J. Stephen Downie
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profdownie.bsky.social
J. Stephen Downie
@profdownie.bsky.social
690 followers 1.2K following 63 posts
Professor and Associate Dean for Research, School of Information Sciences, University of Illinois.

Digital Humanities-Music Information Retrieval-Library and Information Science
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Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
tolonen.bsky.social
Great news! This is out: Opening the black box of EEBO academic.oup.com/dsh/advance-...
Opening the black box of EEBO
Abstract. Digital archives that cover extended historical periods can create a misleading impression of comprehensiveness while in truth providing access t
academic.oup.com
November 9, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
bibliowingate.bsky.social
#BookHistory!
This is a hybrid panel so please do join us even if you’re not in Bloomington!
yrhu.bsky.social Yuerong Hu @yrhu.bsky.social · 6d
Hi DH friends, join us on Nov 10, 10-11 am CT, for “New Book History Research with Internet Data”, a hybrid panel sponsored by SHAR, to explore challenges and opportunities of using Internet data and digital methods for book history research. More info in the poster attached and comments :)
This is a panel on “Book History with Internet Data”, with 8 panelists from different IMLS/iSchools, funded by SHARP. Over the past two decades, a variety of internet-based datasets have emerged related to books, reading habits, and reader communities—ranging from crowd-sourced genre tags and online reviews to platforms like BookTok. These datasets are increasingly valuable for research in reading and readership, often complementing traditional book history approaches. However, they also raise new questions and challenges. To explore these opportunities and foster interdisciplinary collaboration, this panel will bring together eight panelists from diverse fields to discuss questions, such as: How can we critically understand the relationship between Internet-based “book” data and traditional research materials? What are the methodological challenges and potential pitfalls of using digital data in book history research? How can interdisciplinary approaches enrich the analysis of Internet book and reader datasets? Here are our amazing panelists: - Micah Bateman, Assistant Professor, School of Library and Information Science, The University of Iowa - Melanie Walsh, Assistant Professor, an Assistant Professor in the Information School and an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the English Department, University of Washington - Wenyi Shang, Assistant Professor, School of Information Science & Learning Technologies, University of Missouri - Cici Ling, Assistant Professor, Department of Informatics, Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering, Indiana University Bloomington - Kai Li, Assistant Professor, School of Information Sciences, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville - Andrew Zalot, Assistant Professor, College of Education, East Carolina University - Alex Wingate, PhD Candidate, Department of Information and Library Science, Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering, Indiana University Bloomington
November 6, 2025 at 7:10 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
tedunderwood.com
Wrote a short piece arguing that higher ed must help steer AI. TLDR: If we outsource this to tech, we outsource our whole business. But rejectionism is basically stalling. If we want to survive, schools themselves must proactively shape AI for education & research. [1/6, unpaywalled at 5/6] +
Opinion | AI Is the Future. Higher Ed Should Shape It.
If we want to stay at the forefront of knowledge production, we must fit technology to our needs.
www.chronicle.com
November 4, 2025 at 7:55 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
ischoolui.bsky.social
The #iSchoolUI has 🔸FOUR🔹 open faculty positions in the areas: Information Sciences, Information, Culture & Society, Information Behavior/HCI/UX, and Early Literacies!

Submit your application by December 15 ▶️ bit.ly/iSchoolatIllinoisJobs
"We are hiring" graphic, with the iSchool building in the background in a blue overlay.
November 6, 2025 at 7:11 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
lauraestill.bsky.social
Out now: "Digital Text Analysis and Early Shakespeare Bibliography: Using Voyant Tools with Bad OCR"
www.digitalstudies.org/article/id/1...
Digital Text Analysis and Early Shakespeare Bibliography: Using Voyant Tools with Bad OCR
Enumerative bibliographies are lists of scholarship that capture the state of a field. This article first evaluates digital texts of one such bibliography, Franz Thimm’s Shakspeariana from 1564–1864 (...
www.digitalstudies.org
November 5, 2025 at 4:50 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
chesterjankowski.com
Quick question for y’all musicology PhDs from a humble composition MusDoc: what‘s the consensus on the Jan Swafford bios?
November 4, 2025 at 4:23 AM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
ryancordell.org
Job alert: the University of Illinois Library is hiring a Humanities Librarian to serve as liaison to African-American Studies and English Literatures. I’m sure someone here would be a great fit for this job—& we’ve got a pretty phenomenal community here

Please share!
Humanities Librarian - (African American Studies and English Literature)
Duties & Responsibilities
illinois.csod.com
November 3, 2025 at 11:01 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
mellymeldubs.bsky.social
As DH grows, it’s increasingly important to publish conference papers, but there hasn’t been a clear venue for that.

So I’m thrilled to share this new home for DH proceedings, which will include CHR papers & more.

Thanks to @taylor-arnold.bsky.social for leading this effort!

bit.ly/ach-anthology
Screenshot that reads: Introducing the Anthology for Computers and the Humanities Taylor Arnold, Maria Antoniak, Miguel Escobar Varela, Marie Puren, Mila Oiva , Amanda Regan, Lauren Tilton, and Melanie Walsh 1 Data Science and Statistics, University of Richmond, U.S.A. 2 Computer Science, University of Colorado Boulder, U.S.A. 3 Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, National University of Singapore 4 Laboratoire de Recherche de l'EPITA, Paris, France 5 History and Archaeology, University of Turku, Finland 6 History and Geography, Clemson University, U.S.A. 7 Rhetoric and Communication Studies, University of Richmond, U.S.A. 8 Information School, University of Washington, U.S.A. Permanent Link: https://doi.org/10.63744/HHsQG7hNWyxG Published: 25 September 2025
October 29, 2025 at 3:39 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
urinieto.bsky.social
Are you a brilliant grad student with a passion for human-centered audio creativity? Experienced in generative AI and multimodal reasoning models for audio creation? Come join us at Adobe in San Francisco during the Summer of 2026 for our Internship program! research.adobe.com/careers/inte...
Careers
Internships at Adobe Research Excited about research on the cutting edge? Adobe Research works with graduate student interns to collaborate on state-of-the-art technologies across a range of research ...
research.adobe.com
October 28, 2025 at 5:05 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
ryancordell.org
In a few weeks CU will host the Midwest Yiddish Fest ’25. The kickoff "Block Party" includes a lecture by Rachelle Grossman on Yiddish Printing in America & live printing @skeuomorphpress.org using our case of Yiddish type—the event does require registration but there’s a single-event $5 option
Midwest Yiddishfest 2025 | Champaign-Urbana Jewish Federation
www.cujf.org
October 27, 2025 at 2:06 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
mkirschenbaum.bsky.social
So glad to see my friend Steve here. A good follow and a better fellow.
October 17, 2025 at 1:29 AM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
tedunderwood.com
Looking forward to this meeting at Chicago organized by @hoytlong.bsky.social and Chris Kennedy: neubauercollegium.uchicago.edu/research/hum...
Humanistic AI: Reimagining Humanistic Pursuits in the Age of Generated Media Project Team: Hoyt Long, Chris Kennedy, Maria Antoniak, David Bamman, Eamon Duede, Ari Holtzman, Atoosa Kasirzadeh, Mikayla Kelley, Cody Kommers, Mina Lee, Laura K. Nelson, Nanyun (Violet) Peng, Jason Salavon, Richard Jean So, Ted Underwood, Anubav Vasudevan, Matthew Wilkens 2025 – 2027
October 16, 2025 at 5:05 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
roopikarisam.bsky.social
Getting ready for my lecture for Dartmouth’s Family Weekend tomorrow! They’re getting the #DataEmpire sneak peek 🤩
From Clay Tablets to Cloud Servers: The Deep History of Data (Murdough Center) Read more v Cook Auditorium, 31 Tuck Mall Drive Special Faculty Lecture Before there was "big data," there were tallies carved on bone, census rolls of empires, and ledgers of trade. Sharing insights from her forthcoming book, Data Empire: A Human History of Records and Rule (HarperCollins, 2026), Prof. Risam reveals how data has always been a tool of power, tracing its history from ancient civilizations to the digital platforms that govern our lives today.
September 25, 2025 at 12:27 PM
profdownie.bsky.social
Yiting Xia showing our poster at ISMIR 2025’s Late-Breaking/Demo session!
September 25, 2025 at 11:08 AM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
ryancordell.org
Pulling this post from the archives because…well because I have only a few papers left to comment on & need to fill the exponentially-longer stretches of time between each one
ryancordell.org Ryan Cordell @ryancordell.org · Dec 13
Prof. Zeno’s paradox—to grade a stack of papers, you must first grade half the stack—With this done, you must now grade half the remaining stack—then half again—then half again of the remaining stack—Each smaller stack takes just as much time as the previous for some reason—You never finish grading.
September 24, 2025 at 7:38 PM
profdownie.bsky.social
MIREX poster at ISMIR 2025.

MIREX started 2005!
September 24, 2025 at 6:56 AM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
arxiv-sound.bsky.social
A controlled symbolic music generation task produces piano scores with a desired difficulty level; an auxiliary optimization target for difficulty prediction helps prevent conditioning collapse, enabling more precise and adaptive score generation.
Difficulty-Aware Score Generation for Piano Sight-Reading
Pedro Ramoneda, Masahiro Suzuki, Akira Maezawa, Xavier Serra
arxiv.org
September 23, 2025 at 8:55 AM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
anuncivilphd.bsky.social
So delighted to be hosting my friend @hellejensen.bsky.social as an @ischoolui.bsky.social Research Fellow over the next 10 days!

She’ll be giving several talks about digital history, a transnational look at Sesame Street, and a new transnational project on childhood during the early WWW years.
September 22, 2025 at 6:33 PM
profdownie.bsky.social
Beautiful day in Daejeon for my favourite conference.
September 23, 2025 at 1:49 AM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
epyllia.bsky.social
Our closing keynote for #TEI2025 is @juliaflanders.bsky.social , who speaks earnestly of TEI’s ongoing relevance in an ethical formulation of our technologies and data structures.
September 19, 2025 at 3:16 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
johnrgallagher.bsky.social
Just reposting this because I shared the blog post a bit late last night. Please share! Let me know what you think.
johnrgallagher.bsky.social John Gallagher @johnrgallagher.bsky.social · Sep 19
My newest blog post is up: "Seeking human traces in AI writing" (2600 words)

I appreciate you taking the time to read it. Let me know what you think.

meresophistry.substack.com/p/seeking-hu...
Seeking human traces in AI writing
Introduction
meresophistry.substack.com
September 19, 2025 at 3:16 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
nabsiddiqui.bsky.social
My book Cultural Analytics in R: A Tidy Approach has just been published! It showcases how tidy data can be used in cultural analytics workflows, from text analysis, machine learning, network science, etc. Check it out: link.springer.com/book/10.1007...

#tidyverse #rstats #digitalhumanities
September 17, 2025 at 5:33 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
machawk1.bsky.social
@tarannum44.bsky.social from @webscidl.bsky.social is up next at #ACMHT2025 describing web archives usage for verifying attribution of Twitter screenshots with a compelling use case of one's love for pineapple pizza. 🍍🍕 @phonedudemln.bsky.social
September 16, 2025 at 9:45 PM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
iamjasonk.bsky.social
Happy Pythagorean Theorem Day to all who celebrate!

www.npr.org/2025/09/16/n...
On 9/16/25, celebrate a date of mathematical beauty
Pythagorean Triple Square Day, as one man affectionately calls 9/16/25, is a day like no other this century.
www.npr.org
September 16, 2025 at 10:49 AM
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
yrhu.bsky.social
Here is the DSH publication link: academic.oup.com/dsh/article/...
Comparative analysis of classics book review data created by users across Douban and Goodreads
Abstract. While empirical research on online book reviews has advanced our understanding of book reception and everyday reading, more cross-platform and co
academic.oup.com
September 15, 2025 at 2:27 PM