Kirsten the Librarian

And more info in this thread bsky.app/profile/kirs...

This year I found out that the International Women's Day .com website which says things like

"IWD Event Managers are encouraged to invite nonprofit speakers and guests, exhibit nonprofit displays, distribute nonprofit resources, and establish ongoing giving."

Is run by a for-profit private org

International Women's Day | United Nations The purpose of the day is to uphold women’s achievements, recognize challenges, and focus greater attention on women’s rights and gender equality to mobilize all people to do their part.

With #InternationalWomensDay coming up, please be aware the UN theme is Rights Justice Action (not Give to Gain).

UN: www.un.org/en/observanc...

This Guardian article explains the issue: www.theguardian.com/world/2025/d...

Do share this information. Thank you.

#IWD2026 #RightsJusticeAction

“Give to Gain” isn’t actually the official UN theme - bsky.app/profile/megj...

um, asking for a friend, is anyone keeping a list of all the Languages departments/courses that have been cut/under threat in UK universities? #langsky

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Guest Post — AI Fatigue and Vocational Awe in Academic Libraries - The Scholarly Kitchen Today's guest blogger says academic librarians don't need another class on how to use AI, but an institutional reflection on the emotional and mental cost of rushing innovations.

Guest Post — AI Fatigue and Vocational Awe in Academic Libraries - The Scholarly Kitchen

Does anyone have an actually up-to-date list of which preprint servers are indexed where? The ASAPBio list mentions Microsoft Academic so I suspect is not to be trusted, and DOAPR is missing some for Scopus and lots in Dimensions. #OpenResearch #LibrarySky 📚

Sneaking suspicion that my little collection of screenshots from poking databases myself is more accurate than anything else out there

The episode of the podcast There are No Girls on the Internet where Bridget Todd talks about AI obituaries is heart-breaking but really thoughtful and well-worth listening to.

Apparently we all, not just famous people, need to find a legal way to prevent our likeness from being used after death now

Authorised new spoons for the break room (i.e. willing to spend money, even a small amount, on a thing that was purely for staff welfare and actually focusing on a solution rather than finding blame - I feel like everyone has experienced the demoralising "who stole the spoons!!!" witch hunt)

Any authors or image creators who haven't registered their latest work with ALCS need to do so asap. The next payment is being processed and you really don't want to miss out.

Episode 7 onwards of Bridgerton gets very grief heavy, including a funeral scene, fyi just in case that rules it out as light watching.

Also someone seems really determined to post their LLM generated pseudo-science onto a list of preprint servers

I've submitted a GitHub request, which always makes me anxious that I'm doing it wrong, but at least I can take comfort that I'm doing it less wrong than the person who just submitted a photo of a field and another empty request with a link I'm not clicking and the comment "Tis is Sunflower"

Also, does anyone have clear definitions of what the functions and support for open research categories in DOAPR mean? E.g. writing support, revision support doapr.coar-repositories.org/repositories...

Does anyone have an actually up-to-date list of which preprint servers are indexed where? The ASAPBio list mentions Microsoft Academic so I suspect is not to be trusted, and DOAPR is missing some for Scopus and lots in Dimensions. #OpenResearch #LibrarySky 📚

Fair Library Jobs manifesto sites.google.com/view/fairlib...

The entire FLJ manifesto is stuff that can be done to improve recruitment (e.g asking for references only when actually needed, not ghosting candidates) and I do believe that’s all important!

But individual employer choices won’t change the fundamental system problem of too few jobs.

Requiring stuff that doesn‘t actually make a difference to whether someone can do the job is unfair. But there’s also a risk of ‘silent‘ specifications, or desirable criteria becoming de facto essential, leading to people wasting their time applying for jobs they’ll never get.

If an organisation *knows* they will get hundreds of qualified applicants for a single post, what is the fairest thing to do? Increasing the job criteria might exclude people from marginalised groups where there’s unequal access to qualifications, publications, other opportunities etc.

Fair Library Jobs - Trauma Informed Recruitment Originally published 21 November 2023, by Darren Flynn It is a non-controversial observation to acknowledge the recruitment process is often a fraught and stressful experience for many applicants. It ...

The focus is libraries, but I once again recommend @patchedelbows.bsky.social on trauma-informed recruitment "the process of looking and applying for jobs can cause applicants to experience or re-experience trauma"
sites.google.com/view/fairlib...

The question of how to do recruitment in a fair and ethical way in the context of a brutal job market is really really difficult to resolve. The problem is only getting worse in UK academia, and it feels like institutions aren't taking it seriously.

Image of a large trophy with cartoon characters around this

Applications for the inaugural Elaine Sykes Open Research Award are now open.

Have you been involved in a project or initiative that aims to make research more openly accessible, transparent or reproducible? We want to hear from you 👇

portal.lancaster.ac.uk/intranet/new...

Unions pass no confidence vote in University of Nottingham bosses They say it follows "years of shocking financial decisions and governance failures".

An understated part of this: teaching staff, PhD students, research support staff, technical staff, facilities workers + more ALL voiced zero confidence in university leadership.

Do you have any idea how hard it is to get all these people to agree on anything. The boss is truly the best organizer.

A screenshot of an article from ResearchProfessional News with the headline "Nottingham cuts 'theatre status as research-intensive university'"

A screenshot of an article from the BBC with the headline "Unions pass no confidence vote in university bosses'"

A screenshot of an article from NottinghamshireLive with the headline "'Breakdown of trust' at University of Nottingham as Vice Chancellor told to quit'"

Hey! We're in the news again! And if the University believes that all press is good press, they're nailing it.

oh man i risk being the biggest bluesky stereotype but

ALT TEXT IS FOR ACCESSIBILITY. if you want to also include humour, sure (i do). but if the alt doesn’t actually describe what is in the image you are defeating the point

In an unprecedented move, one reflective of the deeply unprecedented times at our university, UoN branches of three different unions (@UCU.org.uk, @unisonorg.uk, and Unite) have all successfully passed motions of no confidence in the Vice Chancellor and the entire executive board.