"The only way to address the reliance on a journal’s brand as a proxy for quality was to take a recognized signifier and destroy that signification." Nice piece. I still have so much respect for eLife's decision to jeopardise its prestige in order to show that journal prestige is bad for science.

Question for US Copyright folks - if an author has approached a rights holder for reproduction rights (for an academic book) and been denied because the book is critical of the work, would that impact a fair use justification in either direction?

This has reminded me of the time our local IMAX (RIP) had old James Bond films on, and in the middle of the Junkanoo scene in Thunderball, a dog very clearly lifts a leg and has a nice massive piss.

Ig Nobel prizes moving to Europe because US 'unsafe' to visit

(And there, just at the end, funding is in jeopardy because of the CDC cuts...)

The House of Lords Digital & Communications Committee just published their report on AI, copyright & the creative industries, and their conclusions could not be clearer. 🧵 1/5

It's been a really great time to have not slept for a full three days for medical reasons. youtu.be/TmosS8G03Y8?...

As we have said and continue to say: the absolute vibe-based public safety conversation is not going to change until we get serious about social change: library-specific deescalation work and broader social interventions around housing, youth engagement, safe consumption, and accessible healthcare.

Higher Ed lives! UWinnipeg is posting two tenure track positions in Human Rights: Focus on digital security/ AI Ethics: www.northstarats.com/University-o... Joint teaching in Peace & Conflict Studies: www.northstarats.com/University-o...

Is this bad

It’s been a year since we launched the science IRL mini-grant program. Wanna see what our grantees got up to?? Check it out! www.patreon.com/posts/scienc... We’ll be doing this program again in 2026, keep an eye out for the announcement soon!

!! Something I've been working on for a year is finally live!! A report from @eff.org , @justjournalism.bsky.social, and IPVM geared toward journalists but important for law makers and the general public decoding the nefarious ways police and surveillance tech gets sold, marketed, and deployed. 🧵

Winnipeg, this is your reading for the day! Follow the delegations against Councillor Duncan’s disastrous anti-protest bylaw below

“The chaos that is unfolding south of us right now is a clear indicator that it’s coming our way and if we don’t put these things in place to stop that, it’s going to be your neighborhood next” Is Duncan saying Winnipeg is banning actions similar to the Twin Cities resistance to ICE violence? WHY

What is the academic equivalent of #NoTechForICE? A colleague has proposed #NoPapersForICE... A lot of the journals we publish in and subscribe to are behind some of the grossest targeting of humans in the US. See also: bsky.app/profile/jamb...

Oh, the Freep story literally uses a photo of a pro Palestinian action on campus. This definitely will be fine.

What is the academic equivalent of #NoTechForICE? A colleague has proposed #NoPapersForICE... A lot of the journals we publish in and subscribe to are behind some of the grossest targeting of humans in the US. See also: bsky.app/profile/jamb...

Heroes live among us, and farfalle is a crime. www.reddit.com/r/Cooking/s/...

This is why expanded IMLS funding isn't really a good thing under the current regime--funding is the tool through which they will seek to push and control a narrative that will unmake and disassemble our libraries under the fascist image of trump's big government plan that we likely will never undo.

Hey, my talk on open education and authoritarianism from #OpenEd25 is up on YouTube. www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ta4...

Five minute task of the day: send a cranky email to researchers sending out a survey via CAUT/ Faculty Associations on Academic Freedom, which appears to be worded to either exclude academic librarians, or ignorant that they are also usually Faculty Association members. With Academic Freedom.

I'm pleased to have co-authored a new article out today in the Canadian Journal of Academic Librarianship. Kevin Sanders, @sluginkpress.bsky.social, and I reflect on the Radical Librarians Collective and how we situate radical librarianship alongside critical librarianship. doi.org/10.33137/cja...

PSA: it is in fact possible for universities to address financial challenges by slashing (incredibly expensive and largely useless) admin positions. Memorial University just downsized VPs from 7 to 3. Yes we can! universityaffairs.ca/news/memoria...

🎵Hakuna ricotta🎶

Turns out that the publisher of the property law textbook I use, Thomson Reuters, "holds a contract worth up to $22 million (U.S.) that began in May 2021 to provide ICE with access to a law enforcement investigative database subscription". Welp, new book time... www.thestar.com/business/mor...

I just posted a free workbook that aims to help university workers better understand when and how to take risks in the fight against fascism in higher ed. halperta.com/shalperta%20...

My kid got a furby two years ago, and probably once a week I think about how smart it was to have "DOES NOT CONNECT TO THE INTERNET" in big letters on the box.

"I find myself wondering if I still have a home here in Minnesota, in America, in the world of the people who get to decide who is valuable and who is not, who belongs and who does not, who lives and who dies." - Kao Kalia Yang, one of the best writers in MN and in the rest of the universe

Some days you have an incredibly busy work day, but you also have My Ding-a-Ling by goddamned Chuck Berry in your head.

In other, hilarious news: I found a search that broke Primo, and every week or so I get updates about what their “team” has figured out about why 85-ish junk results appear instead of the actual item. The search? “What Could a University Be”

Interesting tender from the Association of Canadian Publishers (won by HESA, it appears). If you click through, the first potential cause of reported publishers' declining revenue identified is OER & Inclusive Access. Together. Because those are obvious similar models. publishers.ca/rfp-higher-e...

There is a Canadian research grant program currently aimed at recruiting international researchers in key strategic areas: - advanced digital technologies (including artificial intelligence, quantum and cybersecurity); - health, including biotechnology; - clean technology and resource value chains;

Comfort listening

Winter storm tip: wheat paste is probably your most effective postering tool in cold weather, but you gotta protect your hands (with gloves you don't care about) and make it thicker.

The irony of everyone fawning over how Mark Carney is 'standing up' for Canada is that he is simultaneously eroding the few institutions that actually distinguish the Canadian state from the US, and those which theoretically could be used to shield Canadians from the disaster area to the south.

Naomi Klein personally (mass) emailed me to join the party and vote for him as leader, and Cory Doctorow endorses him, so for Canadians who are interested in shifting the window of electoral politics left, trying to get Avi Lewis in as national NDP leader might be your jam.

I would sign up for a streaming service that was just Columbo episodes. Nothing else. Don't distract me from the purity of the experience.

The People's Consultation on AI launched today! Whether you have in-depth expertise in AI issues, or don't consider yourself an "expert" but have firsthand experience with AI or its impacts and want to have your say, this is for you. Participate by March 15, 2026: www.peoplesaiconsultation.ca

The Canadian 🇨🇦 govt, and its Minister of AI and Innovation, is rushing headlong into full blown AI. All gas, no brakes, no real consultation So we're launching the People’s Consultation on AI You can find out more here 👇: www.peoplesaiconsultation.ca/news-updates/

Excellent reminder to always read Sarah Lamdan: www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2019/ice-sur...

Given all the news about ICE in the past few weeks, can I kindly remind you all that RELX (owners of Elsevier & LexisNexis) is "mission-critical" to ICE. ICE pays RELX Group and Thomson Reuters millions of dollars for the personal data it needs to fuel its big data policing program […]

For CBC Arts, I wrote about why I think Canada needs to revel in the beauty of its weirdest impulses www.cbc.ca/arts/canadia...

I... think I may have to take back some things I've said.

Wow! Go back up and ready this whole thread.

Truly impressive how quickly the nationalist squabbling and insults came out on here in the last few days. Real quick turnaround on that one from a bunch of people who were talking about community and solidarity for the last few years. It's everywhere I look now. GG.

New from Sam Popowich - Young's Five Faces of Oppression & Citational Justice, in an issue of Kula focused on Citational Justice that has some other interesting articles for librarians and pedagogues too! kula.uvic.ca/index.php/ku...

Do yourself a favour and go read this. Elegant, precise, and gives this moment its true name.

"touchless lead poisoning" ☠️