OU PIPs kick off with inspiring ‘Welcome Week’ event As part of this year’s Open University Welcome Week, the newly formed Politics, International Relations and Policy Society (PIPs) held its first event with Matt Staples, Head of the School of Social Sciences and Global Studies (SSGS) and Dr…

Tonight at 6:30pm!

I'm at @oustudents.bsky.social at @oulibrary.bsky.social for an Welcome Week event. I'm representing the future @oupips.bsky.social

Big news: Internet Archive Europe ( @internetarchive.eu ) has opened its new HQ in Amsterdam! 🎉 A home for preservation, access & shared cultural heritage. Read coverage from @mariabustillos.com in Flaming Hydra: flaminghydra.com/freedom-and-...

Join us on 30th September - 6.30pm - 7.30pm, joined with Matt Staples and Dr. Edward Wastnidge will be sharing how the Open University’s teaching, research, and wider engagement in politics and international relations connect with the aims of our new society Join: www.oustudents.com/ents/event/2...

we have gone from a world in which we were told not to cite wikipedia because it was unreliable to a world where wikipedia might be the only reliable source left on the internet and we all owe a lot to the pedantic nerds who got us there

One of our most pernicious social trends, which I think emerged from Covid and seems to have been retained more among the middle classes. It brings out my inner contrarian: I will just walk past the queue and, interestingly, bar staff don’t punish you. The queue itself only responds with glares

Please be prepared for this to become my entire personality (yes, it always has been, but now I will have stats to back up my tenacity) #historyteacher #EndSexismInSchools #women observer.co.uk/news/columni...

Have a good weekend

I wrote an article about why Wikipedia still matters and how everyone can get involved with the project. I'll be running a session on how to get started as part of Welcome Week for @oustudents.bsky.social thehootstudents.com/why-wikipedi...

If a history, arts, heritage, or craft account adds ALT text to images, it's usually a pretty good indicator that a) they are fairly decent folk and b) not a content scraper. Why? Fairly decent folk understand the importance of inclusivity and content scrapers don't care.

A plagiarism on both your houses!

I wrote an article about why Wikipedia still matters and how everyone can get involved with the project. I'll be running a session on how to get started as part of Welcome Week for @oustudents.bsky.social thehootstudents.com/why-wikipedi...

Meet the wonderful George Pendergast who, at 100 years of age, edits #Wikipedia and uses #AI. Come to #Aberdeen #Wikimetup and we'll show you how easy and satisfying it is. ti.to/code-the-cit... It is time to #BeMoreGeorge w.wiki/FJi5

Book bans get headlines, but the bigger threat to books is hiding in plain sight: A handful of companies control how ebooks reach readers, and they can cut off access with a click. New from @mariabustillos.com in @columjournreview.bsky.social ⤵️

LINK ROT: 38% webpages that existed in 2013 were no longer available 10 years later. Even among pages that existed in 2021, 22% no longer accessible just two years later. This is often because individual page was deleted or removed on otherwise functional website. Many implications for knowledge 🧪

Pulitzer Feeling Increasingly Out Of Place In Washington Post Office

There's been a great initiative over the summer by the @openuniversity.bsky.social Arts and Humanities school students to run a weekly writing workshop. One student wrote up their summary about it for the Hoot @oustudents.bsky.social thehootstudents.com/arts-and-hum...

The MSNBC commentator saying that most political violence has historically come from the left just once again showed how we suffer from failing to learn history. Lynching, pogroms, race riots, the political violence that ended Reconstruction, and against the Civil Rights Movement. Come on.

AJP Taylor - not a referencing guy

Very much looking forward to working with the 121 @oustudents.bsky.social student reps who will be serving on @openuniversity.bsky.social committees for the next two years, especially the 11 other FASS students who I will be collaborating with www.oustudents.com/news/article...

Looking for your next great read? 📖 Tomorrow is #NationalReadABookDay! 🎉 #OUstudents & staff can enjoy thousands of ebooks, audiobooks, magazines & more through Overdrive - all on your own device. 📱💻 Start browsing to see where your next book takes you👉 open.overdrive.com (OU login req)

Wikipedia is one of the great human achievements of the 21st century. We must protect it at all costs.

Paul Metcalf is one of the great unknown American writers. A thread. Metcalf's books are collages of excavated texts and his own surgically applied prose. He confronts the powerful facts of American history: its violence, its celebration of individual freedom while subjugating masses...

Welcome @oupips.bsky.social to Bluesky

With my free time, I have been working on the new OU Politics, International Relations, and Policy Society. We have a website now. Sign up for the upcoming newsletter oupips.org.uk @oupolitics.bsky.social @oustudents.bsky.social

Ten days until my module website (A328 Empires: power, resistance, legacies) opens up and the wait is killing me. I just want to start work on the TMAs now as I have some free time #oustudents #A328

Spent the last 3 hours talking to fellow @openuniversity.bsky.social students at various online events and I'm so glad that I became involved with @oustudents.bsky.social

Tonight at 6pm!

My soup weather program for the last few nights has been Homicide:Life on the Streets. I used to have the full DVDs of Homicide but at one point I lost the first 2 seasons. God they are good.

Business idea: a cheese takeaway. For when you are too many glasses of wine in and you want cheese.

Our online training session, 'Assessing the reliability of information for your assignment', is ideal for giving #OUstudents the confidence they need to identify reliable sources when carrying out research for their assignments. 💻📖 Here's a quick session overview... 👇 youtube.com/shorts/HG5FN...

Since search is dead, how soon do you think Google Scholar is headed for the Google Graveyard? I'm betting it's soon, and academia is NOT prepared

The mental health benefits of not knowing any history right now must be massive. Moving through your day with total equanimity. What happens next? Who knows? Maybe something good

Can’t be repeated often enough ‘The UK’s creative industries are vital to the economy. Valued at £124bn, they are worth more than the life sciences, aerospace and automotive industries combined. Arts and culture alone contribute an impressive £34.6bn.’ on.ft.com/42hzVmL

Feels like a good time to re-up this.

I hate when the algorithm knows me too well

🚨 New blog post by Paul-Francois Tremlett! 🚨 The tragic death of #DiogoJota drew immense grief, while vast losses in wars seem to remain harder to mourn. What does this say about grief? Freud’s “displacement” offers one answer www.open.ac.uk/blogs/religi... @thebasr @OU_FASS @bloomsburyrs

Here's your annual reminder: whether you received A-level results today, years ago, or never, there's space for you at the @openuniversity.bsky.social!

If the UK manages to make Wikipedia untenable without a VPN it'll be a national embarrassment. Unfortunately I strongly suspect this will still be net popular, but the point is it's bad on merits and I wish Labour cared about that more. I wish there was any evidence Starmer's government ever cared.

The faculty have been waiting decades to get this quote into the Times.

Curious about what lies behind global headlines? Explore great power rivalries, terrorism & key IR theories with our FREE OpenLearn course: Introducing International Relations. No sign-up needed & earn a Statement of Participation! bit.ly/4mwSDxJ #FreeLearning

Interested in undergrad IR? Check out this thread of @openuniversity.bsky.social links, including sign up details for our new module D228, a new @ouopenlearn.bsky.social course, our IR degree, and two informative videos #StudyIR #OpenUniversity @polstudiesassoc.bsky.social @mybisa.bsky.social

“American Academy of Arts&Sciences reports 96.3% of humanities grads age 23-32 fully employed. Earnings in humanitiess comparable to social/life sciences, job satisfaction levels too. A serious mismatch bw actual employment for hum grads +general perception." www.mellon.org/voices/human...

🧵 Humanities degree holders are just as fully employed and just as satisfied with their jobs as their peers with STEM degrees. We have the data. We’ve replicated the data many times. It’s humanities bashing (and often anti intellectual) to insist otherwise. It’s also, ironically, bad science!

Did you know that #OUstudents and staff get free access to top-quality newspapers through Library Search - papers you may usually have to pay for? 📰💰 Our latest YouTube Short shows how to quickly find reliable, up-to-date sources right at your fingertips 👇 youtube.com/shorts/_PGEK...

MAN: What's that, girl? Trouble at the old mine? LEFT-WING LASSIE: Woof! [The miners are striking for better pay and conditions] MAN: B-but Billy's down there! LEFT-WING LASSIE: Woof! [BILLY'S A SCAB]

FASS Connect tonight at 6:30pm. Join fellow FASS students at @openuniversity.bsky.social for an informal chat www.oustudents.com/ents/event/1...