J. Stephen Downie
@profdownie.bsky.social
Professor and Associate Dean for Research, School of Information Sciences, University of Illinois.
Digital Humanities-Music Information Retrieval-Library and Information Science
Digital Humanities-Music Information Retrieval-Library and Information Science
Meeting new friends post-lecture in Hsinchu.
Having fun with AI.
Having fun with AI.
November 26, 2025 at 12:13 PM
Meeting new friends post-lecture in Hsinchu.
Having fun with AI.
Having fun with AI.
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
Nearly-perfect printed and handwritten text recognition is the most consequential technical contribution to the study of human culture of the last fifteen years, and it's not even close.
It fundamentally changes our (both lay and expert) relationship with the written past.
It fundamentally changes our (both lay and expert) relationship with the written past.
New issue of my newsletter: "The Writing Is on the Wall for Handwriting Recognition" — One of the hardest problems in digital humanities has finally been solved, and it's a good use of AI newsletter.dancohen.org/archive/the-...
The Writing Is on the Wall for Handwriting Recognition
One of the hardest problems in digital humanities has finally been solved
newsletter.dancohen.org
November 25, 2025 at 6:14 PM
Nearly-perfect printed and handwritten text recognition is the most consequential technical contribution to the study of human culture of the last fifteen years, and it's not even close.
It fundamentally changes our (both lay and expert) relationship with the written past.
It fundamentally changes our (both lay and expert) relationship with the written past.
Big lecture tomorrow at NYCU, Hsinchu, Taiwan.
@ischoolui.bsky.social
@ischoolui.bsky.social
November 25, 2025 at 4:02 AM
Big lecture tomorrow at NYCU, Hsinchu, Taiwan.
@ischoolui.bsky.social
@ischoolui.bsky.social
Trinity in Ginza. Off to Hsinchu tomorrow.
November 23, 2025 at 11:40 AM
Trinity in Ginza. Off to Hsinchu tomorrow.
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
Thinking a lot about Canadian metadata sovereignty led to wanting to know more about the history of national union catalog development. Just found two sweet sweet sources. I remember UTLAS and AMICUS and have the protest letters when OCLC got it all. This goes a bit deeper.
November 21, 2025 at 9:38 PM
Thinking a lot about Canadian metadata sovereignty led to wanting to know more about the history of national union catalog development. Just found two sweet sweet sources. I remember UTLAS and AMICUS and have the protest letters when OCLC got it all. This goes a bit deeper.
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
📣 Tenure-track DH position at Chapel Hill with a home in English/Comp Lit
Assistant Professor in Digital Humanities
The Department of English & Comparative Literature at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill invites applications for a full-time Assistant Professor in Digital Humanities with an anticipated sta...
unc.peopleadmin.com
November 19, 2025 at 5:22 PM
📣 Tenure-track DH position at Chapel Hill with a home in English/Comp Lit
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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
Great news! This is out: Opening the black box of EEBO academic.oup.com/dsh/advance-...
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
#BookHistory!
This is a hybrid panel so please do join us even if you’re not in Bloomington!
This is a hybrid panel so please do join us even if you’re not in Bloomington!
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 :)
November 6, 2025 at 7:10 PM
#BookHistory!
This is a hybrid panel so please do join us even if you’re not in Bloomington!
This is a hybrid panel so please do join us even if you’re not in Bloomington!
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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
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] +
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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
Submit your application by December 15 ▶️ bit.ly/iSchoolatIllinoisJobs
November 6, 2025 at 7:11 PM
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
Submit your application by December 15 ▶️ bit.ly/iSchoolatIllinoisJobs
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
Out now: "Digital Text Analysis and Early Shakespeare Bibliography: Using Voyant Tools with Bad OCR"
www.digitalstudies.org/article/id/1...
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
Out now: "Digital Text Analysis and Early Shakespeare Bibliography: Using Voyant Tools with Bad OCR"
www.digitalstudies.org/article/id/1...
www.digitalstudies.org/article/id/1...
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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
Quick question for y’all musicology PhDs from a humble composition MusDoc: what‘s the consensus on the Jan Swafford bios?
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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!
Please share!
Humanities Librarian - (African American Studies and English Literature)
Duties & Responsibilities
illinois.csod.com
November 3, 2025 at 11:01 PM
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!
Please share!
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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
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
October 29, 2025 at 3:39 PM
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
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
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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
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...
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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
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
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
So glad to see my friend Steve here. A good follow and a better fellow.
I have a new(-ish) book out: *On the Digital Humanities: Essays and Provocations* from University of Minnesota Press.
www.upress.umn.edu/978151791501...
www.upress.umn.edu/978151791501...
On the Digital Humanities
A witty and incisive exploration of the philosophical conundrums that animate the digital humanities Since its inception, the digital humanities has been rep...
www.upress.umn.edu
October 17, 2025 at 1:29 AM
So glad to see my friend Steve here. A good follow and a better fellow.
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
Looking forward to this meeting at Chicago organized by @hoytlong.bsky.social and Chris Kennedy: neubauercollegium.uchicago.edu/research/hum...
October 16, 2025 at 5:05 PM
Looking forward to this meeting at Chicago organized by @hoytlong.bsky.social and Chris Kennedy: neubauercollegium.uchicago.edu/research/hum...
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
Getting ready for my lecture for Dartmouth’s Family Weekend tomorrow! They’re getting the #DataEmpire sneak peek 🤩
September 25, 2025 at 12:27 PM
Getting ready for my lecture for Dartmouth’s Family Weekend tomorrow! They’re getting the #DataEmpire sneak peek 🤩
Yiting Xia showing our poster at ISMIR 2025’s Late-Breaking/Demo session!
September 25, 2025 at 11:08 AM
Yiting Xia showing our poster at ISMIR 2025’s Late-Breaking/Demo session!
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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
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
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
MIREX poster at ISMIR 2025.
MIREX started 2005!
MIREX started 2005!
September 24, 2025 at 6:56 AM
MIREX poster at ISMIR 2025.
MIREX started 2005!
MIREX started 2005!
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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
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.
Reposted by J. Stephen Downie
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.
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
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.
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.
Beautiful day in Daejeon for my favourite conference.
September 23, 2025 at 1:49 AM
Beautiful day in Daejeon for my favourite conference.