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ALA Personal Technology

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning in Libraries

Cover image of Library Technology Report

Now available is a publication I’m particularly proud of, “Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning in Libraries” from ALA Techsource. I edited the volume, as well as authoring two of the chapters. The real stars are the three other librarians who contributed: Bohyun Kim, Andromeda Yelton, and Craig Boman. Bohyun wrote up her experience at the University of Rhode Island in setting up the first library-based multidisciplinary Artificial Intelligence lab, Andromeda talked about the development and possible future of AI-based library search as illustrated by her fantastic service HAMLET, and finally Craig talked about his experience in attempting AI-driven subject assignment to materials.

I wrote the Introduction, where I try to give a summary of the current state of AI and Machine Learning systems, and show some examples of how they work and are structured in practice. I also am particularly proud of drawing a line from Mary Shelley to the Google Assistant…you’ll have to read it to get the full effect, but here’s a different section to whet your appetite for more AI talk:

What changes in our world when these nonhuman intelligences are no longer unique, or special, or even particularly rare? …. AI and machine learning are becoming so much a part of modern technological experience that often people don’t realize what they are experiencing is a machine learning system. Everyone who owns a smartphone, which in 2018 is 77 percent of the US population, has an AI system in their pocket, because both Google and Apple use AI and machine learning extensively in their mobile devices. AI is used in everything from giving driving directions to identifying objects and scenery in photographs, not to mention the systems behind each company’s artificial agent systems (Google Assistant and Siri, respectively). While we are admittedly still far from strong AI, the ubiquity of weak AI, machine learning, and other new human-like decision-making systems is both deeply concerning and wonderful.

I also wrote the Conclusion and suggested some further reading if people are really interested in diving deeper into the world of AI and ML. In the conclusion, I try to talk about some of the likely near-future aspects of AI, and the impact it is likely to have on the information professions, from individualized AI assistants to intelligent search. From the conclusion:

As with much of the modern world, automating the interaction between humans is often the most difficult challenge, while the interactions between humans and systems are less difficult and are the first to be automated away. In areas where human judgment is needed, we will instead be moving into a world where machine learning systems will abstract human judgment from a training set of many such judgments and learn how to apply a generalized rubric across any new decision point. This change will not require new systems short term, but in the longer term a move to entirely new types of search and discovery that have yet to be invented is very likely.

I hope this work is useful for librarians, libraries, library students, and any other information professional who is trying to wrap their heads around the possibilities and potential for Artificial Intelligence and the world of information creation, consumption, organization, and use.

If your organization would like to talk to me about AI or Machine Learning and how it might make a difference to your business or operations, please get in touch. I’d love to work with you.

Categories
ALA

How to Implement Things When People Hate Change

Here’s the slides from the panel I put together for the American Library Association Annual conference 2016 that featured Rebekkah Smith Aldrich, Ranti Junus, and Emily Clasper. Huge fun, really great response. Below the slides are a Storify of the tweets from the presentation…it’s a good representation of the discussion during our hour.

Thanks to the Knight Foundation for helping put this together!

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ALA presentation

Presentations from ALA Midwinter 2016

Back in January, I did a few presentations at the ALA Midwinter conference. Two of them were recorded and I’ve finally tracked down the recordings and got them ready to post here. I only have slides for one, but hopefully someone finds the recordings useful.


ALA Master Series
Jason Griffey & Measuring the Future


LITA Top Technology Trends – ALA Midwinter 2016


The two trends that I talk about are the Blockchain and it’s potential for decentralization of the web, and the confluence of AI/Machine Learning and autonomous agents as interface for data.

The video below is a great presentation about Blockchain and its potential, by one of my compatriots at the Berkman Center, Primavera De Filippi.

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ALA LITA Measure the Future Top Tech Trends

ALA Midwinter 2016

Next week brings with it the ALA Midwinter 2016 meeting, which means I’m bundling myself up and heading back to Boston for a few days to revel in more library than anyone can take. This is my first ALA conference in almost a decade in which I don’t have overwhelming amounts of LITA commitments (the last ten years looked like: Created an interest group > Chaired said Interest Group > Chaired committee > Elected as Director-at-Large to Board > Appointed as committee chair and Parliamentarian of board). So what did I do with all of my newfound freedom and time?

Over-scheduled myself like mad, of course.

Here’s a quick rundown of things I’m getting myself into at ALA Midwinter! If you’d like to meet with me about anything, I would love to talk to you. Drop me an email and let’s find some time to meet up!

Booth 2232

For the first time, the Measure the Future Project will have a booth in the ALA Midwinter Exhibit Hall! We will be showing off examples of what we’re building, including hardware and software, and will be taking signups for libraries and librarians interested in the project. I’ll be at the booth any time I’m not speaking at one of the below, so if you’re looking for me, it’s a good bet that’s where I’ll be. We’ll have cool giveaways, a LibraryBox sharing information about the project, and we’re sharing a booth with the Library Freedom Project (who are basically made of cool and awesome and you know you want to come hang out).

Thursday

7-10pm
EMW Drink Salon on Tech & Ethics: Libraries
EMW Bookstore, 934 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, MA
https://emwdrinksalon-libraries.splashthat.com/

This is going to be an amazing time. Trust me. Take a look at the website, register, come have some drinks and talk tech and ethics with a bunch of awesome people.

Saturday

Knight News Challenge on Libraries 2016
9-10am, Convention Center Room 206A/B
Myself and a few other of the winners of the previous Knight News Challenge for Libraries will be on a panel with Knight Foundation staff to discuss how you (YES YOU) can apply for a News Challenge grant. Open to individuals as well as organizations, this is IMNSHO the very best funding available for library projects. If you have any ideas that you’ve been kicking around, now is the time to pick them up and dust them off and polish them up. Another News Challenge is coming this year, and if you want to know how to apply from previous grantees….this is the way to do it.

Master Series: Measuring the Future
12:30pm-1:30pm, Convention Center Room 206A/B
One of the most valuable assets a library has is the physical building itself, but aside from gate count we have remarkably little information about how it’s used. What if you could have a Google Analytics style dashboard and understanding of what happened in your library yesterday? Over time, longitudinal data about activity in your library can do amazing things: allow you to plan staffing predictively, let you A/B test displays or furniture arrangements, check what rooms are most popular during different parts of the day or year, and much more. Why just collect statistics when you can use them to actively make your library better for both staff and patrons? Come have a discussion with us about these issues and let us know what you’d like to see from the Measure the Future project!

Sunday

LITA Top Technology Trends
10:30-11:30am, Convention Center Room 253A
I’ve been lucky enough to be a part of this august panel a handful of times in the past, and I’m thrilled to be included again. This time around I will be talking about Blockchain and its potential to revolutionize library systems, with a detour over into the Rise of the Machines (AI, computer vision, semantic analysis, ubiquitous computing, mesh networks, Internet of Things) and how that is going to make the future stranger than we can imagine. This is a do-not-miss panel (not because of me, but…trust me).

LITA Happy Hour
6:00-8:00pm, MIJA Cantina & Tequila Bar, Quincy Market, 1 Faneuil Hall Marketplace
The best gathering of library technologists anywhere, LITA Happy Hour is an amazing time full of awesome people. This is the best place to meet tons of techie librarians, and is where I will be happily sipping a drink amongst friends. Come introduce yourself and say hello if you make it!


 

This doesn’t count the half-dozen other non-public meetings I’m attending, or seeing friends and such. It’s gonna be fun, and exhausting, and great. Come see me at the booth! I look forward to meeting all the librarians I don’t know yet, and can’t wait to see old friends.

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ALA LibraryBox Measure the Future presentation

Innovation & Libraries: LLAMA Thought Leader Webinar Series

I was honored today to be a part of the LLAMA Thought Leader Series for Libraries, talking about innovation. I focused on my own career in libraries, and the aspects of things I’ve done that I considered innovative…efforts and projects that I thought were interesting. The conclusion of the presentation was talking through what the commonalities are in those projects, what I think is necessary for innovation in libraries, and how leadership can support said innovation. If you’re interested in downloading the video or slides, you can find those on the LLAMA website, or watch below.

Video

Slides

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ALA LibraryBox presentation

LLAMA Thought Leader Webinar

On Wednesday, Sept 16, I will be doing a webinar for the Library Leadership & Management Association, known in library circles as LLAMA. This particular webinar is part of a series called the LLAMA Thought Leaders, which has been host to a ton of amazing librarians that I look up to: Ben Bizzle, Susan Hildreth, Barbara Stripling, Sari Feldman, with fantastic upcoming episodes with Rebecca Smith Aldrich, Steve Teeri, Tod Colegrove and Tara Radniecki. I’m honored to be included in such brilliant company.

I will be talking about innovation in library technology and leadership, and how I’ve managed to carve out the career I’ve had, from leading the technology team at at academic library,  running a successful open source project like LibraryBox, building a new way to understand how our patrons use our buildings and resources with Measure the Future, and now as a Fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. I’ll be taking questions from the audience and I hope to have a great conversation with the attendees. Come and ask me questions!

Register and join me! 12noon until 1pm Central Daylight Time (1pm Eastern, 10am Pacific) on September 16th.

Categories
ALA Personal

Inclusive vs Safe

I was listening to an episode of Accidental Tech Podcast, Not a Cactus in Sight, (one of my favorite podcasts, mostly because I’m a total John Siracusa fanboy), and during their discussion of the Reddit community John mentioned two tweets by Laurie Voss that totally made my brain explode with thought:

(here I think Voss is using “inclusive” in a legalistic/law oriented way, not in a norm or cultural sense…inclusion means “the ability to be a part of a community regardless of any aspect of your identity”…a lack of exclusion of any type)

Prior to the World Wide Web, I was an avid Usenet user, falling deeply into any number of alt. and rec. subgroups. Usenet was, in retrospect, where I learned so many things about “being online”, including tone, behavior, expectation….the entire culture of many parts of the social web were preceded and predicted by Usenet. Reddit is one of these spaces, as the concept and execution of a site that’s basically many user-driven bulletin boards is, in abstraction, just a modern execution of Usenet.

Reddit has been in the tech news a lot lately, and while I’m not interested in debating the pro and con of the decisions that have been made there, I think it’s fairly obvious that there’s a lot of terrible things on Reddit and that the response to said terrible things has been horribly blundered. I agree with the ATP guys above in their analysis…if you want to build a horrible place, keep doing what you’re doing Reddit…but that’s not a place that non-horrible people will choose to continue to hang out. I think there are lots and lots of other online communities that have been ran very well and have managed to be smart and useful places to have discussions online…the premiere example of this is probably Metafilter. It isn’t clear if Twitter and Facebook will do as well over time dealing with their respective issues.

There is, however, another social space that includes text based information resources that I am very attached to and fond of: the library. And in thinking about the axes of “inclusion” and “safety”, I realized that the rhetoric of the library world is very much the same rhetoric that is often used in the online spaces to justify what is usually horrific behavior. The oft-used quotation is Jo Godwin’s fantastic turn of phrase “A good library contains something in it to offend everyone.” Library collections are constrained by collection development policies that are driven by their local boards and communities, while calling back to the ALA Library Bill of Rights:

  1. Books and other library resources should be provided for the interest, information, and enlightenment of all people of the community the library serves. Materials should not be excluded because of the origin, background, or views of those contributing to their creation.
  2. Libraries should provide materials and information presenting all points of view on current and historical issues. Materials should not be proscribed or removed because of partisan or doctrinal disapproval.
  3. Libraries should challenge censorship in the fulfillment of their responsibility to provide information and enlightenment.
  4. Libraries should cooperate with all persons and groups concerned with resisting abridgment of free expression and free access to ideas.

In a way, a library collection is a conversation between the librarians and the community, written not letter by letter or word by word, but book by book over the course of decades or even centuries. That conversation is under the same tensions that online conversations are as it relates to safety and inclusivity. When someone challenges a book, they are in effect saying “this is a kind of speech that makes me feel unsafe.” And as Voss notes, the library gets to decide who to side with: those that feel unsafe, or those that make them feel unsafe. In the library, that answer is almost always the latter.

This isn’t to say that there aren’t limits…each library draws its own limits of the things they are willing to collect. In my personal opinion, not collecting particular items is not problematic; for example, I would have no trouble as a librarian not purchasing nor shelving anything published by the KKK.

I’m intentionally trying to frame this in the most difficult way, because I think it’s a difficult thing to navigate. Let me state my own position, straightforwardly: I think that the Library Bill of Rights is a positive document, and that the library providing access to material that the majority of their patrons would disagree with is absolutely fine. I also think that individuals deserve to be protected and feel safe in their activities and surroundings. The tension between these two positions puts me in a disharmony…I dislike being contradictory in my positions.

It has been pointed out by those much smarter about these things than I that librarianship has inclusivity issues written deep in its core. While our collection development statements tend towards inclusivity of multiple perspectives on social issues, once purchased those collections are often described and presented to the community using a grammar that is anything but. For many public libraries, the Dewey classification system is massively problematic, and Library of Congress subject headings are no better. We have inclusivity issues baked into our classifications (indeed, it’s likely epistemologically impossible to categorize without exclusion of some sort).

I don’t know how these issues get reconciled. How do you square inclusion and safety of spaces, both real and virtual? What are your thoughts on that dichotomy? Is it a false one? I’d love to hear from the library community about these seemingly opposing perspectives.

Categories
ALA LITA

ALA Annual Conference 2015

At the end of this week, myself and about 20,000 of my librarian and library-adjacent colleagues will be jetting off to lovely San Francisco for the American Library Association Annual Conference. The conference is always a highlight of my year, and this summer is a particularly busy one for me. There are a bunch of responsibilities as a part of my Knight News Challenge project, Measure the Future, as well as my last set of Board meetings with LITA as Chair of Bylaws and Parliamentarian.

If you want to schedule some time at ALA to talk to me about an upcoming technology consulting or speaking/workshop/presentation need, I’m all ears. Use the Contact Form over at Evenly Distributed or drop me an email or tweet and we’ll find some time to talk about how I might be able to help.

If you’re interested in just saying hello, here are the places that you can find me at ALA Annual 2015!


 

Friday, June 26

LITA Open House – 3-4pm – Moscone Center 2005 (W)

Saturday, June 27

LITA Joint Chairs Meeting – 8:30-10am – Hilton San Francisco Union Square Continental 4
LITA All Committees Meeting – 10:30-11:30am – Hilton San Francisco Union Square Continental 4
LITA Board Meeting – 1:30-4:30pm – Moscone Center 276 (S)
Crowdfunding for Libraries: How to use Kickstarter to Build Your Community – 3-4pm – Moscone Center 2009 (W)

Sunday, June 28

Measure the Future Demo/Informational – 11am-12pm – South Exhibit Hall, Moscone Convention Center, Booth #3731
This is the first time that I will, if everything goes well, have a sensor demo for people to see regarding Measure the Future. I’ll be there to answer questions about the project, and talk about our goals and plans.

Top Technology Trends – 1-2pm – Moscone Center 3014-3016 (W)
LITA President’s Program – 3-4pm – Moscone Center 3014-3016 (W)
LITA Happy Hour – 5:30-8pm – DaDa Bar, 86 2nd Street, San Francisco, CA 94105

Monday, June 29

LITA Board Meeting – 1:30-4:30pm – Moscone Center 220 (S)

Tuesday, June 30

Everything Tor! – Digital Rights in LibrariesThe Library Freedom Project – 3:30-4:30pm – Noisebridge Hackerspace
I’m doing a one hour session at the 2 day library privacy and security event being run by the Library Freedom Project all about Tor, and how libraries and patrons can use it to protect themselves. The entire event is going to be bonkers good, so I’ll be there all day on Tuesday soaking it in. But if you wanna hear me talk about Onions for an hour, come see me.


 

Aside from all of that, I’ve got a variety of meetings, gatherings, and shindigs I’ll be attending. If you poke around the available wifi SSIDs, I’m betting you’ll see my LibraryBox v2.1 beta unit wandering around Moscone…I’ll have a bunch of stuff on there for people to grab, including the vast majority of my writing from the last 5 or so years. Keep an eye out.

I’m very excited about ALA Annual, and I hope you are as well. See everyone in San Francisco!

Categories
3D Printing ALA TechSource

3D Printers for Libraries

I spent yesterday hanging out at the GigTank Demo Day, listening to 3D printing startups pitch their ideas and companies at investors. It was a fantastic event, as is normal for things that the Company Lab is running, and I had a good time listening to the excitement around 3D printing as a technology.

It made me want to look back and see how long I’ve been following this technology, and I was dumbfounded to discover that the first mention of 3D printing on this very blog was in 2006. In October of 2006 I posted about a company called Fabjectory that was way ahead of the curve in providing 3D printing as a service for people. Then, not quite a year later I held the first 3D printed object that I’d ever touched, and it happened to be a print of myself as a Nintendo Mii. That was in August of 2007!

In 2011 I was asked to record a video by the LITA Top Tech Trends committee as an experiment for doing some information updates on technology between ALA Annual and Midwinter, and the trend I pointed to was 3D printing.

There’s a lot more that I’ve written over the years, ranging from my interviews with Bre Pettis (CEO of Makerbot Industries) about libraries and 3D printing to reporting last year for American Libraries on the 3D printing news from CES 2014.

3D Printers for Libraries

All this time and interest in the technology is coming to head in the publication of a new Library Technology Report that I have written on 3D printing, called 3D Printers for Libraries. In it I explain all of the varieties of 3D printing and 3D printers, from the inexpensive fused-deposition printers that most libraries are installing to the highest end Electron Beam Melting printers that are used to produce medical-grade implants. I go through the pros and cons of a variety of manufacturers, and make suggestions for libraries who are just getting started in offering 3D printing as a service.

If your library is looking at starting to offer 3D printing, this is a good reference work to help you make some decisions about types of printers and pitfalls and problems you may see with them. If your library would like some help in making decisions like this, or in figuring out how  to offer 3D printing to your patrons, feel free to contact me (griffey at gmail.com or @griffey on Twitter). I’d love to help you get to a place where your staff is confident in offering 3D printing as a new technology offering from your library.

Categories
ALA Digital Culture Hardware Maker

SparkFun @ ALA Annual 2014 – Hardware and Coding!

ALA Annual 2014 in Las Vegas is going to be a fantastic conference for a ton of reasons, but at least one of those reasons is that there is a new exhibitor that anyone interested in technology, coding, and general hardware hackery should get to know: SparkFun Electronics.

SparkFun is a company that not only makes awesome hardware and hardware kits, they have an amazing educational wing that works with schools and libraries to teach Maker skills to people across the country. I had the opportunity back in February to visit and learn from Sparkfun along with a handful of other Chattanooga librarians you may have heard of. Their educational materials are top-notch, and they are happy to work with libraries who want to teach Arduino, coding, soft circuits, and a few dozen other projects.

At ALA Annual they will be in the exhibit hall, Booth 1870, and will have a ton of interesting stuff to look at and play with. Sparkfun’s Jeff Branson along with Nate Hill from the Chattanooga Public Library will also be taking part in the LITA Library Code Year Interest Group Technology Speed Dating event on Saturday, June 28, in the Las Vegas Convention Center Room N119. That looks like an incredible lineup of presenters, and will be a great program.

In addition to all of that, they will be hosting a number of short classes in the Networking Uncommons if you want to get a quick 1/2 hour introduction to Arduino, AruBlock, Scratch, or Processing…or if you want to stick around for the whole shebang and have a 2 hour block of technology awesomeness. They will be doing two classes of each:

Saturday, June 28 – Networking Uncommons
3-3:30 Ardublock
3:30-4:00 Arduino
4:00-4:30 Scratch
4:30-5:00 Processing

Monday, June 30 – Networking Uncommons
10-10:30 Ardublock
10:30-11:00 Arduino
11:00-11:30-Scratch
11:30-12:00- Processing

If you have any interest at all in Maker technologies, I recommend showing up for one of these…Jeff from Sparkfun is a great instructor, and I guarantee it’ll be a good time. I hope to see you all there!