire readers with a compelling heroine, engagement in controversial topics, and a story that wrestles with the paradox of individual conscience versus social justice. This biography about a midwestern African American woman appointed as Director of the Detroit Public Library in 1944, chronicles not only her legacy, but how she used her leadership to advocate for racism and sexism awareness, eventually rising to achieve national influence.
If you would like to be a reviewer for Against the Grain, please write me at <cseeman@umich.edu>. If you are a publisher and have a book you would like to see reviewed in a future
Author Renate Chancellor excels at writing books that explore historical lives, events, and trends. She provides a deeper understanding of the current world and illuminates present-day issues by conferring greater perspective. Her first book, E.J. Josey: Transformational Leader of the Modern Library Profession (2020), examined the life and career of African American librarian, educator, and activist during midcentury America. Shortly after this book’s release, the United States witnessed the George Floyd protests, and a worldwide debate evolved concerning police brutality and systematic racism that overwhelmingly effects the Black community. Although Josey, who lived from 1924-2009, left a legacy as a transformative leader of his time, many of the same barriers he faced then still echo in today’s Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. Now with Chancellor’s most recent work, in similar
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An Eurasian Red Squirrel — my first trip to Europe as the Squirrel Dude. Picture taken on May 19th, 2025 in The Prater (Vienna, Austria).
happenstance, it discusses the intersectionality of Black Feminist Theory and Critical Race Theory (CRT), highlighting Jones’ unwavering advocacy for both racial and gender equality which she began eighty-years ago. Publication coincides with a United States political climate giving rise to prohibition of CRT teachings in the classroom, widespread library book bannings often aimed at titles authored by Black writers documenting the Black experience, together with the rollback of Roe vs. Wade reversing a woman’s constitutional right to make her own health care choices. Chancellor’s newest book is again a timely recommended read. [Editor’s Note: This review was received in January 2025 – things have definitely gotten worse for people who wish to explore and share viewpoints on the cultural experience of minority communities in the United States.]
“While the nation has undoubtedly made progress,” says Chancellor, “entrenched structural racism continues to corrupt American democracy and preserve racial inequality.” Underlying the book’s account of Jones’ life and career is a prevailing message that reflects on how racism and sexism persist in today’s America. This is a short but powerful read that calls into question the current United States governmental conversations about banning ideas and deflecting conversations about structural inequality around race and gender. Historical evidence points to this as an unlikely path to building understanding and solidarity between people. Given this work is under one hundred pages, and should the publisher be amenable to a quantity discount, it is ideal for a book club, common read, classroom material, or academic diversity, equity, and inclusion programming material, as it conveys an important narrative well beyond the library profession.
ATG Reviewer Rating: I need this in my library. (I want to be able to get up from my desk and grab this book off the shelf, if it’s not checked out.)
Evans, Robert, ed. Critical Insights: The Lord of the Rings. Amenia, New York: Salem Press / Grey House Publishing, 2022. 9781637000717, 324 pages. $105.00.
Reviewed by Margaret Dawson, MLS, MA (Co-Head of Public Services, Texas A&M University-Central Texas, Killeen) <madawson@tamuct.edu>
This volume follows the general format of the others in the “Critical Insights” series, with sections comprising of an introductory essay, and “Critical Contexts” and “Critical Readings” that are the bulk of the volume. The “Critical Readings” section is the largest with twelve essays on Tolkien and his writing of Lord of the Rings. The “Resources” section contains bibliographies, a chronology of Tolkien’s work and a brief biography and a comprehensive index. The volume consists of both scholarly articles and essays dealing with wide-ranging issues and perspectives on Tolkien and The Lord of the Rings
The introductory essay and the “Critical Contexts” section serve as a bit of introduction to the world of Tolkien and his work. In the introductory essay, Franco Manni, an Italian philosophy professor, gives an international view of Tolkien. Manni’s passion about Tolkien is obvious as he writes about the factors that he believes are the reasons for the author’s international and widespread popularity. Robert Evans, the editor of the volume, follows the introductory essay with a short biography of Tolkien and covers the main points of his life and work. Evans
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also includes other biographies on Tolkien that the reader could reference as a source.
The second section of “Critical Contexts” is comprised of four articles that examine its historical and critical reception, teaching approaches, and some comparisons between The Lord of the Rings to other popular books turned into a movie, such as The Wizard of Oz. Nancy Bunting writes the first article in the section and she examines historical and biographical sources of the work. The second article by Brandon Schneeberger, discusses teaching approaches to Tolkien. He does not give his own teaching techniques but does a good job in giving a summary of Approaches to Teaching Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” and Other Works, edited by Leslie A. Donovan. Donovan’s work was published in 2015 and has been well received by critics. Schneeberger’s article would be useful to someone who was interested in Donovan’s work but wanted a summary of it before reading it. John R. Holmes article on Boromir follows as he does a close reading on one of the pivotal scenes of the book. The final article in this section, Robert Evans, the volume’s editor, does a comparative appraisal of the two films. He also shows how Fleming influenced Jackson’s movie. Evans does not, however, cite Peter Jackson as evidence of this influence. Evans also has some inaccuracies when comparing Tolkien’s work to Jackson’s movie.
The “Critical Readings” section is the longest with twelve articles and offers diverse approaches to the work. The articles cover Tolkien scholarship, Peter Jackson’s films, Tolkien’s poetry and religious influences on Tolkien and his work. The religious and spiritual discussions range from his Catholic influences to Celtic mythology. The final group of the section has articles dealing with race and ethnicity in terms of Tolkien’s work. In the first article, the volume’s editor gives a summary and review of two earlier essay collections on Tolkien. Evans gives a comprehensive overview of the works but does not give the reader a discussion of how these works have influenced the current Tolkien scholarship. Overall, the twelve essays give a diverse and varied discussion of The Lord of the Rings. The volume would be best suited to those who are just starting their exploration of Tolkien and could be useful to students. The final “Resources” section has a very valuable index of the names, places, and characters that are discussed in the book which is helpful due to the considerable number of all of them present in Tolkien’s work.
ATG Reviewer Rating: I need this available somewhere in my shared network. (I probably do not need this book, but it would be nice to get it within three to five days via my network catalog.)
Evans, Robert, ed. Critical Insights: Sense and Sensibility. Amenia, New York: Salem Press/Grey House Publishing, 2023. 9781637004388, 400 pages. $105.00
Reviewed by Margaret Dawson, MLS, MA (Co-Head of Public Services, Texas A&M University-Central Texas, Killeen) <madawson@tamuct.edu>
The “Critical Insights” books follow the same pattern within this book series of being divided into sections, with an introductory essay, a biography of the author, a “Critical Contexts” section with four essays and then eleven essays in the “Critical Readings” section. The section on “Resources” follows with a chronological listing of the author’s life along with
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a complete listing of the works and a secondary bibliography. The books in this series end with a biography of the editor, the contributors, and an index. This volume examines Jane Austen’s work, Sense and Sensibility from a variety of approaches, both in literature and in film.
Collins Hemingway discusses Austen’s life and career with an emphasis on Sense and Sensibility in the introductory essay. Hemingway investigates the novel in terms of its current and past reception, along with cultural contexts and its characters and plotlines. He ends his essay with contemplating why so many people still read Austen after all of these years. His conclusion is that she made her characters people that others want to read about, as these characters have lives that they can recognize and deal with problems that they can also be dealing with today, especially women. The introductory essay is followed by a brief overview of Austen’s life.
The “Critical Contexts” section has four essays with each one having a distinct focus on the work. The first deals with the historical context of the novel as it examines the position of women in the Romantic era. The authors, Joyce Kelly and McKenna Odom, praise Austen for her observation skills and how her novels show the gender norms of the time. They also think Austen is a Romantic feminist who created strong women whose experiences show the inequalities of society and how the women must deal with these inequalities to survive in their world. The second essay offers a thorough overview of literary criticism since the year 2011 on the novel. Joyce Ahn covers a wide range of essays that discuss the work from a variety of perspectives and with many theories, from feminist to philosophical. Ahn concluded that readers and critical theorists can find many different truths in the novel, depending on their own point of reference. The third essay deals with the novel’s concerns with money, envy and status. Wong discusses how the entire novel deals with the concepts and both the plot and characters revolve around it. The final essay features the examination of one scene
Guide to the ATG Reviewer Ratings
The ATG Reviewer Rating is being included for each book reviewed. Corey came up with this rating to reflect our collaborative collections and resource sharing means and thinks it will help to classify the importance of these books.
• I need this book on my nightstand. (This book is so good, that I want a copy close at hand when I am in bed.)
• I need this on my desk. (This book is so valuable, that I want my own copy at my desk that I will share with no one.)
• I need this in my library. (I want to be able to get up from my desk and grab this book off the shelf, if it’s not checked out.)
• I need this available somewhere in my shared network. (I probably do not need this book, but it would be nice to get it within three to five days via my network catalog.)
• I’ll use my money elsewhere. (Just not sure this is a useful book for my library or my network.)
from two of the renowned film adaptations, the 1995 and the 2008 films. The critical scene of Edward and the two women who want to marry him, Elinor and Lucy Steele are in the same room and then Marianne enters the room to further complicate matters. Bailey discusses how the directors and actors portray the characters and how effective they are in realizing Austen’s words.
The “Critical Readings” section contains eleven essays which are mainly dealing with two aspects of the novel, the language of the novel and the film, television and play versions. Robert Evans, the editor of the book, examines how the words sense and sensibility were used in Austen’s time. The final essay explores the Spanish language reception of the novel. Cinthia Garcia Soria discusses how the Spanish language version did not get published until 1942, due to the popularity of the film version of Pride and Prejudice.
The “Resources” section concludes the volume and has a chronology of Austen’s life, her bibliography and also a secondary bibliography addressing books about Austen. A detailed and comprehensive index is the last section.
ATG Reviewer Rating: I need this in my library. (I want to be able to get up from my desk and grab this book off the shelf, if it’s not checked out.)
Franks, Patricia C. (editor). The Handbook of Archival Practice. New York, NY: Rowman & Littlefield, 2024. 9781538192221. 512 pages. $49.00 (paperback) or $105.00 (hardback)
Reviewed by: Victoria Eastes (University Archivist, University Library and Archives, Texas A&M University-Central Texas) <veastes@tamuct.edu>
Members of many professions often wish they had access to a comprehensive guidebook that might provide answers to their questions and ideas on how to proceed for a multitude of issues. For archivists who find themselves increasingly tasked with managing hybrid collections of mixed materials, resources that provide useful descriptions in plain language, with clear examples, and written in a way that encourages action are rare.
This is why editor Patricia C. Franks’ The Handbook of Archival Practice provides a useful guide aimed at archival practitioners of all levels (from student interns to senior level professionals). A Certified Archivist and Certified Records Manager, as well as coauthor and manager of multiple publications and white papers about archival and records management, Franks created this work in an attempt to meet the immediate information needs of working archival professionals. In a way, she has accomplished this with a lengthy guide (512 pages) covering 111 entries of terms chosen by an advisory board of archival professionals from the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, and written by 105 authors. The terms are arranged into ten categories (such as Appraisal and Acquisition, Digital Preservation, and User Services), followed by a useful appendix of example documents, lists of standard terms, and various templates and checklists provided for fair use by the reader as needed.
I have already added this handbook to our reading room’s ready reference selection as I believe it will fit as a beneficial resource for not only me, but the various students, interns, and volunteers who join me in the archives. The practical explanations and guidance of Section Two, on “Records Creation and Recordkeeping Systems,” is particularly helpful to me as I
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work with our university’s records management department to develop a system for the interdepartmental transfer of records marked for the archives in our university’s records retention schedule. Being able to identify the seven factors of “Critical Records” provides a list of criteria to pass along to stakeholders; learning about the importance of “Enterprise Content Management” for digital content will help me argue for a better management system for the archives; and the information provided in “Records Management Program Design” will help me put ideas to paper when choosing that management system.
With enough positives to make this book what I would consider a useful and easily accessible addition to a library’s collection, the negatives lie possibly not in what topics are covered but rather in which topics are omitted. With so many archival and records professionals involved in the creation, planning, and execution of this book (including Franks herself), I was surprised to find no section on professional development, writing and publishing, or even networking opportunities.
These may have fallen outside the original scope of ideas, but if the intention was to create a useful handbook for archival professionals of every type and career stage, I would think that the collective wisdom that could have developed in this area would prove useful information to pass along.
Overall, the time and effort that went into the creation of this work and the intention behind it is commendable and appreciated. I consider the book a useful addition to any library’s collection and am happy to add it to our own. I believe that the Handbook is a useful entry into the world of ready reference books geared towards archival practitioners of any level. Its entries provide snapshots of information useful for archivists ranging from students or interns processing their first collections, to senior-level professionals unfamiliar with certain terms or in need of a refresher on others.
ATG Reviewer Rating: I need this in my library. (I want to be able to get up from my desk and grab this book off the shelf, if it’s not checked out.)
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Booklover — Disconnected
Column Editor: Donna Jacobs (Retired, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, SC 29425) <donna.jacobs55@gmail.com>
With a bit of hesitancy, I share with you my discovery of The House of the Sleeping Beauties by Yasunari Kawabata. I discovered this book in the Clemson Library. In addition to The House of the Sleeping Beauties, it included two other short stories: “One Arm” and “Of Birds and Bees.” The artistry, culture, food, social structure and norms of the Japanese culture intrigue many of us in the Western world, in many ways we just can’t quite connect. Western embracing of Japanese food might bring the closest connection. Now for the disconnect.
In 1968, the Nobel committee awarded Yasunari Kawabata the Nobel Prize in Literature “for his narrative mastery, which with great sensibility expresses the essence of the Japanese mind.” In my limited experience, all of the Nobel accolades can be understood and seen in the works of the author. But this work leaves me wondering about the “essence of the Japanese mind.” Yukio Mishima, in his Introduction, prepares the reader. He describes The House of the Sleeping Beauties as an “esoteric masterpiece.” One where “… a writer’s most secret, deeply hidden themes make their appearances.” How is one not intrigued when Mishima states: “I have elsewhere likened The House of the Sleeping Beauties to a submarine in which people are trapped and the air is gradually disappearing.” Is this going to be like watching a train wreck — you just can’t look away or in this case stop reading?
First, “One Arm.” A story about a man who is given an arm by a girl and his subsequent interaction with this appendage. It begins:
“‘I can let you have one of my arms for the night,’ said the girl. She took it off her right arm at the shoulder and, with her left hand, laid it on my knee.
‘Thank you.’ I looked at my knee. The warmth of the arm came through.
‘I’ll put the ring on. To remind you that it’s mine.’ She smiled and raised her left arm to my chest. ‘Please.’ With but one arm, it was difficult for her to take the ring off.
‘An engagement ring?’
‘No. A keepsake. From my mother.’”
The story continues with the man’s intimate interaction and conversation with the arm that ultimately leads him to the exchange of his arm for hers. An anatomical action that creates a bit of hysteria with the man — “Steadying myself, I looked at the arm on the bed. I caught my breath, my heart raced, my whole body trembled. I saw the arm in one instant, and the next I had torn the girl’s from my shoulder and put back my own. The act was like murder upon a sudden, diabolic impulse.”
With that prelude, one now enters the The House of the Sleeping Beauties. It begins:
“He was not to do anything in bad taste, the woman of the inn warned old Eguchi. He was not to put his finger into the mouth of the sleeping girl, or try anything else of that sort.”
Eguchi had come to this secret place, run by a middle age woman, to sleep (and only sleep) with a beauty that had been drugged and placed in repose for him. The story proceeds in vivid detail describing Eguchi’s observation of each sleeping beauty encountered over several visits and his struggle with the thoughts that come with each visit. At one point he asks: “What is the most you can get by with in this house?” The question is answered with a stare and a “faint smile.” In the house of the sleeping beauties, Eguchi discovers that invasive thoughts, frightening unanswered questions, drugged sleep and even the death of a sleeping beauty can happen in this house.
And thus, Kawabata ends the story with a question and for this booklover — disconnected.
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LEGAL ISSUES
Section Editors: Bruce Strauch (Retired, The Citadel) <bruce.strauch@gmail.com> Jack Montgomery (Georgia Southern University) <jmontgomery@georgiasouthern.edu>
Questions & Answers — Copyright Column
Column Editor: Kyle K. Courtney, Esq. (Director of Copyright & Information Policy, Harvard Library) <kyle_courtney@harvard.edu>
QUESTION S FROM AN ACQUISITIONS LIBRARIAN: Libraries have long struggled with restrictive and costly licensing agreements for eBooks and digital audiobooks, limiting their ability to provide equitable access to digital content. I hear that the Connecticut legislature recently passed a bill in both chambers to address these library eBook challenges and now it’s going to the CT governor to sign. What is the legislation, how does it work, and what is next?
ANSWER: Yes, in May 2025 Connecticut passed a first-ofits-kind law to improve how libraries license eBooks and digital audiobooks from publishers. Senate Bill 1234, which passed with bipartisan support and overwhelming enthusiasm from the state’s library community, is part of a broader push to address what many librarians see as a long-standing crisis in licensed digital content access.
What prompted Connecticut to pass a law regulating eBook licensing for libraries?
ANSWER : For years, libraries across the country have struggled with the terms imposed by publishers for eBooks and digital audiobooks. Unlike print books — which libraries can purchase outright and lend without restriction — digital content is almost always subject to highly restrictive licensing terms that hinder a library’s normal operations. Publishers often require libraries to rent eBooks for limited periods, limit the number of times a digital copy can be checked out, or charge five to ten times more than consumers pay for the same exact eBook titles. This forced rental model gives publishers extensive control and often results in libraries spending increasingly more money for less access.
Librarians and policy experts across the U.S., and especially Connecticut librarians, have been sounding the alarm for some time. They have all argued that these licensing practices undermine core library values: unfettered access to materials, circulating collections, long term preservation, and the freedom to read. Particularly since the pandemic, when digital circulation surged, the inequities of this eBook rental model have become impossible to ignore. Rural patrons, people with disabilities, students, and families all rely heavily on remote digital content — and when libraries can’t afford to provide it, those communities suffer the most.
The legislative effort in Connecticut was spurred by direct advocacy from the Connecticut Library Consortium (CLC), the Connecticut Library Association (CLA), and the eBooks Study Group (ESG), along with grassroots pressure from library workers and patrons across the state. According to Ellen Paul, Executive
Director of the Consortium, the goal was to stop letting Big Publishing “handcuff” public institutions. Library leaders made the case that unless the state intervened, access to reading and learning in the digital age would remain unfairly limited by corporate rental contracts designed to serve the publisher’s for-profit mission over the library mission, which serves the public good.
Lawmakers responded. Senate Bill 1234 was introduced earlier this year and moved quickly through the legislative process, ultimately passing both chambers with strong support. Governor Ned Lamont is expected to sign the bill into law.
What exactly does the new Connecticut eBook bill do?
ANSWER: Connecticut’s eBook bill is written carefully to avoid the pitfalls that derailed similar legislation in other states. At its core, Senate Bill 1234 sets the terms of contracts that public libraries in the state are allowed to enter into with publishers for eBooks and digital audiobooks. Rather than imposing rules directly on publishers, it sets boundaries on how libraries can license and rent eBook content, while still allowing core library operations.
The law contains several key provisions. First, it prohibits libraries from entering into licensing agreements that impose a loan cap or time-based expiration. Publishers have often used this combination, sometimes allowing, for example, only 26 checkouts or a two-year term, whichever comes first — as a way to maximize profits. But these restrictions frequently force libraries to re-purchase the same content again and again and again.
Second, the law mandates that any licensing terms be “reasonable.” While the statute does not define that term in exhaustive detail, it outlines the core principle: the bill is intended to prevent publishers from offering libraries eBook licenses that are dramatically more expensive or restrictive than those offered to consumers or other buyers. This provision gives libraries a potential basis for striking out terms in some of the licenses — and could help level the playing field by allowing the coercive power of the state to help libraires negotiate with large vendors.
A third major provision bans secrecy clauses that prevent libraries from discussing the terms of their licensing contracts. Transparency has long been a problem in this space. Many
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vendors insist on confidentiality, which keeps libraries from sharing price information, comparing deals, or pushing back collectively. By eliminating these nondisclosure requirements, the Connecticut law allows for greater collaboration and shared advocacy.
Finally, the law protects traditional library rights by specifying that licensing contracts cannot forbid interlibrary loan or preservation efforts. This provision ensures that libraries can continue to perform essential functions such as sharing resources across systems and safeguarding digital content for future generations.
When will the law take effect, and what’s the purpose of the “trigger clause”?
ANSWER: One of the most novel aspects of the Connecticut law is that it includes a “trigger clause.” A statutory trigger clause is a provision written into a law that delays the law’s implementation or certain effects of the law until a specified condition is met. This condition, or “trigger,” could be something like the passage of similar laws in other states, a court decision, the outcome of a study, or an administrative action that delays implementation until other states join in. Specifically, the eBooks law will only go into effect once other states, with a combined population of at least 7 million, enact similar legislation.
This mechanism is designed to create strength in numbers. Connecticut alone represents a small fraction of the library market, and state officials were concerned that acting in isolation could expose libraries to retaliation or simply fail to shift publishers’ behavior. But if multiple states adopt compatible laws, libraries can collectively change the market for digital content licensing.
The Connecticut State Librarian has been tasked with monitoring developments in other states and reporting quarterly on whether the population threshold has been met. Once it is, the law will become enforceable in Connecticut.
This approach also gives library advocates in other states time to prepare legislation of their own. Already, several states have expressed interest in following Connecticut’s lead. The trigger clause creates a shared goal and encourages momentum toward national action without requiring every jurisdiction to move at the same time.
How is this different from the eBook laws passed in Maryland and New York?
ANSWER: Connecticut’s bill is one of several major attempts by states to regulate eBook licensing for libraries — but it is the first to be designed in this way.
In 2021, Maryland passed a law that required publishers to offer eBook licenses to libraries “on reasonable terms” if they sold those eBooks to the general public. New York passed a similar law in 2022. The Maryland eBook law was challenged in court as unconstitutional under federal copyright law. A federal court agreed, ruling that copyright holders cannot be compelled or forced to license their work under state law. New York’s governor, fearing litigation, vetoed the same bill.
ESG learned from this Maryland court ruling and developed a new contract-focused legal strategy for the states. Rather than attempting to compel publishers to license content at all, ESG worked with Connecticut libraires to draft Senate Bill 1234 which is a contract and licensing bill, regulating the purchasing decisions of libraries. It does not interfere with the publishers’
copyright interests or require them to enter into contracts. Instead, it tells publicly funded libraires what kind of agreements they can enter into. This approach shifts the legal analysis away from copyright law and toward the state’s authority over its own agencies and spending.
Legal experts and library advocates believe the bill also aligns with how other public contracting laws function: states routinely place conditions on how their agencies can spend money or enter into agreements, without running afoul of federal law.
What has the response been from the library community and the publishing industry?
ANSWER: Within the library world, the response has been overwhelmingly positive. Library leaders in Connecticut hailed the passage of Senate Bill 1234 as a landmark achievement and a necessary correction to an unsustainable status quo. Advocates praised lawmakers for listening to the needs of public institutions and taking a stand on behalf of readers, especially those who rely on digital access for school, work, and leisure.
Scott Jarzombek, president of the Connecticut Library Association, emphasized that the bill restores some balance to the library-publisher relationship. “This bill puts our state, and those who join us in this fight, on a more equal and appropriate footing with the publishing industry for the digital age,” he said in a statement.
The ESG, a national coalition of librarians and legal scholars focused on fair digital licensing, also supported the bill and helped shape its language. They see the Connecticut model as a careful and legally sound path forward for other states.
The publishing industry’s response has been more cautious. While no lawsuit has been filed to date, groups like the Association of American Publishers are closely watching the situation. In public comments, the AAP has previously argued that similar laws “violate the rights of authors and publishers” and could reduce the availability of content. However, because Connecticut’s law regulates libraries rather than publishers directly, the industry may find it harder to challenge.
However, the Solicitor General of Connecticut has weighed in on these exact claims before and stated through submitted testimony to the legislature that “Connecticut, through its sovereign police powers, has long established, regulated, and funded our state’s libraries.” The Solicitor General continued that “publishers have no freestanding right to contract with state or local government.” He continued that “the bills, in fact, do not regulate publishers at all” and “only seeks to ensure that public funds in Connecticut are expended responsibly in the public interest. Nobody has a right to compel misplaced state spending on unfair contracts.”
What could this mean for libraries in other states, and how can they prepare?
ANSWER: Connecticut’s law is likely to become a model for other states, especially those that want to act on the forced rental eBook market without risking a court challenge. Its structure — focusing on library contracts, library operations, using a population trigger, and embedding transparency and rights protections — offers a blueprint for impactful reform.
Library leaders in states like Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Rhode Island have already expressed interest in similar legislation. The Connecticut bill’s passage could be the tipping point for a broader wave of
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coordinated state action. If just a few additional states pass compatible laws, the population threshold will be met, and the Connecticut law will activate. That activation could send a strong message to publishers that libraries are no longer willing to accept eBook rental contracts with one-sided terms that prevent the library from performing its public mission: to provide equitable, enduring access to knowledge and culture. By rejecting eBook rental contracts with restrictive, one-sided terms, libraries would be reclaiming their ability to lend, preserve, and share digital materials in the same spirit as print collections — free from artificial limits forced upon the library’s ccollections.
In the meantime, libraries and their supporters can take several steps to prepare. First, they can educate lawmakers and the public about the issues at stake — emphasizing that this
is not just a matter of money, but of public access. They can also join national advocacy efforts, such as those led by ESG, to share information and coordinate messaging. Finally, they can audit their current licensing contracts to understand how much is being spent, how often titles are re-purchased, and where improvements could be made under a better system.
Ultimately, Connecticut’s eBook law signals a shift in how libraries assert their rights in the digital age. It reflects a growing recognition that public institutions must not be at the mercy of opaque, overpriced, and exploitative licensing schemes. Whether this becomes the start of a nationwide movement will depend on what other states do next — but the door has been opened.
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And They Were There — Reports of Meetings 2024 Charleston Conference
Column Editor: Caroline Goldsmith (Associate Director, The Charleston Hub) <caroline@charlestonlibraryconference.com>
Column Editor’s Note: Thanks to the Charleston Conference attendees, both those who attended in person and those who attended virtually, who agreed to write brief reports highlighting their 2024 Charleston Conference experience. Our in-person event was held November 11-15, 2024 in historic downtown Charleston, with the virtual event following on December 9-13, 2024. The virtual event included recorded presentations from the in-person event followed by live Q&A sessions with speakers as well as exclusive “virtual only” content. There were more Charleston Conference sessions than there were volunteer reporters for Against the Grain, so the coverage is just a snapshot.
There are many ways to learn more about the 2024 conference. Please visit the Charleston Conference YouTube site, https://www.youtube.com/user/CharlestonConference/ videos?app=desktop, for selected interviews and videos, and the conference site, https://www.charleston-hub.com/thecharleston-conference/ for links to conference information and blog reports written by Charleston Conference blogger, Donald Hawkins, https://www.charleston-hub.com/category/blogs/ chsconfnotes/. The 2024 Charleston Conference Proceedings will be published in 2025, in partnership with University of Michigan Press.
The first installment of Conference reports for our 2024 event were featured in our February issue (v.37#1), and included key takeaways, top three things learned while at the conference, impressions from the vendor showcase, and summaries of 20 minute vendor information sessions. The second installment of Conference reports for our 2024 event were featured in our April issue (v.37#2) and included individual reports and short summaries from Wednesday’s sessions.
This issue will feature individual reports and short summaries on Thursday’s and Friday’s sessions, including poster sessions, as well as virtual only sessions. Thank you again to all of our volunteer reporters, and this wraps up all of our 2024 Reports. Registration is now open for the 2025 Charleston Conference — don’t miss our exciting sessions this Fall! — CG
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 14
CONCURRENT SESSIONS
Awareness-Informed Action: Empowering Collaborative Collections Building
Reported by Sara Saddler (Head of Collection Services at the Alyne Queener Massey Law Library Vanderbilt University Law School) <sara.c.saddler@vanderbilt.edu>
Presented by Todd Carpenter (Executive Director, National Information Standards Organization (NISO)); Gaelle Bequet (Director, ISSN International Centre); Jill Morris (Executive Director, PALCI); and Boaz Nadav Manes (University Librarian, Lehigh University Libraries) — Video Recording available at https://youtu.be/GCwVIiVOGzM?si=rgTKSLm_3Q6gCKjP
The Collaborative Collections Lifecycle Project (CCLP) represents a cutting-edge endeavor designed to reshape the model of interlibrary collaboration. Launched in 2019 and currently in its second phase as of 2022, the project involves 70 professionals from 50 distinct institutions, all with a shared vision of enhancing community-centric collaboration in libraries.
Todd Carpenter, Executive Director of National Information Standards Organization (NISO), one of the keynote speakers, elaborated on the objective of the collaborative group to remodel the way in which libraries collaborate, a process that hinges on middleware development that is tailored to support a unified system. Phase 2 highlights the modeling of cross-institutional cooperative efforts to bolster efficiency and effectiveness. Central to this phase is the employment of Ithaka S+R’s expertise, focusing on refining acquisitions and selection procedures.
Ithaka S+R provided information that outlined the consultancy’s role in guiding the group through governance and research, aimed at developing practical solutions, grounded in the actual library operations. Their contributions include key findings, and a work-in-progress recommended practice framework grounded in real scenarios. Furthermore, Ithaka S+R has highlighted the necessity for infrastructure that supports these collaborative mechanisms, pointing to the National Information Standards Organization’s (NISO) recommended practices.
Following the discussion about contributions from Ithaka S+R, Gaelle Bequet, Director at ISSN International Centre, introduced a working group. The team, which consists of ten dedicated cataloging and metadata professionals, convenes bi-weekly to refine metadata standards that will be integral to the CCLP. Their current focus highlights four distinct metadata types, with several recommendations already established.
Further presentations in the session detailed a user experience (UX)-led functional analysis approach. With this method, which streamlines data for generating targeted lists and activating relevant actions, the data comes in and is then filtered for the purpose of use. Upon analysis of the data, lists are created that trigger actions. This initiative spearheads the creation of extensive metadata aggregations necessary for the envisioned collaborative framework.
The progress of the Collaborative Collections Lifecycle Project marks a significant step towards reimagining collaborative efforts among libraries. The practical research and guidelines provided by this initiative offer an invaluable resource for organizations. The project’s ongoing development and implementation hold the promise of revolutionizing collection development practices, setting a new standard in the library community’s collective work. This collaborative approach from key stakeholders has moved theoretical discussions and developed more practical applications with
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tangible results that are changing the landscape of cataloging and metadata practices.
Charleston goes to Washington: Public access, AI, copyright ... and yes, the election
Reported by Karen Burton (Science Librarian, Clemson University) <kbburto@clemson.edu>
Presented by Tom Ciavarella (Head of Public Affairs and Advocacy, North America, Frontiers); Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe (Professor, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign); Miriam Quintal (Managing Principal, Lewis-Burke Associates); and Darla Henderson (Director, FASEB Open Science and Research Integrity, Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB)) — Video recording available at https://youtu. be/HodwsxXK4RE?si=C9Z7ZtQJ_hHGDE9Z
The Charleston goes to Washington: Public access, AI, copyright ... and yes, the election session offered viewpoints from several panelists on what they anticipate will happen in the next four years with the change in administration. Miriam Quintal, Managing Principal at Lewis-Burke Associates, shared what she believes will be the Trump administration’s top three priorities. Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe, Professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, noted that we have a historical Trump administration to reflect on, and she expects the OSTP Nelson Memo to be affected. Dr. Darla Henderson, Director of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology Open Science and Research Integrity, also expects the OSTP Nelson Memo to be impacted but hopes for bipartisan support for science due to the value of research in driving innovation. Closing thoughts included suggestions to stay engaged with current events and highlighted that the National Institutes of Health received its highest budget under the first Trump administration.
Presented by Keith Webster (Dean of Libraries and Director of Emerging and Integrative Media Initiatives, Carnegie Mellon University) and Daniel Hook (CEO, Digital Science) — Video recording available at https://youtu.be/ OhPVwVV2b6Y?si=JdQ33ASfFHA-M4n_
As engaging a session as any you’ll find in Charleston! Most of the hour was devoted to a demo wherein Daniel Hook created a real digital twin before our eyes. A digital twin is a “reusable virtual representation” of a real-life object; for instance, Google Maps is a digital twin of the real landscape. But here, Hook used NotebookLM to create, train, test, and use a basic digital twin of himself, one that could answer his boss’ emails with Hook’s own style and even his English sense of humor. After creating his twin, Hook and co-presenter Keith Webster just scratched the surface of the deep vault of unintended side effects and longreaching consequences that such digital twins could manifest. Does your employer own your work-based digital twin, and what does that mean if you leave the job? How do we make sure this actually makes work easier rather than simply adding to the pile? How do digital twins intersect with disinformation?
The
Ephemeral Web: Understanding and Addressing LinkRot in Digital Libraries
Reported by Amanda Elzey (Metadata Cataloger & Database Specialist, J. Murrey Atkins Library, University of North Carolina at Charlotte) <aelzey@charlotte.edu>
Presented by Stephen Rhind-Tutt (President, Coherent Digital) and Gary Price (Librarian, InfoDocket) — Video recording available at https://youtu.be/gUYbzBSGpnE?si=8pbSiN0pORIxGNiy
In a talk that was equal parts depressing and impassioned, Stephen and Gary demonstrated the short-lived nature of internet links and offered suggestions for slowing the loss of vital STEM research, government publications (particularly local ones), and cultural documents that are stored oh-so-tentatively on websites that may be here today and gone tomorrow. Initiatives to try to salvage a historical view of the web include the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine and its subscription service Archive-It, and researchers are encouraged to utilize permanent identifiers such as DOIs and PURLs. Stephen likened sifting the web to an archaeological dig — trying to unearth links before they are gone forever from the historical record. On an individual level, Gary suggested archiving one’s own work efficiently (with metadata!) and regularly contributing URLs to the Wayback Machine using the Save Page Now function. He stressed that each web page version is a unique iteration, and that a link in any given bibliography may not point to the same content from when it was cited. Although, as one listener opined, this talk gave us the “first official panic attack of the day,” Stephen and Gary encouraged us to do what we can to save what we can on the web.
How Libraries Can Champion Research Impact
Reported by Lynne Jones (Electronic and Continuing Resources Librarian, UWM Libraries, University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee) <jones873@uwm.edu>
Presented by Evan Simpson (Associate Dean for Experiential Learning and Academic Engagement, Northeastern University); Vicky Williams (CEO, Emerald Publishing Group); Thane Chambers (Head of Research Impact Services, University of Alberta); and Aditi Pai (Interim Vice Provost for Faculty and Professor of Biology, Spelman College) — Video recording available at https://youtu.be/OzX5pukav3E?si=fjMZlN40YSMjYGLM
Panelists in this session focused on impact as an outwardlooking measure. Impact is not citations, impact factors, or mentions on academic networking platforms. Impact in this context is real-world change because of academic research. Given the nebulous nature of this definition, it’s no wonder that the panelists were not able to tidily sum up exactly how to measure this. There was broad agreement that what impact is will vary from discipline to discipline and even researcher to researcher. Compared to tenured faculty, for example, an earlycareer researcher may be less able to publish in an open access journal (which would allow more of the public to access their research) if their department prefers them to focus on journals with high impact factors to gain tenure.
The panelists suggested that librarians take opportunities to encourage faculty and administrators to go beyond traditional quantitative impact metrics, although mileage on that may vary.
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A final take-away from this session is that while librarians are well positioned to be partners in understanding and explaining research impact, researchers and “impact professionals” will need to take the lead to figure out how to define and measure impact.
Measuring Societal Benefit: The Future of OA Impact Analytics
Reported by Lynne Jones (Electronic and Continuing Resources Librarian, UWM Libraries, University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee) <jones873@uwm.edu>
Presented by Lettie Conrad (Product Experience Architect, LibLynx); Kelsey Mrjoian (Library Relations Manager, Michigan Publishing); Elliott Hibbler (Scholarly Communication Librarian, Boston College); and Michelle Urberg (Client Success Manager, LibLynx) — Video recording available at https://youtu. be/eDLm-vli_U0?si=YBCLyVBi51MNUtaY
This session understandably offered up more questions than it provided answers. Starting from the position that current usage metrics are no longer good enough, and may even be privacy-invading, panelists reviewed the many complicating factors in measuring the use and impact of the ever-growing body of open access research.
The most salient theme running through all the panelists’ comments is that open access impact is best conveyed through stories. The number of downloads and cost per use do not adequately convey how institutional funding, such as fees for transformative agreements, is being used to push scholarship out to the world. Nor does it show where and how readers are using said scholarship to create positive societal impact. The difficulty in collecting data while still preserving privacy for users was repeatedly stressed but without any real resolution about how to do that. New standards and best practices for the more qualitative data about open access use will need to be established.
Mergers
& Aggravations: The Realities of Merging and Reshaping
Library Collections
Reported by Ramune K. Kubilius (Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine) <r-kubilius@northwestern.edu>
Presented by Denise O’Shea (Montclair State University, moderator); Daniel Holden (Saint Joseph’s University); and Anne Krakow (St. Joseph’s University)
NOTE: Anne Krakow presented remotely. Video recording available at https://youtu.be/ PMZO9LPPTTM?si=H4CIu3tPoUPWKHge
This was the second of two similarly themed Wednesday conference sessions. The first (a lively discussion) focused on hospital mergers & acquisitions, while this session described library collection mergers after academic institutions’ mergers (but also primarily driven by financial challenges). Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia underwent mergers with two local institutions- University of the Sciences and Pennsylvania College of Health Sciences. Montclair State University merged with Bloomfield College. Upsides: at SJU, the merger added health sciences programs; the merger into Montclair State University ensured the continuing mission of Bloomfield College, the only institution in New Jersey serving a predominantly minority
population. Speakers described merger timelines, task forces, and project management tools. Speakers did not ignore that there were cultural differences, misconceptions (and realities), administrative level changes in scenarios (for Montclair, the merger involved a state and private institution), new library budgeting scenarios, and many licensing and pricing discussions with vendors. Holden and Krakow described collection merging that necessitated much planning, external e-resource changes (e.g., upgrading IP authentication), financial system changes, template creation, and working with general counsels … O’Shea described collection reshaping and cultural differences, mergers (and decisions) beyond e-collections- the ILS, cataloging practice consensus, reports, inventories, data clean-up, staff training, etc. No surprise that recommendations included: communication, also flexibility — accept the “gray” of the process (ambiguity, uncertainty). Krakow contended “it takes a lot of time to get on the same page.” O’Shea quoted her administrator’s mantra “We’re not just rescuing this school — we’re really trying to do right by them…”
INNOVATION SESSIONS
Innovation Session 2
Reported by Elizabeth Jarcy (DMEP Librarian, Library of Congress) <ejar@loc.gov>
Moderated by Elaina Norlin (ASERL) —Video recording available at https://youtu.be/YJciEPjsZBc?si=JpLB0gdQQbTjwd0L
Presentations included the following:
The SeamlessAccess Audit Toolkit: Phase II of a Framework for Librarians to Audit Resource Access — Presented by John Felts (Head of Information Technology and Collections, Coastal Carolina University); Tim Lloyd (CEO, LibLynx); and Jason Griffey (Director of Strategic Initiatives, NISO)
Improved Collection Analysis and Visualizations with Business Intelligence Software — Presented by Meredith Taylor (Collection Assessment Librarian, Appalachian State University)
Navigating the Minotaur’s Maze: Harnessing Airtable for Library Collection Strategies — Presented by Emilie Menzel (Collections Management and Strategies Librarian, Goodson Law Library, Duke University)
No end in sight – A Serials Review Process that Works — presented by Carrie Ludovico (Business Librarian, University of Richmond); Anna Creech (Head, Resource Acquisition and Delivery, University of Richmond); and Carol Wittig (Head, Research and Instruction, University of Richmond)
This session ran the full gamut of well-funded software initiatives to classic spreadsheet management. SeamlessAccess presented an update on their Access Audit Toolkit, sharing insights on security and reliability requirements and analysis for their product. I particularly enjoyed the attention paid to patron consent (data collection, sharing, and withdrawal of consent by the user). Meredith Taylor (Appalachian State University) demonstrated how her library employed Tableau for collection assessment. The data visualizations were great, though the learning curve (and price tag) seem steep. Emilie Menzel (Duke University) put Airtable to use to track collection management decisions, which I was impressed by — I immediately started to mull over my own library’s
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recordkeeping method and how it could be improved. Lastly, the University of Richmond reviewed how everyone’s old friend Excel helped them consolidate, weed, and assess an enormous serials collection. While this process was painstaking, UR staff created a framework for future collection decisions that will help standardize their approach to serials acquisitions. I really enjoyed the breadth and creativity of options used in this session to accomplish so many complex administrative tasks. I left the session thinking about a lot of potential practical applications to my library and my position — if not through software directly, then with workflows adjustments inspired by them.
LIVELY LUNCH DISCUSSIONS
Clinical Information Provision in an Era of Hospital Mergers and Acquisitions (24th Health Sciences Lively Discussion)
Reported by Ramune K. Kubilius (Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine) <r-kubilius@northwestern.edu>
Presented by Sarah McClung (University of California, San Francisco, moderator); Dunc Williams (Medical University of South Carolina); Daniel Burgard (University of North Texas Health Science Center); and Renae Barger (University of Pittsburgh)
Almost 50 on-site attendees listened with interest to three panelists’ insights about hospital mergers and acquisitions. Moderator McClung introduced the session, and polled the audience, revealing a few hospital librarians, publishers, and vendors, while academic health sciences librarians were the largest contingent.
Ramune Kubilius spotlighted trends from the annual “Developments” handout prepared for the session. On the radar (since the last Charleston Conference): publisher and product anniversaries, new and transitional licensing models (and pilots), also AI enhanced products.
Health administration professor and researcher Williams shared eye-opening statistics, trending down since 2010, of the numbers of U.S. hospitals closed outright, leaving many U.S. rural areas without any health facilities. The mergers/ acquisitions phenomenon is another facet to this landscape. Business world phrases include: “bankruptcy-distressed hospitals,” “value purchasing,” and “cost to value.” Personnel costs comprise almost half the cost of running a hospital. Though libraries (librarians) unavoidably are impacted, information resource costs are a very small percent of hospital budgets (less than 1%).
Regional examples showed similarities and differences. Per Burgard, Texas statistics are daunting, with counties that have no hospitals and no physicians. Still, he has encountered librarians (in other states) who survived (and thrived after) hospital mergers/acquisitions. Barger described their library’s solution: the academic health sciences library’s separately licenses “Clinical Digital Library” to serve the needs of the GME program and the almost 50% academic medical physicians with Pittsburgh Medical System appointments.
Collectively, speakers’ take-away practical advice: “keep hospital librarians, if possible,” “identify department licensed resources” (consolidate for better e-resource management), “get key decision makers to be champions,” “manage
expectations,” “be prepared, amenable, and receptive to change,” and “spend more time outside your library than in it.”
On-site discussion confirmed the likelihood that the landscape described in this session is (and will remain) on the radars of health administration researchers and librarians, in their different roles, and viewed from their different prisms.
Slide set is available: https://doi.org/10.18131/necz9-4rf94
Handout is available: https://doi.org/10.18131/twhx7-xse23
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 15 CONCURRENT SESSIONS
From Everybody Wants You to Can’t Touch This: Creating Collections Tracks to Found Collection Development Decisions, Collections Assessment, and Standardize the Intake of Multifarious Materials
Reported by Tonya Dority (Interim Acquisitions & Metadata Librarian, Liaison to the Department of Communication, Reese Library, Augusta University) <TDORITY@augusta.edu>
Presented by Bill Maltarich (Head of Collection Development, NYU Libraries); Jane Excell (Assistant Director of Collections, NYU Libraries); and Jill Morris (Executive Director of the Partnership for Academic Library Collaboration and Innovation (PALCI)) — Video Recording Available at https://youtu.be/ IJRV5FxJHK8?si=Z2Evh4P53TlrIxC6
NYU Librarians Bill Maltarich and Jane Excell conceptualized a program aimed at transforming local collection development decisions, workflows, and measurements of success. The pair worked with Jill Morris of PALCI to extend their concept to the regional consortium. Maltarich and Excell created new, needs-based collection development “tracks” and assigned song titles to each of them. These tracks were Trending , Always Available, Standard Onsite, Standard Offsite, Object, and Spotlight. Placing materials in the appropriate tracks would better inform decisions on purchasing and access. Excell also discussed how the program could impact technical services’ workflows. The presenters requested feedback especially from attendees who work in a consortium.
STOPWATCH SESSIONS
Reported by Ramune K. Kubilius (Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine) <r-kubilius@northwestern.edu>
Moderated by: Ramune K. Kubilius (Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine) — Video recording available at https://youtu.be/SI84PZtM4sE?si=tq-1tCWpbk8vO7u_
Presentations included the following:
Empowering Academic Excellence: Establishing a Graduate Student Repository at Athens State University — Presented by Dagan Bond-Turner (Athens State University)
ETDs and the Scholarly Communication Process — Presented by Scott Bacon (Coastal Carolina University)
Limiting or Limitless? Responding to Collection Needs with Interlibrary Loan — Presented by Danielle Skaggs (West Chester University) and Anne Larrivee (West Chester University) - Note: Anne Larrivee was the on-site presenter.
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Wait, Can We Do That? A Review of TDM Statements in Licenses — Presented by Amie Freeman (University of South Carolina) and Christee Pascale (University of South Carolina)
Instances of Ambiguity: Deconstructing Library Licenses — Presented by Jesse Holden (Orbis Cascade Alliance)
Conference attendees often like the variety and nuggets offered in brief presentations of stopwatch program slots. Organized by conference directors and moderated by Kubilius, session #7 featured electronic theses and dissertations, a research project (about ILL and collection use), and licensing — a focused and a theoretical view.
Bond-Turner spoke about the search for the right solution for ETDs that began with a faculty inquiry. She described a choice of PQ ETD Administrator, with the library paying for the theses to be open access, sharing some of the issues and library support strategies.
Bacon described ETDs as a scholarly communication concept, and his institution’s choice to not only use PQ ETD Administrator, but to also use the repository platform, Digital Commons. The workflow issues (e.g., students must upload twice) were addressed with solutions (including PQ’s “Repository Export” tool), and attempts are underway for consistency across colleges.
Larrivee described her institution’s single source funding system for one-time collection purchases. A resulting research project involved a 5-question survey of her university’s researchers, yielding information about their reported use of collections to complete scholarly/creative work. Filling in the picture: analysis of her ILL trends, loans, and renewals, eBook (package) usage (all at her library), and externally- ARL statistical trends and literature reviews. Survey research findings: her institution’s faculty use library collections but were also satisfied with ILL as a way to obtain what they needed.
Freeman and Pascale described a project to examine statements/licenses that started with the university libraries’ 2021 “Objectives for Negotiations and Licensing.” Their working group’s TDM review analysis process included: review of existing licenses, adding patron-facing information, identifying vendors and publishers (to prioritize outreach). Outcomes: internal information for library staff to access; a public LibGuide, making some tools available (e.g., Ithaka’s Constellate). Recommendations: review your campus requirements, consider focusing on open and self-hosted solutions, and where possible- include licensing language to include TDM language.
In the last presentation, the most theoretical, Holden posed a question long on his radar: Why are licenses in the library? He discussed licenses as texts with: nuance and flexibility, a legal framework, a value, subject to interpretation, and with an ethics component. Ambiguity (in licenses) is a strategy and has risk. He opined that due to multiple license modules, “openness” has to be deconstructed. During discussion, he acknowledged that in a consortium the size of ORBIS (30+ members), consensus on licensing approaches is likely to be more easily reached.
2024 POSTER SESSIONS
What I Learned After Viewing the 2024 Charleston Conference Posters
In my third year reporting on the Charleston posters, I continue to be impressed by the breadth of issues that the posters cover. This year, in my library back home, we have been working on our open access (OA) strategy and deciding what kinds of investments to make. More librarians have been involved in transformative agreements and other campus OA programs for several years now, so we’re starting to see some excellent reporting on results. One of my goals then for the poster session was to seek out these folks and learn how their programs are going!
On Day 1, I talked to a librarian from Virginia Tech whose library is ending their OA publication supplementary fund. Reasons cited for the unsustainability include rising APCs, repeat demand, and the impracticality of targeting for need as they had intended. Meanwhile, the team at UCSB is focused on how best to promote their OA offerings to students and faculty. Their solution is constant assessment alongside a multi-strategy approach, including one on one outreach to new faculty, “OA Week” displays and giveaways, and a dedicated communications manager.
Day 2 included a poster by a Penn State team who is also interested in promotion of OA but their study looked at current student understanding. Of 57 students surveyed, 44 have zero knowledge of OA publishing models. Their goal is for the community to learn how its work is disseminated and they certainly face an uphill battle. Coastal Carolina is researching how their community’s OA output compares among peer institutions. They found an OA publishing rate of 27-35% over the last 5 years, in the middle of the pack. Their next step is to study to what extent an institution can influence its OA output and the impact of promotional strategies.
MONDAY, DECEMBER 9 VIRTUAL ONLY SESSIONS
Enhancing Invoice Management: The Electronic Resource Workflow Initiative in Academic Libraries
Reported by Eva Murphy (Electronic Resources Librarian, Knowledge Access & Resource Management, West Virginia University Libraries)
Presented by Russell Michalak (Founding Partner, Inclusive Knowledge Solutions) and Devon Ellixson (Library Intern, Goldey-Beacom College) — Video Recording Available at https:// whova.com/portal/webapp/charl_202412/Agenda/4109412
Goldey-Beacom College’s invoice management system had a heightened risk of errors, as it relied on forwarding emails and manual data entry into an online collaboration platform. These errors led to inaccurate billing and delayed payments, which had the potential for financial and legal repercussions. Library Director Russell Michalak and Intern Devon Ellixson
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created an innovative solution using ClickUp, a cloud-based project management software similar to Microsoft Planner, to organize invoices, define roles and responsibilities, and optimize invoice management.
Michalak and Ellixson used task decomposition to build a robust framework within ClickUp that solved the problems associated with the old workflow. ClickUp allows task assignment, progress reporting, and a notification system. A key feature of this solution is a form where Michalak can add invoices as he receives them, which triggers the rest of the payment workflow. Each invoice is tracked with task statuses such as “Waiting for Response” and “Follow Up” that Ellixson
updates as the invoice moves through the payment process. Streamlining invoice management with ClickUp resulted in an efficient workflow that improved accuracy and supported faster approval and payment of invoices.
This concludes the third and final installment of reports from the 2024 Charleston Conference. You can also view recordings of all of our other conference sessions, podcast interviews and our new Charleston Conference leadership interview series on our YouTube channel. Thank you again to our volunteer reporters!
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Seeing the Whole Board — Understanding Advocacy to Platform Your Library Within Your Institution
In the course of my work at the EveryLibrary Institute, I have occasion to directly lobby legislators on behalf of libraries, speak to library supporters, and present to library professionals at conferences. In each scenario, I have learned that advocacy starts with understanding. When I speak about advocacy, I speak about people, place, and platform as an opportunity-driven approach to library advocacy. Understanding where those opportunities are on college campuses and within university communities starts with people.
People
• Who has influence over the library? The budget? Your involvement in decision making?
• Who are your natural supporters? Your advocates? Potential partners?
• How can you root your messages in terms of the benefits to those people?
• Where do their constituencies, needs, interests, or mission and your supporters, users, or natural partners overlap?
Once you understand the people in your advocacy equation, you can better understand their needs and how to fill them by understanding place.
Place
• What are their jurisdictions? (What is the environment in which they operate? What is their ecosystem, their community?)
• What is happening in those jurisdictions that impact their constituencies and their stakeholders and decision making? (Are there outside influences, internal pressures, programs, fundraising efforts, budget constraints, administrative mandates or goals?)
Place provides the context that informs what your allies and potential allies do and where and it is where their committees of jurisdiction lie. The platform.
Platform
• What are the interests and “committees of jurisdiction” of those stakeholders, supporters, and potential allies? (e.g., Departments, Committees, Associations, Boards)
• What are their responsibilities? (Constituents/Staffing/ Labor Force, Budgeting, Grants, Decision or Rule Making?)
• Where do they feel pressure?
• What is the work of their staff?
• Who and what do your allies and potential allies care about?
• Who and what do their staff care about?
Addressing people, place, and platform begins well before there is a crisis or an issue to address. It begins with
the relationships you foster to build support for the library, its budgets, its staff, and its initiatives. Relationships begin when you say yes. When you accept invitations to meetings, to serve on committees, and workshop ideas, or when you say yes to a request for help. When you find interested parties, understand which departments need your assistance, would benefit from your expertise, represent an influential research division, or bring significant funding into an institution. In doing so, you are beginning the work of both expanding your influence and influencing decision makers.
These decision makers may not be limited to the campus community. Colleges and universities are an important part of their community, communities where donors and potential donors reside and do business. Board members may come from the alumni community. The alumni community comes from the student body. What are you doing to strengthen the ties with current students who may become future donors and board members? Relationship building is both strategic and smart. It allows library professionals to showcase their resources, staff, and value to the stakeholders who may be able to influence at crucial times or open up new opportunities for library professionals and advocates.
How Can You Speak to People, Place, and Platform?
Whether you are a librarian, a content or technology provider, a researcher, or an advocate, you are likely to speak the language of libraries. This shorthand, this trade talk, this vernacular comes easily when you are speaking to your cohorts, to fellow travelers, to colleagues. However, in the world of advocacy, those are not the people you need to influence. Thinking about people, place, and platform allows any advocate to start from neutral, understand the audience, and learn which messages will resonate with an individual. An administrator has different priorities and needs than her staff. The head of a department has different stressors than an associate professor. Running a university and running a research lab are not the same. Are you speaking Library-ese or are you using the language of administrators? Staffers? Department Heads? Faculty? Researcher? Students? Alumni? Members of the community? My 20-plus year involvement in the library business means I thought nothing about talking about “full-text access” or “access to the full text” and if I wasn’t speaking to a library professional or a content and technology provider, I would get a noticeable blank stare. That shorthand, the trade talk, meant nothing to people for whom saying, “you can read the articles,” would make immediate sense. Avoiding library trade talk while also understanding and picking up on the language of those with whom you are seeking better relationships can break down barriers and demonstrate your interest in what is important to them. Hearing their stories, understanding their concerns, also allows you to make connections to your own concerns and find common ground.
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If you’ve committed to people, place, and platform, you don’t have to abandon all your library basics. Does your outreach include intake? Are you conducting advocacy-related reference interviews? Are you showing up, asking questions and making connections to business relationships and alliances? What do stakeholders and staffers need to know about issues they may not understand are core to libraries? (e.g., How the library budget impacts departments and disciplines) Are you comfortable having conversations with the people who control the library purse strings? Can you make your case in a language and style that suits their needs?
An academic library serves the needs of multiple stakeholders. Those holding the purse strings, those bringing money and influence into the institution, those trying to run the university all have information needs that the library should be meeting. If the library can inform these decision makers and their staff, it can become an indispensable resource. Are you making yourself, your staff, and your library indispensable? By using your library expertise and showcasing its resources, library professionals can bring the library directly to stakeholders. By understanding strategic plans, local or current concerns, regional or institutionspecific interests, library professionals can use library resources to alert stakeholders to news, research, reports, competitive analysis, whatever that reference interview uncovers.
Keyword searches tailormade for stakeholders or staffers means each search, each alert, each email, is an iteration of your library on the phone or desktop of the people who can make a huge difference in your lives and careers. Using your expertise and resources can provide your institutional community with access to invaluable information while centering the library and its collection. By providing timely information from vetted resources using technology designed to deliver customized information updates, you both expand awareness and timeliness of information sharing and showcase the power of libraries and information access.
Claiming Your Own People, Place, and Platforms
Understanding the difference makers and making yourselves indispensable are just a part of opportunity-based advocacy. The relationship building can’t be one-sided; you also need to be able to directly make the case for libraries. Telling the story about your library, your staff, and your resources involves being able to speak to impact and raise awareness. It means understanding the business implications of decisions and it often requires being about to speak to the unintended consequences of proposed plans.
Library advocacy can be informed by understanding different motivating factors. In the 2008 book, “The Political Brain, The Role of Emotion in Deciding the Fate of the Nation,” Drew Weston wrote about understanding what people care about and different types of motivational drivers and supporter types.
Motivations
• Compassionately Engaged
Populations and people
• Pride of Place
Interesting, thriving, and prosperous
• The Data Shows It
Data about outcomes as lens
• Concerned or Fearful
Focused on filling gaps
Supporter Types
• Relational Supporters
“Know” libraries and librarians
• Ideological Supporters
Aligned with what librarians do
• Aversion Supporters
Would like to avoid bad outcomes based on principles or ideals
• Access Supporters
Motivated by feedback, praise, or gratitude
Using an Example of Data-driven Motivation and an Aversion Supporter Type
It is essential to be able to speak to the business implications of issues and concerns more than the emotional messages. While library professionals are accustomed to collaborating and looking for ways to share collections and knowledge, remember that colleges and universities are inherently competitive institutions. They compete for administrators and faculty, researchers and research dollars, as well as students. What does the data show about how much money departments at your institution, colleges and universities in your state, and even athletic rivals budget for the library, student retention, and student success per student? Is there data to help you assist faculty, researchers, and department heads to benchmark themselves against others seeking increasingly competitive grants and research dollars. Are you able to depoliticize the language surrounding the library, research, or particular disciplines and provide data, research, and analysis? It starts with understanding your audience, their motivations, and how they best receive information. That awareness begins with relationships. The pick list of motivations and supporter types provides an array of opportunities to shape an argument, presentation, or request for information.
An advocate speaking to a legislator or legislative staffer needs to point out the potential fallout issues in a bill and suggest alternative language. Library professionals need to use their understanding of library holdings, procedures, policies, and the profession to speak clearly about what already exists that may be unknown to administrators or supporters, what library professionals do, and areas of expertise that may not come to mind when non-librarians think about a library. Data privacy can inform data stewardship and student privacy. Copyright protection and digital rights management can inform information access and artificial intelligence. Subject headings and keywords can inform grant restrictions and research biases. Aligning library needs with institutional or administrative business initiatives — student retention, student success, and institutional benchmarking — helps to showcase the library and provide library professionals with opportunities to demonstrate their wide-ranging set of skills. The depth of the library profession is worth defining and specifying. Leave no doubt about the array of skills library professionals possess.
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Wandering the Web — All Sewn up: Locating Fun Online Sites for Sewists
Column Editor: Lesley Rice Montgomery, MLIS (Catalog Librarian II, Tulane University Libraries’ Technical Services Department)
Introduction
Summertime is here and many people typically will have more free time to pursue their favorite hobbies. This month’s “Wandering the Web” features websites, blogs and online shops that are focused on all things sewing, whether you are interested in watching informational videos to hone your skills, would like to find out what other seamstresses, tailors, quilters, dressmakers, or modistes are working on, or feel like going on a shopping expedition to look for interesting sewing patterns, beautiful handprinted fabrics or hard-to-find haberdashery like vintage ribbons and buttons. My mom taught me how to sew when I was eight-years-old and I spent hours designing and sewing doll clothing or home accessories for my Rich Toys dollhouse. In the past, seamstresses like myself relied on many exceptional how-to sewing books to learn new skills, usually only having access to these books in their public libraries. Dressmakers and quilters were lucky if they lived in a town that was large enough to support a local fabric store with adequate supplies, and were even luckier if the establishment offered sewing classes. Today, we are extremely fortunate to be connected to the web for our informational and social needs, for educational purposes, and to buy items to enhance our recreational activities like sewing — including print books, which are still invaluable. The online possibilities are almost endless, so I will describe just a few of my favorite sites that are user-friendly, relevant and attractively designed.
Educational Sites
Not wanting to completely reinvent the wheel, I will start with the basics, listing a compilation of excellent instructional resources that have a focus on sewing. The following websites provide carefully reviewed online sewing resources that can help sewists to grow and expand their skills.
The Best Sewing Resources by Faith St. Juliette. Ms. St. Juliette has created a useful and thoroughly vetted minidirectory of online programs and books that will “help you master the art of sewing (St. Juliette, 2024)” at https://shorturl. at/hROjM. She has done a fabulous job of curating her list that includes Craftsy at https://www.craftsy.com/, “a comprehensive online learning platform that offers a wide range of sewing courses for different skill levels (Craftsy, 2025).” Craftsy allows you to try out the site with a free 30-day trial. This crafting site sells DVDs and presents online classes, including courses on sewing and quilting. Quite frankly, I personally feel their site is too cluttered and cumbersome to navigate, which is why I have never bothered to pay for a membership, but Faith St. Juliette does note that their classes “cover everything from beginner stuff to advanced sewing tricks (St. Juliette, 2024).”
Another online sewing program at CreativeBug (https:// www.creativebug.com/) also gives free, unlimited classes, this time for sixty days, which seems like a good value. CreativeBug has a standard, streamlined and accessible site, with a search box at the header and a drop-down menu to find “Classes,”
“Images,” “Instructors,” and “Materials.” The site is, “Your hub for art & craft inspiration, instruction and community…” where you can “access thousands of sewing, art, craft, and needle art classes tailor-made for a diverse community of makers (CreativeBug, 2025).”
Faith St. Juliette also mentions Sew Over It Online (https:// sewoverit.com/pages/what-is-stitch-school) that helps you to make clothing easily, where you can learn how to read patterns and overcome tricky issues like customizing a pattern, fixing it to fit the intended wearer. Sew Over It is based in the UK, but the skills are timeless and universal. Their site is sparse, but practical and I agree with Ms. St. Juliette that it looks like a useful website.
As I mentioned, The Best Sewing Resources is comprehensive, listing additional tutorials for all levels of sewing expertise on YouTube — seven in all — along with seven essential sewing books. Take a look at your leisure, and I believe you’ll enjoy browsing through Faith St. Juliette’s tutorial directory.
Amazing Sewing-related Blogs
As you can imagine, there is a plethora of superb sewingrelated blogs. The sewing community is vast, numbering in the hundreds of thousands of avid sewists, so you can easily connect to the rest of this enthusiastic community. Bloggers are focused on a specific niche, creating original and useful content for their audience. The only drawback is that many bloggers stop updating their sites, due to work or family constraints or just because life has become too busy, so they are lacking the time and energy to refresh their personal blog postings. Here is a small selection of blog sites that appear to be kept reasonably up to date on the activities of these online authors.
The Little Pomegranate is written by Rumana, who is an Arabic doctor born and raised in London, England, a mother, and a former quarter-finalist on the BBC program “The Great British Sewing Bee.” She maintains a blog that features trustworthy pattern reviews, free sewing patterns for subscribers, interesting musings about her sewing and crafting lifestyle, and even a library of her beautiful designs for Spoonflower, a custom fabric company for which she is an ambassador. Rumana’s blog at https://thelittlepomegranate. co.uk/ is straightforward, provides interesting advice for making your DIY life easier from the perspective of someone who suffers from sleep disorders, and throws in some tips for repurposing items such as empty jars into fun projects (decorating the jars and filling them with hot chocolate powder and tiny marshmallows to distribute as festive holiday gifts). Rumana’s mission is “to show the real process of sewing and other crafts” and to demonstrate that the process is more important than the end product (Rumana, 2024). Overall, this is an enthusiastic and positive blog, displaying her passion about inclusivity within the crafting community.
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The Sewing Retreat run by Sarah, who is primarily a teacher and sewing expert, is a blog that offers many instructional videos to accompany her postings. Located at https://www. thesewingretreat.co.uk/blog, Sarah’s blog explains such skills as adjusting bust darts and adapting patterns so you can design your own clothing. A promoter of ethical sewing, she discusses sustainable sewing shops around the world and includes a shop directory. Her site is simple, fresh-looking, and accessible. The images are beautiful and well-designed. Sarah can be reached on Instagram, YouTube and Pinterest.
The Crafty Gentleman at https://www.thecraftygentleman. net/ is authored by Mike Aspinall, who is a digital marketing director, a professional craft blogger based in Liverpool, England, and regularly writes craft columns in a wide variety of magazines, including Reader’s Digest, Simply Sewing, Today’s Quilter, and Sew Magazine, among others. He has appeared on radio and on podcasts and at events like Stitch Festival in London. Unusual in the world of sewing and crafting, Mike’s male-focused blog celebrates the world of crafting. He firmly believes, “everyone can be creative. Men, women, old, young (Aspinall, 2022).” Mike can be reached via Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, and Facebook.
Lotta is my favorite sewist, designer, author, teacher, handcrafter, and overall fabric artist. Her work is organic and fabric designs are nature-based and very stylish. Lotta Jansdotter has been around for a while, since 1996, promoting her “mission to create special work with [her] hands that is meaningful, original, purposeful and that bring joy (Jansdotter, n.d.).” While not a blog in the true sense of the word, Lotta’s site https://www. jansdotter.com/ advertises retreats that she presents around the world, where she teaches how to stencil material by hand, creating lovely works of fabric art that can then be sewn using her simple and elegant clothing and home accessories patterns. Her twelve lifestyle, travel and sewing books are works of art in themselves, with images of the very photogenic Lotta modeling her personally designed clothing created with her own decorator fabrics, posed against the backdrop of her incredible art studio in Montclair, New Jersey or on the shores of the Åland Islands, Finland, where she was born and raised.
“Let’s Go Shopping!”
There are numerous online stores that appear at first glance to be focused solely on knitting or crocheting merchandise like books, supplies and patterns, but actually are excellent sources for sewists, as well. One of my favorites is a brick-and-mortar shop in London, England that also maintains a very popular presence online, which is so accessible and attractive that I used this store as an exemplary website while working on projects for my MLIS courses in web design and digital information services.
Loop London
Loop is a shop located in Islington, London. Primarily advertised as a yarn and haberdasher with merchandise sourced from around the world, it recently was voted by customers as being the best independent knitting shop in London (Loop, 2025). The online version of the store at https://loopknitting. com/en-us is lovely to look at and Loop’s IT personnel have constructed a website that provides a perfect user experience. The home page — “Loop London gorgeous knitting supplies” — features an easy-to-use navigation bar at the header with extensive drop-down menus for “New in,” “Yarn,” “Haberdashery,” “Patterns,” “Kits,” and many other sections that cover numerous events, classes and Loop’s in-house blog. An example of a sewing-related page, Loop’s “Sewing + Embroidery
Needles” section, can be reached at https://loopknitting.com/ en-us/collections/sewing-embroidery-needles . A “Sort by” choice allows sorting by best-selling items, alphabetically a-z or z-a, by price low to high and vice versa, as well as by date, and you can view the merchandise as a grid or a list. At the top left side of the header, the search box suggests popular searches that include classes and haberdashery. A quick click on the haberdashery choice leads to Loop’s “incredibly beautiful range of haberdashery — handmade, vintage and the most useful stuff we could find from around the world. Buttons, ribbons, exquisite threads, and many more wonderful tools from punch needles to handmade darning mushrooms (Loop, 2025)” — all items that are useful for sewists. This page can be found at https:// loopknitting.com/en-us/pages/haberdashery. Another click on the internal link for vintage items at https://loopknitting. com/en-us/collections/vintage displays vintage buttons in amazing colors for sale at very reasonable prices. Lastly, a quick perusal of Loop’s sewing section at https://loopknitting.com/ en-us/search?q=sewing and sewing kits at https://loopknitting. com/en-us/search?page=1&q=sewing%20kits features many pages’ worth of a wide variety of supplies, sampler kits, fun kits to craft embroidered toys, as well as books, magazines and information about workshops. Overall, each website section is well-organized, the structural elements define the page layout and the internal links open instantaneously, while the entire website is illustrated with gorgeous photographs.
Purl Soho
Founded as a small storefront in 2002 in New York City’s Soho neighborhood, Purl Soho was a popular hangout for knitters, offering many fiber supplies and notions that were more difficult to find at that time. Unfortunately, the physical store closed in 2023, but does still maintain an online presence at https://www.purlsoho.com. In a way, Purl Soho was the sister store for Loop, since one of the people associated with the Manhattan shop moved to London in the early 2000s and opened Loop in 2005. As with Loop London, Purl Soho has a focus on yarn and knitting, but also has internal links to sewing patterns and supplies. The shop has a large number of sewing patterns, mostly for free with printable templates, that feature full-color illustrations and internal links to all the notions you would need to complete each project. Purl Soho’s online store includes a sewing section located at https:// www.purlsoho.com/shop?q=sewing, with over forty products that can be sorted by favorites, relevance and price. Like all good websites, the search facets are user-friendly, and you can pick your items by clicking on the category, brand, color, type, and subject. The categories are further broken into “Tools + Notions,” “Purl Soho Goods,” “Patterns + Books” and several items on sale. The sewing products are high quality and yet have reasonable prices. Their products include a wide variety of sewing and embroidery scissors, cute and useful repair kits, stylish backpacks and totes with the company logo, branded tags for handmade gifts, beautiful linen fabric, and Japanese thimbles and silk thread. The store’s inventory incorporates forty-five distinct brands and of course many items produced by Purl Soho.
Etsy and eBay
Etsy and eBay are but two examples of online stores that sell unique haberdashery, vintage or handprinted fabrics, and print DIY books or digital sewing patterns. Part of the early aughts’ arts and craft revival, Etsy’s focus tends to be on pre-2000s material in retro patterns, antique buttons and ribbons, and
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even sewing machines, as well as print instructional monographs and patterns. Etsy at https://www.etsy.com in fact states that you can “shop for handmade, vintage, custom and unique gifts.” As an example, the search filters for “fabric” include “Not mass-produced,” “Floral,” “Quilting,” “By the yard,” “Fat quarter,” “Pattern,” “Color,” “Fabric type,” and more. A look at the “Not mass-produced” section reveals pages of unique material products like a large stack of recycled vintage cotton from Indian Sarees sold as a forty-piece bulk lot for $650! There are other less expensive products, such as hand block-printed fabrics in glorious colors and 1970s era cotton fat quarters. A search for “sewing supplies” yields an equally large number of pages, listing “Notions,” “Vintage,” and many sewing machines, including “Hand-crank,” “Pedal,” and “Portable” models, sorted by features and color, along with “Accessories” you might need for your vintage machine.
Many people enjoy shopping on eBay, but might not realize you can find products that will enhance your favorite hobby. A quick search on eBay’s “Sewing Tools & Supplies” at https:// www.ebay.com/b/Sewing-Tools-Supplies/160737/bn_1865471 retrieved 2,119,066 results as of my search on May 26, 2025! Fortunately, the online store does include search facets along the left side of the web page, including “Embellishments & Finishes,” “Hand Sewing Needles & Accs,” “Marking Tools,” “Measuring Tools,” “Quilting,” “Sewing Boxes & Storage,” “Sewing Machines & Sergers,” “Sewing Patterns,” and “Sewing Thread.” A search on eBay for “sewing lots” retrieved 3,553 results, where you can narrow your search for “Baskets & Boxes,” “Sewing Kits,” “Manuals & Books” and much more by choosing “Original/ Reproduction,” “Handmade,” “Condition,” and “Price.” You can find lots ranging from an enormous assortment of vintage Singer sewing machine parts to a single posting of a pre-owned 1940s “Ladies Simplicity House Dress” pattern for $40. There are also hundreds of thousands of results for “Vintage Fabric” for sale on eBay.
Conclusion
As you can see, there are so many services and community websites that deliver sewing-related products or information in interactive and attractive visual formats that a single article cannot encompass the broad range of available sites that pertain to the complex topic of fiber arts. However, I hope you have gained some useful ideas from my descriptive sampling of websites. May you enjoy your shopping expeditions on the web and successfully locate some of the many services, instructional videos and blogs that can help you with your dressmaking, embroidery, quilting or other sewing projects!
References
Aspinall, M. (2022). Home page. The Crafty Gentleman. https://www.thecraftygentleman.net/ Craftsy. (2025). Home page. https://www.craftsy.com/ CreativeBug. (2025). Home page. https://www.creativebug. com/ eBay. (2025). Sewing Tools & Supplies. https://www.ebay. com/b/Sewing-Tools-Supplies/160737/bn_1865471 Etsy. (2025). Home page. https://www.etsy.com/ Jansdotter, L. (n.d.). Lotta Jansdotter . https://www. jansdotter.com/ Loop. (2025). About Loop. https://loopknitting.com/en-us Loop. (2025). Sewing. https://loopknitting.com/en-us/ search?q=sewing Loop. (2025). Sewing + Embroidery Needles. https:// loopknitting.com/en-us/collections/sewing-embroideryneedles
Rumana. (2024). About me. The Little Pomegranate https:// thelittlepomegranate.co.uk/about-me/ Rumana. (2024). Home page. The Little Pomegranate https:// thelittlepomegranate.co.uk/
Sarah. (2025). Home page. The Sewing Retreat. https://www. thesewingretreat.co.uk/blog Sew Over It. (2025). Home page. https://sewoverit.com/ pages/what-is-stitch-school Spoonflower. (2025). The little pomegranate Collections. https://thelittlepomegranate.co.uk/
St. Juliette, F. (2024, June 10). The best sewing resources. https://www.faithstjules.com/post/learning-the-proper-waythe-best-sewing-resources#:~:text=Craftsy%20(formerly%20 Bluprint)%20is%20a,stuff%20to%20advanced%20sewing%20 tricks.&text=CreativeBug%20teaches%20sewing%20in%20 easy%20steps
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The Digital Toolbox — More Than Movies: How Kanopy Supports Academic Rigor and Inclusive Learning at University Canada West
By Elizabeth Johnston (Undergraduate Liaison Librarian, University Canada West) <elizabeth.johnston@ucanwest.ca>
Column Editor: Steve Rosato (Director of Digital Book Services for Academic Libraries, OverDrive, Cleveland, OH 44125) <srosato@overdrive.com>
Through thoughtful curation, inclusive design, and strong institutional partnerships, Kanopy has emerged as a vital educational and cultural tool at University Canada West (UCW). With an extensive library of films, documentaries, and educational videos, Kanopy complements UCW’s mission to deliver accessible, high-quality education, while also promoting cultural understanding and community engagement.
UCW: A Modern Institution for a Global Student Body
Located in the heart of downtown Vancouver, University Canada West is a business and technology-focused, teachingintensive institution. Since its establishment in 2004, UCW has been offering a range of career-oriented programs including the Bachelor of Commerce, Bachelor of Arts in Business Communication, Associate of Arts, and Master of Business Administration.
With students joining from across the globe, UCW emphasizes hands-on, practical skills that prepare graduates to thrive in today’s dynamic professional environments.
The Library as a Hub of Student Support and Digital Literacy
The UCW Library plays a critical role in the academic journey, supporting students with research tools, citation assistance, and a culture of academic integrity. Workshops, one-on-one appointments, and research guides are all part of the comprehensive support offered.
Kanopy — a film streaming platform, has become a critical resource that is also a favorite among students and faculty alike.
Shifting to Kanopy BASE: A Strategic Move
In summer 2024, UCW upgraded its Kanopy subscription from a limited, faculty-only model to Kanopy BASE, a bundled academic subscription available to all users. This shift, made possible through the British Columbia Electronic Library Network (BC ELN) consortium, has dramatically increased access and visibility.
Kanopy has become a staple for coursework, campus events, and even recreational viewing. Departments across UCW are using the platform for on-campus screenings, enabling the library to also highlight key concepts like copyright and public performance rights.
As a bonus, it’s also just fun — the UK version of The Office holds the top spot for most-viewed title, proving that students are engaging with the platform on their own time, too.
Positive Student and Faculty Feedback
Feedback on Kanopy’s film diversity has been overwhelmingly positive. Faculty members appreciate the expanded options for in-class multimedia content, while student associations have taken advantage of the Public Performance Rights feature to host culturally significant events on campus.
Kanopy films have been used in programming for heritage months and awareness days, offering an accessible, engaging medium to explore complex, nuanced topics.
Supporting a Diverse Student Population
With a large international student body, the UCW Library is committed to building a collection that reflects and supports this diversity. Kanopy BASE’s extensive selection of international and Canadian content, including Indigenous voices and historically significant themes, makes it an ideal partner in this mission.
Enhancing Access and Engagement
All new UCW students participate in a four-week orientation course where they are introduced to essential academic skills — critical thinking, evaluation, citation, and academic integrity. The library uses this opportunity to familiarize students with resources like Kanopy, and to encourage participation in workshops or drop-in sessions for more support.
Library webpages are also being redesigned with a usercentered approach to improve accessibility and make navigation more intuitive and engaging.
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Promoting Digital Literacy
UCW’s transition to remote and hybrid learning during the COVID-19 pandemic led to a renewed focus on digital literacy. Today, the library continues to offer online workshops each term, blending instruction on research and citation with guidance on how to effectively use digital tools.
As a digitally forward institution, UCW ensures that its students are not only accessing information — but doing so confidently.
Collaboration at the Core
Librarians at UCW are active participants in the university ecosystem. As liaison librarians, we actively find ways to connect and engage with faculty and other student facing departments. We attend meetings, talks, send emails, and are just generally around! Through these connections we learn more about what faculty and staff are looking for, which helps us make informed suggestions and ultimately grow our collection as well. This approach has proven successful in curating a balanced resource collection that includes print, digital, and audio-visual materials.
Culturally Relevant Materials and Tools for Equity
The UCW Library maintains curated displays, print books, and online research guides centered on Indigenous topics and 2SLGBTQIA+ resources. These materials help ensure that all students feel seen, represented, and supported in their academic and personal journeys.
In addition, on-campus computer labs and loanable surface tablets are available for students who may not have regular access to a personal device, further enhancing accessibility and inclusion.
University Canada West’s partnership with Kanopy is more than just a subscription — it’s a reflection of the university’s values: access, diversity, and student success. By expanding digital access, promoting cultural awareness, and embedding digital literacy into the student experience, UCW continues to build a learning environment where every student can thrive — academically and beyond.
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Optimizing Library Services — Will AI Replace Librarians? Exploring the Future of Library Services
By Prof. Iman Khamis (Director of the Library, Northwestern University in Qatar, Qatar) <iman. khamis@northwestern.edu>
and Prof. Kevin Arms (Associate Dean of Library and Learning Services, Lake-Sumter State College, USA) <ArmsK@lssc.edu>
and Dr. Kyla Tennin (Fellow-in-Residence: College of Doctoral Studies Center for Leadership Studies & Org. Research, University of Phoenix, USA) <kltennin@email.phoenix.edu>
Column Editor: Mr. Will Hartley (Director of Business Solutions, IGI Global Scientific Publishing) <wharltey@igi-global.com>
Column Editor’s Note: As technological innovation continues to reshape the academic landscape, publishers must evolve to effectively support the changing needs of libraries and their users. IGI Global Scientific Publishing is deeply committed to advancing its practices in step with the growing influence of artificial intelligence (AI) across academia.
To ensure seamless integration with AI-powered discovery tools and library platforms, every publication we produce is enriched with extensive metadata and precise, contentspecific descriptions. This level of detail not only enhances the discoverability of our titles but also ensures that key research insights are easily accessible and contextually understood by both human and machine readers. By proactively aligning our publishing standards with the capabilities of emerging AI technologies, IGI Global Scientific Publishing strengthens the connection between libraries and the wealth of knowledge in our portfolio — ultimately supporting deeper research engagement and accelerating academic discovery.
Considering that AI continues to be at the forefront of conversation and development within the academic community, IGI Global Scientific Publishing has made this topic a focal point with our offerings. As such, IGI Global Scientific Publishing has compiled over 565 titles of cutting-edge AI research within the areas of business, medicine, education, computer science, and engineering to create our Artificial Intelligence e-Book Collection. With IGI Global Scientific Publishing’s quick and comprehensive publishing process, this collection provides professionals with the latest growing trends and developments within this ever-evolving technology. To ensure that your library’s holdings contain the latest in AI research, including titles such as Explainable Artificial Intelligence and Solar Energy Integration (979-8-3693-7822-9), Advancements in Intelligent Process Automation (979-8-36935380-6), and Enhancing Communication and Decision-Making With AI (979-8-3693-9246-1), visit https://www.igi-global. com/e-resources/topic-e-collection/artificial-intelligence/229 for more information. — WH
Introduction
In an age where artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly reshaping countless industries, libraries stand at the forefront of this digital revolution. As automation and intelligent technologies become increasingly integrated in library operations, the
role of AI in reshaping librarianship is coming into sharp focus. IGI Global Scientific Publishing (www.igi-global.com) — “Publishing Tomorrow’s Research Today” internationally since 1988 — in collaboration with our partner eContent Pro (www.econtentpro.com), a trusted provider of professional copy editing and editorial services, recently co-hosted a thoughtprovoking live webinar titled “Will AI Replace Librarians? Benefits and Pitfalls of This Technological Revolution.”
This engaging event brought together a panel of leading experts to examine how these AI advancements are transforming the profession — highlighting both the opportunities for innovation and the challenges they present. From streamlining routine tasks and personalizing research assistance to unlocking new possibilities in data analysis, AI offers promising benefits — but not without raising serious ethical, professional, and societal concerns.
We are now pleased to offer the webinar as a free on-demand virtual event. Join us as we examine the opportunities and challenges this technology presents and explore what the future holds for librarians in an AI-powered world.
Gain valuable insights from global experts as they discuss the integration of AI in libraries and its growing impact on the future of library services.
Learn More and Watch this Free On-Demand Virtual Event Now:
Check out some key highlights and takeaways from this thought-provoking discussion below.
Q: In what ways can AI-driven personalization enhance research assistance, and how can libraries balance efficiency with the need for human expertise in nuanced inquiries?
“AI driven personalization is probably one of the most promising developments in modern research support. Today’s discovery systems are becoming increasingly sophisticated, offering customized search results, recommendations based on past behaviors, adaptive
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interfaces that respond to a user’s field of study or research history, or even their preferred reading format.
For instance, if a student regularly searches for articles on environmental policy, this system can begin to surface related journals, new publications, and cross-disciplinary resources that might not have appeared in a standard search. AI can also assist in auto completing citations, which I know a lot of us at the college level, we deal with citations everyday. [With] suggesting the related keywords and alerting users to relevant conferences and calls for papers, which kind of extends the scholarship outward, this level of personalization streamlines the entire research process and saves user’s time. It helps them discover materials that they also might otherwise overlook.” — Prof. Kevin Arms, Associate Dean of Library and Learning Services, Lake-Sumter State College, USA
Q: What are the risks of losing the human element in library services as AI becomes more prominent, and how can libraries ensure they preserve empathy, critical thinking, and contextual judgement?
“While AI can enhance efficiency, I agree that it lacks empathy, ethical reasoning, and cultural awareness necessary for fully responsive service. I think over reliance on AI may marginalize those who require personalized or sensitive assistance, such as underserved or neurodiverse populations.
These are some of the things that I look at when I think about this question and I love the personalized service from librarians. And so, to counter this and to further think about it, libraries must prioritize human centered design and ensure that AI supplements or arguments, rather than replaces, human expertise.
So, librarians should continue to act as ethical mediators and cultural stewards, but also training should emphasize interpersonal communication, critical thinking, and things such as reflective practice to preserve the profession’s humanistic foundations in an AI rich environment. We are moving in that direction. AI is trending — it’s probably not going away anytime soon, so I think embracing that is critical regarding preserving the human element. To summarize here, the risk lies in overreliance on AI, which we’ve discussed previously, potentially eroding empathy and critical interpretation. I think libraries must intentionally preserve human roles and advisory services, embed ethical frameworks into AI use, and even maintain a people-first approach.” — Dr. Kyla L. Tennin, Fellow-inResidence: College of Doctoral Studies Center for Leadership Studies & Org. Research, University of Phoenix, USA
Q: Given the well-documented issues of bias and misinformation in AI models, how can librarians safeguard the integrity and reliability of the information they provide through AI-driven tools?
“It’s kind of a collective effort, so every individual in education and everywhere should be aware of these biases and misinformation that AI models are producing out. In order to safeguard integrity, [it] has to be taught at every single place that you are [at]. In terms of what I can do in my library to make sure that AI tools maintain integrity, I have to practice that first myself. So, whatever I do as a librarian [...] I have to be practicing a very high level of integrity and vetting the sources as much as I can in terms of the ethical way that these sources have been built. We can definitely ask our information specialist to educate the community on the importance of maintaining a very high academic integrity in everything that we are doing. It’s not only on the libraries — it should be a whole community debate, at the moment, of how to safeguard academia and academics for future generations.” — Ms. Iman Magdy Khamis, Director of the Library, Northwestern University in Qatar, Qatar
Conclusion
AI is reshaping the future of library services, offering powerful tools to improve efficiency, enhance research support, and enable data-driven decision-making. This expert-led event offers valuable insights into how libraries can strategically adopt AI while addressing key concerns around ethics, bias, and the preservation of human expertise. As the field continues to evolve, libraries are uniquely positioned to lead this transformation — leveraging AI to elevate services, better support patrons, and redefine the role of librarianship in the digital age.
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Librarian Luminaries — Clare Graham
Director, Malvern-Hot Spring County Library
Column Editor: Caroline Goldsmith (Associate Director, The Charleston Hub) <caroline@charlestonlibraryconference.com>
Public librarians and library professionals are crucial to providing access to not only books but also to a safe space, resources and support to help meet the needs of their communities. “Librarian Luminaries” is a new column which will feature a different librarian each month who has had a recent notable achievement, implemented a new idea or approach in their library, who is a trail blazer, or who is an overall exemplary model of service, scholarship and innovation.
We’re happy to share this interview with Clare Graham, Director of the Malvern-Hot Spring County Library, who was featured for our May 2025 Librarian Luminaries column!
ATG: Hi, Clare! Can you share a little bit with us about your background and education?
CG: I moved to the United States when I was eight years old from the United Kingdom, with my mother, who came here for a nursing job. I started my career in the mental health field, earning my degree in Psychology from Henderson State University in Arkadelphia, Arkansas. I quickly realized that libraries are where my heart is. They’re the one place where everyone — no matter their background — has access to knowledge, resources, and a sense of belonging. That’s the kind of work I wanted to be part of. In 2017, I obtained my master’s degree in library science from the University of North Texas.
ATG: What made you decide to go to library school or drew you towards librarianship?
CG: It wasn’t just about books; it was about people. Libraries are essential because they provide access, opportunity, and a sense of belonging to anyone who walks through our doors. Libraries are community hubs, places where people come for information, support, and sometimes just a quiet moment in the chaos of life. I realized the profound impact libraries have, connecting people to knowledge, resources, and each other. I knew I wanted to be in a profession where I could help build that kind of space for my community.
ATG: We see that you’ve worked in the Malvern-Hot Spring County Library for about 12 years now. Can you tell us about the evolution of your role, and how you came to be Library Director?
CG: I started as a part time Assistant to the Director and slowly stepped into more leadership responsibilities. Becoming director wasn’t just about managing a library. It was about listening to my community, understanding what they need, and continuously finding new ways to serve and expand access to resources. That’s what drives everything we do. I prioritized advocating for the library, securing funding, and building partnerships to enhance our offerings. Being director is about vision, adaptability, and ensuring our library remains a relevant and vital part of the community.
ATG: What are some challenges of being a small town librarian in a rural community in Arkansas?
CG: Running a library in a rural community means constantly looking for creative solutions. People need reliable Internet, job resources, and programs that serve them, but
funding is always tight. Certain resources can be limited and sometimes people don’t realize how much the library has to offer. We’ve worked hard to bridge those gaps and make the library a lifeline for our community, whether it’s providing WiFi hotspots, lending out everyday items, or creating programs that truly respond to the needs of our patrons in meaningful ways.
ATG: Speaking of responding to the needs of your patrons — we noticed that your library has a “Library of things.” What types of items are available for check-out and what are the top items that community members are borrowing? What was your goal with lending these types of items out?
CG: Our Library of Things lets people check out more than books. We lend everything from tools and kitchen appliances to telescopes and carpet cleaners. Seeing patrons discover something new and useful, something that they might not otherwise have access to, has been one of the most rewarding parts of this initiative. Libraries are about making life better, in ways both big and small.
ATG: This is such a great way to provide a wider range of resources that really benefits your community. In addition to the “LOT” — what have been some recent successful services, initiatives or programs that you have offered to the community?
CG: Our most meaningful programs are the ones that meet people where they are. Whether it’s workforce training, digital literacy classes, family reading initiatives — we focus on giving people the resources they need to succeed in ways that matter to them. When people come to the library, they should leave with something valuable, whether that is knowledge, inspiration, or even a practical tool they can use in their daily lives. Our outreach efforts have also expanded — we partner with local organizations to bring resources directly to those who need them, ensuring no one misses out on essential library services.
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ATG: What’s a major challenge you have faced in your role in librarianship and how did you overcome it?
CG: Navigating legislative challenges has been one of the hardest things, but it’s also shown the strength of the Arkansas library community. Seeing librarians come together, support one another, and protect the future of libraries has been powerful. It is proof that these institutions matter, and that people will stand up to protect them. The library community is strong, resilient, and ready to protect access to books, information, and spaces that matter.
ATG: You are the 2025 winner of ALA’s Scholastic Library Publishing Award, which is an acknowledgment of your hard work and contributions with empowering young readers at your library. Congratulations on this award! What does receiving this award mean to you?
CG: I am incredibly honored and thankful to have been chosen for this award. This recognition represents the work we do to help young readers discover the joy of books and learning. Literacy builds confidence and opens doors, and libraries play a vital role in making sure kids have access to those opportunities.
ATG: What does “Librarianship Elevated” Mean to you?
CG: It means seeing libraries for what they really are — spaces for opportunity, learning, and connection. Libraries have evolved to provide technology, non-traditional lending services, and dynamic programming. “Librarianship Elevated” is about embracing that change and ensuring libraries continue to thrive in new and innovative ways.
ATG: Is there anything that we didn’t ask you about that you’d like to talk about here?
CG: I want people to understand the importance of libraries, especially now. We’ve seen challenges, but we’ve also seen incredible solidarity within the Arkansas library community. Libraries are more than shelves of books — they are lifelines for their communities, and the fight to protect them is worth it. I also want to emphasize the importance of advocating for libraries at the legislative level. Ensuring sustainable funding and policies that protect access to books and information is critical for the future of public libraries.
Also, I’d love to highlight the work our staff does every single day! They are the heart of the library, and their dedication makes everything we do possible. Libraries thrive when communities come together, and it’s been incredible to work alongside caring and passionate people who care about expanding access, creating meaningful programs, and making sure everyone feels welcome.
ATG: It really looks like you have an amazing team there. Is there something that you enjoy doing in your “spare time” or a hobby that you enjoy that you want to share with us?
CG: When I’m not working, I love spending time at the lake with my family. Whether it’s reading outside of work, painting, getting involved in local projects, or exploring new ideas, I always want to keep growing.
ATG: Thank you so much, Clare, for taking the time to talk with us, and for sharing insight into your experiences at your library. We know you are very busy. We really appreciate it!
If you would like to nominate a librarian or library staff to be featured in this column, please reach out to us at info@charlestonhub.com.
Librarian Luminaries — Nancy Kwangwa
Deputy Librarian, Women’s University in Africa
Column Editor: Caroline Goldsmith (Associate Director, The Charleston Hub) <caroline@charlestonlibraryconference.com>
Academic librarians and library staff are a bridge between the vast world of knowledge and the needs of students, faculty, and researchers. “Librarian Luminaries” is a new column which will feature a different librarian each month who has had a recent notable achievement, implemented a new idea or approach in their library, who is a trail blazer, or who is an overall exemplary model of service, scholarship and innovation.
We’re happy to share this interview with Nancy Kwangwa, Deputy Librarian, Women’s University in Africa, who was featured for our June 2025 Librarian Luminaries column!
ATG: Hi, Nancy! Can you share a little bit with us about your background and education?
NK: I began my career in librarianship at the Zimbabwe Women’s Resource Centre and Network, where I was responsible for providing resources to students and policymakers on gender and development. This foundational role instilled in me a deep commitment to the values of equity and inclusion, which have continued to shape my professional journey.
I later transitioned to the University of Zimbabwe Library, where I experienced significant professional growth, progressing from Assistant Librarian to Manager of Scholarly Communication and Publishing. Over 11 years, I led and implemented innovative programmes that enhanced access to scholarly resources and empowered both staff and students in their academic pursuits.
Seeking to broaden my horizons and deepen my understanding of knowledge management within the human rights space, I joined the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission as Chief Knowledge Management and Research Officer. This role was particularly enriching, as it offered me valuable insights into the intersection of librarianship and human rights, and the critical role of information professionals in managing and disseminating human rights knowledge. Despite the rewarding nature of that work, my passion for education and the transformative power of academic environments drew me back to the higher education sector. I am currently serving as Deputy Librarian at the Women’s University in Africa, where I continue to contribute
to knowledge access, research support and the empowerment of students and academic staff.
I hold a Doctor of Philosophy in Library and Information Studies from the University of Cape Town, South Africa, as well as Master’s and Bachelor’s degrees in Library and Information Science from the National University of Science and Technology, Zimbabwe. In pursuit of continuous professional development, I participated in the U.S. Department of State’s Community Solutions Programme. In recognition of my contributions to community development and academic librarianship, I was honoured to be nominated as a specialist for the U.S. Department of State’s Community Engagement Exchange Programme and selected as a fellow of the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP).
ATG: What made you decide to go to library school or drew you towards librarianship?
NK: I was drawn to librarianship because I grew up in a community where access to information was limited, with no libraries, and this lack of access often hindered my progress, especially in making informed decisions about education and career paths. Witnessing the profound impact that access to the right information can have inspired me to pursue a qualification in Library and Information Science. Even today, the transformative power of information is not recognized and appreciated, yet it is central to development at both personal and societal levels.
With my LIS qualification, I feel empowered to navigate both professional and social issues more effectively, equipped with the skills to seek, evaluate and apply information when needed. I regard librarianship as a deeply transformative profession, one where the impact of our work is tangible. For instance, when a student walks into the library with a research question and leaves with clarity and direction after engaging with me, the sense of fulfilment is immeasurable.
Serving others in the library has not only allowed me to witness growth in those I assist, but has also enriched me with invaluable skills and networks. I have come to appreciate that a librarian does not have to know everything, but must know how to find and connect people to what they need. Lastly, my naturally curious mind has always sought answers. I believe that there is little that is truly new under the sun, and my LIS training provides me with a powerful tool to explore knowledge, both within and beyond the workplace, to support myself, my community and those I care about.
ATG: We see that you’ve worked for over a decade in university libraries, various library associations, planning committees and mentorship programs — What have you learned over the years? What does your day-to-day work look like now and what has kept you going?
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NK: Over the years, I have learnt that academic librarianship is a dynamic and evolving field. It constantly responds to changes within the institution, shifts in user expectations, and broader global trends. This means that I must remain alert and adaptable because those who do not keep pace with developments risk being left behind in the proverbial stack rooms.
What has kept me going is an internal drive for excellence, a quest for growth and a strong commitment to service. I actively leverage professional networks for knowledge exchange, innovation and resource mobilization. I regularly participate in national and international library forums and currently serve as Chairperson of the Zimbabwe Library Association, Mashonaland Branch, as well as a member of the IFLA Law Libraries Section. These engagements have been instrumental in providing fresh perspectives, exposure to emerging practices and the inspiration needed to thrive in a constantly shifting landscape.
My day-to-day work as Deputy Librarian involves strategic planning, oversight of library operations, staff mentorship, research support, policy development and innovation in service delivery. I find fulfillment in enabling access to knowledge, empowering users and contributing to the academic and professional success of students and faculty.
ATG: Do university students that you work with face challenges like limited Internet access, or are there challenges which exist for some students that may not be present at other Universities?
NK: While the Government of Zimbabwe and universities have made commendable efforts to improve students’ access
to the Internet for research and learning, significant challenges remain. In some instances, bandwidth is slow, and campus WiFi coverage may not extend to all areas. These limitations can hinder students’ ability to access online resources effectively. The most pronounced challenges are experienced by students living off-campus in private residences that lack reliable Internet access, and during university vacations when many students return to rural or remote communities with little to no connectivity.
Moreover, universities in Zimbabwe are at varying stages of development, and as a result, the challenges faced by students differ from institution to institution. For example, some universities struggle with limited student accommodation, inadequate library collections, or a lack of assistive technologies to support students living with disabilities. The issue of electricity supply is also a perennial challenge; institutions without reliable backup power are particularly affected. Power outages disrupt connectivity and access to online library databases, especially for students who rely on shared computing facilities provided by their universities.
ATG: As a librarian serving the unique needs of diverse students, what are some things you have done to help empower these students? What advice do you give them?
NK: In my role as a librarian, I serve students from a wide range of backgrounds, each with differing levels of exposure to information literacy and technology. Some come from schools with no libraries or computers, while others are highly proficient in navigating digital environments. I also frequently engage with students who believe they no longer need the library because “everything they need” can be found using generative AI tools. While I strongly support the responsible use of AI in education, I am concerned by the misconceptions and undervaluing of library resources and services that such statements reflect.
My approach is rooted in bridging these disparities and ensuring that every student, regardless of their starting point, is equipped with the skills and confidence to navigate the modern information landscape. To this end, I have introduced AI literacy training programmes for both students and academic staff, and I am encouraged to see a growing recognition of the librarian’s critical role — even in the age of artificial intelligence.
I also design and deliver information and digital literacy programmes, tailored for both group sessions and one-onone support, to meet learners at their point of need. These initiatives are aimed at fostering independent, critical thinkers who can discern credible sources and use information ethically and effectively.
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Furthermore, in my capacity as an Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) Champion at the Women’s University in Africa, I work closely with staff, students and thought leaders to ensure that our library programmes and services are inclusive, equitable, and responsive to the diverse needs of our academic community. My advice to students is always this: embrace every opportunity to learn, be curious, and remember that “Librarians are the magicians of your learning and research,” they get things done, retrieve information from different sources, and always engage them for a successful research and academic journey.
ATG: What have been some recent successful services, initiatives or programs that you have offered to your students?
NK: Recognizing the evolving higher education landscape, particularly the growing influence of generative AI, I have introduced capacity-building programmes focused on the ethical use of generative AI in education and research. These sessions are designed to equip students with the critical skills needed to responsibly engage with AI tools, while still valuing traditional academic rigour and information literacy.
I have also established a Writing Centre that offers dedicated research support to students. This initiative has provided a structured space for learners to seek guidance on academic writing, referencing, research methodologies, and other scholarly practices.
Understanding that students are often overwhelmed by the volume of information and the pressures of academic life, I have introduced an informal mentorship programme targeted at finalyear students. Through this platform, I share knowledge and insights gained from global mentorship and leadership training programmes, particularly those I participated in through U.S. Department of State exchange initiatives. These efforts aim to holistically support students, not only academically, but also in preparing them for life beyond university.
ATG: What’s a major challenge you have faced in your role in librarianship and how did you overcome it?
NK: One of the major challenges I have faced in my role as a librarian is the issue of recognition and often feeling misunderstood. There remains a persistent misconception in society about what librarians do, and many hold outdated or narrow views of the profession, failing to recognize its strategic and transformative role in education, research, and sustainable development.
I have addressed this challenge by consistently striving for excellence in every aspect of my work. I believe that the best way to shift perceptions is not through argument, but through demonstrating value. I always aim to deliver highimpact programmes, engaging meaningfully with academic and professional communities and positioning the library as a
central hub for learning and innovation. As a result, I have seen some changes in how people engage with me and the library. I have been invited into spaces and conversations that I never imagined I would be part of, which is a testament to the power of professionalism, visibility and unwavering commitment to the highest standards of service.
ATG: We see that you are on the program committee for planning the new CollectionDevelopment in Africa conference. How exciting! What can you tell us about your role in the planning for this event and updates on the conference that will take place in Cape Town this coming September?
NK: I am equally thrilled to be part of the organizing committee for the upcoming Collection Development in Africa Conference. Being involved in the planning process is both exciting and fulfilling, especially as I am passionate about event coordination — witnessing an idea grow from a blank canvas to full implementation is incredibly rewarding. Within the committee, I am responsible for conference publicity and outreach, ensuring the event reaches a wide and diverse audience. I am also involved in logistics planning, helping to ensure a smooth and impactful experience for all attendees.
This Conference is particularly timely and relevant. As many of us in academic libraries face the dual challenge of declining usage of physical collections and shrinking acquisition budgets, I look forward to engaging with peers and experts to explore sustainable strategies for collection development across the African continent.
The Conference promises to be a dynamic platform for librarians, information professionals and stakeholders to exchange ideas, share innovations and strengthen regional networks. What excites me most is the diversity of participants, ranging from early-career professionals to seasoned experts and industry leaders in collection development. It is a space for learning, growth and solidarity.
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Set against the backdrop of the beautiful “Mother City,” Cape Town, the conference will feature keynote addresses, paper presentations, networking events and an exciting excursion, making it intellectually enriching as well as a memorable experience.
ATG: What does “Librarianship Elevated” Mean to you?
NK: To me, Librarianship Elevated means positioning the library at the heart of all institutional and societal processes. I firmly believe that access to information is the lifeblood of sustainable development. Librarianship should not be perceived as a peripheral or support function but as a core, strategic profession that must be embedded across sectors and departments. At its essence, librarianship is about centrality. We cannot speak of meaningful development without recognizing the critical role of libraries and information professionals. Elevating librarianship is, therefore, about recognizing the transformative power of librarianship and ensuring it is fully integrated into the engines of progress.
ATG: Is there anything that we didn’t ask you about that you’d like to talk about here?
NK: One area I would like to highlight is the need to extend library and information services beyond the structured environments of universities into the wider communities where most of our population resides. While university library systems are relatively well-organised, there remains a significant gap in access to information and digital resources at the community level. To help address this gap, I founded the Zimbabwe Information and Technology Empowerment Centre (ZITEC), a national non-governmental organisation dedicated to promoting digital equity and access to information
for development. Through ZITEC, we have designed and implemented transformative training workshops, public lectures and educational resources that have empowered over 10,000 people at the national and international levels. This work reflects my deep belief that information is a powerful equaliser and that libraries and information professionals have a vital role to play in bridging digital divides and advancing inclusive development.
ATG: Is there something that you enjoy doing in your “spare time” or a hobby that you enjoy that you want to share with us?
NK: I love travelling! Exploring new places offers me opportunities for personal growth, as it broadens my perspective and deepens my understanding of the world. I find great joy in discovering different cultures, trying new cuisines, fashion and engaging with diverse ways of life. Travelling allows me to see the world through a different lens and helps me appreciate the privileges and opportunities I often take for granted. A fun fact about m, if I go an entire year without visiting a new place, whether within Zimbabwe or abroad, I genuinely start to feel restless! For me, travelling is not just a hobby; it’s a source of renewal and inspiration.
ATG: Thank you so much, Nancy, for taking the time to talk with us, and for sharing insight into your experiences at your library. We know you are very busy right now, especially with conference planning. We really appreciate it!
If you would like to nominate a librarian or library staff to be featured in this column, please reach out to us at info@charlestonhub.com.
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ATG Interviews Torsten Reimer
Dean, University Library, University of Chicago
Interview conducted by Michael Upshall (ConsultMU) <michael@consultmu.co.uk>
This is a lightly edited transcript of a conversation between Michael Upshall, Guest Editor for the Charleston Briefings and Guest Host for ATG the Podcast, and Torsten Reimer, University Librarian and Dean of the University Library, University of Chicago. Torsten currently oversees one of the world’s largest academic library collections. In this conversation, Torsten shares his diverse academic journey which began as a historian with a focus on British maritime history, before leading various digital and research initiatives at King’s College London, JISC, Imperial College in London and the British Library, and then to the University of Chicago where he leads work on data and computational infrastructure. Torsten says libraries play a very important role in the global research and knowledge ecosystem, in facilitating collaboration, and that they have an evolving role in the digital age ensuring digital content is preserved for future use.
The full interview can be viewed at https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=mSb_jwiDY7Y
MU: Well, I’m very pleased to be talking today with Torsten Reimer. Torsten is a university librarian at the University of Chicago, but was born in Germany and spent several years working in the United Kingdom, so he has a fascinating background covering several different national systems. So welcome to ATG the Podcast, Torsten.
TR: Well, thank you. It’s a real pleasure to be here. Thank you for making time for me today.
MU: Let’s begin with a bit about that wonderful, exotic background. I believe you studied as a historian, and you studied British maritime power. What appealed to you about British history?
TR: Yeah, that question really takes me back. I mean, when I was a graduate student, I often got that question. And in some ways, at the time, it always surprised me because I thought, well if you’re a German, does it mean you should only study German history? I was really attracted to this because I felt the question of the origins of British sea power and really the global impact that it had through the British Empire was one that has influenced history broadly and, in some ways, arguably influences us today. Part of my interest in this, I think, came from being an Anglophile.
Part of it was that many of my peers in the early modern area of the history department in Munich studied the constitutional history of the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation. And while I find many historic aspects of early modern history
interesting, that was not a direction that I wanted to go down. But there was arguably, for me, a wider issue that drew me into this. And I think it’s one that is relevant to talk a little bit longer about because I think it really speaks to a lot about libraries. I didn’t really set out to study maritime history as such. I became really interested in how the English, and then later the British, thought of themselves as a maritime power and what that meant. I started out studying a bit of the actual history and then found that how that history had been represented over the centuries afterward was very different from what I found in the textbooks. There were a lot of discrepancies. I remember seeing all these films about English pirates and swashbucklers and about the history of the Spanish Armada.
And looking at the history books, looking at the sources, I found something that was very different. And I started asking myself the question, how did we end up remembering something so differently from what modern historical research tells us? And in the end, what I then found and what I tracked through my PhD is that in the moment when history happens, the way how we talk about it shapes how it’s perceived later. And I was tracking a process that ran over several centuries. I looked at the time from 1480 to 1740. 1480 when print arrived in England and 1740 when Real Britannia was first performed. And I think that song, even though it has many other strands that leads into it, encapsulates a lot about how we currently think about British sea power, even though England for a long time was not the predominant maritime power. That was the French or the Spanish or the Portuguese or even the Dutch. And yet in retrospect, we think of the country and the nation in that way. And so I traced public discourse, but then also how historians later picked up the public discourse, how different groups instrumentalized what happened and tried to instrumentalize memory to make claims about what it always had meant to be English. I found that almost all of these were driven by a current political agenda at the time. And it was really insightful. And it also gave me a great opportunity to spend several years in mostly libraries, but also archives, in the UK and some of the wonderful libraries in Germany to get to the bottom of this and develop an understanding of how national identity is created over time. It is an active process that involves choices that we make and involves propaganda and involves pressure groups and people of interest that, at least from my perspective at the time, are not always sort of benign or neutral, but in some cases are very much about control or power, instrumentalizing language and others and instrumentalizing memory.
I think that brings it back to a question that’s important about the role of the archive and the library in national identity,
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because it can be a source of national identity, but it can also be a tool to critique narratives that happen and critique people in power trying to use the interpretation of history to push the agendas that they have. And it’s, I think, highlighted to me in some ways how important even today libraries can be. I lived in England during Brexit and a lot of the rhetoric I could trace back to the early modern period that I’d looked at. Early on, I told my friends that I was concerned Brexit might happen because it uses powerful language of national identity that needs to be countered with something else. And there wasn’t anything as emotional, not anything that was sort of rooted in national identity. And so, it was a really interesting piece of research. It spoke to my interest, I think, in English and British culture and had this global reach that I found interesting. But it really, I think, ultimately highlighted a lot to me about the importance of memory and archives and libraries. Quite frankly, we see even today how authoritarian rulers in different countries try to suppress archives and libraries because I think they understand that in a similar way as I do, just from a very different perspective.
MU: Goodness me, that contrast between what happens and how people perceive what happened, that’s the theme that has repercussions in pretty much every one of the countries you’ve been involved with. So, after several years of immersing yourself in British archives, you clearly hadn’t lost your taste for things British because you ended up working in Britain. I think you started off working for JISC, the Organisation for Technology and Education.
TR: Well, I first actually worked at King’s College, but JISC at the time was partly hosted by King’s College. So I spent a while in the Center that later became the Department for Digital Humanities. Mostly, I think, working with digital scholars on digital research methods in the UK, but also internationally. From there on, I then transitioned over to JISC. For those of you listeners not so familiar with it, in many ways, it’s a provider of digital infrastructure services for higher education and libraries. But at the time in particular, it also ran a research program that had a strong focus on more speculative approaches.
I had an opportunity to run JISC’s research infrastructure program, thinking about how cloud computing could be used for research and working on a whole host of digital research tools, and social media analysis that was new. And that was a very exciting time where I think I learned a lot about the potential of digital infrastructure to enable really exciting research.
MU: And following JISC, you then moved to a full-time library position, I believe.
TR: In a sort of staged process, from JISC, I moved to Imperial College where I wasn’t technically in the library. I was based in the research office, but with a fairly broad remit to coordinate work across the university, to build open access infrastructure and services, and also research data services. I did a lot of work in the library at that time, working very closely with the library director, Chris Banks, who had just retired, and others at the library.
And that, in many ways, brought me back to the start of my career where I not only spent time in libraries doing research, but also working in the State Library in Munich, which is a stellar library that very early on put a lot of resource into digitization and digital projects. And we had an ongoing partnership between the university and the library. So, working again closely with the library at Imperial College, I think, connected me to the earlier start of my career. And at that time, a senior position
came up at the British Library. And I jumped at the opportunity because it’s a wonderful library with great collections, but it also does a lot more. And at the time, I joined the British Library, not only but partly also to think about how the library could benefit more from technology in its research mission, and how it could support digital research more broadly.
MU: But the technology, I think, has been a persistent strand in your career roles. But back to the British Library for a moment. Your title was Head of Research. What does the Head of Research do at the British Library?
TR: Well, it actually evolved in a sense. It was first Head of Research Services and then expanded to become Head of Content and Research Services. Originally, I started with the focus of developing a strategy on how the British Library supports research and then working with colleagues across the institution to implement that.
The teams that I oversaw included a digital unit that did a lot of innovation-focused work on research infrastructure, repositories, research data, and persistent identifiers, where the British Library has been active for a very long time, being one of the co-founders of Datacite. At the time, I also joined the board of Datacite that I very recently stepped down from. But also, my team at the time included what in a university library you might describe as the subject librarians, colleagues who were focused on licensing and procuring electronic resources.
Initially, the bulk of my work was on the strategy and saying, how can we pull together all these different threats into a forward-looking agenda and vision and a plan on how the British Library evolves and changes its research services, partly recognizing that one of the most important research services for the British Library for a long time has been its document supply service. That is one that is also, in a way, enshrined in law. If you look at the British Library Act, it says the British Library has to run an effective photocopying service, is the language used. That was the technology at the time. And that was really crucial in the 70s, 80s, and 90s, but obviously shifted a lot. And that change, I think, in part, was one of the reasons why the British Library said we need to think more broadly.
Over time, though, my remit expanded and also included all the contemporary acquisitions of the library, managing of legal deposits, and my teams effectively processed all the content that came into the British Library which, at this time, both still in print but also in digital, is very extensive. So over time, I expanded much more into also operationally running of a large research library. And that’s been crucial knowledge and expertise that helped me a lot in making the step over in my current role, being responsible for all aspects of a university library system.
MU: Yes, so you then moved to Chicago, and it must have been a great contrast going from a national library to an individual institution and also going from one country to another in a very, very different system. It must have been a bit of a shock.
TR: Interestingly, in a way, I didn’t experience it that way. Partly, I think what helped is having already made the transition once, going from Germany to the UK. I mean, I would say on a spectrum, as much as you maybe don’t do a country justice, I think the UK is culturally, in many ways, closer to Germany and Europe, even though it may sometimes not perceive itself that way. And the U.S. is notably more different. But what I found on the two occasions when I’ve changed countries now, a lot of certainly the experience at work, I think, links
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to the organizational culture. I remember, in particular, German friends and former colleagues sometimes asked me how I found that transition. And, in some cases, I found the transition between different institutions was more striking in a work context. Research libraries, at least in the countries that I worked in, have, I think, a very similar ethos. It’s about serving people. It’s about being sort of inclusive. It’s maybe, in some ways, focused a bit more on preserving things than on changing the status quo. And I think that probably comes from being organizations where preserving is one of the key missions. Libraries are very collaborative and generally inclusive and welcoming spaces. That’s how I’ve always experienced them. And so, for me, in some ways, changes in organizational culture in work have been more striking than, I think, the changes between countries. I mean, to explain this in some ways a bit more, we often have this perception that the United States does maybe not have that much bureaucracy, that for everything that sort of involves personnel matters, there are fewer protections here, that you could be fired at a moment’s notice.
And that may be true in some ways, but it doesn’t really reflect, even at a private institution, how libraries and universities are run. There are so many similarities culturally and, in the policies, and processes, irrespective of what the law says. I think anyone who feels at home in a UK research library could come to the University of Chicago library and would not find it a striking difference. There are some differences, for sure, but I experience them somewhat more outside work. And even here, I think, one key thing one needs to remember, making comparisons, the United States is a vast country.
MU: One interesting aspect of the University of Chicago is that some university libraries run the publishing operation within the library, but I think the University of Chicago Press is separate.
TR: Yes, this is true. It has to do with the history of any organization of how it’s organized, but a key factor is also the size. Many university presses are smaller than libraries. At the University of Chicago, you could make the case that the press is larger than the library. Our press is the largest academic press in North America, I believe, and one of the largest globally. It’s a very significant operation, and it also publishes a lot of content on behalf of other institutions, which, again, is, I think, different to many university libraries. Although I appreciate looking at the UK, you have Oxford and Cambridge that stand out in many ways. So, we are both part of the portfolio of the provost here at the University of Chicago and so we’re collaborating. I am, in fact, an ex-officio member of the board of the press, and the director of the press is also an ex-officio member of the board of the library. So, we are linked, but we are separate organizations, and I think partly this has to do with the size and scope of the operation.
MU: You talked about similarities between the research libraries, and perhaps this is a theme for the next question. You talked about how, for a national library, the collection can never be the entirety of available content these days. There’s so much more content available, that the library can never collect it. Surely the same must be true even more so for a single scholarly institution.
TR: Yes, I mean, very much so. Now, what I should say, there are some interesting differences looking at, say, private institutions in the U.S. Some of the really prestigious, longstanding, and well-founded private institutions have, over a long time, invested a lot of money in their collections, and the
size of the collection, in particular monographs and journals at leading private institutions here, are often significantly larger than those in the UK or in Germany. We have private institutions here that I wouldn’t say could rival the totality of the British Library’s collection, but in certain areas can rival and sometimes even surpass them. We have a really extensive collection here, just picking maybe the most easily quantifiable part with well over 13 million volumes. That’s sizable even, and bigger than many national libraries in terms of what we hold here. Managing a collection of that size comes with its own challenges.
Also, I think the large private institutions here have larger acquisitions budgets than many institutions in the UK. The acquisitions budget that I’m responsible for here is significantly larger than that of the British Library, but obviously, you can’t exactly compare it because the British Library, in principle at least, receives a copy of everything published in the UK, given the UK’s sizable publishing output. That alone is substantial. But the fact of the matter is that was true for the British Library, and it will be true for the Library of Congress or Harvard, which I believe holds the largest library and private ownership anywhere in the world, that even these kinds of operations must be focused. We cannot acquire anything. We cannot even acquire everything in the areas that our faculty and students do research on. Like any collecting organization, we must make choices. The way we make these choices, obviously, also then shift how people use our organizations and, in some ways, also shift how our current past will be remembered in the future, because that’s linked to what we can leave behind. We can address some of this through partnerships. That is something that I think was important for the British Library while I was there, and certainly important for the University of Chicago Library. We are the only library in the United States that’s part of both the Ivy Plus Libraries Confederation and the Big Ten Academic Alliance. I think Ivy Plus Libraries Confederation will probably explain itself relatively easily. It’s a network of the libraries of the Ivy and Ivy-like institutions. The plus stands for institutions like, say, Stanford or MIT and the University of Chicago. The Big Ten Academic Alliance is an organization that originally came out of universities coming together and playing sports together. This, I think, from a European perspective, sounds a bit strange. The University of Chicago was a founder in this until it decided to abolish some of its sports activities as not scholarly enough.
Going back to culture, maybe I should, as a quick, if I may, excursion say, even though I come from a family where football or soccer was really important, I was never that interested in it. I’m now overseeing a library that was built in the space where the university previously had its stadium. The university at some point decided to get out of college football, eventually tore down its stadium and built its central library facility on it. That’s an approach that I feel very much aligned to. In some ways, I feel closer to that than if I had ended up at an institution that’s very strongly based in its culture around football which, obviously, for many institutions is important. But anyway, going back, the Big Ten Academic Alliance is a group of universities that play sports together, but they also collaborate on a range of initiatives, including the libraries, work together. There are now quite a few of us and together we control a sizable amount of North American library budgets and collections. Some very big institutions like Ohio State, UCLA, and University of Michigan are involved. We have made a commitment that we want to treat our collections as
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one. In practical terms, that means any Chicago scholar can go to any other library and receive the same privileges and access that faculty would receive there. We are slowly, given the complexity of this, but really working toward the idea, of how can we be not just more inclusive overall, but also more comprehensive by joining forces and saying effectively if we share everything as one collection and we can make much more material available for our researchers. These are, I think, some of the challenges, but also some of the approaches that we are taking, partly to reduce cost, but also partly to broaden the amount of material that we can make available and preserve.
MU: You talked about technology, and this is a good moment to introduce interoperable technology because you’ve been a great advocate of persistent identifiers and open citations. Do you think this is something that an individual library like Chicago can be involved with?
TR: Absolutely. We support a range of these initiatives at the university. I think persistent identifiers ultimately only work if they’re broadly used. Like any technology, however wonderful it is, if not enough people use it, it’s not going to be effective. This is especially true for technologies that are there to link information and people. We are embedding persistent identifiers in our data, in the work that we do, our digital infrastructure. We promote them to faculty, and we also work with institutions like DataCite and others to support them. One of my colleagues, after I stepped down, has now joined the DataCite board. In a way, similar to other institutions who’ve been active in this space, we support a range of not just persistent identifier activities, but general not-for-profits and collaborative efforts, because we think, and this is a core part of our new strategy that we recently launched, we don’t see ourselves as an island. We think that libraries, in particular academic libraries, need to be interfaces for the institutions into a global knowledge environment. The way I sometimes talk about this to faculty is that the classic idea of an academic library is it purchases or licenses, in whatever form, it procures knowledge — in the past that was embodied in manuscripts or books or CD-ROMs, now it’s content that we license — and brings that into the community it serves.
That is a core function of libraries, and I think will be for a long time, but we’re now also increasingly helping knowledge to flow within our organization and flow out of the university into the world. That means providing persistent identifiers for our faculty, providing repository services, data management services, support for open access publishing, and broadly speaking, I think, different bits of glue that make all these things play together. Therefore, we really have to think of the library as an interface for information to flow in and out, and that means you have to have a view and an engagement and support core technologies that are required to make this happen. In particular, publishing something online is easy, everyone can do it, maybe not for petabyte-scale data sets — although if your credit card is big enough, that’s not that difficult either — but do it in a way where people can find and access and reuse the information, and where you have some realistic hope that it’s going to be there in three years, or as an early modern historian, I would hope 500 years, and that’s much more complex. And so, a key role, I think, of libraries is also providing infrastructure in partnership with a global knowledge environment. That is something that I honestly feel every research library needs to be involved in to an extent, and it’s a crucial part of our mission and vision, considering that we are the research library of a global research institution that wants to have and has had since its inception, global impact. I think that’s also an encouragement for a library like ours to say, like our host institution, we want to make a global impact that makes people’s lives better through knowledge. That is the original Latin motto of the University of Chicago, loosely translated to improving lives through knowledge, and I couldn’t think of a better motto for a research library as well.
Editor’s Note: Thank you very much to Michael Upshall for hosting this interview, and to Torsten Reimer for speaking with us. View the full-length interview at https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=mSb_jwiDY7Y
This is a lightly edited transcript of the audio from the 2024 Charleston Conference Leadership Interview Series. Heather Staines, Senior Strategy Consultant, Delta Think interviews Andrea CayetanoJefferson, Founder and Owner of Gullah Sweetgrass Baskets, a sixth-generation Gullah Geechee sweetgrass basket sewer from Mount Pleasant, South Carolina.
We had the pleasure of having Andrea speak with us at the 2024 Charleston Library Conference and got to experience her beautiful sweetgrass basket display inside the Gaillard Center. In this conversation, Andrea shares the history of sweetgrass baskets, which is one of the oldest African American art forms still practiced in the United States. She tells us about her personal journey in the craft which began in her childhood, the difficult process of collecting materials to create these baskets, the cultural significance of the Gullah Geechee language, and the challenges of sustaining this ancient art form today for future generations. Today, these baskets are cherished not only as works of art but as a living connection to history, preserving the skills and stories of a people who have called the Lowcountry home for centuries.
art form still practiced. So my ancestors have continuously sewn baskets for the seven generations now.
HS: Yeah, and there’s a connection with them being used in rice production, if I recall correctly from the conference.
ACJ: Yes, so the baskets you see behind me, most of the open water ones, are called rice fanner baskets. These baskets were used to separate the rice from the chaff. So you would put the rice in the basket and you shake it and when the wind came up, the chaff would fly away and you would end up with the rice. Now our ancestors were brought here to the Charleston Lowcountry area because of their knowledge of rice harvesting and part of that included making the rice fanner baskets.
HS: Great, that was a new piece of information for me and I’d probably walked by baskets in the market, you know. I’ve been going to Charleston almost 20 years and I just didn’t know about the rich history there with the baskets. Now you started out as a really young child. Tell us about how that all got started for you.
The full interview can be viewed at https://youtu.be/ pgCpPueMQ08?si=lR2R7FHU7wKYcBsI.
HS: Hi, I’m Heather Staines. I’m a senior consultant at DeltaThink and one of the directors for the Charleston Library Conference. I’m here today with Andrea Cayetano-Jefferson, who spoke at the recent conference in November 2024. Welcome, Andrea, it’s great to see you.
ACJ: Hello, good to see you too.
HS: Maybe to start out, for folks who were not in Charleston and weren’t able to catch the session, could you introduce yourself briefly and tell us a little bit about where sweetgrass baskets come from and we can talk about how you got to making them.
ACJ: My name is Andrea Cayetano-Jefferson. I am a sixth generation sweetgrass basket sewer from Mount Pleasant, South Carolina. Sweetgrass baskets, the sewing technique, is one of the oldest African art forms still practiced in the United States. I myself am Gullah Geechee and one of the Gullah Geechee traditions or crafts that we still do is sweetgrass basket sewing. Some of the other things are quilting, fishing, sewing, but sweetgrass baskets are definitely unique to the Gullah Geechee culture and it is one of the oldest, like I said, the oldest African
ACJ: Okay, so I don’t mind saying my age. I am 45 years old, but I grew up kind of like how my mom grew up. We grew up down the dirt road. We grew up priming the pump, like we played outside all day long. There was no coming in. We built clubhouses and everything down this dirt road. So like this was our community. Once I was about five, my mom, I was born in New York, but my mom came down. She always sold baskets and she started working down at the Charleston City Market. So I went down and I saw that all these ladies were making baskets I’d never seen. Of course, I’m from down a little dirt road. I told my aunt I wanted to learn, so my aunt took the time to teach me. By the time I was seven or eight years old, I was working down at the family booth at the city market. Now our family had a basket stand, which are the little huts that you see along Highway 17 in Mount Pleasant. We had one on the corner of Highway 17 and 41. My grandmother’s house still sits there. But once you went to the city, there were so many more customers. From the time I was eight years old up until 2020, I was working down in the Charleston City Market selling sweet grass baskets.
HS: So you didn’t just like immediately start with like the big baskets, right? Like there’s a hierarchy. Tell us how you started out.
ACJ: No, ma’am, you do not. It took, from the time I was at the beginning, you learn with a starter, and you learn how to just make rows around. While you’re doing that, you’re learning too
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how much grass to add in, how to add the new maida, which is palmetto. We say maida, gullah basket, so it’s a word unique to us. So, you learn how to add your maida in and you learn how to add your grass in. And in order to learn how to turn up a basket, which means go on the sides to complete a full basket, you had to know all of that first, which took a couple of years because, of course, I’m a little girl. I’m still going to school. And you had to show that you were serious about it. There was no cutting corners with my Aunt Linda. It was none of that. It was you do it right the first time or you don’t do it at all. Yeah.
HS: And I think from a pretty early age, you said you were actually doing everything in running the stand. I guess folks must have come up and saw a little bit of a girl and thought, oh boy, this is going to be a pushover event. I bet you drove a hard bargain.
ACJ: I did. I knew the rules. I could not take more than $5 off a basket. My biggest thing was, and I hate to say this, but I love to eat. So if I took more off, then you are taking out of my lunch money. I need my lunch money! No. And I also knew how much work went into it because it was my mom and my aunts, most of them had full time jobs. And then once they got off, they come in the evening. So, it was every evening at my grandmother’s house that my aunts would get together and all of my cousins, we would all be together playing, and so I knew that it took all week long. As a young child, I knew how much work went into it. And of course, going into the fields with them, too, I also knew all of that stuff.
HS: Now I want to talk to you a little bit about getting the materials but, first, when we talked prior to this interview, you mentioned that having that lunch money opened up a new world to you there with a variety of food options that were available and the people who are visiting Charleston. Tell us what that was like for you from down the dirt road and to now the world via the lens of Charleston.
ACJ: Oh my gosh. So definitely, I was exposed to people from all walks of life. Things that you only see in, I mean, I’m acting like I grew up in the fifties, but it felt like that for us because we didn’t — it was one car. And if you’re going — you didn’t get to go to the store all the time. And if you did go to the store, sometimes you had to stay in the car. So it was like seeing things that you see in the books that you’re reading and to actually see it then, it was mind blowing. I’m going to say, I say that a lot because I’ve had so many great experiences that as a little girl from down that dirt road, you never expected for that to happen. Just like doing this conference. We used to go to the Gaillard Auditorium. We would go there for concerts and go to see plays when I was a little kid and to be on that stage and to be part of Charleston’s history, it’s, I don’t know. I don’t know what to say. It’s kind of, it’s crazy to believe that it’s real.
HS: Had you ever heard about the Charleston Library Conference before that point?
ACJ: It was a surprise. Never, never, never. And all those years working down in the city market, I would see people come through with little tags on their, you know, I would see tags, but it never, it never clicked to me. You know, you would just meet people and, you know, meet names and I love to talk. Someone probably told me years ago who bought a basket from me, but me with all my run of my mouth, I didn’t even remember. But to know that this conference has been going on for so long and so many people come to Charleston, I know that somewhere someone had to, definitely down in the market, someone had to mention it to me or something.
HS: You mentioned going out and getting materials for the baskets. You’ve talked about some of the materials that are used, but you said you have equipment you carry in your car in case you just happen to spot some stuff. Tell us a little bit about maybe some of the things that have happened when you’re foraging for those materials.
ACJ: Okay, the tools that stay in my vehicle are a pair of boots, a knife, and like a sheet or something like that to wrap everything up and to make it easier to bring out of the woods, whatever we find. South Carolina is the palmetto state, so we use palmetto to wrap the baskets together. But like I said earlier, in Gullah baskets, so we’re saying maida. So cutting maida out the tree is easy. That’s what I use my knife for. Sometimes there’s snakes in the trees, so my husband cuts the maida. My husband does the cutting in the trees. And then if we are near marsh, so we also use bulrush or needle rush. If we see a patch, like the tide has gone down enough and we can walk out to the edge, we’ll cut bulrush. Palmetto or maida and rushes, we can get all year long. But sweetgrass, we can only harvest kind of towards the end of May to the beginning of August. I’m going to say August 15th, because that’s when hunting season starts. And most of the sweetgrass is on private property. When we’re doing that now, sweetgrass harvesting is the hardest part, because it is done in the summer. When you harvest sweetgrass, you’re literally pulling it out of the ground like you’re weeding a garden. And you’re doing that, and we normally start about five in the morning, because you want to get in the fields just like any other field before the sun comes up. You want to get most of your work done before that summer heat gets to you. We’re there as soon as we can see, because you don’t want to pick up any snakes. You don’t want to run into anything. I’ve seen a rabbit that I thought was something that scared me. Ground bees have attacked my husband and my mom. Never me. I’ve never got stung by bees, but I have had chiggers before, and lots of ticks. Those, the ticks and the chiggers, are worse in North Carolina. I don’t know what it is, but North Carolina is notorious in the fields with the ticks and the red bugs. We harvest from up to Wilmington, North Carolina, down to about Daytona. So we’ll get maida down in Daytona. And then there’s always some longleaf pine needles, too, that we use. We find a lot of that in Florida too.
HS: Well, it’s fascinating. And with the materials, since they grow back, it’s wonderful to have sustainable resources that you can work on. Now you told me when we were getting ready for this call that you don’t necessarily like long sleeves, that you like to feel free. You put on some sleeves for us today. We’re honored. You look beautiful. So I want to talk just a little bit about, you know, you mentioned that you’re Gullah Geechee and at the conference you actually introduced yourself in the Gullah Geechee language. Can I ask you just to do like a mini-introduction in that language so the folks who are listening will know what I’m talking about?
ACJ: (Speaking Gullah Geechee) And all I said was good morning to you all. I’m glad to see you this morning so I can tell you about who we are, Gullah Geechee people.
HS: Great. Now I know there’s been a lot in the news lately, United States, Canada, all around the world, indigenous people, people who have their own languages being discouraged or worse from using their languages in the educational setting. You had some experiences like that when you were young.
ACJ: Yes. I always start off whenever I do a speech or speak in front of people and let them know I have a fear of public
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speaking because of this reason. Growing up, and I say “um” and “I think” a lot, because I want to use Gullah words and I know growing up we were taught not to. If you said a word in Gullah you were — you got in trouble. I had to stand on one foot in a trash can because of what I was saying and so I stopped. I just didn’t raise my hand all through school. I was a straight A student, smart as can be, but it’s like you go to school and you’re taught to speak a certain way and then when you come home you have to speak another way. So I always say like we Gullah Geechee people, we are one of the first actors and actresses in the world because you couldn’t take that home and you couldn’t take home to school. You had to find a divide in between. The library became my best friend because I could always read in our library and like in elementary school they like always had so much fun stuff going on. I would just go in there during recess or if like if I would get overwhelmed I just can I go to the library and I have to help with something, you know.
So the library was my safe haven away from because I wasn’t — I am also not only Gullah Geechee but I’m Garifuna. So my dad was from Livingston, Guatemala. He passed away almost 11 years ago. He was from Livingston, Guatemala and where he’s from, the Garifuna people also have their own language. They’re exactly like the practices, like the dancing, the cooking, the religion, it’s exactly like the Gullah Geechee people a little bit further down and they speak Spanish. So it’s kind of, it’s, I went last year and it’s, I felt like I could have been in the old life back in Mount Pleasant back in the early 80s. I felt like that’s where I was. I was also teased because of these little eyes and because of my last name, Cayetano. The library was my safe haven to get away from being teased a lot. And that’s why I think it was easier for me to pick up sewing sweet grass baskets because I had friends, but not like that. None of my friends sew baskets, none of them. I have one friend now who sews, we became friends later on in life, but growing up, it was just me. None of my cousins, there are 23 of us, none of them did it. I was friends with older ladies.
HS: So just to end, I would love it if you would tell us a little bit about a couple of the baskets that are behind you. You know, I’ve been looking at them this time that you’re talking and I don’t know, do you have a favorite or do you have one back there that might be like the most challenging to make? Any that you just want to talk about briefly to show folks?
ACJ: The most challenging one, I do not have up here behind me. But this one is kind of like a vase and it was inspired by something that Mary Jackson, she’s like a famous sweet grass basket sewer. She made a piece like this that’s in our airport, in Charleston airport. And I was making one and I was like, “Oh, I think that would look really nice.” That one is in honor of her. But this style right here is my favorite style to make. It’s called like a wrap or bread basket. My aunt Linda taught me to make
this style. You see here, this is longleaf pine needles. The lighter color is grass. All of this is the bullrush or the needle rush that I was saying earlier. And if you can see here, it’s wrapped with the maida or the palmetto. So we strip it down and we use a tool called a nail bone. My mom’s generation used a nail, a 10 penny nail. My grandmother in the generations before her, they use beef bones. The beef bones would be filed to a point, and that’s what was used. Now, I use spoon handles. The spoon handle that I have, it’s about 25 years old. And that’s my favorite, my go-to. My other ones that I have, once someone in our family transitions or whatever, I am the one who gets the nail bones because I am the last to sew baskets in the family. Me and my daughter, my mom still sews, too, but not as much as she used to, but I am the keeper of the bones. And I use them. I alternate throughout and I use them a lot.
HS: Yeah. I think you mentioned that your son is good at making nail bones.
ACJ: Did I? Yes. My 12 year old. Yeah.
HS: So it is passing through you to him?
ACJ: Yes. He’s the nail bone maker and he just learned how to make palmetto roses. So I’m happy for that. Yes. Well, I have three children.
HS: Are any of them going to take up the torch, do you think? Or do they need some time to go out and sow their wild oats, so to speak, and then they’ll come back?
ACJ: Oh, well, definitely my middle son. He is the flower child. He’s living life like, so we just leave him alone, but he knows how to make palmetto roses. And my daughter helps me the most. Without her, I couldn’t do half of the stuff, including setting up this camera today. But they all have been in the fields with us, so they do know how to harvest, but my daughter would be the one who knows exactly where to go. She can drive there. She knows what to do. She knows how to dry the grasses, where to store it. If she has to run the business today or tomorrow, she can handle it.
HS: That’s great. Well, definitely pass along our thanks to her for setting up the camera, because without her doing that, we would not be here talking to you today. So it has been a pleasure, as always, to chat with you, and hope to see you at a future Charleston conference.
ACJ: Sure. Hope to see you too!
Editor’s Note: Thank you very much to Heather Staines for hosting this interview, and to Andrea Cayetano-Jefferson for speaking with us. View the full-length interview at https://youtu. be/pgCpPueMQ08?si=lR2R7FHU7wKYcBsI.
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ATG PROFILES ENCOURAGED
Megan Bean
Copyright & Information Policy Specialist
(Assistant Professor of Practice)
Mississippi State University Libraries
P.O. Box 5408, Mississippi State, MS 39762 <megan.bean@msstate.edu> https://www.library.msstate.edu/scholarlycommunication-services
BORN AND LIVED: Grew up in Houston, Texas with summers in Puget Sound. Have since lived in California, England, Washington State, North Carolina, and now Mississippi.
PROFESSIONAL CAREER AND ACTIVITIES: I’m in Act III of my career. I fell in love with copyright law during my JD at Duke and followed that love to become a big firm litigation associate in Los Angeles. I also spent nearly two decades creating work-for-hire photographs as a university photographer. I’m delighted to now find myself in what could well be my copyright dream job, which I aim to keep aligned with my values and thoughtful global copyright policy.
IN MY SPARE TIME: Hiking and travel, best when combined. As nearly empty-nesters, my husband and I have renewed our passion for seeking out live music.
FAVORITE BOOKS: I’m in three book groups, so this list could get long. But here’s two recent faves: The Invention of Morel by Adolfo Bioy Casares (1940) and The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O’Farrell (2022).
HOW/WHERE DO I SEE THE INDUSTRY IN FIVE YEARS: I would like to see all universities joining together in the effort to move the scholarly publishing ball forward in the interests of global academia. The outcome must minimize costs and maximize accessibility.
Arthur J. Boston
Scholarly Communication Librarian & Associate Professor Murray State University Murray, KY 42071 <aboston@murraystate.edu> https://ajboston.substack.com and https://aj-boston.pubpub.org
BORN AND LIVED: Born in South Korea, raised in Louisville, Kentucky, and now permanent resident of Western Kentucky.
PHILOSOPHY: This too shall pass.
MOST MEMORABLE CAREER ACHIEVEMENT: This may be an unorthodox achievement, but it was an honor to be blocked on Twitter by the founder of The Scholarly Kitchen and by a co-founder of Wikipedia.
HOW/WHERE DO I SEE THE INDUSTRY IN FIVE YEARS: I want to see the goal of free access to become more widely decoupled from open access (strictly defined) which has become too tightly bound up with costly, inequitable, and inefficient economic models. This might be achievable through projects like JSTOR’s Register & Read program or my proposed New Read Deal
Jennie Rose Halperin
Executive Director Library Futures
Library Futures at NYU Engelberg Center on Innovation Law & Policy
139 Macdougal St., Floor Four New York, NY 10012
Phone: (774) 273-0084
<jennie@libraryfutures.net> jennierosehalperin.me
BORN AND LIVED: Suburban MA; New York City; Boston, MA; Somerville, MA; Berea, KY; Carrboro, NC; Berlin, Germany; Boston again; Brooklyn, NY; Durham, NC.
EARLY LIFE: Easton, MA.
Kevin S. Hawkins
Program Director
Johns Hopkins University Baltimore, MD 21218
https://www.ultraslavonic.info/
PROFESSIONAL CAREER AND ACTIVITIES: I started running XML publishing workflows in library publishing and grew into scholarly communication work more generally, including helping launch the Open Access Book Usage Data Trust. Now I serve as program director for Johns Hopkins University side of the UCSF-JHU Opioid Industry Documents Archive, a collaboration between the University of California, San Francisco, and JHU.
HOW/WHERE DO I SEE THE INDUSTRY IN FIVE YEARS: Continuing to struggle with the reality that institutions are the main customers of scholarly literature but individuals are the users.
Paul T. Jaeger
Professor and Distinguished Scholar-Teacher University of Maryland College Park, MD 20742 <pjaeger@umd.edu> https://ischool.umd.edu/directory/paul-t-jaeger/
PROFESSIONAL CAREER AND ACTIVITIES:
Paul T. Jaeger, PhD, JD, MEd, MLS, is a Professor and Distinguished Scholar-Teacher in the College of Information Studies, Director of the Museum Scholarship and Material Culture graduate certificate program, and Associate Director of the Maryland Initiative for Digital Accessibility at the University of Maryland. He previously served as the Director of the MLIS Program.
He studies the impacts of law and policy on information access and behavior, with a focus on human rights and civil rights. He is the author of 20 books and more than 200 journal articles and book chapters. Recent books include Foundations of Information Policy, Foundations of Information Literacy, Libraries and Global Retreat of Democracy, and Foundations of Information Law. His research has been funded by the Institute for Museum and Library Services, the American Library Association, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Smithsonian Institution, and the National Science Foundation, among others.
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He is an editor of the journals Library Quarterly and Including Disability He is the founder of the Conference on Inclusion and Diversity in Library and Information Science (CIDLIS) and co-founder of the Including Disability Global Summit. He has also previously served as an editor for Advances in Librarianship, Government Information Quarterly, the International Journal of Information, Diversity, and Inclusion, and the Information Policy Book Series from MIT Press, but not at the same time. In 2014, he received the Library Journal/ALISE Excellence in Teaching Award. A 2019 study published in Public Library Quarterly named him one of the two most influential scholars of public library research in the past 35 years (it was a tie) and a 2020 study published in Library Quarterly found his publications to have the highest prestige value in the field.
BORN AND LIVED: Born in the United States, Ryan James Jessup has lived and worked in places including Texas, Pennsylvania, New York and Michigan. His work spans hybrid and remote roles across the country, offering a broad lens on regional and global communications.
EARLY LIFE: Ryan’s early career was rooted in in-person civic engagement and public service, including key roles with the City of Philadelphia and the U.S. House of Representatives, where he gained experience in media strategy, policy, and event coordination.
PROFESSIONAL CAREER AND ACTIVITIES: With over 15 years of experience across publishing, healthcare, real estate, and government, Ryan has held leadership roles at Impact Journals and JMIR Publications, and currently serves at BioMolecular Imaging, StandOut Marketing, and Buy a House in Buffalo. He founded SWB Consultants to support global visibility efforts in academia and research. His work spans SEO, content strategy, Google Ads, podcasting, and research integrity.
FAMILY: Grounded by a strong sense of loyalty, Ryan values accountability and showing up for the people who matter most.
IN MY SPARE TIME: He enjoys creating media, tracking real estate trends, researching science and policy, and building new digital projects. Quiet, creative time is a priority.
FAVORITE BOOKS: Nonfiction focused on science, law, public policy, and systems thinking — works that challenge assumptions and offer practical insight.
PET PEEVES: Disorganization, performative leadership, follow the line thinking, and a lack of curiosity.
PHILOSOPHY: Speak plainly. Lead with integrity. Build with purpose. Stay curious. Make it count.
MOST MEMORABLE CAREER ACHIEVEMENT: Plain-language editing some of the most complex scientific work from the world’s top universities and labs — and getting to meet the Nobel laureates and research teams behind it.
HOW/WHERE DO I SEE THE INDUSTRY IN FIVE YEARS: In five years, scholarly publishing will face mandated reform driven by legal pressure, federal oversight, and demand for transparency. Closed peer review will give way to third-party certification, especially for federally funded research. Publishers will need to prove editorial rigor or risk losing contracts and facing liability under laws like the False Claims Act Consolidation will slow. Independent, auditable platforms focused on integrity will rise. The era of unchecked publisher immunity is ending.
Allison Jennings-Roche
Associate Director of Digital Initiatives & Collections, RLB Library
The University of Baltimore Baltimore, MD 21201 <ajenningsroche@ubalt.edu>
BORN AND LIVED: Baltimore, MD.
HOW/WHERE DO I SEE THE INDUSTRY IN FIVE YEARS: I think the future of the industry is genuinely uncertain. I hope we take our ethical commitments seriously and are able to navigate the current political landscape in such a way that results in better access to information and more inclusion for all.
BORN AND LIVED: Born in Brandon, Florida and grew up in Tampa, Florida. Attended undergraduate college in Auburn, Alabama, then graduate school in Champaign, Illinois and law school in Chicago, Illinois. Now living in Tampa, Florida once more.
EARLY LIFE: I grew up spending a lot of time in my father’s law office, which I believe eventually influenced my own career choice down the line.
PROFESSIONAL CAREER AND ACTIVITIES: I have only just begun my professional career, but I am involved in many plaintiff’s lawyer organizations such as the Florida Justice Association, the American Association for Justice, and the Tampa Bay Trial Lawyers Association. I am also collaborating with a few local attorneys to establish a Tampa chapter of the National Lawyers Guild.
FAMILY: I have two older sisters and two younger brothers. I work at my family’s law firm with my father, stepmother, and oldest sister. My other sister is considering attending law school as well. My paternal grandfather was also an attorney. My family and I enjoy spirited discussions that other people may identify as arguments.
IN MY SPARE TIME: I love watching movies in my spare time. I have a personal goal in 2025 to watch at least one movie per day. So far, I am exceeding this goal.
FAVORITE BOOKS: The Cheese and the Worms by Carlo Ginzburg, The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, and The Crucible by Arthur Miller.
PET PEEVES: Not replacing the bag in the trash can after taking out the trash.
PHILOSOPHY: I’m always seeking to learn and know more about everything.
MOST MEMORABLE CAREER ACHIEVEMENT: I’m very early in my career, but the most memorable thing I’ve done so far was pass two bar exams in a row, the first in Florida and the second the Uniform Bar Exam in Illinois.
GOAL I HOPE TO ACHIEVE FIVE YEARS FROM NOW: I hope to be able to pivot my legal career into a law library setting, because I would love to be able to utilize both my master’s and my law degree in a professional environment.
<https://www.charleston-hub.com/media/atg/>
Libraries, Leadership, and Synergies — Collections Analysis Skills, Part 2: Training Guidance and Resources for Analytical Skills and their Application in Library Settings
Column Editor: Antje Mays (Collection Analysis Librarian, University of Kentucky Libraries) <antjemays@uky.edu>
Column Editor’s Note: Continuing from the November 2024 article’s portrayal of analysis skills from recent job postings and published collection analysis projects, this article shares guidance and resources on analytical skills and training resources for skill-building. To help librarians who are interested in analysis but to whom creating strategic training plans seems daunting, training guidance and resources in this article address statistical principles and methods, as well as software-aided data analysis in library settings. The next article will complete this series with detailed training guidance for specific analysis software packages, programming languages, and visualization tools. — AM
Introduction
The proliferation of digital content and analytical tools has expanded libraries’ needs for data-informed insights. Yet their proliferation and scaling-up have outpaced the systematic development of analytical skills and training in the library collections field. Covered in the November Against the Grain article, Part 1 of this series on library collection analysis and related skills examined fifteen recent job postings1 and twentythree published library analysis projects which portrayed these analytical techniques and skills in purpose-specific practical application. 2 The job postings sought skills encompassing analytical thinking, specific data analysis and visualization tools, software packages, programming languages, relational database design, knowledge of data and library standards, and proficiency in data-informed collections-decision-making. Cited qualifications spanned analytics, database programming, visualization techniques, computer science, and/or information science.
A more recent job posting 3 omitted librarian credentials from required qualifications, hinting only at information science among backgrounds plausible for consideration. Analysis postings’ sought-after analytical skills, software competencies, and statistical and analytical thinking customarily prevail in data science and software development realms while less present in librarianship — a circumstance prompting some analyst-seeking libraries to look beyond traditional librarian candidates to acquire the envisioned technical expertise.
Yet qualitative consideration of the meaning behind a given analysis is philosophically rooted in librarianship’s broader epistemological umbrella of knowledge and learning. While hiring analysis expertise from outside the library profession may fulfill the analyst-seeking libraries’ strictly technical needs, this approach overshadows the equally important element of content knowledge across scholarly communication and content dissemination, library collection strategies, and business models for content acquisition. Overlooking library credentials misses librarians’ qualitative background knowledge for illuminating
the data work, thereby risking diminished successes in contextsensitive, meaningful analysis outcomes. Yet gaps exist between strong self-efficacy in traditional content and outreach skills in librarianship and weaker self-assurance of skills in analytical competencies that are emerging in librarianship but more prevalent in data and technology professions. 4 Additional barriers to professional development in the sought-after skills around data and technology include institutional resource constraints and individual time constraints.5 To bridge this gap, this article offers a structured blueprint for helping interested librarians develop these analytical skills.
Proliferating Demand for Analytical Skills
Libraries seeking technological and analytical competencies reflect global need across many industries. Analytical thinking comprises breaking down broad and complex information into smaller manageable parts for systematic inquiry, examining details, and detecting patterns, and findings-derived problemsolving. Quantitative analysis leverages mathematical methods and specific tools for examining logical relationships between components. Relentless technological evolution continues to accelerate the growth of technology-and analytics-infused roles. The World Economic Forum’s 2025 Future of Jobs Report6 cites rapidly rising demand for skills including programming and technological literacy, artificial intelligence and information processing, big data, analytical thinking, agility, creativity, curiosity, lifelong learning, resilience, resource management, and operations. Of equal importance are cognitive skills including knowledge acquisition and management, information science, synthesis, complex systems and design thinking, abstract reasoning, and problem-solving. 7 Evolving library and information ecosystems and their increasing complexity share the rising demand for these cognitive and analytical competencies in professional practice8 and library research.9
Training Guidance: Strategic Overview
Evolving skill requirements bring librarians face-to-face with a smorgasbord of emerging career directions and training needs. Continually changing library ecosystems, proliferation of technologies, and widening ranges of specializations heighten the importance of continuing professional development10 and post-MLIS certificates as pathways to career enhancement through targeted training in specialized paths and technologies.11 While librarianship maintains a wide range of operations and services, technology and software skill requirements are broad and range from business productivity software to creative design and web development suites.12 As analysis-focused job postings increasingly seek skills more customary in data science and developer fields, librarians can circumvent this training gap by examining occupational profiles for data scientists13 and software developers14 for detailed descriptions of data and computer task realms, specific tools, programming languages,
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analytical skills, and career-development guidance. For librarians intrigued by the emerging analysis-focused job postings but unsure about possessing the requisite skills, the ads can form strategic raw material for self-creating a tailored training plan. Skilltype15 and LinkedIn Learning16 offer a vast universe of online courses, tutorials, and certification programs; LinkedIn Learning also offers a portal specifically focused on professional certificates and credentials.17 Both skill-development portals are browsable by skill families and searchable by specific desired skill or tool to learn. Microsoft Learning18 offers a wide range of software training, credentialing, documentation, video tutorials, and interactive learning modules. Qualifications and rolespecific learning paths are grouped into curricula of targeted instruction and tutorials;19 the entire training site is browsable at-a-glance with a granular selection interface.20 Similarly, Google Learning21 offers a vast range of analytical training, while Grow with Google22 offers certification programs related to specific roles and qualifications. Codeacademy23 and W3C Schools24 offer in-depth learning resources and coding guidance for a wide range of software suites and programming languages.
To start experimenting with skill development, searching these training sites for the skills cited in job ads of interest is a solid first step toward strengthening analytical skills. The next article will delve deeper into training resources for specific analytical software, programming languages, and visualization tools.
Statistics and Data Analysis: Books for Skill Development
The rise of analysis ads specifying statistical software skills indirectly imply the need for understanding statistics and the structured inquiry on which statistical software tools are built. While statistical proficiency is second nature for librarians regularly engaged in analytical functions, students of librarianship or librarians whose last formal engagement with statistics was past graduate study will benefit from this selection of self-paced refreshers in statistics and structured exploration of the logical relationships between factors under investigation.
Susan and David Carroll’s Simplifying Statistics for Graduate Students: Making the Use of Data Simple and User-Friendly, 25 offers accessibly written guidance covering statistical principles, data collection, and statistical thinking with a view to designing structured analyses. The book includes detailed instructions for building statistical analyses with Microsoft Excel’s Analysis ToolPak, practice datasets, and explains types of data visualizations and how to choose the visualizations best suited for illustrating the data at hand.
Gopal Kanji’s classic, 100 Statistical Tests, 26 details the major types of statistical tests, their characteristics and purposes, how to structure statistical tests, and illustrations of statistical methods with examples of calculations. The book also outlines common testing errors and portrays the limitations of statistical tests. Although not recent, the book’s enduring value rests with its approach of expounding on each statistical test’s underlying logic and thereby helping researchers make informed choices of tests appropriate to their inquiries.
Daniel Scheller’s Elementary statistics for public administration: an applied perspective27 echoes the statistical tests from Gopal’s aforementioned classic, with the added benefit of applying the statistical principles to determine actions and facilitate decisions in public administration settings. The book teaches step-bymathematical calculations; screenshots from SPSS and Stata illustrate the author’s instructions for software-aided statistical analysis.
Tiffany Bergin’s book, An Introduction to Data Analysis: Quantitative, Qualitative and Mixed Methods , 28 covers
philosophical elements of analytical thinking, research methods, and critical analysis of project-appropriate choices of research methods. Written in an accessible, conversational style, the book guides learners through theoretical and practical components of quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods research. Example scenarios illustrate the unpacking of research questions to inform the structure of research design and data gathering and analysis to ensure analyses meaningful to the inquiry at hand. Additional guidance includes data analysis and visualization, data management, and communication of data and findings.
Software-Aided Data Analysis in Library Settings: Books for Skill Development
Statistical knowledge and analytical thinking in real-world problem-solving encompass framing a specific problem or question for analysis, gathering inquiry-pertinent data, and software-aided data analysis and visualization.
In the book Data-Driven Decisions: A Practical Toolkit for Librarians and Information Professionals, 29 author Amy Stubbing guides librarians from the broader philosophical considerations of data analysis through the stages and details of designing analysis projects, analyzing and visualizing data, and drawing actionable conclusions for decision support. Styled as a toolkit, the book explains data types, distinctions between quantitative, qualitative, and blended research, context-informed inquiries and how to translate them into successful analyses, identifying context-appropriate source data and their gathering and processing, interpreting and communicating findings, and enlisting the findings to inform libraries’ directions in operations and services. The conversational style presents a comprehensive yet accessible overview of research design from inception to application, introduces methods to help readers develop analytical thinking, and illuminates the principles with library projects to exemplify practical application of these skills. Beginning analysts will benefit from the accessibly portrayed process of analytical thinking and the methods of analysis. More experienced librarians will gain refreshers, further deepen existing data and analytical skills, and reap new ideas from the comprehensive toolkit.
Bruce White’s comprehensive spreadsheet instruction book, Spreadsheets for Librarians: Getting Results with Excel and Google Sheets, 30 covers spreadsheet skills from the basics through advanced analytics for library contexts. The author offers a variety of library scenarios, breaks down analytical strategies, situation-tailored projects and their underlying logic, and detailed instructions for creating formulas to achieve the desired calculations.
Training Strategies: Getting Started and Next Steps
For librarians interested in analytical directions, taking a page from data science professions for career documentation widens the lens for skill-development ideas. The above-described resources for analytics training and credentialing offer structured learning pathways to spur ideas for systematic skill pursuits. The teaching books on statistics and data analysis reintroduce fundamental principles and step-by-step work-along practice examples. The books on software-aided analysis in library settings provide accessible examples for inspiring your own analysis projects. The next article will feature specific analysis software packages, programming languages, and visualization tools. Training guidance for software and programming languages will cover SAS, SPSS, Python, R, Stata, relational databases and SQL. Training guidance for visualization tools will cover Power BI, Tableau, and ArcGIS.
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Endnotes
1. “Dataset: 15 anonymized job ads across the realm of library collections, collected during 2024, anonymized, and compiled in a spreadsheet for examination of duties and skill requirements.” ResearchGate. 2025. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/392626204
2. Antje Mays. “Libraries, Leadership, and Synergies — Collections Analysis Skills, Part 1: Introduction to Analytical Skills, Practical Projects, and Training Guidance.” Against the Grain 36 no.5 (November 2024), 42-44.
3. “Textual data: new collection analysis job posting from 2025 for study on collection analysis skill requirements and related training strategies.” ResearchGate. 2025. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/392626663
4. Weldon, Matthew. 2024. “ATG Special Report - Librarian Futures Part III: The Librarian Skills Landscape, Author and Librarian Commentary.” Against the Grain 36 no.1, 30–33.
5. Fuhr, Justin. 2022. “Developing Data Services Skills in Academic Libraries.” College & Research Libraries 83, no. 3, 474–502. doi:10.5860/ crl.83.3.474.
6. World Economic Forum. Cologny/Geneva, Switzerland, 2025, Future of Jobs Report. https://www.weforum.org/publications/the-futureof-jobs-report-2025/in-full/
7. Stephen K. Reed. Cognitive Skills You Need for the 21st Century. 1st ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. doi:10.1093/ oso/9780197529003.001.0001.
8. Sandra Hirsh. Information Services Today: An Introduction. Edited by Sandra Hirsh. Third edition. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2022.
9. Caitlin Gerrity and Scott Lanning. Conducting Original Research for Your Library. New York: Bloomsbury Libraries Unlimited, 2024.
10. Anushie Moonasar. “Continuing professional development and the changing landscape of academic libraries.” Library Management 45 no.3/4 (April 2024), 226-242. doi:10.1108/LM-09-2023-0100.
11. Jennifer A. Dixon. “After the MLIS: For Librarians Looking To Change Career Course, Post-MLIS Certificates Can Help Them Learn A New Specialization Or Catch Up On Technologies.” Library Journal 147 no.6 (June 2022), 50.
12. National Center for O*NET Development. “25-4022.00 - Librarians and Media Collections Specialists.” O*NET OnLine. May 20, 2025. Accessed May 30, 2025. https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/25-4022.00
13. National Center for O*NET Development. “15-2051.00 - Data Scientists.” O*NET OnLine. May 20, 2025. Accessed May 30, 2025. https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/15-2051.00
14. National Center for O*NET Development.“15-1252.00 - Software Developers.” May 20, 2025. Accessed May 30, 2025. O*NET OnLine https://www.onetonline.org/link/summary/15-1252.00
15. Skilltype. Skilltype | Talent Management for Knowledge Organizations. 2018-2024, accessed May 20, 2025. https://www.skilltype.com/
16. LinkedIn. LinkedIn Learning. 2025, accessed May 23, 2025. https://www.linkedin.com/learning
17. LinkedIn. “Professional Certificates and Credentials.” LinkedIn Learning. 2025, accessed May 20, 2025. https://learning.linkedin.com/ certifications-and-credentials
18. Microsoft. “Learning for everyone, everywhere: Explore Microsoft product documentation, training, credentials, Q&A, code references, and shows.” Microsoft Learn. 2025, accessed May 20, 2025. https://learn.microsoft.com/
19. Microsoft. “Training: Discover your path.” Microsoft Learn. 2025, accessed May 20, 2025. https://learn.microsoft.com/training/ 20. Microsoft. “Training: Browse all training.” 2025, accessed May 20, 2025. https://learn.microsoft.com/training/browse/
21. Google. Google Learning. [n.d.], accessed May 23, 2025. https://learning.google/ 22. Google. Grow with Google. [n.d.], accessed May 23, 2025. https://grow.google/
23. Codeacademy. Codeacademy. [n.d.], accessed May 23, 2025. https://www.codecademy.com/
24. W3Schools. W3Schools Online Web Tutorials. 2025, accessed May 23, 2025. https://www.w3schools.com/
25. Susan Rovezzi Carroll, and David J Carroll. Simplifying Statistics for Graduate Students: Making the Use of Data Simple and User-Friendly. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2023.
27. Daniel S. Scheller. Elementary statistics for public administration: an applied perspective. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2025.
28. Tiffany Bergin. An Introduction to Data Analysis: Quantitative, Qualitative and Mixed Methods. 1st ed. London: SAGE Publications Ltd, 2018.
29. Amy Stubbing. Data-Driven Decisions: A Practical Toolkit for Librarians and Information Professionals. London: Facet, 2022.
30. Bruce White. Spreadsheets for Librarians: Getting Results with Excel and Google Sheets. 1st ed. New York: Libraries Unlimited, 2021. doi:10.5040/9798216017967.
Back Talk continued from page 74
consistency, production optimization, supply chain efficiency, and the like, nothing about the recipe. That’s remarkable, and makes me wonder whether that kind of consistency and authenticity is something that can survive in the production of journals — or whether “journals” will even still be the form of distribution of bite-sized chunks of scientific and
Against the Grain / June 2025
scholarly knowledge. I’ll need some more Cheez-Its® to think about that.
So I have one last question: now that I’ve written a major article on Cheez-Its® for a serious professional journal like Against the Grain, can I start writing them off on my taxes?
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Back Talk — Cheez-Its and Libraries
Column Editor: Jim O’Donnell (University Librarian, Arizona State University) <jod@asu.edu>
I’ve been eating Cheez-Its® since I was eight years old. I’ve been reading Speculum and Classical Philology and The Journal of Roman Studies since I was twenty or twenty-one. I want to tell you what they’ve made me understand about libraries.
Cheez-Its® have been around, one inch squares of cheesy heaven, since 1907 when the Green and Green company of Dayton OH introduced them as “baked rarebit.” (By the way, the fading of welsh rarebit from American menus is a vast undocumented tragedy of our time, but I digress.) Sunshine Biscuits took them over in the 1930s, then Keebler, then Kellogg’s, and there seems to be a deal in the works now to hand them off to Mars. The march of civilization being sometimes acutely slow, they have been introduced outside the United States only in 2020 (Canada) and 2024 (Australia and the UK).
And they never change. Let’s start there: works of human ingenuity that catch the public attention and retain it can continue to be produced in remarkably similar fashion despite dramatic upheavals in the business arrangements behind them. Take publishing, for example. The original Penguin books began in 1935 as a subsidiary of the Bodley Head and were uniquely engaged in reflecting and shaping upper middlebrow English literary taste for decades. Today they are owned by Bertelsmann, which was founded in 1835, went large after World War II under the leadership of Richard Mohn, and is now a worldwide conglomerate still primarily controlled by the Mohn family.
Now Cheez-Its® have in fact kept their basic recipe and identity remarkably consistent over all that time and all those corporate transformations. So if you go to your local grocer and seek out the Cheez-Its,® you’ll see that what was once a single shelf with boxes of identical packages, from the 7 ounce teaser portion to the 24 ounce single serving size, is now a column of shelves with a dozen or more styles (shall we say “varietals” shall we “curate” our collection?), which the connoisseur greets with weary dismay. White cheddar, jalapeno, puffed, grooves, snack mix? Snap’d® (baked not fried, chips made with 100% real cheese)? Really? (And Penguin books are still eminently recognizable and can convincingly claim that the original Penguin spirit and ambition guides them. OK, it’s true there are a lot more lines and sub-brands of Penguin books. )
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Well, a connoisseur is by definition not a very inclusive fellow. He turns his nose up at odd spellings, insensitive to the growing brand and logo crisis in the world. There are only so many vaguely recognizable five and six letter combinations that can be imagined, and a huge number of those have been gobbled up and are being gobbled up. You heard it here first, but the logo shortage crisis will be acutely upon us before all the arctic ice has had time to melt. I’m sure the varietals of Cheez-It® all find their audience (they wouldn’t still be on the shelves), even if not with me.
And yes, the commercial dominance of publishing means that every publisher is looking to extend the variety of their offerings, find audiences, achieve efficiencies, take costs out of the system, etc., etc., etc. And so the benighted librarian is compelled to broaden her selections and accept a whole lot of material on faith that someone must want this stuff. Where our publisher colleagues are smarter than Mr. Cheez-It,® though, is in two tell-tale aspects of their business. First, they don’t need to find customers for a new product (“Cheez-It® Duoz® Pesto & Mozzarella Crackers”), they just need to find producers for articles for a new journal ( The Journal of Palaeographic Optometry, for people who need help squinting at medieval manuscripts), and better still, the producers are all mom-andpop shops, or just mom or pop shops, individuals, and small groups taking pity on aging medievalists. Better yet, publishers are figuring out how to get the mom-and-pop shops to pay for the whole business! (And the clever ones get the article producers and the libraries pay and assure us most earnestly that they’re not double-dipping.) The publishers can multiply and diversify their lines without ever caring whether any of the new product gets consumed. The librarian is the one stuck with a closet full of (back to the metaphor) unopened or opened-but-scarcelytouched boxes of Cheez-It® Snap’d® Variety Pack (Cheddar Sour Cream & Onion, Double Cheese). Second, the publishers don’t take the chance of filling up a column of shelves at the supermarket. They have pre-sold a ton of their product in singleinvoice orders, when they haven’t gotten mom-and-pop to pay APCs, and in either case they just load up eighteen-wheelers (so to speak) of journal content and leave the trailers in our library parking lots, and every year we look out and there are more and more of those trailers being dumped off. Lucky for us they’re only digital: can you imagine the crisis we would have faced if journals had remained all-print objects and the global proliferation had taken off the way it has?
And there are a lot of people addicted to the journals our publishers produce, probably even more than there are Cheez-Its® addicts. If this were a slightly more pompous and au courant column, it would be the place to worry about what artificial intelligence will do to Cheez-Its® and scholarly journals. The Cheez-Its® product has remained remarkably the same for 118 years (“just like librarians,” my editor says!) and when I asked ChatGPT “what difference will artificial intelligence make to the way Cheez-Its® are produced,” all I got back was a screen and a half about quality control and
continued on page 73
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