Dot Porter
@leoba.bsky.social
Medievalist, digital humanist, and wannabe booklicker.
I'm here to post memes and yell about manuscripts.
See also @sims-mss.bsky.social
I speak for myself and not for my employer
I'm here to post memes and yell about manuscripts.
See also @sims-mss.bsky.social
I speak for myself and not for my employer
Pinned
Dot Porter
@leoba.bsky.social
· Apr 3
I love EVERYTHING about manuscripts but mostly I love that they were made by people - that every part of them, from the substrate to the ink to the ideas behind the words on the page to the thread that holds the codex together - were made by the hands and minds of people.
There is a bat trapped in my bedroom! I cannot function under these circumstances.
November 10, 2025 at 1:40 PM
There is a bat trapped in my bedroom! I cannot function under these circumstances.
Finally watched "Frankenstein" and I am solidly on that train. TOOT TOOT 🚂🚂🚂🚂🚂
November 10, 2025 at 12:16 PM
Finally watched "Frankenstein" and I am solidly on that train. TOOT TOOT 🚂🚂🚂🚂🚂
Reposted by Dot Porter
Make the Goddamn meal and put it in your Free Fridge. Write the $100 check to the food bank. Ask your local school what they need for the kids and then go about trying to get that stuff.... Do these things regularly and you are making meaningful contributions to your communities.
November 9, 2025 at 3:50 AM
Make the Goddamn meal and put it in your Free Fridge. Write the $100 check to the food bank. Ask your local school what they need for the kids and then go about trying to get that stuff.... Do these things regularly and you are making meaningful contributions to your communities.
Reposted by Dot Porter
Reposted by Dot Porter
A dragon hides in the initial word-panel at the beginning of Torah portion Chayei Sarah(חַיֵּי שָׂרָה).
#ParashahPictures
BL Or 2696; 1350-1399 CE; Torah, the Five Scrolls and Hafṭarot with masorah & Rashi's commentary; Germany, S.; f.39r
#ParashahPictures
BL Or 2696; 1350-1399 CE; Torah, the Five Scrolls and Hafṭarot with masorah & Rashi's commentary; Germany, S.; f.39r
November 9, 2025 at 8:09 PM
A dragon hides in the initial word-panel at the beginning of Torah portion Chayei Sarah(חַיֵּי שָׂרָה).
#ParashahPictures
BL Or 2696; 1350-1399 CE; Torah, the Five Scrolls and Hafṭarot with masorah & Rashi's commentary; Germany, S.; f.39r
#ParashahPictures
BL Or 2696; 1350-1399 CE; Torah, the Five Scrolls and Hafṭarot with masorah & Rashi's commentary; Germany, S.; f.39r
Reposted by Dot Porter
The rights for Roger Rabbit have reverted back to author Gary K. Wolf 🐰
“I now have back the rights to all my characters, all my books. I can, basically, do my own Roger Rabbit projects"
“I now have back the rights to all my characters, all my books. I can, basically, do my own Roger Rabbit projects"
November 9, 2025 at 8:29 PM
The rights for Roger Rabbit have reverted back to author Gary K. Wolf 🐰
“I now have back the rights to all my characters, all my books. I can, basically, do my own Roger Rabbit projects"
“I now have back the rights to all my characters, all my books. I can, basically, do my own Roger Rabbit projects"
Reposted by Dot Porter
money could buy my friends with shitty, soul-crushing jobs they're only keeping for the health insurance a year of rest to work on creative projects and take care of their bodies and minds (and cats, and gardens, and families), but it can't buy Elon Musk kids who actually like him
November 7, 2025 at 10:34 PM
money could buy my friends with shitty, soul-crushing jobs they're only keeping for the health insurance a year of rest to work on creative projects and take care of their bodies and minds (and cats, and gardens, and families), but it can't buy Elon Musk kids who actually like him
I score zero because I'm Generation X!
(i got a zero lolz)
THE FABULOUS WEIRD CHECKLIST
Give yourself I point for each thing you've NEVER done.
THE FABULOUS WEIRD CHECKLIST
Give yourself I point for each thing you've NEVER done.
November 8, 2025 at 6:13 PM
I score zero because I'm Generation X!
Reposted by Dot Porter
#GLAM friends, quite a lot of you went to IU for your undergrad, MLS, and PhD! Those of us still here would appreciate alumni support against the upper administration’s nonsense, especially in regard to academic/intellectual freedom
My undergrad alma mater, Indiana University, has gone full Project 2025 - from eliminating liberal arts majors, to suppressing campus protest to shuttering the student paper. A group of alums are organizing thanks to @juliedicaro.bsky.social. Join us by filling the form.
forms.gle/vbsHAGUH6JHa...
forms.gle/vbsHAGUH6JHa...
Alumni For a Better IU
Connecting alumni to save IU
forms.gle
November 8, 2025 at 5:30 PM
#GLAM friends, quite a lot of you went to IU for your undergrad, MLS, and PhD! Those of us still here would appreciate alumni support against the upper administration’s nonsense, especially in regard to academic/intellectual freedom
Reposted by Dot Porter
And specifically to counter the Thurgood Marshall adage "Do what you think is right and let the law catch up"
Gentle reminder that the idea that SCOTUS and appellate judges can only follow what the law is and not what the law should be is conservative propaganda from the 1970s and 1980s created by the Federalist Society in response to the civil rights decisions of the Warren Court.
November 8, 2025 at 2:41 PM
And specifically to counter the Thurgood Marshall adage "Do what you think is right and let the law catch up"
The whole thread.
Identifying flaws in GenAI unfortunately offers a pretext for claims that perfecting the product is just a matter of time & money. So pointing to chatbots’ role in,say, suicides can only go so far if we don’t also identify the systemic, irresolvable lack of Gen AI’s human commitment bc math has none
November 8, 2025 at 2:10 AM
The whole thread.
Reposted by Dot Porter
If you have a Tesla you should get rid of it immediately.
The world’s first trillionaire initiated a move that has left more than half a million people dead, most of whom are children.
November 7, 2025 at 2:25 PM
If you have a Tesla you should get rid of it immediately.
Reposted by Dot Porter
Tangentially related, but I read this Calvin & Hobbes comic to my 7yo last night. Celebrate inefficiency!
November 7, 2025 at 2:03 PM
Tangentially related, but I read this Calvin & Hobbes comic to my 7yo last night. Celebrate inefficiency!
Reposted by Dot Porter
3-year postdoc with CODICUM project for a medievalist placed in Odense, Denmark!
Special focus on Latin, palaeography & Dominican text and book history 📖😍🕵️
tinyurl.com/yrt4x8y3
Special focus on Latin, palaeography & Dominican text and book history 📖😍🕵️
tinyurl.com/yrt4x8y3
3-year postdoc position in medieval studies
3-year postdoc position in medieval studies The Department of Culture and Language invites applications for a 3-year postdoc position in Dominican studies within the CODICUM project. The position is e...
tinyurl.com
November 7, 2025 at 12:06 PM
3-year postdoc with CODICUM project for a medievalist placed in Odense, Denmark!
Special focus on Latin, palaeography & Dominican text and book history 📖😍🕵️
tinyurl.com/yrt4x8y3
Special focus on Latin, palaeography & Dominican text and book history 📖😍🕵️
tinyurl.com/yrt4x8y3
I love the block function because it means if I see someone say something stupid I never have to see them again.
November 7, 2025 at 1:44 PM
I love the block function because it means if I see someone say something stupid I never have to see them again.
Reposted by Dot Porter
Ivy Leaguers: stop trying to reinvent racism. Challenge level: impossible.
bro are you fucking kidding me
November 7, 2025 at 1:27 AM
Ivy Leaguers: stop trying to reinvent racism. Challenge level: impossible.
Reposted by Dot Porter
Once again, @yaelrice.bsky.social and I published this article in 2020 so that no one ever has to debunk this vile nonsense point-by-point ever again. As we write (see the next post in this thread)...
hyperallergic.com/604897/how-s...
hyperallergic.com/604897/how-s...
November 6, 2025 at 7:55 PM
Once again, @yaelrice.bsky.social and I published this article in 2020 so that no one ever has to debunk this vile nonsense point-by-point ever again. As we write (see the next post in this thread)...
hyperallergic.com/604897/how-s...
hyperallergic.com/604897/how-s...
Reposted by Dot Porter
Just found out about this amazing example of #manuscript #recycling . The whole manuscript is made up from the margins of an earlier liturgical manuscript, cut out and rearranged (hence the unusual format), the (mostly) blank margins then used to copy various magical texts in the mid 16th century.
November 6, 2025 at 5:33 PM
Just found out about this amazing example of #manuscript #recycling . The whole manuscript is made up from the margins of an earlier liturgical manuscript, cut out and rearranged (hence the unusual format), the (mostly) blank margins then used to copy various magical texts in the mid 16th century.
Reposted by Dot Porter
Tell me you work with rare materials without telling me you work with rare materials 😂😭
Every time someone asks me why I'm not wearing gloves in a social media video an angel loses its wings.
November 6, 2025 at 5:34 PM
Tell me you work with rare materials without telling me you work with rare materials 😂😭
Reposted by Dot Porter
I hope this pattern is becoming clearer:
Billionaires target & destroy assets that serve the public interest so that their profits & power go uncontested.
From news to tech to finance & space, billionaires are not interested in "innovation" or "job creation" or any of that bullshit. They plunder.
Billionaires target & destroy assets that serve the public interest so that their profits & power go uncontested.
From news to tech to finance & space, billionaires are not interested in "innovation" or "job creation" or any of that bullshit. They plunder.
Space X billionaire fanboy Jared Isaacman, back as Trump's NASA nominee, has a secret plan to demolish the agency and turn it into a slush fund for Space X and other private aerospace contractors:
A confidential manifesto lays out Isaacman's sweeping new vision for NASA
The former, and possibly future, nominee for the space agency said he did not intend for the document’s public release.
www.politico.com
November 6, 2025 at 4:36 PM
I hope this pattern is becoming clearer:
Billionaires target & destroy assets that serve the public interest so that their profits & power go uncontested.
From news to tech to finance & space, billionaires are not interested in "innovation" or "job creation" or any of that bullshit. They plunder.
Billionaires target & destroy assets that serve the public interest so that their profits & power go uncontested.
From news to tech to finance & space, billionaires are not interested in "innovation" or "job creation" or any of that bullshit. They plunder.
Reposted by Dot Porter
Something crazy about the US and international copyright enforcement regime is that they consistently criminalize digital archiving when it is done for pro-social reasons, but consistently protect the reuse of archived materials by other parties when it is for commercial reasons
The FBI has subpoenaed the domain registrar of archive.today, demanding information about the owner.
FBI Tries to Unmask Owner of Infamous Archive.is Site
The FBI has subpoenaed the domain registrar of archive.today, demanding information about the owner.
www.404media.co
November 6, 2025 at 4:17 PM
Something crazy about the US and international copyright enforcement regime is that they consistently criminalize digital archiving when it is done for pro-social reasons, but consistently protect the reuse of archived materials by other parties when it is for commercial reasons
Reposted by Dot Porter
Bibliography friends: any source recommendations that discuss the use of “marginalia” as additions specifically related to the text vs. other manuscript additions (ownership inscriptions, unrelated notes, etc.)?
November 6, 2025 at 2:53 PM
Bibliography friends: any source recommendations that discuss the use of “marginalia” as additions specifically related to the text vs. other manuscript additions (ownership inscriptions, unrelated notes, etc.)?
Reposted by Dot Porter
In my head, every time, I say: yes. You got me. I, a rare book professional, am knowingly and brazenly flaunting best practice in this public forum in which I’m a representative of my department and my profession.
This era of American politics has eroded respect for expertise, in all fields.
This era of American politics has eroded respect for expertise, in all fields.
November 6, 2025 at 2:29 PM
In my head, every time, I say: yes. You got me. I, a rare book professional, am knowingly and brazenly flaunting best practice in this public forum in which I’m a representative of my department and my profession.
This era of American politics has eroded respect for expertise, in all fields.
This era of American politics has eroded respect for expertise, in all fields.
Reposted by Dot Porter
November 6, 2025 at 12:40 PM