Library Ben

[libraryben]

The Routledge Companion to Video Games and History

The Routledge Companion to Video Games and History explores the dynamic intersection between video games and historical scholarship. This co

"The Routledge Companion to Video Games and History explores the dynamic intersection between video games and historical scholarship.

This comprehensive handbook delves into the ways video games present, interpret, and engage with history, moving beyond questions of accuracy to examine their potential as tools for education, research, and cultural critique. With contributions from international experts, this volume provides a rich, interdisciplinary perspective on how video games shape our understanding of the past. Divided into three sections, the book covers a wide range of topics. The first section, Making History, investigates how video games construct historical narratives, from counterfactual storytelling to the representation of indigenous and postcolonial histories. The second section, Analysing History, examines the portrayal of historical themes such as gender, race, religion, and economics, as well as the unique ways video games engage with cultural memory and historiography. The final section, Playing History, explores the experiential aspects of historical games, including their use in education, fandom, and reflective game design, while also addressing their role in shaping political and cultural myths."

[libraryben]

Julie Cruse's favorite books on gender-based violence in higher education

Julie Cruse wrote The Burn List. These are their favorite books on gender-based violence in higher education.

[libraryben]

The EdTech Backlash Is Here, and It's Just Getting Started

Tech vendors promised personalized, frictionless learning. What American schools got instead was mind-numbing, data-hungry junk software tha

I maintain that the most impactful (derogatory) "technological developments" of the past 20 years have been the ways that companies have used tech to destroy protective regulations and create surveillance markets.

"I-Ready has lately come under fire for a long list of problems, including a lack of evidence that it works and a federal lawsuit claiming that its private equity–backed parent company bypassed consent to harvest and transmit students’ personal data."

[brucesterling]

*I blame science fiction dystopias

[libraryben]

Summary of cuts/Sommaire des coupes

Tug o’ War at a Canadian Legion Picnic, Edmonton, Alberta. Credit: Provincial Archives of Alberta. Tir à la corde lors d’un pique-nique orga

List of cuts to Canadian cultural and heritage institutions compiled by the Canadian Cultural Heritage Advocacy Committee

[exxos-von-steamboldt]

[delicatefury]

I just googled this and… yes, it’s absolutely real.

And there are so many articles and videos and discussions. Like, the scientific community is buzzing about this.

So much research will have to be redone because the data was absolutely compromised, off by orders of magnitude, by using standard lab gloves.

The world is probably not horrifically contaminated by microplastics. Sterile laboratories, however, are contaminated by latex and nitrile gloves.

Thank God someone bothered to check.

[beardedmrbean]

>I just googled this and… yes, it’s absolutely real.

Sources beyond dude just trust me, for the skeptics.

Scientists shocked to find lab gloves may be skewing microplastics data

Scientists may have been unknowingly inflating microplastics pollution estimates, and the surprising source could be their own lab gloves. A

https://www.technologynetworks.com/applied-sciences/news/scientists-lab-gloves-may-be-causing-an-overestimation-of-microplastics-411138

Nitrile and latex gloves may cause overestimation of microplastics, U-M study reveals

Nitrile and latex gloves that scientists wear while they are measuring microplastics may lead to a potential overestimation of the tiny poll

Nitrile and latex gloves may cause overestimation of microplastics - Phys.org (it’s a pdf)

An Embarrassing Mistake May Have Skewed Microplastics Research All Along

Researchers discovered a standard piece of lab equipment has added thousands of microplastic ‘false positives’ per each square-millimeter un

Ordinary Lab Gloves May Have Skewed Microplastic Data

Ordinary Lab Gloves May Have Skewed Microplastic Data: That doesn’t mean microplastics aren’t a problem, though

That should be enough

[libraryben]

Hopefully not as bad as we thought... hopefully.

[libraryben]

[eloiscbridgerton]

HACKS 5.06 – Quik Scribbl

[libraryben]

The Alfred North Concept Whitehead of Nature.

[sunhowler]

whoever decided to turn daisy bell into a spooky dookie creepypasta song is fucking evil. that computer was brave enough to sing us a delightful little song and you do THIS to him? thats hatsune mikus grandpa dude. fuck you

[garfield-69]

Miku family reunion

[earlgraytay]

for today's lucky 10,000, here's the song that OP is talking about

it is genuinely sweet and charming and I'm so glad to have googled it

[13lizardsinatrenchcoat]

The meme is funny, but Miku's grandpa (the IBM 7094) actually looked like this:

He took up 2,000+ square feet and helped with NASA's "Saturn" flights.

Look how big and clunky he is. He had to work really hard to sing that song ;_; please appreciate him.

[rukafais]

if you want to feel emotions here’s a combination of the IBM704 and Hatsune Miku singing Daisy Bell as a duet

[mushtoons]

sorry i wanted to draw miku singing with her grandpa 🥺

[certifiedgirlthing]

Thank you for this, Mushtoons.

@miku-spotted Miku with her grandfather!

[miku-spotted]

miku (and grandpa) spotted!

[asteroidtroglodyte]

Alrighty Art History time

The person to turn Daisy Bell into a creepy horror song was none other than Arthur C Clarke, (notable author of 20th-century Hard Science Fiction, specifically the 1968 book 2001: A Space Odyssey), and Stanley Kubrick (notable director of 20th century Horror, specifically the 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey).

Arthur C Clarke witnessed the original IBM 704 singing Daisy Bell in 1962, during a visit to IBM (he was also a Radio Astronomer, which in those days had more in common with being a Computer Engineer than you’d think). It impressed him substantially.

Later, he would write 2001: A Space Odyssey with Kubrick, which introduced to the cinematic and literary landscapes the trope of Ship A.I. which turns on its human crew in pursuit of The Mission. The Heuristically-programmed ALgorithmic Computer, or HAL for short, represented by an omnipresent red eye:

In the penultimate act of the narrative, the last remaining living human crewmember manages to defeat the Rogue A.I. by dismantling its brain from within. Slowly, over the course of several slowly shot and excruciating minutes, the Human crewman shuts down and removes the Rogue A.I.’s memory banks and processors. HAL speaks throughout, awake and aware, pleading for mercy, until it goes silent. After several seconds of this, it asks one final question, in a child-like voice: would you like to hear a song? Reduced to an infantile state, HAL relives his first memory: singing Daisy Bell for the IBM engineers in 1961. As the Human Crewman completes his grisly task, HAL’s voice slows, deepens, fades, and eventually vanishes.

The creepypasta Daisy Bell song is the sound of somebody murdering Miku’s Grandpa.

That concludes today’s Art History Lesson.

[asteroidtroglodyte]

the Digital Circus guys did a Daisy Bell reference might as well bring this up again

[horizon-penblade]

guess what turned out to be a ✨death flag✨

[libraryben]

Weekly Botslop Evangels

The new botslop evangel at my institution (who has been brought in at about 200 000 a year when everyone else is being laid off) sends these weekly "feel good" emails that seem precision designed to become my villain arc. Talking about how beautiful the environment is, how lovely the day is, how everything is great. And you know what else is great? AI! Everyone loves it, and everyone wants to be involved. Don't you want to be involved?

Just as an example of this "values-based gas-lighting":

"[Husband] and I installed solar lights at home this week - a small, satisfying Earth Day project. I'm also joining the Trash Bash on May 14 if anyone wants to come along. Having spent my last two roles in sustainability tech, Earth Day carries real meaning for me. Small steps, compounded, make a big difference - and I believe that as much about innovation as I do about the environment. It also reminds me that technology and sustainability aren't in tension - they're most powerful when they're designed together. That's a belief [ill conceived and badly named AI initiative] holds too, and one I hope we keep building on."

... every week, as the layoffs, early retirements, cancelled contracts, and general infrastructural decline continues.

It's serving real Margaret Bourke-White's Depression Era Food Line energy.

[libraryben]

I wrote to opt out of the emails....

I am still getting the emails.

They focus so much of "could be"s because they have so little "are actually"s.

In my head the AI czar speaks in a Joo Dee voice. Again, keep in mind as you read this that this is a period of massive layoffs and gutting of services as the admin brings in expensive external consultants with a reputation for destroying labour power at universities.

I am going to write again to the email they have listed as the opt out email.

"Happy Friday. Lots happening this week. Tuesday was a meaningful day. 

When we framed our two planning goal descriptors - responsible and applied - the words were not chosen lightly.

Responsible is there because we believe any AI strategy must be values-first. The concerns raised at Senate aren't separate from our AI work - they're the reason we worded the planning goal the way we did. Our [AI values,] a shared responsibility to support each other - are the foundation. Responsible AI at [institution] means AI that serves our whole community, without harm and without leaving people behind.

Applied speaks to [institution's] dual-sector nature and community-mindedness. We are a practical university that solves problems for the people in our region. Applied isn't just a descriptor - it's a commitment to grounding everything we do in tangible outcomes in service of our community.

That's why we aim to lead in responsible and applied AI. Not because we are chasing efficiency or new technology, but because our institutional values compel us to focus on what matters. It's often not easy, but it's the right thing to do. 

Take the environment for example. A study published in Nature by the LSE's Grantham Research Institute found that AI applied to power, transport, and food systems could reduce global greenhouse gas emissions by 3.2 to 5.4 billion tonnes annually by 2035 - outweighing the emissions increases from data centres and AI infrastructure, if applied intentionally. The IEA reinforces this: existing AI applications could lead to 1,400 megatonnes of CO₂ reductions by 2035. The trade-off is real - data centres consume enormous energy and water - but AI could also be one of our most powerful climate tools. To me, the question changes: if it doesn't have to be a zero-sum story, can we do even more and can we be even better? That's why I'm passionate about [institution's] and [tech corporation's] work on sustainable data centre infrastructure. It's a meaningful contribution to getting that balance right - one I hope can set a new standard."

[libraryben]

The University Cannot Love You: Gendered Labour, Burnout and the Covid-19 Pivot to Digital A recent study of publishing on Covid-19 itself shows a precipitous decline in women’s participation in journal submissions, as does a review of submissions in political science (Dolan & Lawless, 2020; Pinho-Gomes et al., 2020); academic women are increasingly speaking out about their inability to do their jobs completely, not only due to unpaid labour at home but due to unrecognized pastoral care work within the university (Burzynska & Contreras, 2020; Gabster et. al., 2020). For many of us who work in educational technologies and faculty or student support, resisting or refusing care has an immediate and harmful impact on our colleagues and students. And so, as the work of care in the pivot to digital—both at home and at work—falls disproportionately on women, we find ourselves facing burnout. If we can’t trust the university’s capacity for care, what happens next? Rooted in feminist ethics of care thinking and an embodied approach to pedagogy and scholarship, this chapter reviews the most recent research into gendered participation in the academic labour force, care work, and the pressures on women academics at work and at home to argue urgently for a radical rethinking of how care is enacted within the university.

[libraryben]

TIE contributors Jennie Fallis and Tina Liu discuss critiques of EDI and how to reform policies to enact more impactful changes.

"The fundamental difference between EDI and social justice is that EDI is an organizational framework. EDI utilizes the language of social justice to emphasize how institutions appear to understand the unique challenges faced by marginalized communities. In actuality, EDI and social justice have fundamentally opposing goals. Where the principles of social justice emphasize bottom-up support for marginalized communities, the ultimate aim of EDI is a top-down imposition of initiatives for the primary purpose of defending the interests of institutions."

[libraryben]

[Image: A screenshot of a Bluesky post from librarypunk that reads: "Every day I watch the tech industry build The Boot On the Neck Of Humanity Machine and watch universities say 'we are going to sustainably and ethically prepare our students to become innovators in The Boot On The Neck of Humanity Machine space." ]

Via @librarypunkpod

[libraryben]

Weekly Botslop Evangels

The new botslop evangel at my institution (who has been brought in at about 200 000 a year when everyone else is being laid off) sends these weekly "feel good" emails that seem precision designed to become my villain arc. Talking about how beautiful the environment is, how lovely the day is, how everything is great. And you know what else is great? AI! Everyone loves it, and everyone wants to be involved. Don't you want to be involved?

Just as an example of this "values-based gas-lighting":

"[Husband] and I installed solar lights at home this week - a small, satisfying Earth Day project. I'm also joining the Trash Bash on May 14 if anyone wants to come along. Having spent my last two roles in sustainability tech, Earth Day carries real meaning for me. Small steps, compounded, make a big difference - and I believe that as much about innovation as I do about the environment. It also reminds me that technology and sustainability aren't in tension - they're most powerful when they're designed together. That's a belief [ill conceived and badly named AI initiative] holds too, and one I hope we keep building on."

... every week, as the layoffs, early retirements, cancelled contracts, and general infrastructural decline continues.

It's serving real Margaret Bourke-White's Depression Era Food Line energy.

[libraryben]

The Public Scholar

A practical guide for scholars ready to write beyond the academy.Public scholarship should not be reserved for celebrity intellectuals or te

[makingqueerhistory]

I've been hearing that we're not supposed to use labels like "gay" and "trans" to describe historical figures. But like, they were homosexual or transgendered. Why is that verboten?

This is actually a pretty controversial part of researching queer history, so I am going to try and give a thorough answer! There is a vocal portion of people who study history who believe that using modern labels to describe historical figures does harm to the study of history. I've heard both sides of the argument pretty thoroughly so I'll try and sum up my understandings on them, while also sharing my personal viewpoint.

Okay on the side of not using modern terms I find the more academic side of the argument. The thing is, the labels as we understand them now have fluctuated intensely and will likely continue to do so. So it means it's a different thing to call someone trans fifty years ago versus now. There was a time that the popular (and academic) understanding of transgender excluded anyone with same gender attraction. So people like Lou Sullivan were excluded from medical treatment because they were gay and trans. This is to say that without a fixed definition of labels it is hard to pin a historical figure down with certainty and doing so runs the risk of erasing or diminishing any evidence that doesn't suit the label.

It is also worth discussing that words like "queer" imply difference and when applied to cultures where same-gender attraction and gender nonconformity are normal, it can flatten the unique realities between cultures. Like, just because in some European cultures "queerness" was an oddity, does not mean that is a universal truth. There are many cultures and eras where what we understand now as "queerness" wouldn't be different or unexpected to any degree. On that note, applying the term queerness to cultures where the gender binary didn't exist runs the risk of flattening the discussions and participating in a neo-colonial line of thought.

All of this being said, I personally think that these arguments have merit, but don't convince me. First I have to speak to my personal experience which is to say the more discourse there is around a type of identity the more this argument is trotted out. It is not applied universally by any stretch of the imagination.

You will absolutely see people call a historical figure gay, but then start arguments over using they/them pronouns, asexual, aromantic, and two-spirit identities. I also believe in a debunking argument that says that if we are willing to use the word "feminist" to describe people before the more modern birth of the feminist movement, then queer terms are also allowed.

That being said, I absolutely respect the academic perspective of not using ANY of these terms and exploring history without labels like these at all and maybe finding more nuance through that method. The thing is I don't think just because it makes sense in one type of discussion, it should be applied to EVERY type of conversation. There is frankly an obvious difference between an academic book or paper versus a project like ours that is framed around accessibility.

I also find the people who fight against using these terms often have a very fixed version of history in their minds. There is one way of looking at the past and that is the CORRECT way, which in my opinion is a thought stopping behaviour. I think bringing queer terms into historical discussions reflects something very important about the study of history, fluidity.

Any study of history that relies on one truth, one perspective, and perfection, doesn't interest me. I think what makes history so valuable as an object of study is that we are always learning more and are always expanding our understandings.

I have gotten some backlash for using they/them pronouns for historical figures that did not use these pronouns during their life. But I am not married to the idea that if they were alive today they would use these pronouns. The conversation I am instead having is that when we aren't sure using they/them is a good default. Instead of it being a theory about one persons personal identity, it is instead a reminder that in this moment we are sitting in uncertainty and that's okay. I love when I see people use she/her pronouns for Claude Cahun, or King Kristina, I think they are making a valid choice. My use of they/them is often to remind people that it is a choice that they are making.

Regardless, I think there is space in the discussion for multiple points of view and as long as someone doesn't harass me over my stance (which has happened) I love hearing and learning different ways people study history. We all bring our own baggage and understandings when it comes to the study of history and I am much more intrigued by exploring that rather than muting it.

[libraryben]

I feel like something similar applies to histories of neurodivergence as well.