Trevor Owens
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tjowens.bsky.social
Trevor Owens
@tjowens.bsky.social
Chief Research Officer at the American Institute of Physics. Working on the history of science, libraries and archives, and social science research. Fan of bike rides, small dogs, and vegetarian cuisine.
Today’s World Digital Preservation Day 2025 brings the release of the new Global Bit List of Endangered Digital Materials from the @dpc-chat.digipres.club.ap.brid.gy 🌍

It’s a snapshot of the digital materials most at risk of being lost forever. #WDPD2025

-> www.dpconline.org/digipres/cha...
DPC Global 'Bit List' of Digital Materials - Digital Preservation Coalition
www.dpconline.org
November 6, 2025 at 1:57 PM
Reposted by Trevor Owens
Do you take snapshots of your everyday life as a physical scientist? @aip.bsky.social is soliciting photos from scientists at all career stages and disciplines from around the world to broaden its 30 000+ photo collection, which is used frequently by historians. #physics #astronomy #histSTM
Archivists seek photos of today's physical scientists
The goal of a new crowdsourcing effort is to build a more contemporary and inclusive visual record of the physical sciences community.
physicstoday.aip.org
October 30, 2025 at 7:33 PM
Learn more about the work of AIP's librarians & archivists to build a more contemporary and inclusive visual record of the physical sciences community in this new @physicstoday.bsky.social article -> "Archivists seek photos of today’s physical scientists" physicstoday.aip.org/news/archivi...
October 29, 2025 at 4:16 PM
Reposted by Trevor Owens
In today's AIP History Weekly Edition, guest contributor Don Opitz looks at the multitudinous scholarly and professional contributions of the late Margaret Rossiter in creating a historiography of women in science. #HPS
In memoriam: Margaret Walsh Rossiter, pathbreaker in “writing women into science”
AIP History Weekly Edition: October 24, 2025
www.aip.org
October 24, 2025 at 2:28 PM
Had a great time exploring @hornbakelibrary.bsky.social’s new exhibition. Letterpress, labor unions, archivists, and Zip disks. What more could you want! Kudos to the whole team on a great exhibit.
October 25, 2025 at 12:03 AM
Really proud of this piece, and the full report that will come out in the near future.

What we learned from early career leaders in the physical sciences is likely broadly relevant to other scholarly/scientific domains.
Interviews with early-career scientists reveal the ways that professional societies foster a sense of belonging, write @tjowens.bsky.social and Anne Marie Porter. They also provide opportunities for members to give back to the community. #physics #astronomy
A home base for your career
Professional societies can foster a sense of belonging and offer early-career scientists opportunities to give back to their community.
physicstoday.aip.org
October 24, 2025 at 8:36 PM
“Reframing the narrative on physics readiness” great article in
@physicstoday.bsky.social

A powerful case for how/why intro course sequences for physics and engineering undergrads can be updated to support students who did not take calculus in high school.

physicstoday.aip.org/features/ref...
Reframing the narrative on physics readiness
Alternative undergraduate physics courses expand access to students and address socioeconomic barriers that prevent many of them from entering physics and engineering fields. The courses also help all...
physicstoday.aip.org
October 16, 2025 at 11:52 AM
Had a lot of fun responding to these digital preservation questions. Neat to also see how @rfrank.bsky.social and so many other smart folks responded!
LIL fellow @maxy.bsky.social asked 14 scholars, archivists, designers, business leaders & engineers: "If you were given unlimited funding to design a system for storing and preserving digital information for at least a century, what would you do?"

Their answers:
lil.law.harvard.edu/generational...
Generational Data Interviews | Library Innovation Lab
14 Designs for Digital Preservation in 2025
lil.law.harvard.edu
October 15, 2025 at 9:33 PM
“Major climate change indicators broke records in 2024” excellent breif overview in @physicstoday.bsky.social of the recent @ametsoc.org State of the Climate report physicstoday.aip.org/news/major-c...
Major climate change indicators broke records in 2024
A report authored by hundreds of climate scientists worldwide documents surface temperatures, humidity, glacier mass, and more.
physicstoday.aip.org
October 15, 2025 at 11:03 AM
People’s stories matter.

The people we most wish we had stories from are often too humble to think their stories matter.

I explore this in a bit in “Shakespeare Got It Wrong: Jack Oliver’s Memoirs of a Geophysicist” for the Niels Bohr Library and Archives Blog.

-> www.aip.org/library/ex-l...
Shakespeare Got It Wrong: Jack Oliver’s Memoirs of a Geophysicist
www.aip.org
October 15, 2025 at 1:08 AM
“Five ways the second Trump term is reshaping climate science and policy” great in depth reporting from @physicstoday.bsky.social -> pubs.aip.org/physicstoday...
Five ways the second Trump term is reshaping climate science and policy
A review of federal actions on science, data, and policy in the administration’s first eight months shows far-reaching consequences.
pubs.aip.org
October 14, 2025 at 11:53 AM
Reposted by Trevor Owens
And Martinis? His dad was a refugee from Yugoslavia. repository.aip.org/node/129661
October 7, 2025 at 8:17 PM
Was honored to get the chance to respond and engage with @shannonmattern.bsky.social’s insightful questions and observations on my last book in this conversation.
Libraries, archives & museums are under pressure, but cultural memory can survive.

Hear author @TJOwens.bsky.social of AFTER DISRUPTION: A FUTURE FOR CULTURAL MEMORY chat with @ShannonNattern.bsky.social on the Future Knowledge #podcast.

🎧 Listen & subscribe ⤵️
futureknowledge.transistor.fm
October 9, 2025 at 2:06 AM
Great context and background on the winners of this year’s Nobel prize in physics.
October 8, 2025 at 12:26 PM
Finished reading Shohini Ghose’s book “Her Space, Her Time: How Trailblazing Women Scientists Decoded the Hidden Universe.” I highly recommend the book to anyone interested in the physical sciences and their histories. -> mitpress.mit.edu/978026204831...
Her Space, Her Time
Women physicists and astronomers from around the world have transformed science and society, but the critical roles they played in their fields are not alway...
mitpress.mit.edu
October 6, 2025 at 8:58 PM
Finished reading @adambecker.bsky.social’s “More Everything Forever: AI Overlords, Space Empires, and Silicon Valley's Crusade to Control the Fate of Humanity.” An amazing resource for understanding how the focus on AI relates to billionaires desires to colonize space and live forever.
Today's the day! My new book MORE EVERYTHING FOREVER is finally out! If you want to understand why tech billionaires are so obsessed with impossible ideas about space and AI — and why that's dangerous — this book is for you. #MoreEverythingForever www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/adam-...
More Everything Forever
This "wild and utterly engaging narrative" (Melanie Mitchell) shows why Silicon Valley’s heartless, baseless, and foolish obsessions—with escaping death,...
www.hachettebookgroup.com
October 3, 2025 at 3:22 PM
Lots of updates and opportunities in this month's @aip.bsky.social history monthly newsletter! Learn about some new photo collections, grants for archives and historians of science, and articles on a number of major history of science exhibitions and programs www.aip.org/history/aip-...
September 2025
AIP History September Update
www.aip.org
September 30, 2025 at 8:23 PM
Reposted by Trevor Owens
Amid today's fast-moving news cycles, it can be hard to keep up with the rapid changes happening to federal climate science in the US. Here's a review of some of the big changes in the US since January.

#physics #standupforscience
Five ways the second Trump term is reshaping climate science and policy
A review of federal actions on science, data, and policy in the administration’s first eight months shows far-reaching consequences.
pubs.aip.org
September 30, 2025 at 6:38 PM
Great @physicstoday.bsky.social article covering how professional societies are supporting scientists to lobby effectively in response to the attacks on science -> pubs.aip.org/physicstoday...
Advocating for science gains urgency
In response to the US government’s attacks on science, professional societies intensify efforts to prep scientists to lobby effectively.
pubs.aip.org
September 29, 2025 at 4:32 PM
Always excited to check out a @copystar.bsky.social talk! Don’t miss out on this one on libraries and LLMs.
Today I spoke on a panel at THE LEGACY OF CCH CANADIAN LTD. v. LAW SOCIETY OF UPPER CANADA AND FUTURE OF COPYRIGHT LAW CONFERENCE 2025.

Here is my talk: "Libraries and Large Language Models as Cultural Technologies and Two Kinds of Power"

librarian.aedileworks.com/2025/09/20/l...
Libraries and Large Language Models as Cultural Technologies and Two Kinds of Power
On September 20th, 2025, I spoke on a panel at THE LEGACY OF CCH CANADIAN LTD. v. LAW SOCIETY OF UPPER CANADA AND FUTURE OF COPYRIGHT LAW CONFERENCE 2025. Here is my talk.
librarian.aedileworks.com
September 29, 2025 at 11:04 AM
Reposted by Trevor Owens
Sudden policy change from NSF, saying only 1st year PhD students, or earlier, can apply to the GRFP. Second years are out of luck. (I got a GRF as a 2nd-year applicant, and it very much turbocharged my dissertation work; much more valuable than if I'd had it while still doing my coursework.)
Today was a hard day for Ph.D. students who found out that they can no longer apply for NSF's prestigious Graduate Research Fellowship Program. "Devastating“ was how one student described it to me. #GradSchool #NSFGRFP

www.science.org/content/arti...
‘Completely shattered.’ Changes to NSF’s graduate student fellowship spur outcry
The announcement comes months later than usual, leaving many would-be applicants stranded
www.science.org
September 27, 2025 at 2:36 PM
Reposted by Trevor Owens
At AIP we've launched a new policy research program to go deep on current questions and pull together more comprehensive pictures. Leading this work, Lindsay Milliken has produced her first public product, a primer on the new $100,000 fee on H-1B petitions.
Policy primer: A new $100,000 fee on H-1B Visas
President Trump has issued a proclamation requiring a $100,000 payment for each new H-1B petition. We examine what it does and does not do, how it is being justified, and what developments to look out...
www.aip.org
September 26, 2025 at 1:41 AM
Reposted by Trevor Owens
How do decisions about big science projects get made?

In the 1980s, it was still possible to think that it could be done by finding an influential person who could make it happen. But increasingly, having a formal, consultative process was regarded as necessary to secure buy-in.

#histsci #scipol
The ’80s-era transition in US science project politics
AIP History Weekly Edition: September 26, 2025
www.aip.org
September 26, 2025 at 2:57 PM
"How AIP is Giving a Name to Mrs. Scientist" -> www.aip.org/mrs-scientist Excited to see this overview of some of the reparative description work that AIP's Niels Bohr Library and Archives team is doing with our photo collections.
How AIP is Giving a Name to Mrs. Scientist
Our librarians and archivists are working together to recognize more Faces of the Physical Sciences
www.aip.org
September 25, 2025 at 9:14 PM
"After Disruption shares a compelling summary of the problematic notions stemming from the digital age into memory institutions, and it offers hope and inspiration for memory workers to pave the way for a more just culture beyond our current one." Thanks Jaycee Chapman for the review.
Fun to wake up to this thoughtful & positive review of my book, After Disruption: A Future for Cultural Memory in the journal College and Research Libraries.

Read the review here -> crl.acrl.org/index.php/cr...

Open access copy of the book here -> www.fulcrum.org/concern/mono...
September 25, 2025 at 12:38 PM